|
Profit Boosting Case Study 3 – Million Dollar Publicity Secrets Revealed
Secrets To Getting Advertising Worth Thousands Of Dollars & Achieving Expert Status Literally Overnight. . . Practically For FREE!
And NO, it's NOT the same old create a 'story-the-media-would-be-interested-to-publish' strategies. Those strategy mostly work for those who are already famous, not for those trying to be famous.
In the following case studies I will spill the beans and show you the stealth strategy I created to get great media coverage for free…even if you're an unknown nobody. It's the exact same secrets that I have used to help:
Dr Dennis Wee, celebrated self-made, multi-millionaire real estate entrepreneur (in Singapore), win prestigious, high profile awards such as the Lifelong Learners Awards, Spirit of Enterprise award and get featured extensively in various media such as The Straits Times (Singapore's largest national newspaper), Singapore Business Review and many others.
Adam Khoo, Asia's top trainer & multi-millionaire entrepreneur, get featured on Class 95FM (Singapore's most popular radio station).
And almost got Ewen Chia, world renowned #1 Super Affiliate, to be featured in 91.3FM (one of Singapore's popular radio stations)… although at the last minute Ewen couldn't make it.
And all for FREE!
BUT! They Are Already Famous…
"It's not difficult to get free coverage from the media for someone who is already famous. So what's the big deal?" you're probably thinking.
Not exactly right.
But I understand your perception. Most people think that when they have 'made it' and become famous, the media will always look for them. Sure, people love celebrities and the glitzy rich and famous.
But the truth is, it works the other way around too. If you can get featured in the media, you can become famous overnight. And fame brings along a whole lot of opportunities.
The question is…
How Can An Ordinary, Low Profile Business Or Even A 'Next-Door-Neighbour' Type Of Person Get Featured In The Media?
The secrets I'm about to reveal shows you exactly how. It is the same strategy I used to help:
Gloria Wong, an infant & children massage therapist get featured in Young Parents magazine (one of the biggest magazine for parenthood in Singapore) and NTUC Link's (Singapore biggest union) website dedicated for mothers: mummyandme.com.sg
Olivia Lim, creator of a prenatal information product, get featured in Today's Parents (another big magazine for parenthood in Singapore) in multiple pages x 2 separate issues, Live Well magazine and Gold 90.5FM (a popular radio station) just within 2 weeks of launching the product.
biteSize, a start-up bakery in Bali (Indonesia), get featured in the largest advertising-based English newspaper in Bali, Bali Advertiser twice, and that resulted in the bakery creating a niche supplying well-known F&B outlets such as Warung Made, Trattoria, Hu'u Bar, Kopi Bali (if you've been to Bali, you've probably been to one of these high-profile places).
I've even gotten myself featured on The Straits Times, Marketing Magazine (Singapore's biggest magazine on business and marketing) and other marketing related media.
And yes… I got all those media coverage worth thousands of dollars practically for FREE!
Interested?
Before I share with you the step-by-step process of my strategies to get featured in the media for free, let's talk about the pros and cons of getting featured in the first place.
Pros:
Instant credibility. When you're featured positively in the media, your credibility skyrockets immediately because people have an inherent trust in what the media publishes. This credibility booster is much better than paid advertisements. This means that a full page article featuring you will give you much more credibility than a full page ad (and it can be much cheaper as well!).
Instant expert status. People will instantly see you as an expert in the topic that you discussed in the media.
Permanent portfolio tool. You can use it forever. Once you are featured in a credible media, you can use that particular coverage forever as your promotional tool.
Free publicity. You can get it for free. If you've checked advertisement costs in the media, you will know that paying for advertisements of similar size to the featured articles can set you back thousands of dollars. In fact, one my clients was just telling me about the advertisement rate in a regional magazine she was thinking of advertising in: one full-page ad costs US$6000! Imagine paying that much for a one-time ad that has limited information about you, your company and you product, but yet you don't enjoy the kind of credibility booster that you can get from a featured article.
I think you're now starting to get the idea about the countless benefits that positive media coverage can get for you.
Cons:
Unpredictable. The process of getting featured in the media is unpredictable. It's not hard if you know how to, but there are a lot of variables that are out of your control. For example, there is no certainty that your story will be published (your story may be pushed back if something more 'newsworthy' pops up). They may also change the date of publishing your story due to any last minute changes. The fact is, the more popular and highly regarded the media, the more unpredictable they tend to be.
