Business Conference at Topnotch

I have been slacking on the blog front - my apologies! But, this Thanksgiving morning, before I power walk, make pies, and head off to dinner, I thought about what I am thankful for - and my success thus far at opening my own public relations business is certainly at the forefront. With that thought I'd like to bring you all back a few weeks to the Women Business Owner's Network (WBON) Fall Conference I attended and offer some thanks to the women I most associated with at the conference by giving a few other small business shout-outs!

First, I'll say the conference was held at Topnotch Resort in Stowe. What a fantastic location! I don't frequent Stowe often; it is a bit swanky for my tastes. My skiing also stays at Bolton Valley, Smuggler's Notch, or Sugarbush (where my pass is this year!) And I always thought Topnotch was just another over-priced "resort" in Stowe. I relent - this place was worth it and I should learn to not judge! I managed to take a few pics with my disposable camera, which certainly doesn't do the place justice, but we were busy at the conference and I took these while finishing Harry Potter on a private patio outside the lobby. If anyone reading this is planning a conference, large or small in the near future, especially one for Vermonters - bring 'em to Topnotch - there's something special about doing "work" in a place many people who bring money to this state spend their money.

I always enjoy attending WBON events so I can catch up with those women who are also friends in my personal life. Danielle Livellara is one! Danielle is a financial advisor with Smith Barney and was also a speaker at the conference (the theme was the financial side of running a small business). Danielle is smart and with-it and always gives me great advice and knowledge I need since I am a publicist, NOT a financial analyst! She doesn't have a direct website to link to, but if anyone wants to schedule a free consultation with a trusty gal, call Danielle at 802-652-6074!

Danielle's good friend and woman I have met before at these events is Jen Stanley, owner of Stanley Technical Services. Jen is a technical writer who I hope to work with soon! I write publicity materials. Jen writes all the big stuff that no one wants to write - annual reports, manuals, catalogs, and all that stuff that technical folks need to make into English for everyday folks to understand. Her website is www.stanleytechnical.com - check her out! Here I even have a conference shot of myself, Jen, and Danielle!

My roommate while staying at Topnotch in absolutely fabulous rooms I must say was Carrie McDougall, owner of Cultural Crossroads, a wonderful travel service for people to go on worldwide tours that include access and private tours to some of the most renowned historic and cultural locations across the globe. You must at least check out her website to see what some of these tours are - www.culturalcrossroads.com - and share with friends you think would be interested!!!

I also spent some time chatting with my new bookkeeper, Diana Jones of Double Entry Bookkeeping, who I scheduled a meeting with the very next week. I can purchase QuickBooks through Diana and she will give me a tutorial and help me set it up for my public relations business and will help me prepare my taxes! Double whammy!! Maybe that's why it's Double Entry? Either way, if you or someone is in need of such services, I highly recommend Diana. The website is www.doubleentrybookkeeping.net.

Happy Thanksgiving all!!!

Trends

When I first started studying public relations, I quickly learned what I consider to be the three cardinal rules of PR in what makes something newsworthy and if it can't fit into one of these three categories, then leave it and move onto the next thing. The "news" that someone wishes to promote can be considered news and therefore "pitched" in some manner if:

1.) It solves a problem
2.) Can offer useful tips
3.) Identifies a trend

It is with trends I want to touch upon this week. It is imperative in the marketing world to keep up with trends. Trends allow you to tie your product, service, idea, "news" into the larger picture by connecting it somehow to a trend, which is what makes it newsworthy to the media.

Some examples would be relating a product to a certain season or a way of life, such as being green. Or, offering a service and tying it in to a similar service popular on the national level. Or, positioning an event with a well known movement. Or, connecting a concept to popular lifestyles or recreation.

Trends can be local, regional, or national and using trends can help a local item of news become newsworthy on a national level and vice versa. It is important to note trends have nothing to do with what you wish a trend to be, it is what the existing trends are and using them to your advantage - a great opportunity to get creative!

