Writing A Press Release
Posted by Mitch on Aug 14, 2010
Okay, by now everyone should know that I’m putting on a social media workshop on Thursday with Renée Scherer. Well, at least you’d think that. What I found out just after the last one is that no matter how many times I put the link out on Twitter, people seemed to miss it. I mean, what the hey? This included people I talked to often on Twitter; that was discouraging, and of course if people don’t know about it, they’re not coming.
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This led me to considering the idea of writing a press release for this one and seeing if the newspaper would put it in. Of course, one can have a press release go to many other outlets as well, but there’s only one main newspaper in town, and I know the rules for writing a press release, which is pretty much only one main rule; make it sound like a news story and not an advertisement.
Having said that, there are some basic rules for writing up a press release; here they are:
1. You need to make sure there’s contact information in it
2. You need to indicate what the press release is for, hopefully giving them a title they might be able to use. I did that within the article, and I told what the event was up front.
3. You should have someone quoted in it. That’s not quite a necessity, but it helps to have a quote or two.
4. It needs to be in 3rd person. No “I’s” or anything like that unless it’s contained in the quote.
5. It needs to look “newsy”. In other words, it should read like it’s a story in the newspaper, even if it’s a short one.
I created the press release and I passed it by one of my Twitter friends who also happens to work at the newspaper. She said it was perfect, and that she’d give it to the powers that be. This isn’t my first press release, by the way. I’ve had two others put into the newspaper, one in 2004 when I was giving my Keys To Leadership seminars, and another when I was promoting a customer service workshop in 2005. So, it had been awhile, but my hope was that I hadn’t lost the skill of putting one together.
I hope it shows up in the newspaper, but there are never any guarantees. Actually, I’m writing this days ahead of time, so if you see this line then it probably won’t make it in time. In either case, another friend of mine in media said I should put it on my website to make sure it’s at least seen by someone. I decided to share it here:
Press Release:
Social Media Marketing Workshop
Hope Lake Lodge, August 19th, 2010Following up on a successful first presentation on July 22nd, Mitch Mitchell of SEO Xcellence and Renée Scherer of Presentations Plus are putting on a second workshop on the topic of social media marketing. Titled “Make A Splash With Social Media Marketing”, they put on a 5 hour workshop that talks about social media strategies that have been used by many companies across the United States to enhance their business profiles and interact with customers.
“Smaller companies found out first how successful they could interact with current clients and grow their client base by using social media marketing, and now bigger companies have hopped on the bandwagon and establishing themselves as players in the game as well,” said Mitch Mitchell, who’s been working with clients on social media marketing strategies for 3 years now. “Anyone who hasn’t figured out that they need to embrace at least some aspects of social media marketing are going to fall behind, and it’s not going to be easy to catch up.”
Since both Mitchell and Scherer are from the Syracuse area, why start at Hope Lake Lodge? “I’m a skier and I love Greek Peak,” stated Scherer. “Once I realized how much more they had and that they’d love finding ways to help promote the new Cascades Water Park it seemed like it would be a nice marriage.”
They are working on setting up a workshop some time in September in the Syracuse area, then hoping for at least one more presentation at Cascades Water Park before deciding where to take it next. “I’d love to take it on the road, as it’s become a very hot topic”, said Mitchell.
To find out more about the presentation, you can call Renée Scherer at 315-863-9011 or visit http://www.seoxcellence.com/SMMregistration.html.
For confirmation:
Mitch Mitchell, SEO Xcellence, 315-622-5922 or mitch@seoxcellence.com
Renée Scherer, Presentations Plus, 315-863-9011 or renee@presentations-plus.biz
So, what do you think?
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Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2010 Mitch Mitchell
BlogInterviewer.Com
Posted by Mitch on Apr 15, 2010
Am I narcissistic or what? Actually, I don’t think so, but I’ve participated in another interview for a blog called, nicely enough, BlogInterview.com. It’s a blog where the owners get recommendations for people they should talk to, and they have a series of questions that they ask every participant to respond to.
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I have no idea who passed my name on, but hey, it’s all about publicity, right? My interview was fun and interesting, and if I say so much I feel like I’m the first one who answered the questions in the proper manner. You know, sometimes I think many people just don’t know how to answer certain types of questions because it’s beyond their purview. I remember years ago, during a leadership training session, where a group of nurses were asked specific questions about how they’d handle a brand new employee. Thing is, the questions didn’t pertain to anything any nurse with any sense at all would do, so they all got confused, instead of seeing it as an exercise into one’s thinking process.
