Marketing

Well, I got off track.

Just a little bit. Just for a while.

But moments ago I finished my marketing calendar for top5pages.com! (I'd had one for www.comeseemyshow.com, and it worked great!) I got the idea from Guerilla Marketing, but I think I changed it.

In Guerilla Marketing, they say to figure it out for a year. "In March, we'll emphasize this. In April we'll emphasize this."

Mine I do by the day.

+ Monday I pitch radio and TV shows to be a guest, and I drive around L.A. refilling the flyers in the holders I've taped up

+ Tuesday I send out a press release about top5pages.com, I work on my latest publicity stunt, and I do one thing off my "to do only once" list (like getting a graphic artist to design some higher-end flyers & post cards)

+ Wednesday I refill the flyers again and I write a blog

+ Thursday ... you get the idea.

Do you have one for your business?

Keep the Marketing Ball Rolling

A good friend of mine, Melissa Pilgrim, told me to get new interviews based on the one I just got.

So my pitch has been like this: "I just booked an hour-long interview on www.LATalkRadio.com and I'd love to be on your show too!"

Then I go into the angle I'm using for this pitch:

• small businesses helping small businesses


• my process of starting with an idea and creating a business from it


• running home-based businesses with my wife


• search engine placement is really really important and here's why


• etc.

After only ten emails like that I got another interview (on www.MindYourBIZness.com)! How cool is that!

(PS: I'll tell you if interviewing on internet radio and TV and such really gets people to come to my website. I bet it will!)

Use the Media

Publicity.

People trust news stories -- even fluffy ones -- more than they trust an ad you pay for.

Kathy Griffin ("My Life on the D-List") does EVERYTHING for publicity. She goes out on dates with celebrities and calls paparazzi beforehand to tell them where she'll be. She pitched this story to The National Enquirer: photograph me eating, then photograph me losing weight, then photograph me doing the "final weigh-in" to see if I lost the weight I said I would. She goes on every talk show that will interview her. She gave her assistants bonuses based on who could sell the most t-shirts that promoted her.

And the ultimate: she landed her own reality show, with cameras following her all day long. Her life has become a publicity stunt, and she loves it and she's more famous than she was as "just" a comedian!

How do you get publicity? I'm learning it as I go. I just landed my second internet radio interview, and I'm sure there are more of those to come -- plus regular radio and TV.

I read that the media LOVE things to do with pets and with children. I've been trying to work that angle, but all my ideas appear forced (because they are!).

But the media also love to get viewers & listeners. So when I researched and found that there are 5 million small businesses in the U.S., and they employ 20 million people, I started including that in my pitches. If there are 20 million of them, a lot of them (and their friends) are probably listening to / watching the interview! That's good for the news program.

I'm also coat-tailing on other news-worthy items (just like Kathy dating celebrities). I've mentioned Google and Yahoo a lot, since everyone knows those names. I also talk about how top5pages.com is a great cheap way to get customers in this slumping economy, because there are millions of stories about our "economic downturn".

Another person who really uses the media is Stephen Colbert ("The Colbert Report"). I'll blog about him another time. Check out his show in the meantime and notice how much self-promotion he does!!

My First Interview!

Hooray! I'm going to be interviewed on L.A. Talk Radio!

I know there was another potential interview for me a few weeks ago, but they charged money so I decided against it. (Good way for them to make money, though!)

My actual interview is going to be on Setember 9 at 10am, and you can listen to it on www.latalkradio.com. And after September 9 it's going to be on top5pages.com (assuming I can figure out how to put it there!).

The interview is 50 minutes. Whew! They didn't even ask for a list of suggested questions. Sam (of Sam & Suzy, the DJ's) said they'll just find out who I am.

But I came up with a bunch of topics anyway -- mainly my businesses and my inventions.

Make sure you listen to it! Thanx!

Kids' Allowances ... Without the Kids

"Family Allowances from T-Mobile". What a clever business idea!

The way it looks on the commercial, parents put money into their kids' text messaging account or cell phone bill. And they think of that as the kids' allowance.

That prevents the kids from spending their allowance on other things, like clothes and food and video games. So T-Mobile gets ALL their allowance instead of letting the kids decide how much to spend on their cell phone and how much to spend on movies, magazines, music downloads and mocha frappa-whatevers.

Brilliant! (And evil, too. Tsk tsk!)

Advertising Ideas

Holy smoley -- has it really been a week since I blogged? Guess I've been preoccupied!

I've been making videos for www.YouTube.com/BrettFromLA. My goal is to make 2-3 a week of all my creations and creative ideas.

Then I finally downloaded iComment (which I blogged about a few weeks ago), so I can comment on any website. Of course I put great comments on my own sites, top5pages.com and ComeSeeMyShow.com. I also put an iComment on the Small Business Administration website and a few chamber of commerce sites. These people should at least know about top5pages.com!

And I've been thinking about other ways to advertise, along with iComment. I may go pass out flyers on Main Street in Venice (CA). There are throngs of people there at lunch time and all throughout the day!

Plus I've been thinking about programming the site to host free web pages, for businesses that don't have their own website. There are hundreds of little nail shops, barbers, bakeries, fish markets, knitting supply stores, arts & crafts places, mechanics, organic food stores, plumbers, electricians, etc. who don't have websites. I'll just remind them that 3 out of 4 people find stuff with a search engine; they're missing out on customers if they aren't online!

The tricky part is not programming it. The tricky part is advertising it. If someone gets a flyer, I want it to be clear that if they have their own site they can list it. And if they don't have a site, we'll make them a page (with all their contact info and street address and stuff) when they buy a spot. That's wordy; I want to sum it up in 2 short phrases and a picture or two.

I'll let you know how that goes!

The 80/20 Rule

You know how 80% of every project only takes 20% of the time, and that last 20% takes 80% of your time?

Just be satisfied with the 80% that you've finished. Sell that. Launch that. Give that to your customers. Get your product or service started with that, while you work on adding that other 20% (which takes 4 times as long as it took to do the first 80%).

I've learned that fact over the years, and started doing it without really being aware of it. Take top5pages.com. There were some other things I wanted to include before I launched it, but they were taking for EVER to program. So I just figured people would be really happy with what I'd done so far; let them use that! And now I'm programming those other features. The last 20%. I'll roll them out as I complete them ... and you didn't have to wait to use 80% of top5pages.com.

Win-win!