The Publicity Hound |
Saturday's workshop covered working with the media, creating video and audio, blogging (and repurposing your own content), press releases and pitching to journalists. Here are my top ten takeaways from Joan's presentation:
10. Pinterest is one of the fastest growing forms of social media. This visual platform is predominantly used by females.
9. Join LinkedIn groups that contain influencers who can help you with your promotions, not just author and/or publisher groups.
8. The Freelance Directory of the Society of Professional Journalists can help you locate journalists who write about your topic.
7. Once you have identified the journalists who represent what you write about, then read their blogs. Research them before you pitch to them.
6. Authors need to blog. Ideally, a blog post should be around 700 words so Google can find it.
5. Repurpose your content. Turn blog posts into podcasts, create YouTube videos, put tips on Pinterest.
4. Review existing podcast topics. Small, niche topics do well here because not too many people are doing it.
3. Complete a Google profile, and make sure that you have linked all of your websites to it.
2. Creating videos and audio content is imperative if you want to be found on Google, and to be recognized as an expert in your field.
And the top tip learned from Joan...
1. Promote yourself as an expert, do not promote your book. If the media sees you as an expert, they will call upon you for stories. The publicity for your book will follow.
Joan's presentation was professional, entertaining and enlightening. The fifty some attendees were attentive and engaged. What a productive way to spend a Saturday morning.
If you are not currently following Joan, I would highly encourage you to do so. Her publicity tips are priceless, though many of them are offered for free. To receive her free DIY publicity tips, you can subscribe here.