Here are some trend resources - both for talking about trends and for you to browse to discover trends yourself:

- National Consumer Trends:
www.trendwatching.com
www.dailycandy.com

- Vermont Trends:
burlington.craigslist.com
sd.blogs.com/802online
candleboy.com/candleblog

Any trends out there people would like to comment about?

New Magazine in Vermont!

And its GREEN!!!

I feel like such a reporter today instead of a Vermont public relations practitioner. Coming very soon to a newsstand near you is the Central and Northern Vermont edition of the Green Living Journal. Yippee!! The magazine is being published by Vermont magazine industry veteran, Ellen Shapiro, most recently seen as an account manager at Vermont Woman magazine.

Green Living Journal is "a practical journal to friends of the environment." There are currently editions in Southern Vermont and Southern Oregon, and now Central and Northern Vermont with Ellen as the Publisher! The magazine operates as a whole with structure and general content publishing "news you can use" articles on organic gardening, green building, health, eco-careers, outdoors, socially responsible investing, eco-notes, Q&A, book reviews, and environmental issue topics. But, the magazines are independently published so they are tailored to the specific geographic regions they reach which allows content to be localized while offering the backbone of an established magazine group (Green Living Journal started in 1990).

Sounds like a win-win to me! The website is www.greenlivingjournal.com and look for the Central and Northern Vermont edition soon! And be sure to look through for a blog column written by me! If you'd like to reach Ellen for marketing opportunities with the magazine, email her at ellen@greenlivingjournal.com.

Constant Contact

Yes, in marketing, of course people should have "constant contact" with constituents. What I am talking about, and actually wondering about as well, are email marketing programs such as Constant Contact, a company that provides such services as newsletter distribution and other email based communication programs.

I highly recommend such programs for newsletter distribution, however, in my direct business, that is not something I currently offer. I may, if I sign up with an email program like Constant Contact. I heard about Constant Contact at the latest monthly luncheon for the Burlington Chapter of the Women Business Owner's Network - one of my favorite self employed business activities and organization I might add. Every time I go to a WBON event, I learn such valuable and helpful information for operating my independent public relations agency - RachelCarterPR. (I've decided I like the one word identity.)

Anyway, the reason I am interested in a potential email marketing program is for press release distribution. I can see how it would be a plus on one side with eliminating annoying formatting issues and being able to include photos without attachments. However, editors get so much email, that will the majority of them even bother to click the button that allows newsletter content to be read? And, furthermore, they haven't subscribed - email marketing is anti-spam and while there would be an option to unsubscribe, they never subscribed in the first place and the last thing I want to do is annoy the press. For this post I need advice - anyone have any???

Bartering

I like the concept. I do. Work for someone and trade for something you need. The key word in that sentence is need. It's a lot like coupons.

The concept of coupons is good. Be diligent, clip coupons, create a shopping list of things you need and then use the coupons against those things on your list and save money. But, how many people see coupons for things they might like, or might want to try, a might use down the road and how many people end up buying those things simply because they have a coupon?? I mean, seriously, isn't that the point of coupons? Yes! They are not there to save you money! They are a marketing strategy to get you to buy things!! And, in my opinion, a very good one.

And, yes, even as a public relations and marketing consultant in Vermont, I too fall prey! When I moved to my new apartment to help consolidate expenses for starting my own business, I got the relocation coupons. One was a 10% off Home Depot. So, of course I went to Home Depot to buy some stuff I needed and quite a bit more stuff I did not need. Great marketing tactic to get me to shop at Home Depot when normally I would go to South Burlington Ace Hardware and support my local hardware store owner where I already have a 10% discount card that applies everyday!

So silly. But, we all do it, don't we?

However, now that I run my own business, I have started to come up against the bartering and trade for my public relations work. And, I have to be frank -

I do not like them PR fans,
I do not like to barter PR for my ham,
I will not barter for my pork,
I will not trade PR for a silver fork,
I do not want a bag of yams,
I will not have it Bartering Fans!

Unless it is trade for my rent, internet, phone, utilities, or garbage, as I am in my first year as a business owner, I think I'll opt out. There is the Vermont Barter Network, which down the road, I may explore as I am one to be open minded, but that, my friends is for another post, in another year.

