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Most people are fully satisfied with the publicity results only when the “reach, persuade and move-to-desired-action” process produces sufficient visible actions on the part of those people you wish to influence. However, it may take several weeks or even months for this to occur.

There are five key measurement points you should use to determine your level of satisfaction with the effectiveness of your publicity efforts.

1. The first point is when you transmit the release. Do you feel like the costs of performing the publicity outreach are reasonable? Do you feel like the service has been responsive to your needs?

2. The second point is immediately after the release is distributed and you can identify the number and quality of the media responses to your news release.

3. The third point is when articles are actually published or when your interviews have been conducted.

4. The fourth point is when you determine whether enough of the right people respond to your message.

5. The fifth and final point is sometime later still, when you are finally able to somehow determine the overall benefits of your outreach effort and experience. It is only now you can truly ask “Was it worth it?”

At each of these points you should ask yourself: “What is really happening here?” Real data should be collected objectively and evaluated without prejudice. The actual numbers of tangible events can be tallied. The actual costs can be surmised. Only then can you ask yourself “How do you feel and why?”

It is crucial that you recognize the importance of measuring the value of publicity in clear financial terms at each step in this process. However, you must realize that this will not be easy to do.

On one time publicity efforts, you might be able to break even financially on step four within a few weeks of sending out a news release, especially if the release goes to newspapers, radio and TV. But with magazines and trade publications that require longer lead times, it may take seven to ten months to reach steps 4 and 5.

You may also need to continue to maintain your publicity outreach, say on a month-by-month basis. If you do not break even on a news release, what should you do? Stop or continue? Do you use the same publicity materials and media list or change them?

The answers depend on your specific goals, and your specific finances. Some publicity goals are financial and some are not. You may have the resources and commitment to go for a long distance. You may not.

You might not want money as your goal. You may simply be seeking publicity. You may simply want to get the word out for the purpose of informing and educating the public to a serious and important issue. You may need a specific type and quantity of media coverage to achieve this goal.

But if you are in business, you are far more likely to be solely interested in enhancing the bottom line. You are seeking to use publicity as a means to achieving sales. To you publicity is an essential part of your marketing plan and you very simply seek a positive return on investment.

If that is the case, every dollar counts and you must document and tabulate your sales and expenses.

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So much confusion over this simple question. Here’s my definition of a news release:

A written proposal:

- 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, etc.) or placed where they can find it and use it (as when it is posted to a news search engine 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 persuades 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.

But if publicity in media is what you want, you write a news release.

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Each year I create an annual publicity plan to help people look ahead and map out their ideas for acquiring publicity throughout the year.

The special design makes it easy to develop a detailed personalized framework of key dates and events so that you map out your strategy and ideas to promote your book or your writing in 2009.

The new planner for 2009 is now available as a free pdf file.

Anyone who is interested can send me an email at Paul@DirectContactPR.comand just ask me to send you the 2009 Publicity Planner

It is also available as a free download at my web site www.directcontactpr.com - look in the free downloads section for the Publicity Toolkits.

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I have a lot of books on my shelf by Brian Tracy. He is a fascinating and awe inspiring teacher and his ideas on personal and professional development are very readily implemented with great benefit.

It’s not very often that you can find something so short and sweet that you can take it home in your pocket and bank the benefits immediately. But these two little videos do just that. They will help you make a significant difference in what happens to you not just today, but for the rest of your life.

This first one describes how to identify and select the most important goal in your life.

This second one describes the single most important word you’ll ever need when achieving goals.

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We’ve been traveling this week, visiting colleges around the west.  So this post will be quick and short. 

Listening to so many talented and energetic tour guides makes me think of what I would have done if I was in my 20’s again.   It came to me that I would have made better plans and goals for myself.   

So here is Zig Ziglar, one of my all time heroes of sales talking on his process for setting goals.   

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Jim Rohn is a very bright, very funny, insprational and entertaining person and his ideas and recommendations will make you more valuable and hence you will be able to charge more. This wonderful three video series from Nightingale Conant explains what you have to do to yourself rather than what you have to do at work.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Want more? Visit Jim Rohn . He offers a free weekly newsletter.

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I’ve done a lot of work with Joe Vitale and he’s one of the most remarkable people I’ve ever had the pleasure of working with. He is incredibly productive and offers insights into doing things that matter well and effectively so you can be successful and profitable especially when you are helping others. In this superbly simple lesson he describes his secret of productivity.

The bottom line is that if you snooze, you lose! When an idea occurs to you, act on it.

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