| |
Creating
Marketing Magic |
|
| |
Each
month you will find information you can
use on marketing,
advertising and speaking to your niche
target market!
|
|
| |
Click here to read
the archives |
|
Welcome to the
November 2007 issue of
“Creating Marketing Magic.”
The Holy Grail
of Free Marketing and Exposure
According to
Evelyn Adams, "Winning the lottery isn't always what
it's cracked up to be." She should know, she won the
New Jersey lottery two years in a row (in 1985 and
1986) to the tune of $5.4 million. According to an
article on
MSN, “Today the money is all gone and Adams
lives in a trailer.”
While you may not
be a lottery ticket buyer, you may have your eye on
another equally evasive and lucrative prize; an
appearance on Oprah, Dr. Phil or some other
nationally syndicated program as a way to launch
your business to the next level of sales and
success.
It’s a common dream among small business owners, to
be blessed with the exposure and success such an
endorsement ultimately brings. I had a phone
conversation last week with a woman who has such a
goal. She’s certainly not alone and I have several
clients who also have expressed this as a goal for
their business. If this is your goal as well, here
is information you need to know.
You probably already know that to appear on a
nationally syndicated show is a strong endorsement
of your product or service. One entrepreneur’s
business experienced an increase in sales of 60% in
the first month after her product was featured on
Oprah’s show. That’s why some marketing experts
compare such exposure to winning an Oscar. One thing
is for sure though, winning the lottery takes luck.
Winning a spot on a nationally syndicated show takes
careful planning and hard work. Unlike lucky lottery
winners, no one ever won an Oscar (or an appearance
on a nationally syndicated show) by sheer luck.
This brings us back to the topic of how you can get
YOUR business featured on a nationally syndicated
show.
The story continues here....
First, you have to have a sound business model.
You might be surprised by this. You may have
thought I was going to say, “You have to have
passion!” or “You have to have a compelling story.”
Unfortunately, incredible passion combined with
and a compelling story without a sound business
model means that if you are invited to appear on a
nationally syndicated show, you won’t be getting the
business changing benefits of that appearance.
Many people have
appeared on nationally syndicated shows, gotten
their "15 minutes of fame" and faded blissfully back
into obscurity.
In order to
capitalize upon your appearance on a nationally
syndicated show you must have a sound business
model in place BEFORE your appearance on the show. A sound business model includes
-
an infrastructure
which enables a business to deliver their goods
and/or services.
-
a system of
gathering contact information as a permission to
market
-
an offering of
those goods and/or services
-
tightly targeted
customers for those goods and/or services
-
cost structure to
support the 1
-
revenue as a
result of 1-4
In other words,
if your goal is to merely appear as a guest on a
nationally syndicated show, all you need is passion
and a compelling story. If your goal is to use such
exposure to create a LOT of business for your
business, then you’d better have a sound business
model in place.
Second, you have to DEMONSTRATE that sound
business model of yours in everything you do!
The added benefit to demonstrating your sound
business model to the minor
deities of PR is that such “improvements” will also
improve the performance of your other marketing
efforts. By demonstrating your
sound business model in everything you do, you’ll
inspired confidence in your product/service amongst
EVERYONE who visits your web site, not just the PR
people.
Keep in mind, there’s a reason that Oprah or any
other nationally syndicated figure’s staff will want
to see visible evidence of your incredibly sound
business model. Whether it’s Oprah, Dr. Phil or Tyra,
not one of these syndication GIANTS wants to tarnish
their reputation by aligning themselves with someone
who can’t handle the MASSIVE influx of inquiries
that comes with such a high powered recommendation.
(Remember what happened when Oprah featured and by
doing so endorsed James Frey's book " A Million
Little Pieces"? )
That means before you wrangle an invite onto one
of these shows, you’d better have the tools in
place to handle a huge influx of traffic, inquiries
and product orders that are sure to follow.
I'm personally convinced that part of the "reason"
behind the 2-4 year lag between sending in your idea
for consideration and contact from the show is not a
matter of backlog but simply a matter of
attrition. By waiting 2-4 years to begin
digging deeper into your request, the show's
producers will have already eliminated those whose
business models weren't sound enough to sustain them
for long enough to "endure" the wait.
Of course,
submitting your business to the show for
consideration is just ONE way to get on a show.
Another way is for the show to find you!
A client of mine who was contacted by a nationally
syndicated show several years ago and was surprised
that just such a request came via an email from a
hotmail email address. Ever since she received that
fateful email (which resulted in being featured on
the show) she has been PASSIONATE about getting
EVERY PIECE OF EMAIL… even if it means sifting
through THOUSANDS of spam messages each and every
day.
This client had
made a conscious effort for every element of her
business to scream "competence" and the investment
of time and money paid off with this one appearance.
It also caused her to change her "business model"
from one of limiting contact via email to
encouraging it!
If you are SERIOUS about getting yourself and your
business into a position of being an invited guest
to just such a show, then you’re going to have to go
above and beyond what everyone else is doing.
"Good
enough" isn't when you're shooting for the PR stars!
Jeanine Boiko of
J9 Public Relations, who placed her client Bonjour
Fleurette in O magazine three times for three
different products, has this rule of thumb:
"Ask yourself
this: if you walked past your product on the shelf
somewhere, would it catch your eye and make you
stop? It must have unique, attractive packaging that
will photograph well. My advice, especially to new
business owners, is to not play it cheap with
packaging. At the end of the day, it's all about the
draw of your packaging."
If you’re a
service based business, guess what your product’s
most visible “packaging” is? It’s YOUR WEB PRESENCE.
(If you're an author, then your second most visible
package is the cover of your book.)
For example, I have a client whom I half-jokingly
say is going to have Oprah as a guest on HER show
some day. This client is truly going above and
beyond “good enough” and is reaching for “the best
in the business.” It’s not been an “inexpensive”
journey. She is investing a significant sum in the
creation of a custom theme for her web presence, a
word press blog. She’s also investing a significant
sum in the services of a professional writer to
compose and polish her thoughts for posting on her
blog. She’s also invested in video production
services to create videos to feature on her blog.
She’s not the daughter of a wealthy family but she
is a business savvy professional with over 30 years
of experience in her chosen field. She’s aiming for
national exposure for her business and she’s been
well aware that it won’t happen if her web presence
doesn’t “look the part”.
When another
client of mine had a PR professional review his web
materials (developed by another developer), the
first thing the PR professional jumped on was the
typos in the copy on his web site pages. First
impressions are the only impressions when it comes
to PR.
Questions, comments, rants, raves? Feel free to .
Find My Niche and Creating Marketing Magic
are written Kathy Hendershot-Hurd who
is the founder of Virtual Impax, a small business
marketing consulting firm and the author of
"Beyond
the Niche"
available at online book stores everywhere.
|
