Direct Contact PR, Internet media faxgrowth




 
amateurfetishist.com

presentations

Getting More Publicity with Trash-Proof News Releases – Free Ebook

Someone asked “does any one use news releases any more?”

I laughed. It may come as a surprise to people, but I still do write news releases and send them out to custom targeted media lists.

And guess what. They still work. I even wrote a book about them.

But there’s a catch. There are no guarantees. The psychology o dealing with media has not changed. There are however, a lot more media – people who publish in one form or another.

The technology has and continues to evolve and there are more types of media technology and platforms.

But to be featured or interviewed has not evolved significantly. The news release is still a viable and in fact essential tool that you need in your marcom (marketing communications) toolbox.

What is a news release?

My definition has not changed:

A written proposal:

– containing a request for media coverage (feature stories, interviews or product reviews).

– and/or an offer to provide media the content needed to achieve that end.

A news release is either:

– sent directly to media decision makers directly (e.g., by fax, email, street mail, in person, etc.); or

– placed where they can find it and use it (as when it is posted to web site either your own or using a news release distribution service).

A news release is not an advertisement.

You do not pay for coverage and do not control what the media says. It is a document that seeks to persuade media to give you media coverage.

Your degree of success is often based on how much of what you give them to do their job is actually used.

You must provide media with information that matches what they are accustomed to publishing (or producing). Usually this means the content must be news, education or entertainment, or opinion or commentary.

If you have a different objective, then perhaps you should not be thinking what you are writing or need to write is a news release at all.

It’s OK to have a different objective. There are other types of marcom (marketing communications) you can choose to achieve a goal. It also means your target audience is not likely to be media people. You will need a different targeted list of people to match your objective.

And even when you send out a news release, some media will view you as a target for money since after all, that is how they make a living and they do run publishing businesses. So do not be surprised when media send you sponsored post requests, or email that pushes you to participate in their business (and pay for the privilege).

Trash Proof News Releases

But if objective publicity in media is what you want, you write a news release. You mus earn the right to be featured. This is a gauntlet since you need to provide exquisite quality that meets the media needs – readership and editorial elements, and more.

The first version of the book Trash Proof News Releases captured the lessons learned for getting publicity at the peak of the fax era, and covered the techniques I had developed running Imediafax – The Internet to media Fax Service. It was published in the year 2000.

Faxes died as a technology at the turn of the 21st Century. Email took its place. So we stopped sending out faxes and switched to email html with graphics and links.

Trash-Proof News Releases was revised and published again to focus on and illustrate the techniques that work best using email to reach media and get coverage. It was published in 2015.

The one major change that has occured since then is the continuing changes and evolving changes to search engine algorithms starting with the Google Panda and the Hummingbird updates. It is no longer effective to use free news release distribution services and expect them to have your news release posted all over the Internet and in news search engines. The search engines now routinely penalize duplicate content and require sites to place a no follow command when a news release is posted so that they are not indexed and then found by the search engines.

So quality content was elevated over spam. And now, if you use a news release, your purpose and goal is to persuade the media to do their job using you and your creative work as the centerpiece of their coverage.

You need to learn and recognize that they will require you to help them create unique content so that what gets published or produced meet’s their needs and maybe if you are lucky, some of your own.

The other major change is that you can now find media and pitch journalists and producers on social media.

These were major motivators behind the decision to first create Search Word Pro which evolved into the new creation Presari www.Presari.com

Presari helps you create the keyword strategies and the best content you need to use to find and reach out to media of all types using search engines and social media platforms. You can now search for whatever you want and find all sorts of influencers anytime. Yes, the search engines can set you free.

Free Trash Proof ebook downloads

The link below goes to a PDF file copy of the 2015 Edition of Trash Proof News Releases.

Enjoy
Trash Proof News Releases

Trash Proof News Releases cover
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

Differences between marketing, advertising and PR

Discussion of the differences between marketing, PR and advertising

Great discussion over at Yahoo Small PR Agency Pros

I’ll throw in a little twist here to focus on what a person who works for a living has to do to communicate and accomplish these various and distinctive roles and objectives.

Advertising: paying for the creation and placement of communications so that target audiences of the selected media take the action wanted (which for products and services is usually sales, but for politicians could be votes, or for organizations, could be social action).

Marketing: the creation and management of programs and people and the execution of strategies, tactics and actions to achieve sales and profits of products or services (or votes or social action).

PR: the creation and presentation of proposed content to media (publishers or producers) to persuade them to publish or showcase a story or information that is perceived as objectively reported by their audiences, that creates interest, desire and promotes and triggers desired action (sales, votes or social action).

And btw, if the latter is what you spend a lot of your time doing, my new book Trash Proof News Releases is up on Smashwords – it’s a free download. It’s expressly designed to be an immense help to anyone who even thinks about writing a news release. I basically spend whole chapters of the book trying to explain clarify and communicate the difference between PR, and marketing and advertising, since what I see day in day out is otherwise successful marketing people fail to realize the difference between these distinctive functions, and the different types of MarCom copy required for each.

Book page to download Trash Proof News Releases Smashwords edition:

http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/5921

The book can be viewed online or downloaded in ten different formats.

Why News Releases Fail- Free ebook and Powerpoint presentation

20 + fatal errors people make writing news releases and what to do about them

This is one of my most popular articles turned into a Powerpoint presentation and an ebook pdf file.

Why News Releases Fail

Free Powerpoint Presentation here:

Why News Releases Fail Powerpoint Presentation

Free ebook pdf file here:

Why News Releases Fail ebook pdf file

Improving Your Presentations – Some lessons learned from the presentations of Steve Jobs, Apple

analysis of Stev Jobs speaking and presenting skills, tactics, and style

I’m always learning about how to be a better presenter.

This video, which I found on Drew’s Marketing Minute blog, done by Bnet is an excellent tutorial and analysis of one of the world’s best presenters – Steve Jobs of Apple.

Much of what is said here applies to news release copywriting as well, although if you look at Apple news releases and the publicity they get, it doesn’t seem to matter what they write in their news releases, since it’s what they do that makes the news.

In any case, you can take some of the lessons learned and demonstrated here and use them in your presentations.

It’ll be just like money in the bank.

Improve Your Powerpoint Presentation or Die!

Improve Your Powerpoint Presentation or Die!

Giving good presentations is crucial if you are going to be memorable to people and news worthy to media. You can’t put on a book signing or a workshop and then put people to sleep if you are to be successful and sell products or expand your professional or personal brand.

There are lots of little tips you can pick up if you are going to be an effective presenter.

I’ve done a short self-assessment of my own presenting skills. Here are my top tips or lessons learned:

I have yet to be able to do what Seth Godin says to do, which is limit the number of words on a slide to no more than six words, but I do try!

I use the largest font size possible.

I do not read from the slide. I talk about what’s on the slide.

I do use really good pictures to illustrate what I’m talking about!

I reduce the number of slides to the absolute minimum.

I make sure every slide is truly important.

I change slides about once every 30 seconds.

I get it over fast.

This is a very funny and useful short video by comedia Don McMillan on how to make better presentations if you are using Powerpoint.