You volunteer to do PR for your church, and the job includes generating publicity for–groan–the annual spaghetti supper. A morning drive-time radio show in your community would be the perfect place to promote the event. It’s a fun show and everybody listens to it because the deejay is a real character. But what can you… Read More
Videographer can search his own community for business
Anne Wear of Greensboro, North Carolina says her friend, a videographer, needs ideas on how to market his business. He has almost 20 years of experience behind the camera and also works as an audio person, grip and teleprompter operator. From Jan Cannon of Boston, Massachusetts: Some lawyers videotape depositions. They might be an additional… Read More
Publicity for your holiday traditions
This is the perfect time of year to let the media know about holiday or year-end traditions followed by you, your company or your church, school or family. Here are some examples: –If your company has a holiday tradition of helping others in need, like helping at the local food pantry for a day, let… Read More
Jump-start your publicity campaign
Remember those New Year’s Resolutions you made months ago about keeping in closer touch with the media? If you’v forgotten them, get back into the saddle and jump-start your own publicity campaign, or your client’s. –Vow to make one new media contact each month. That could mean asking areporter to lunch, or sending an article… Read More
Use short pitches
Think about the last pitch you emailed to a journalist, or sent by snail-mail letter. How long was it? If it was longer than a paragraph or two, the journalist might have hit the “delete” key or thrown the letter into the wastebasket. Or if you started your phone pitch with “let me fill you… Read More
Put limitations on sensitive TV video
Night after night, we see stories on the local and national TV news about topics like obesity, alcoholism, drug abuse and mental illness. The reporter’s narration accompanies generic film footage of people walking on a crowded sidewalk, or students making their way to class on a college campus. No problem–except if the story happens to… Read More
How to promote classes for nonprofits
Sally Kirby Hartman of the Norfolk Foundation in Norfolk, Virginia wants ideas on how to publicize the Academy for Nonprofit Excellence, which offers monthly two-day training sessions for area nonprofit staff and board members. Topics will vary each month and range from strategic planning to marketing, accounting and fundraising. From Lois Carter Fay of Massanutten,… Read More
Authors share publicity ideas
Barb Bartlein of Bayview, Wisconsin, author of the book Why Did I Marry You, Anyway? 12.5 Strategies for a Happy Marriage , says she’s had great success with 99PR.com, a service that emails your pitch to radio talk show hosts and other journalists. The pitch looks like it came directly from you. If a journalist… Read More
5 places to look for freelancers
Publicity Hounds spend so much time and energy chasing after staff writers at national magazines, that they often overlook a much more valuable group of contacts–the freelancers that write for those publications. Why are freelancers more valuable? Because many of them already have key contacts at lots of major magazines and newspapers. That means if… Read More
Small bank branch gets big ideas to promote grand opening
Twelve Publicity Hounds have super tips for Therese Myers of Albany, New York. She asked about how to get publicity for a bank branch opening in March. Her branch will be new in this small community in Maine, but it will be the seventh branch to open there within the last two years. Because headquarters… Read More