Bounty Rules at Make-A-Messterpiece

How's this for marketing? Today we visited Make-A-Messterpiece -- a creative art studio for kids. Their slogan is "Say Yes to the Mess!"

They sell messy packages that include painting, drawing, playing with bubbles, making crafts, learning about science, cooking and more.

Some of the titles of their activity stations are: Kids' Creative Kitchen, Bubble'ology, DrumRoll, Lil' Sprouts and Experimentation Station.

Well, this fun, messy place has found a huge sponsor in Bounty paper towels. What a great idea! Every mess needs to be cleaned up, right? So, why not use the best paper towels on the planet?

You can see from the pictures that the Bounty logo is found all over the place -- especially at the hand-washing stations!

Their website works the Bounty sponsorship in well by telling moms part of the benefit of kids visiting this creative studio is that they will also learn how to clean up after themselves!

On a side note, they use Charmin toilet paper in the bathrooms -- each toilet paper roll has the Charmin logo painted above it on the wall! I didn't feel right taking a picture in a bathroom, so you'll just have to imagine that one!

Anyway, if you want to see more about Make-A-Messterpiece, visit www.makeamessterpiece.com!

Cool stuff!

Professional accomplishments land Tina Haisman in Vidette Hall of Fame

I accepted one of the greatest honors of my professional career this weekend. I was inducted into the Vidette Hall of Fame with three other outstanding Illinois State University alumni.

I worked at the Daily Vidette, the ISU student newspaper, from the first day of my freshman year until the last day of my senior year.

HOF Inductees Marc Lebovitz, Tina Haisman and Bill Mulvihill
pause for photos with Vidette General Manager Rick Jones.

The Daily Vidette has long been one of the most successful student newspapers in the country. I am grateful to have been afforded the opportunity to be a part of it during my time at ISU.

Among the reasons listed for my induction were the accomplishments I made while at the Vidette, including the fact that I was the first Business Manager to collect over $100,000 in one calendar month.

Several of my professional accomplishments were also mentioned, including my accreditations, certifications, awards and even the infamous Million Dollar Coupon campaign.

To say that I am honored would be an understatement. What a thrill!

For more information on my public relations consulting and writing business, visit www.haisman.com.

Top 3 Social Media Content Best Practices

Took another webinar yesterday about social media -- got a few great tips and reminders. 

Here are my top 3:

1. When writing social media content follow the rule of thirds:

• 1/3 about you/your brand
• 1/3 about something you've learned (to share)
• 1/3 should be a conversation -- actually interacting with members of the community.

2. Be sure to re-purpose your social media content -- for example well-written, consumer-friendly releases can become blog posts.

3. Including multimedia in your social media release increases the chances of it being clicked on.

Just thought I'd share! It's always good to remind ourselves about the best practices that are out there!

Inspiration from a Webinar

I love feeling inspired and was lucky enough today to participate in a webinar that gave me that satisfaction. I found several action items I'd like to work on for myself and my clients! I know better than to try to tackle all of them at once, but I shouldn't have any trouble picking one to start with!

The webinar was titled 7 Steps for Small Business Success and was facilitated by John Jantsch, author of Duct Tape Marketing.

Here are my three favorite action steps!

• A strategy to grow your business. Find and describe your IDEAL customer -- not just a good customer -- an IDEAL one. An ideal customer is one that values you, is profitable and refers you. Once you find them, analyze them -- demographics, psychographics, geographics and behavior. Get a crystal clear picture of your ideal customer.
• I love that! Why are we looking only for "customers," when we could be looking for the IDEAL customers?
• A tactic for differentiating yourself in the marketplace. Copy and paste into Word the first paragraph of your website. Do the same for one of your competitors. Black out all references to both of your business names. Then, read them and see if you can tell them apart. Have your employees and clients read it for you as well. This will show you if you are making yourself stand out online. 
• What a great tool to get you to spruce up your website copy if it needs it!
• A tool for media relations. Identify five or six key journalists in your community or industry, and put them in Google Alerts so you get updates on what they write. Start commenting on their articles, blogs and send them information you have when appropriate. 
• We all know about building relationships with journalists, but I just loved the simplicity of accomplishing this tactic.

The webinar also listed a few interesting Internet statistics that you can read about in the graphic above. Enjoy! 

Tina Haisman now offering Public Relations Coaching

Are you a small business owner, entrepreneur, overwhelmed public relations professional or non-profit professional who needs guidance on how to get your business noticed by potential clients and the media? Have a limited PR budget, but understand the importance of PR? Can't afford to hire a full-service firm but would like some professional guidance? 

Hire a Public Relations Coach!

As your Public Relations Coach, I can help you:

• Craft an effective public relations plan
• Identify your goals and set achievable objectives
• Determine target audiences
• Devise effective PR strategies to reach your audiences
• Develop powerful public relations messages
• Determine the appropriate media to target with your message
• Prepare for media interviews
• Navigate the social media scene
• Teach you how to write a compelling media release

This service combines my 16 years of public relations experience with my Master Life Coach certification to inspire, motivate and empower my clients to achieve public relations success. Contact me to inquire about pricing!

