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Well, it’s official: The last of the Holiday cookies have been polished off, the empty Champagne bottles recycled, and you’re back to work on this, the first Monday of the rest of your life.
2011 has arrived.
Can we make this year better than the last? Ultimately, that’s the question driving all New Year’s resolutions. It’s a great question, really – a truly noble pursuit.
So why is it that the vast majority of people who make New Year’s resolutions break them, and a third by the end of this month? It’s not because they make trivial vows.
On the contrary, most Americans go for the gusto, vowing to get their finances in order, quit smoking, shed extra pounds, or spend more time with their families.
Experts say the real problem is that most resolutions are too broad, too vague, not explicit enough – and, therefore, hopelessly unachievable.
So you’re not off the hook. You should go for it and make a New Year’s resolution for improving your small business. However, to be successful you need a detailed plan, preferably one with attainable steps and a definite timeline.
Stumped? Well, since you’re reading my blog, I’m going to assume you’re interested in learning some new approaches to and tips for improving your marketing. So I’ve come up with a resolution that will help every small-business owner do just that – and a plan for getting there. I promise that if you take these steps in 2011, you will see the benefits to your bottom line.
The resolution: Increase sales and profits by doing your own PR in 2011.
This post is an oldie, but a goodie: In it, Glenn Kelman of Redfin explains 10 reasons why business owners should ditch the PR agency and do their own PR. One of the reasons he cited – and I would argue the most important reason – is that in this age of social media, people don’t want to read about the scrubbed-up version of you. They want to feel connected to the people they are entrusting with their hard-earned dollars. They want to hear your story firsthand, not your PR rep’s spin. People want to connect with people, not “messages” or “concepts.” They crave authenticity.
If you don’t believe this, consider how many celebrities are using Facebook to tell their own stories. The best aren’t hiding behind a publicity team; they’re writing their own posts, typos and all.
Yes, this takes time. And we all know time is money. That’s why your PR agency has been charging you those hefty retainers and hourly fees all these years – but if you’re honest with yourself, has all that money been worth it? What if, instead, you took 30 minutes a day to connect with your customers directly. Look, if Lance Armstrong and Lady Gaga have time to tell us what’s happening in their professional lives, so do you. So stop making excuses for not promoting yourself and your business, and start getting serious about doing your own PR in 2011.
Here’s how.
The DIY PR plan
When you start any project, but especially one involving PR and marketing, you need to ask and answer these questions: who, what, when, where, why, how? I’ve already explained why. Now you need to take some time coming up with specific answers to the rest of the questions and chart a plan to follow through on them.
What’s your story?
What sets you apart from your competitors? What is special about your business model? What is the reason your best customers keep coming back year after year? What’s the reason you get up every day and do what you do? What are you doing differently this year to stay fresh and relevant?
The answers to these questions will build the foundation for your authentic story. It’s mostly about you, but it also has a few supporting players: your competitors and your customers, for instance, maybe even your suppliers (if they help make you what you are). And even if you’ve been around for a long while, your story needs to remain timely and relevant today. More on that momentarily.
Who is your target market and where will you find them?
Here’s a hint: If you said “everyone,” you’re wrong. Every product or service – and this is especially true for small businesses – has a target market, a type of person most likely to buy what you’re selling. It may be tempting to go after the rest of the world, but trust me: Trying to market to everyone is a lot harder than going after your target market. And it’s pointless.
You can define your market by age, sex, geography, income, the list goes on. Another way to identify your market is to figure out where they hang out. This includes not just their physical hangout (city, suburbs, home, mall, theater, bars, etc.), but also where they spend time online. Are they on Facebook or Twitter? Do they “check in” at businesses using Foursquare? Are they constantly reading tech blogs or art blogs? Once you determine your target market, and where you can find them, go after them with the determination of a squirrel breaking into a birdfeeder – and for now, forget about the rest of the nuts in the trees.
How will you tell your story?
Do-it-yourself PR is possible precisely because we now have so many self-publishing tools at our disposal. Will you start a blog or get on Facebook? Tweet or develop a Foursquare promotion? You don’t have to do everything, and in fact, I would urge against it, especially if you’re just getting started. Instead, use your target market and your own interest to pick one. for now, you can do well. If you get really good at it, you can add a second later.
You have to devote time to social media, otherwise it won’t work. Done right, it’s an ongoing conversation with your customers and potential customers, so you need to spend time both talking and listening. Just like in-person conversations, you’ll probably start with small talk. But as you develop relationships with your followers and friends, you’ll learn to engage them more meaningfully, learning invaluable information about your customers, your business and yourself.
As for traditional media – you know, the newspaper, magazine, radio and TV outlets we read or watch when we’re not reading Facebook or blogs, or watching YouTube – if your story is relevant and authentic and unique, it will come naturally as a result of using social media. Your story will be out there, which means reporters will be able to find it more easily as a result. However, if you want to be more proactive, you can identify the publications and media outlets that attract your target market and focus on them individually. And by focus on them, I mean: Read them. Watch them. Listen to them. Learn what types of stories they publish. Then tailor your outreach to them just as you would anyone else – by highlighting the part of your story that most suits their needs.
When will you get the most mileage?
Holidays, seasons, elections, back-to-school, even famous moments in pop culture – they all have the power to set the media off and running. Stories that reflect the moment aren’t happenstance; reporters develop editorial calendars months in advance and plan coverage that jives with what they already know everyone will be talking about in January, May and December.
You can and should do the same: Grab a calendar and circle all the events and dates that have something, anything, to do with what you sell. Be sure to include the topics everyone writes about and talks about each year, such as Father’s and Mother’s Day, Christmas and Fourth of July. Then develop your promotions and news to “hook” into these already newsworthy events. Use this calendar to guide your content strategy for your blog, Facebook page, tweets, what have you. (If you’ve identified target publications, you can even cheat a little by going to their websites and checking out their editorial calendars. Hint: Look under “Advertising.”)
Once you know your 2011 “hooks,” revisit your calendar. Back up from the dates you’ve already circled and add reminders a few weeks or months prior to pull together and send to target media the key details that will make you and your business part of that story. (Hint on lead time: the fancier the delivery system, the longer the lead time. Today, national pubs are putting March to bed. Meaning writing for April and planning for May and noodling about June is happening now.)
Bonus points for developing your own content in advance, so that you’re not always scrambling to get up your latest blog post or tweet.
Get started
Chances are, when you first cut the chord and start doing your own PR, you’ll be nervous. That’s how most of us feel when we dive head first into that which is unfamiliar and unknown. But what you need to remind yourself is that no one – no one – knows your story better than you do. You are the only one who has been with you through it all, making you the ideal person to tell your story. So get out there and do it, and trust me when I say it’s going to be a very, very good year.
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