Realistically, most of us do not need to generate publicity on same scale as parachuting convention. And even if we were able to generate that kind of coverage, we might not be prepared to handle all of new interest in our business --- especially if we run a service business.

Two things kill more businesses than any other --- not enough operating capital to stay afloat, and more business than we can actually keep up with.

It is important to keep our publicity efforts to a level that is more consistent with our ability to keep up with results of our efforts.

PRESS RELEASES

Press releases are designed to call attention to "a person, group, event, or product." However, for a press release to be effective, it must be constructed in a manner that makes topic newsworthy.

Simply calling attention to existence of a business is seldom effective in generating real publicity, unless your business has just opened --- and then announcement only has merit at your local newspaper office.

Especially when you are attempting to generate attention in local news media, it is important to take special care not to annoy your local newspaper reporters. These people can actually make you or keep you out of paper completely.

Even if you are attempting to distribute your press release at national level, take care to make your press release interesting and newsworthy so that you may gain real advantage with your release.

GENERATING PUBLICITY ON A ZERO BUDGET

The most overlooked method of generating publicity for your business can be had with three simple lines of text:

Your Name Your Business Name or Your Domain Name Your City and State

All over world, there are newspapers, magazines, online ezines and websites. Every single newspaper, magazine and online ezine generally accepts and publishes "Letters to Editor."

In addition, webmasters are generally looking for solid testimonials that they can use on their websites.

Just think, if you were to take time to read a few publications or visit a few websites and take time to notify publisher of your thoughts, you might just find your comments being published in all sorts of locations. You never know just where your next paying customer might come from, so take time to get yourself quoted in these media outlets. You might just find more and more traffic and sales coming from places where you would never think to buy advertising.

John Calder is the owner/editor of The Ezine Dot Net. Subscribe Today and get real information YOU can use to help build your online business today! http://www.TheEzine.Net

The Ezine DOT Net RSS feeds are available.

You see, those of us who work online all day are accustomed to using Internet for just about everything. A large portion of our desired market searches on random impulse generated by some outside stimulus. This stimulus can originate from a news story, a new song on radio, a magazine advertisement or even a subject of interest overheard in conversation.

The Holistic Approach

My intent is not to sway your favor towards one avenue of marketing over another. Instead, I offer you a challenge: take time to examine interrelationships among all forms of media. In fact, just pick a subject (or product) of interest and follow its path through chain of publicity.

For example, when someone sends you a referral to a new web site, ask them how they found out about that site. Did they stumble across it via search engines or does site already have a viral tool in place to generate leads? If site does have a viral tool in place, how did they generate their first visitors to trigger that flood? Do they have a pay per click campaign running? Did they send out a press release? Place a small ad in back of a magazine?

Just put on your detective hat and reverse engineer these paths. Inevitably, you will discover small streams of exposure which lead to flood.

John Calder is the owner/editor of The Ezine Dot Net. Subscribe Today and get real information YOU can use to help build your online business today! http://www.TheEzine.Net

The Ezine DOT Net RSS feeds are available.