Now, here’s the next part, which is another reason I’m mentioning this. I guess people who stop by get to vote on your interview, and the top vote getter for the month earns money of some kind. They pay out around $950 total to the top 18 rated bloggers. I have no idea what first place is, but hey, I’m as competitive as the next person, so I’d like to encourage y’all to follow that link and give me a thumbs up, or however it all works. Help make me some money; doesn’t cost you anything except clicking on a link, then clicking on this little button at the top left of the post that says “vote now”; I had to go look for it myself.
Oh yeah; I’ll also be featured on my friend Beverly Mahone’s internet radio show Passions the next two weeks, and they’ll be the last two weeks because she’s landed a real radio show in the North Carolina area; how’s that for being special? Congrats to Beverly for that, and who knows, maybe I’ll find a way to get on real radio as well. 
Look at me; guest blogging, interviews… now if I can only start making some money from all of it! lol
Different Degrees Of Gaming The System
Posted by Mitch on Mar 31, 2010
Suffice it to say, many of us write our blogs and hope to find a loyal audience. To get a portion of that loyal audience, something else we do is visit each other’s blogs and, when we can, we write comments on those blogs. It not only helps us in potentially getting people to follow the link back to you, but it helps them because not only are you contributing to the community, but you’re also helping their community grow. It seems that people love commenting on blogs that show some kind of activity.
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If you wanted to, you could say that’s a way to “game the system”. I don’t necessarily believe it, but the truth is that it’s nice knowing there are some people who have your back from time to time.
However, I’m betting most of us can’t compare to what’s been reported about the Chinese government. It seems that China wants to change its reputation around the world in the worst way (so many ways to go on this one). So what they’ve done is hired 280,000 people to write good things about the country. Not only on their own blog, but on other websites that even mention China:vacation sites, political sites, product sites… you name it.
This isn’t new, really. How many folks remember the tale of Belkin, a company that was caught having its own employees review their products in many places, including eBay and Amazon, favorably, until someone found an internal memo and leaked it? It’s that sort of thing that brought about the FCC’s new policy on disclosure.
At the same time, who can compete with 280,000 people being paid to say nice things about you, other than India? That’s really gaming the system, and that’s just not right. I mean, almost no one here would be upset to get that kind of great press for their blogs or websites, but at the end of the day, it’s disingenuous, false, and no one benefits from it, including the person being talked about.
How do you feel about this one? Am I wrong?
Some Random Sunday Things
Posted by Mitch on Jan 24, 2010
I’ve been on quite a clip lately in writing this blog, my other blogs, other people’s blogs and all the articles I’ve been writing as well. I could have taken today off, and I kind of am because this is a quick hitter to mention a few things that have entertained or mentioned me lately.
The first is another online radio interview I did with Beverly Mahone of Boomer Diva Nation, the same group that named me as one of the top Baby Boomer Men of 2010. I thank her for that, and I hope to be able to live up to it for the year. Here’s the interview, which you can download as a MP3.
The second is both an honor and some confusion, I guess. I was listed on Not A Pro Blog by Jordan Cooper as one of the 20 Bloggers To Watch Out For In A Back Alley (at least I was; seems the actual Problogger bought this particular blog in April 2010, so the rest of this paragraph makes little sense, but I’m leaving it here anyway). There’s a video that picks on 20 of us guys, but when he gets to me he compares me to Magilla Gorilla. I missed the reference, my wife isn’t happy for some reason (probably that “equating a black man with a gorilla thing), but I like that I got a mention anyway. I’d have commented on his blog but he has Disqus, and you know how I feel about that, so I figure he’ll see the trackback. His blog is pretty good, and I subscribe to it, so go ahead and check it out.
The third is just a bit of funny that I saw that I wanted to pop up here, though I’m not sure I’m really allowed to do. If I’m contacted, I’ll take it back down, but I’ll get a bit of fun out of it first. This is how you take someone’s power away when they don’t really have it to begin with. I wish I could have thought of saying stuff like this back to people when I was a kid; now I don’t have to deal with such things. I bring you Get Fuzzy:
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Finally, some quick football picks. I’m obviously not the best guy at picking games, but I’ll have my fun with it anyway. In the AFC, I expect Indianapolis to win big, but I’m pulling for the NY Jets. They have to be the emotional pick in this game, and all week we’ve been evoking the memories of Broadway Joe here in NY state. In the NFC, man, I really don’t care since my Cowboys lost, but since I have to make a pick I’m going with New Orleans, though for no particular reason. Indianapolis versus Minnesota would have way more back stories to tell, and the networks would love the Manning vs. Favre comparisons, and of course that game would easily draw in more visitors and make more money than a Jets versus Saints Super Bowl
, but most of the world will watch no matter who’s playing, and I’ll have a legitimate betting interest in the game then (Scott, get ready!). By the way, the Jets prove why you play these games rather than just anoint the teams that should be there. No one saw the Jets making it this far with a rookie QB and new coach; fantastic stuff.
