Issue ##742 Aug. 17, 2013
Publisher: Joan Stewart<\/p>\n
\nThis Weekend in the Hound House:<\/strong><\/p>\n
Summer in Wisconsin is so cold that people are actually complaining that they have to close the windows at night. Not me. I sleep in my flannel PJs with the windows open. Love it!<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
1. Where Journalists Troll for Ideas<\/h3>\n
When your pitch to a journalist lands with a thud, and after two weeks you still hear nothing, you might think, “What does it take to get their attention, anyway?”<\/p>\n
Sometimes, only a tweet. Or information about you that one of their friends has shared on Facebook. Or a discussion in a LinkedIn Group.<\/p>\n
While your pitch just sits there gathering dust, journalists are on those sites trolling for trends, story ideas and sources. If a reporter tweets a query for a source, he might get a response within seconds.<\/p>\n
Yet you’ve waited two weeks, and you’d be smart to assume he’s not interested.<\/p>\n
Read the fascinating interview with Sean McLauglin, CBS news anchor and reporter, about\u00a0The Impact of Social Media on Newsrooms & Journalists.<\/a><\/p>\n
He says Twitter’s speed and Facebook’s engagement (“an instant tip line from your friends to you”) have changed the way journalists do their jobs.<\/p>\n
Bottom line: Sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn–Pinterest even–can get you the publicity you’re looking for. Use it or lose it.<\/p>\n
2. YouTube SEO Tips<\/h3>\n
Here’s a tip I shared yesterday when I spoke to the Virginia Chapter of the National Speakers Association.<\/p>\n
Many YouTube users are missing three opportunities to optimize their videos for the search engines and turn those videos into a lead funnel:<\/p>\n
–The title can include about 50 characters. Too many super-short titles don’t include enough keywords.<\/p>\n
–The video description can include a whopping 5,000 characters, the equivalent of a 900-word article! You have lots of room for keyword-rich copy and links. Make sure your channel and your playlists include descriptions (keywords, keywords, keywords.)<\/p>\n
–You can usually tag a video with at least 20 keywords, depending on the number of characters. Use them all!<\/p>\n
What I love about YouTube is that I can go back and optimize old videos, and even create annotations, those little captions that pop up and suggest that people subscribe to my channel, or a playlist, or give give them other instructions. I can also use annotations to correct outdated links within the video.<\/p>\n
Here’s a video I created on the difference between press<\/a> releases, news releases and media releases<\/a>. While you’re there, subscribe to the “Press Release Tips” playlist or to my channel. And please, comment.<\/p>\n
3. Google+ Cover Image Tool<\/h3>\n
Encourage people to add you to their circles on Google+ with a snazzy cover image that really catches attention.<\/p>\n
Use the free Google+ cover maker.<\/a><\/p>\n
My other favorite free tool is the Social Media Image Maker.<\/a><\/p>\n
It lets you resize, crop and retouch things like your avatars, background images and other photos on several social media sites without having to remember the correct dimensions for each photo. I use this all the time and love it.<\/p>\n
If you’re new to Google+, expect to be confused and frustrated. But don’t bail out. Your participation on this site is now part of the algorithm Google uses to decide how to rank your content in its search results.<\/p>\n
Let’s connect on Google+<\/a>. Add me to one of your circles and I’ll add you to one of mine.<\/p>\n
4. Hound Video of the Week<\/h3>\n
This dog that plays the banjo<\/a> really gets into it, then tires of it quickly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Issue ##742 Aug. 17, 2013 Publisher: Joan Stewart “Tips, Tricks and Tools for Free Publicity” In This Issue Where Journalists Troll for Ideas YouTube SEO Tips Google+ Cover Image Tool Hound Video of the Week This Weekend in the Hound House: Summer in Wisconsin is so cold that people are actually complaining that they have\u2026 Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","iawp_total_views":1,"wds_primary_category":6,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[67,228,139,229,230],"class_list":{"0":"post-3535","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-tips-of-the-week","7":"tag-google","8":"tag-google-image-tool","9":"tag-journalists","10":"tag-seo","11":"tag-youtube-tips","12":"entry"},"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Joan Stewart","author_link":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/author\/jstewart\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3535"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3535\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/purelysupp.com\/publicity\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}