Lack of control. Since you're not paying for the article i.e. an advertorial, then you'll not have any control over the content of the article. You won't know exactly how the article will turn out. Will it be positive reviews or just lukewarm lip service? You won't be able to add persuasive elements, call to action, etc. This means that the article might not be as persuasive as it can be, in terms of creating sales.
Results lag time. The effects of the article might not be immediate. This is due to the fact that you have no real control over the content of the article.
However, my strategies will help you overcome the above mentioned challenges, to a large extent.
So…
Here's The Biggest Secret That I Use To Help My Clients Get Great Media Coverage For Free…
Providing great value to the media!
I know. I know. That sounds pretty vague right? Don't you just hate it when 'gurus' 'reveal' to you principles (which you most likely already know) and stop short from teaching you how to actually implement them in practical ways to get tangible results?
I do. That's why in my seminars I always break down my strategies to workable step-by-step processes so participants can apply them immediately. As you have seen from the past case studies, I showed you how to implement the strategies in simple, easy-to-follow steps. And I'll do the same here.
Let's break down this principle into actual steps.
For you to provide great value to the media, you need to know what they want. And give it to them. Sound familiar? This is the exact same basic success principle you need to use when dealing with your target market. This is because in this case the media is your target market.
You need to think about 'What's In It For Them'. Obviously their wants are different from your target market. So you can't pitch to them the same sales pitch you have for your customers.
For instance, let's say you have developed a great sales pitch for your service. Something like…
"Alleviate Pain In Just 1 Session With This Revolutionary Yoga Method – Guaranteed!"
Most people would make the mistake of using the same sales pitch to 'sell' their story to the media. While the sales pitch may work well for your target market, it probably will not work as well when you’re pitching it to a publication.
This is because the decision-maker of the publication whom you are dealing with, whether the person is an editor or a writer, has different needs from your target market. (It's all about fulfilling their needs and not about how great your product or service is.)
Based on my research and experience, I've concluded that these people have 3 core needs that you have to consider.
The more of these 3 needs you can fulfil when you pitch your story, the more likely they'll take up your story and write a feature on it.
When I pitch my stories to the media I usually want to meet all 3 needs. However, sometimes there are limitations from my clients that prevent me from doing that.
Below are my actual pitching process for the case studies mentioned above.
Gloria Wong—Infant & Child Massage Therapist
I did a research to find out some of the high-priority problems faced by parents of newborns, who are Gloria's target market. I found out the most common ailments include colic (incessant crying), temperamental behaviours, restlessness, etc. These ailments can actually be alleviated by using Gloria's massage techniques.
So I wrote an informative article to educate new mothers about this common ailments, their emotional effects on the newborns and their mothers, and some simple tips that they can apply immediately. I also wrote about Gloria's services and how it has helped many other mothers who were suffering similar plights.
Next, I offered this article to a few of the bigger and more popular parenting magazines in Singapore. In my pitch to the editors I explained that the article provides a solution to the common problems that their readers faced. So the article will benefit their readers.
I offered an exclusive for the article for the publication that responded first within a certain period of time. This is to motivate them to stake their claim on the article as quickly as possible, and also ensure that the article gets published soon. In this way, I have some control over when the article gets published.
In this case, we only managed to fulfill 2 of the 3 needs mentioned earlier.
The Results
We received responses only after the initial exclusive offer to the article had lapsed. I think if we'd fulfilled all of the needs mentioned above, we would've received interest from various publications earlier. However, this turned out to be a good thing in this case as more than one publication was interested to publish the story.
Both Young Parents magazine and mummyandme.com.sg published the story. For the Young Parents magazine, the full story was published unedited, and it took up two full pages.
Gloria was positioned as an expert massage therapist who has helped many parents. I even included several testimonials from her previous clients attesting to her skills in the article's content. This made her appear even more credible.
What's more at the end of the story, there was a resource box that contained details of her services and contact number.
As for the web article, it had to be shortened to fit their usual story structure. However, the essence of the article was kept and Gloria's contact details were provided as well.
With the publication of the article, Gloria can add 'as seen in' in her sales pitch to make it more persuasive.
Total costs: Nil
Olivia Lim—Creator of a prenatal information product
In this case, we managed to fulfill all 3 needs of the media person. Here's how we did it.
With my guidance Olivia wrote a content-rich article that was positioned at educating pregnant mothers about the importance of prenatal education. As there was an increased awareness about the effects that prenatal care can have on a child, she wrote about lesser known facts on how pregnant mothers can actually influence their unborn child's intelligence.
The article also provided specific tips on the activities that they could do to help their unborn child's development in the womb. And of course, it mentioned that there were resources that provided more details on such activities (including Olivia's product).