That’s it; a “short post” that ended up being more than 500 words anyway. Enjoy your Sunday y’all!
Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2010 Mitch Mitchell
How Can You Prosper Through Publicity?
Posted by Mitch on Dec 29, 2009
Talk about an interesting issue, at least to me.
This year I’ve probably been a part of more interviews than ever before. Some have been online live interviews. Some have been in magazines. Some have been articles I’ve written. No matter; I’ve been out there, working things as I had hoped I could.
However, when all is said and done, I’ve gotten some publicity, but haven’t figured out how to fully capitalize on it. That’s not quite true; I haven’t figured out how to capitalize on any of it. I think that’s a major issue, as I’ve been getting publicity for years and haven’t yet capitalized on it.
Part of my problem is that I haven’t fully directed myself into one arena, which makes it hard for people to figure out just what it is I do. One wouldn’t think it would matter, but it probably does. My health care crowd has no idea what social media is, just as most of you who visit this blog have no idea what a revenue cycle consultant does. Throw in leadership and SEO and some other things and one might consider themselves as being renaissance, but others might not have a clue what to think.
Even with all of that, I think it’s been interesting over all this time to learn that publicity on its own doesn’t mean anything. Yeah, you get a minute or two of a bounce from some quarters. A newspaper article I was in back in May is on the wall of one of my favorite breakfast restaurants, which is very nice. I also got a free meal out of it at a local steakhouse; loved that as well. But business; none.
In any case, this was a pretty good year, and I’d like to share the links to some of the things I did this year as far as interviews or publicity went, since some of what I did isn’t producible. I wonder how most of you would have found a way to use any of these things to generate new income; I’d love to hear your thoughts.
My most recent magazine interview, though my participation is short, in Oswego County Magazine.
A radio interview I did on a subject called Men Have Issues Too.
A radio interview I did on the subject of Reinventing Yourself.
This is only a link to my business blog talking about my first national podcast on a diversity topic, Celebrating Differences.
An interview I did that ended up on a blog called Ramama’s Musings, where I talked a lot about dealing with diabetes.
An interview I did with New Media Bloggers on blogging.
A radio interview I did on the subject of blogging.
A radio interview I did on the subjects of social media and SEO.
A newspaper interview with my picture (in my red room) on Staying Positive.
An interview I did with Murray Newlands on affiliate marketing and business in general.
A health care interview I was a part of on Persuasive Compassion.
Finally, I’m listed as one of the top Baby Boomer Men of 2010 by Boomer Diva Nation.
So, did I put myself out there enough in 2009? Nope; I need to do even better in 2010!
Are You Using Social Media For Promotion?
Posted by Mitch on Nov 12, 2009
This is the first of a two part series on social media. The first article is asking if you’re using social media to promote yourself, whatever that “self” is supposed to be. The second article will be asking how are you doing it, and it’ll be more than just asking which sites you’re going to. Of course I’ll be telling some of my stuff also, but with the opening, I now give myself a place to do an internal link once I’ve written both posts. Method to the madness; and so we begin.
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By now, everyone should know what I mean by social media, but I’m not going to take any chances. Social media is where people have the opportunity to interact with each other within a controlled environment of some type. Actually, back in the day, we used bulletin board systems to talk to each other, and in many ways that was the earliest bit of social media out there. Then we had early chat rooms, and Usenet, which was a lot of fun initially.
The problems were interesting back then. You could only spend 30 minutes to an hour on bulletin board systems before you got kicked off. Chat rooms weren’t close to being private, and one night I tried talking to over 30 people at the same time for almost 2 hours; never did that again. Usenet was interesting, but sometimes it took too long, got strangely heated, you’d see posts in multiple groups, and eventually it got taken over by pornographers and spammers.
Today’s social media seems to be more social, strange at that sounds. Instant messaging is more personal. Websites such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Ryze can be more personal, with options of being more participatory. Second Life actually allows you to be something else entirely different. And Twitter is instantaneous gratification if you want it, and that actually works best if you care to build up relationships. To a degree, blogging in today’s world is also a form of social media, because fewer people are using blogs as diaries, instead either talking about issues, points of views, or selling something such as products or their business knowledge. And of course there are forums I also belong to.