Media Lists

Good media relationships, understanding the concept of what is newsworthy, long term media campaign planning, and synchronizing publicity efforts between print, broadcast, an online outlets are what I consider to be the four most important factors in a successful public relations campaign. If one of those four are not working, than the other three really will not be able to make up for it. Hence what I try to tell clients and prospective clients - public relations is NOT a quick fix or a magic wand.

But there is a major backbone to public relations that if not in proper alignment can significantly hinder a public relations campaign - even if all four of these components are in place. That is accurate, working media lists. There are a few ways to keep media lists and anyone handling any part of public relations work probably does one of these three things:

1.) Keep an ongoing contact list of your media contacts.
2.) Search on the internet for email addresses and contact names and information for the media outlets you want to target.
3.) Subscribe to a media database - the three most well known being Cision (used to be Bacons), BurrellesLuce, or Vocus.

And, here are the pros and cons for each one:

1.) Media Contact List
PROS: Exceptional idea because the best editorial you will get comes from those people who know and like you as a person, so keep this updated and send individualized notes or "pitches" when appropriate to these folks.
CONS: If you rely only on this, you are missing out on a world of other media outlets who may be interested in different news stories - don't underestimate the power of the vast markets there are out there that are interested in many different elements of the news you are trying to publicize.

2.) Internet Searching
PROS: Web centric, remember? This is great because it allows you to find niche publications, outlets, websites, blogs, etc. that you won't find anywhere else. It helps globalize your news. And, news outlets often change emails because of the high spam volume they get (which is why you shouldn't bug news people unless you have something newsworthy) and usually update their website first - either with a new address or the form, which is becoming increasingly more popular.
CONS: As someone pointed out on my Web Centric post - not everyone is online! Not all publications are online and not all people are online, so relying on this way to get media contacts will only cover partial markets and media outlets.

3.) Media Databases
PROS: Media databases list just about every media outlet that exists - you'd be amazed how many niche publications and trade journals there are out there. And this is exactly why media databases are great - they allow you to find, rather quickly, all of the media outlets that fit your demographic, market, and region. This is especially important with any regional or national publicity you are trying to garner.
CONS: They are super expensive and while they have a contact management system, they do not always list the contacts you may have made or the most appropriate person all the time to contact. They are also a bit lacking on the web side of the equation.

So, what to do? All three of course! You must do a little of each, making the field of public relations so much more about organization than it has ever been. This is part of the reason I love public relations in my new role as running my own business. While I love being a professional storyteller here in Vermont, I am also uber organized, so it all works out well! And coordinating all three components of media lists is quite the organizational task! If it's too much - feel free to hire me as a consultant- even if it's just to help you coordinate and organize the process and you are the actual media contact - I do it all! My company is RachelCarterPR, my website is www.rachelcarterpr.com, and I subscribe to Cision (an an FYI).

Happy Media Listing!

The By-Liner

My latest PR insider tip for those who slyly read my blogs for good ideas yet don't post comments (please - that's all I ask!) - I have a super secret public relations industry tip. Why I give these out, I don't know. I guess it's to position myself as a resource and show I am an honest and trustworthy PR professional in Vermont.

A by-lined article is what my secret of the week is. It is an article written by you or someone of vast knowledge in your organization on a topic of interest to the public you are trying to reach. It IS NOT an article written by you on what you want the public to know about your company. For example, if you are a health related organization and you would like consumers to know more about you and your services, then you would write an article for the local papers in those communities on some useful tips or advice that the paper editors (yes, you should contact them first) would like their readers to know more about. You only mention you and your organization at the end as a little info piece on the author. This helps to position both you and your company as a trusted resource on certain health topics and therefore helps build your credibility instead of the newspaper thinking you are just a shameless self promoter and never printing what you send them anyway.

Does this make sense? Please comment if you have thoughts and you can always get in touch with me directly via my website to discuss such ideas further and how I can be of assistance to you and your organization.