Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas – How to Tap in to the Holiday Publicity Bonanza
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - How to Tap in to the Holiday Publicity Bonanza
If your product or service can be given as a gift, a publicitywindfall awaits at the end of the year - but you need to startworking in June. Each December, media outlets cover the newest,the hottest and the most unusual Holiday gifts. The reportersassigned to develop these pieces typically depend on two sourcesof information:
1. Phone interviews with local store owners
- and -
2. Press materials that have been sent by publicity seekers.
Let's deal with Point 1. Here's a cool trick: In earlyNovember, write a letter to stores and major websites that carryyour product. Remind them that they may be hearing fromjournalists soon about hot gift ideas, and request that theyconsider mentioning your product when that happens. Point out afew reasons why your product is the newest, coolest, best orwhatever. Ask the vendor to drop you an e-mail or give you acall if a story results that mentions your product.
Now, on to old-fashioned publicity. When to contact the mediadepends on the publication or program's lead time (how far inadvance of publication or airing the material is developed).Magazines like Woman's Day have a lead time up to six months, soget materials to them now. Newspapers have a lead time as shortas a week for feature material, so send materials in November. Inbetween are wire services, medium-lead magazines, "in-flight"magazines and others. To learn the lead time of a particularmedia outlet, call the editorial department. If that doesn'twork, try the advertising department.
What you send should be kept simple -- a press release about yourproduct/service, a pitch letter explaining why it's such a greatgift idea, and, if applicable, a disk with color product photos.See our articles "How to Write a Great Pitch Letter" http://www.publicityinsider.com/pitch.asp and "How to Write aGreat Press Release" http://www.publicityinsider.com/release.aspfor more details.
As you craft the materials, think about where yourproduct/service fits. Based on its nature, cost, rarity orusefulness, it may work with a variety of typical Christmas Giftstories such as: Great Stocking Stuffer Ideas, Gifts forTeenagers, Gifts for the Person Who Has It All, Gifts forExecutives, Gifts that Relax, etc. By suggesting a category foryour product, rather than simply stating "Here's a product thatwould make a nice holiday gift", you're making yourself stand out-- and maybe even giving the journalist an idea for a story anglethat he or she wouldn't have thought about otherwise. Eitherway, your chances of getting coverage are greatly improved.Bill Stoller, the "Publicity Insider", has spent two decades asone of America's top publicists. Now, through his website, eZineand subscription newsletter, Free Publicity: The Newsletter forPR-Hungry Businesses http://www.PublicityInsider.com/freepub.asp , he's sharing -- for the very first time -- his secrets of scoringbig publicity. For free articles, killer publicity tips andmuch, much more, visit Bill's exclusive new site:http://www.publicityInsider.com
Blog and Ping ? A Search Engine Traffic Bonanza – Internet-Marketing
Blog and Ping ? A Search Engine Traffic Bonanza
Everyone is talking about blogs these days as the magic money-making marketing tool. Some of the hype may actually be true, but I suggest you cut through most of what you read about blogs just long enough to understand why every business needs a blog.Right now, that's not to say this won't change, search engines are in love with real blogs. By real blogs I mean blogs that are set-up and run by businesses that offer useful content on them. Like every successful marketing method there are people out there setting up fake blogs and dumping garbage, but keyword rich, content into them in order to trick the search engines into ranking the content highly. [Please resist the urge to add to this form of search engine spam as it may actually get you banned by a search engine.]When you understand a little about how blog software works you get a better understanding about why search engines love blogs. Here are the top reasons that business blogs and search engines go hand in hand.Lots of PagesEach blog entry is shown in chronological order on a blog's homepage but, each entry is in reality its own web page, with its own unique URL and title. So, an active blogger can create hundreds of keyword rich web pages in a matter of months.Change Is GoodIn order to claim your place at the blogging table you must commit to making posts often-4 or 5 times a week perhaps. This commitment means that you are creating, updating, changing some portion of your site several times a week. The typical small business web site is lucky to receive an update several times a year. Search engines like change.Wake Up CallBecause search engines love changing content, they are ever ready to visit a site when it is updated. One feature unique to blog software is something called a pinging. Basically, what you are doing is sending out a message to various blog directories to come and visit you site because it has been updated. Once a search engine has located your site, this is like a personal invitation to come back and get the new stuff. I use a site called Ping-O-Matic to send pings to multiple services. Some blog software can be configured to do this automatically.RSS DirectoriesBlogs also have a built in distribution method known as RSS. This allows you to push your updated content out to people who subscribe through an RSS reader such as Bloglines or FeedDemon as well as Yahoo and MSN. This ability allows you to communicate directly with subscribers but it can also help get your main site noticed and indexed by the major search engines. Yahoo, for example, allows people (including you) to subscribe to your blog's RSS feed. On the day you create your blog, you can subscribe to it via a free MyYahoo account and Yahoo will visit and index your blog for free. It has no choice.Linking Is KeyPart of the blogging culture is the predisposition to link to and from quality content that relates to the subject your are blogging about. In other words, bloggers like to link. Links from other high quality blogs will send traffic and get your blog and web site noticed.So, your blog marketing strategy a little like this: Set-up a blog and start posting. Ping each time your make a new entry. Submit your blog to the major blog and RSS directories. Start looking for link partners. RepeatIn the last few weeks I set-up blogs for an attorney, a label manufacturer, and a remodeling contractor. In each case, the blogs were indexed and spidered by the major search engines within 48 hours. Traffic to the main web sites for these businesses (although a bit meager to start with) has already doubled or tripled. Traffic from each of the major search engines is now showing up for a large number of important search terms and phrases.Who knows how long this blog traffic bonanza will last but at this moment a blog has never made more sense.If you're convinced that you need a blog but don't want to hassle with setting it up and learning how to promote it properly, check out my basic blog coaching package. I do the work, you're up and blogging and promoting your blog in a matter of days.Copyright 2005 John JantschJohn Jantsch is a marketing consultant based in Kansas City, Mo. He writes frequently on real world small business marketing tactics and is the creator of "Duct Tape Marketing" a turn-key small business marketing system. Check out his blog at http://www.bloggingbusiness.com