I participate in all of the above except Second Life. There were other sites I had joined, but none of them really did anything for me. Even Ryze isn’t doing much for me these days, as I’ve cut back from my high ever of 11 groups to only one. However, the other sites are doing some interesting things for me, as long as I’m participating in some of the processes that I’m being afforded.
Now, can I say I’ve made any money from any of them just yet? Not definitely, that’s for sure. Well, I’ve made a little bit from blogging, so I do have to throw that in there. I got a speaking engagement once because of my business blog. Two of my blogs have generated a little bit of Adsense money, and this blog actually got a sale of a CJ product once. And I negotiated a writing assignment with a couple of people through IM (instant messaging for the uninitiated), which means I made money there also. And Digital Point forum has garnered me a few clients that I still have as far as writing goes.
As for promotion, Twitter has gotten me quite a few interviews. Both my business blog and this one got me other interviews. Though this blog lost its PR (page rank), it’s still looking pretty good on Alexa, though I still want to crack that 100,000 number one of these days. I mentioned all those followers on Twitter, and I’ve talked to many of those people, including Guy Kawasaki, whose book I helped edit, then got a signed copy of.
And I continue to try to figure out more ways I can use these different social media opportunities. So, I ask once more; are you using social media for promotion?
Getting Positive Publicity Through Interviews
Posted by Mitch on Oct 24, 2009
Here’s a truth; I want to be famous. I want to be well known. And I want to make money from it. I don’t want to be infamous; I don’t want to have to do something illegal or be outed for something bad to get that fame. I like to think my integrity is higher than that.
I’ve given this a lot of thought and come to this conclusion. The best way to get positive publicity is through doing interviews. This, of course, presupposes that you’ve done something that’s worth getting interviewed about. However, if you have this part covered, it’s the best way to go.
To get interviewed, you just might have to contact someone and make a pitch about why you would make a good candidate. If you’re lucky to have done something already, someone else might ask you for an interview. When this happens, you at least know that someone knows about you, which helps make things go easier later on.
Being interviewed is also a big part of marketing. It’s the reason movie stars go on talk shows when they have a new film coming out. It’s the reason musicians show up in places they wouldn’t want anyone to ever see them, because they want to promote their new album (heck, do people still call it that?). I’ve talked about marketing often on this blog; this is one of those most positive things anyone can have the privilege of doing to help promote themselves.
Basically, there are three different types of interviews, and they help you, or hurt you, in different ways. Let’s look at these three.
The first type of interview is as a part of a piece that will have other people’s opinions at the same time. The best part about an interview like this is that you have the chance to not only focus your message in a short period of time, but if the interview goes well you might get your business name mentioned in the piece as well. The bad thing about an interview like this is that you never know which line the interviewer will use of yours, so it’s possible that they’ll use your line to highlight something negative. An example of this type of this interview I was a part of, which I found while writing my article on searching for your own name on search engines.
The second type of interview is a written interview of some fashion only about you. This can be in a magazine, blog, or newspaper article of some sort. With most of these, you may have the same problem as with the first type of interview, that being that you could say a lot of things that you felt makes you look good, only to find that the interviewer decided against using most of it. The best part, of course, is that it’s all about you, and if the interview is positive, you look good and, hopefully, your business and reputation gets a nice boost. An interview that could help highlight this is doing an interview on another blog. And, actually, this recent interview I did with Jim Turner on this blog is a pretty good example.
The third type of interview is the best, that being a live interview. This can either be on live radio or television. If you’re confident enough to be in front of a live audience, you can be an instant hit if you come across well, and your message will be unfiltered. The downside, of course, is if you’re uncomfortable, or look uncomfortable, and give one or two word responses instead of coming across as easy going and someone people might like to work or talk with. This type of interview can make or break your career. An example of that is an interview I did with Beverly Mahone of BAM Enterprises, which, if you’d like, you can listen to, as I talked about the concept of reinventing oneself; this is an MP3 file.
Sometimes the person doing the interview isn’t all that good, so you take risks with your reputation in those instances. Still, most of the time people will understand if you were good and the other person wasn’t up to snuff, and if you handle it all well, then your message will still come across properly and you’ll be better off in the end. Nope, not giving any examples there.
Getting interviewed means you’ve at least made some kind of dent into the consciousness of another person. If you handle it properly, you could be on your way to great things happening in your life and career. I love being interviewed, just as I like getting other people to allow me to post interviews with them here. I think everyone can learn something from an interview, and some of us can gain something from being interviewed as well.
So, who else wants to interview me? 
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