Page 205 - Duct Tape Marketing

Duct Tape Marketing

sell; build relationships. That kind of sounds like real network-
ing doesn’t it?
3. Pitch curves. Resist the urge to lob press releases at your A-Team
list of bloggers and journalists. If you’ve followed through on
steps 1 and 2, you’ve probably earned enough trust to have a
conversation that starts like this: “You know, I saw your story on
the blah, blah, blah, and I think blah, blah, blah would be an
interesting piece for your readers, and here’s why, and here’s an
example of how we did it, how a customer of ours did it.”

Pitch curve ideas, kernels of stories that may have some
impact, tie positive angles tangentially to your company, but
don’t pitch your new widget unless it cures a rare disease. When
you truly build trust with journalists, you will come to under-
stand that they need your stories, but they get pitched so much
crap, you’ve got to stay uncrappy or you won’t get heard.
4. Release. Okay, this one might seem to run counter to step 3,
but another layer of your PR plan is the monthly, or more, press
release briefly outlining some big gig you landed, a new special
recognition, events, special promotions, and general news. This
isn’t the kind of stuff that makes the front page, but it’s the kind
of stuff that your prospects and customers may find interesting
on their way to getting to know you.

Each month, make it a habit to distribute these one-page
announcements through online distribution services such as
PRWeb or PitchEngine. In some cases your story will reach
thousands of end users at the hands of news and industry sites
picking up new releases. Your media releases will be picked up
by news aggregators and real-time search alerts and offer some
amount of backlink building to your Web site.
5. Amplify. Post your press, however small it may seem, to your
online profiles. Tweet your press releases (please, do more than
that on Twitter, but this should be one thing). Create an “In the

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