Who do you think will do better come Black Friday? A business that has a lot of media coverage about its product or service, or a business that doesn’t? If you’re hoping to get media coverage for Christmas sales, you’re probably too late. Most media outlets plan their holiday stories well in advance; we’ve been pitching our clients’ Christmas stories since mid-summer. While it may be too late to get your product in the news for this holiday shopping season, it’s never too late to get your product publicity on track. News coverage about your product is one of the least expensive and most effective promotional channels out there, yet most businesses skip over it or give it watered-down attention at best. If you’re starting to think about how to budget your marketing dollars for 2011, consider earmarking a good chunk for product publicity.
We sell publicity per story, not by the hour. As a rule of thumb, it’s difficult for clients to spend more than $60,000 a month with us because at that point we’re capturing the lion’s shares of available opportunities. Most clients seem to settle on about 10,000 to 40,000 bucks a month. It’s a relatively small amount of money considering you can control and maximize an entire promotional channel for that amount. If you would like to learn more about the types of media stories, both traditional and online, that are available for your product, service or company, give us a call. Getting a handle on public relations and controlling that promotional channel for your product might be the smartest marketing move you make in 2011.
