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How to get free publicity over the holidays

Dear Whitney,
I need your help. I want to get my store and products included in the holiday guides for magazines like ReadyMade, Make and Craft. I'm being pulled in too many directions and it's making me loose focus on doing PR for my business. What can I do? - Overwhelmed

Dear Overwhelmed,

I know how hard it can be to do your own PR and marketing. I'm in the process of printing my first book (called Media Tips for Authors: How to Get Free Publicity for Your Book); artists to come next) and have to promote and market it, too, so I'm trying to practice what I preach!

I know you said you want to get into those national magazines and here's the challenge: most of them are three to six months ahead and have already locked down the content for their holiday issues.

When you can't find time to focus on PR, make it simpler; pick one small project to focus on in a day or a week, whatever you have time and energy for right now.

There are still plenty of ways to do a holiday PR push. Here are some ideas:
1. Jump on their websites/blogs of those mags to join the conversation and see if there is an authentic way you can talk about your store and products and include your link.
2. When you write a post for one website/blog, you can reuse it on the next one to save time as long as you don't just copy and paste. Tweak it a little to make it relevant to the site and readers.
3. If you still want to try to get some free publicity, I'd suggest you try pitching some of the smaller, local newspapers and magazines that don't have such long lead times.

Want more free tips, ideas, information, and inspiration to take your business to the next level? Click here to sign up for The Biz Bite.

Posted by at September 29, 2008 10:11 a.m.
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