The Publicity Hound’s
          Tips of the Week
       Issue #465 Aug. 18, 2009
        Publisher: Joan Stewart
  mailto:JStewart@PublicityHound.com
    http://www.PublicityHound.com
 http://www.publicityhound.net/ (Blog)
 http://www.PublicityArticles.net (Ezine Archives)

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“Tips, Tricks and Tools for Free Publicity”

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          In This Issue
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1. Feedback, Please

2. Huge Payoff for 15 Minutes a Week

3. Pitch Holiday Gift Guides Now

4. Promoting Intranet Software

5. Help This Hound

6. Hound Joke of the Week

7. And at My Blog…

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1. Feedback, Please
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This is the first issue of my newsletter that’s being sent from
AWeber, the list management company I’m using.

I’m also offering you the choice of whether you want to read it
in HTML or plain text.

If you prefer HTML, please understand that using a lot of photos,
different colors and fancy formatting drastically increases the
chances that the newsletter might not arrive in your inbox.
Elaborate designs are more vulnerable to spam filters.

I’ll be making minor design changes in the weeks ahead. But I’m
curious to hear your feedback–good, bad or otherwise. We have
three concerns:

–Whether you’re getting the newsletter

–How it looks on your monitor

–If you’re receiving it in the format you’ve requested (text vs.
HTML)

All comments welcome. Email to
JStewart@PublicityHound.com?subject=Feedback

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2. Huge Payoff for 15 Minutes a Week
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If you want to boost the ranking of your blog or website on
Google by getting more authoritative sites to link to you, you
only have to spend five minutes a day, three times a week, on
social bookmarking.

That’s it. Just 15 minutes total. You can even delegate this task
to an assistant.

Colin Martin, who was my guest during last week’s teleseminar on
“How to do Social Bookmarking to Promote Your Expertise, Attract
Followers & Pull Massive Amounts of Traffic,” said that’s how
much time he spends to help get many of his sites in the Top 10
positions on Google.

That’s practically nothing, compared to all the time you spend
tweeting, retweeting, joining the conversation on Facebook and
checking your direct mail on all the social networking sites.

By sharing content, including your own, with other bookmarkers,
you’re making it easy for people to find you and connect.

There’s one other way to encourage people to bookmark your blog
posts, articles at your website, your videos, photos and other
content. (I delegated this to my assistant, and you can, too.)

You’ll learn what it is and how to do it when you listen to the
recording or read the electronic transcript from last week’s
call. CDs will be ready in a few days. The transcript will be
available this weekend. MP3s can be downloaded right now.

Read more about how to use bookmarking to enhance the power of
everything you do online at http://budurl.com/mdn5

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3. Pitch Holiday Gift Guides Now
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There’s still time to pitch more than 400 magazines, including
certain editors at Better Homes & Gardens, if you’re trying to be
included in their end-of-year holiday gift coverage.

Most editors are facing late deadlines, lean staffs, and
last-minute special sections that publishers hope will lure
advertisers.

“While this may put many editors in a quandary of pulling their
publications together quickly, it allows you to take advantage
of a unique opportunity to secure editorial coverage at later
dates,” says Amy Bates Stump, whose company, Gift List Media,
provides contact information and pitching tips for hundreds of
media outlets looking for products and services that will make
great gifts.

Long leads for large circulation magazines, however, will be
wrapped up within the next few weeks.

The list of media that are planning gift guides will grow
considerably over the next month as Amy and her staff discuss
holiday editorial plans with editors at newspapers,
syndicates, and broadcasters who traditionally don’t start
planning their editorial calendars until after Labor Day.

Don’t make the mistake of waiting until late autumn to start
thinking about pitching these media. Jump on board now and
test-drive her service at http://snipurl.com/GiftListMedia

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4. Promoting Intranet Software
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This week, nine Publicity Hounds have suggestions on how Martin
Amm of Boston, Mass., can market his company, adenin
Technologies, Inc. which provides intranet software for
businesses.

From Mellanie True Hills:

“I found features and pricing at your website, but where the heck
are the benefits for me, if I were still a corporate executive or
IT executive? Don’t waste my time on a demo. Just give me a
concise list of benefits. And if you can apply them to my
industry, so much the better.”

From Gin:

“I would suggest trying the regular and alternative schools and
colleges. Businesses that tend to have groups of people and this
area would be large in the metro areas and available across a
nation though it is just one niche. Maybe youth centres through
children services and small business trade shows and their trade
journals.”

From Reece Franklin:

“Use social media with a different ‘group,’ like on Facebook,
that you create for different types of prospects. Same with
publicity, as Joan taught me. One size does not fit all.”

The Publicity Hound says:

Read all the responses to this week’s Help This Hound question
http://budurl.com/hux6

Send your own Help this Hound question to:
mailto:JStewart@PublicityHound.com?subject=HelpThisHound
and include your city and state.

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5. Help This Hound
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Jennifer Louden of Bainbridge Island, Wa. writes:

“I’m a best-selling author and my last book, The Life Organizer:
A Womans Guide to a Mindful Year, got a call back from an Oprah
producer in March 2007. They called us saying, ‘We love the book
but don’t know how to use it. We will be in touch.’

“Nothing since, even though we have repitched.

“The book is for women who juggle conflicting roles and
schedules. It shows them how to slay the ‘time monsters’ that
keep them from following their dreams. It has 13 planning
sections with four weeks of theme-based questions and includes
true stories of other women who have used the program to improve
their lives and discover their soul’s purpose.

“I want to repitch again with a new angle but am so close to the
material, I’m clueless. My wonderful publisher, New World
Library, will do the pitching, but they are out of ideas as well.

“Anybody have a good hook?”

The Publicity Hound says:

Back-to-school seems like the perfect tie-in. But I’m betting my
Hounds will post lots of other terrific ideas at my blog at
http://budurl.com/yldr

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6. Hound Joke of the Week
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The Publicity Hound asks:

When dog food is “new and improved” and better tasting, who tests
it?

DOG JOKES & QUOTES EBOOK: 170+ G-rated dog jokes and quotes,
perfect for a dog-lover, your favorite vet, or just for a few
good laughs.

BONUS: Buy the ebook and you also get a compilation of the 50
best websites for dog humor.

http://www.publicityhound.com/dogjokebook/

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7. And at my Blog…
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National Publicity Summit expected to sell out soon
http://budurl.com/jbt8

Measure your PR, publicity success these 3 ways
http://budurl.com/paqf

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Reprinted from “The Publicity Hound’s Tips of the Week,” an ezine
featuring tips, tricks and tools for generating free publicity.
Subscribe at http://www.publicityhound.com/ and receive by email
the handy cheat sheet “89 Reasons to Send a Press Release.”

If you like these tips, please pass them on to your friends,
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Joan Stewart
a.k.a. The Publicity Hound
3434 County KK
Port Washington, WI
53074
USA Phone: 262-284-7451 (Central)
Fax: 262-284-1737