Then I took it to the next level and added a motivation booster!
When I pitched to the editors/writers, I threw in an additional benefit for the magazine. With the agreement from Olivia and her partner, I offered 10 sets of the products as a prize that the magazine could give to their readers in a lucky draw.
The Results
The article was featured in full in Today's Parents with minor additions. It even made the front cover. The article spread over 6 pages. The magazine even gave us a half-page ad placement for free in return for the 10 products we gave away for the prizes.
When it was published, the article was so well received by their readers that the magazine asked Olivia and her partner to contribute another article. They did. The second article spread over 4 pages with some mention of the product and there was a resource box at the end with details of the product. It made the front cover again!
Live Well magazine gave a product feature.
Gold 90.5FM promoted the product within one of their segments, giving away 2 products to their audience.
They were featured in Today's Parents, Live Well and Gold 90.5FM all within just 2 weeks of the product hitting the market. It created great awareness for the product.
When they added 'as featured in' in their brochures, sales increased.
Total costs: Manufacturing costs of 12 products, less than $50!
biteSize—Start-up bakery in Bali
The challenge for this bakery was that it was a 'home-based' business that was totally new in a foreign market. Also, the bakery's aim was to sell premium products that was targeted at the expatriate community, who understood appreciated the difference in the quality of the products offered.
We wanted to be featured in the English language Bali Advertiser as that was the MAIN newspaper that ALL expatriates read and had access to. However, since Bali Advertiser is an advertisement-based newspaper (the majority of their content is advertisement listings with some minor articles), we didn't see the point of contributing an article.
Our strategy was to get the newspaper to endorse the bakery. I wrote a sales letter that listed details of the offer that the bakery was willing to provide for the newspaper: free baked goods to reward their readers.
In the letter, I explained that by giving away rewards in a lucky draw, the newspaper will improve their readership and the readers' loyalty. I also included rave reviews from customers who were fans of the bakery. The reviews I provided were from expatriate customers.
The letter got us a meeting with the editor who was very interested to explore the possibilities of a tie up. We brought along samples of the baked goods to convince of the quality of the products.
(I include the exact letter I used to get the editor interested in the Profit Booster DVD Set I'm launching on 20 November. More info below.)
The Results
At the beginning, the editor was more keen on offering us a discounted rate to advertise in his paper. However, we were determined to get 'free' publicity. After some negotiation, we agreed on a win-win barter trade:
We offered to provide hampers and discount vouchers in a lucky draw to reward readers who visited their newly launched website. We would even do the delivery of the products and mail out the vouchers to the winners. In essence, we took on all the 'dirty work' and the newspaper didn't need to lift a finger while benefiting from getting on their readers' good side.
In return, the newspaper will feature us in a quarter-size promo on the back page of the newspaper, twice!
For those who may not know this, the space at the front and back page of the newspaper is considered premium placing and advertisers will need to pay extra (known as loading fees) for these placements.
On top of that, we also got a copy of the contact details and data of all the participants who entered the lucky draw.
From this, we were able to built up a solid customer base who were repeat, loyal customers after they had a taste of the products. The feature in the newspaper and the rave reviews we received also helped us build a reputation and we were supplying well-known F&B outlets such as Warung Made, Trattoria, Hu'u Bar, Kopi Bali.
And all this happened just within 2 months.
Total costs: Manufacturing and delivering costs that amount to less than $100.
By now you can see that there is a pattern in all the 3 case studies. When you fulfill the 3 needs I mentioned above and apply the same steps, you'll increase your chances of getting featured in the media for free.
Now, it's up to you to take the first step and start doing it.
(I cover more strategies to create a buzz for your business in Profit Booster DVD 8: Creating A Buzz & Getting FREE Publicity)
If you have any questions or comments, feel free to post them at my blog. I love to hear from you and interact with you. You can post your comments and questions here:
>> http://www.maneuvermarketing.com/blog/case-studies/
You can also share this case study with those who will benefit from it. Just send them to this link: http://www.maneuvermarketing.com/blog/case-studies/
If you want to be notified of the next case study, you can subscribe using the form below.
Be Notified Of New Posts
To your profits,
Sant Qiu - The Profit Strategist
PS. You can get more in-depth profit strategies from the "Profit Booster DVD Set" that I'll be releasing on 20 November, Tuesday. Only 70 sets are available. For more info on this subscribe using the above form.
© Copyright Maneuver Marketing Pte Ltd and Sant Qiu - All Rights Reserved Worldwide |