Just another day in the media world

Last week I wrote about how excited I was about being contacted by NBC Nightly News. They were going to write a story about beach restoration projects and present both sides of the issue -- or so I was told. The story did not turn out that way at all, in fact, it landed on the "Fleecing of America" series.

What to do for my client now??? I work with another PR firm in representing the ASBPA, and we decided to take a two-pronged approach. I would write my contact at NBC directly with my disappointment, and the President of ASBPA would write a more public response to the piece.

The link to the story is here. Scroll to the program titled Beachfront Facelifts.

Following is the letter I sent to the producer I worked with...Here is the link for the official ASBPA response.

Dear NBC Producer (Name left off intentionally):

To say that I am disappointed by the Fleecing of America Story about “Beachfront Facelifts” would be an understatement.

When you contacted me, you did not reveal this story was for the “Fleecing of America” series. You presented the story as a balanced article about both sides of the issue – but that is not what we saw on the news last night. (Even though I've been told the interviews conducted with ASBPA representatives were thorough.) Out of a two-minute, 40-second piece, you dedicated only 24 seconds to the pro-beach restoration point of view.

The piece contained opinionated words and phrases such as “lost cause” and “futile” to describe efforts to restore America’s beaches. You aired Orrin Pilkey’s unsubstantiated phrases, such as “ignorant” and “societal madness,” to describe his radical (and extreme minority) view of beach restoration. You accused contractors and homeowners about caring only for the almighty dollar.

It seems to me, this story offered nothing more than a rehash of prior reporting on this subject, rather than facts and figures that might offer viewers a context in which to frame the issue and decide for themselves.

Allowing only 24 seconds for ASBPA to respond did not offer sufficient airtime for facts that support beach nourishment, such as:

• Beaches offer a good return on the federal investment: Every federal dollar spent on beaches brings in more than $300; every dollar spent on a restored beach brings $4-$5 back to taxpayers at all levels of government.

• A healthy beach protects the #1 U.S. industry … tourism. If U.S. beaches aren’t maintained, visitors (and the jobs they bring) will go elsewhere.

• A wide beach provides protection for homes, habitat and infrastructure. Money spent to maintain beaches should significantly reduce the federal money necessary to help communities recover after most coastal storms.

• 50% of our population lives within 50 miles of the coast. That’s where people want to be and that’s where the people’s money needs to be invested.

• Beaches are part of a larger and interdependent coastal environment. Loss of a sandy beach has a ripple effect through the entire coastal ecosystem.

• Coastal management is a crucial part of coastal commerce:

    o The navigation that brings in goods.

    o The recreation that brings in visitors.

    o The habitation that makes communities thrive.

• Beaches attract twice as many visitors as our national parks, yet they receive a fraction of the federal funding spent annually on those parks.

There’s one more point I’d like to make: In the story about the flooding in Fargo, ND, which aired just before the beach story, your correspondent interviewed a woman from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers who described how a diversion canal would help reduce flooding in that area in the future. The correspondent then said funding is needed to fix the problem and install the diversion canal.

But where do you think that funding will come from? The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is funded by the U.S. government -- by tax dollars. How is protecting riverfront residents from these annual floods viewed with sympathy while protecting beachfront residents from exceptional (and certainly not annual) storm erosion deemed to be "fleecing"?

The Corps is also the agency responsible for carrying out the majority of federal beach nourishment projects to create wider beaches, which serve as coastal levees – a better barrier against coastal flooding.

I am sincerely disappointed in the way this story was handled.

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Tina Haisman

ASBPA Media Relations

Workin' in the Media Biz

I had the distinct pleasure of receiving an email and call from a producer with NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. How exciting for this Fort Myers, Florida-based girl!

The call was about my client, The American Shore and Beach Preservation Association (ASBPA). Nightly News is looking to do a story about the pros and cons of shoreline protection. They did the story many years ago, and are looking to revisit it again.

Shoreline protection is a highly debated topic in the coastal world. The engineers and scientists involved with ASBPA are very proactive concerning protecting America's shorelines, but there are scientists who are against it. I won't go into all of the details here, but you can visit the ASBPA website if you want to learn more.

When I received the email, I immediately began lining up the right people for NBC to talk to -- they were all gathered in Washington, D.C., for a Coastal Summit, so it was easy! While I was working on that, the producer follwed up his email with a call, and I had the pleasure of speaking to him and getting a better idea of what the story was going to be about. After our talk, I finished arranging the people and places for the interviews and emailed him the details.

Although I wasn't in Washington to meet the reporter and oversee the interviews, my cleint, Kate Gooderham, APR, CPRC, was. She and her husband, Ken, are co-executive directors of the ASBPA. Kate and Ken said the interviews went great!

Afterward, I was surprised to recieve thanks from the producer and reporter for helping them get the interviews they needed for the story. It was as if they were truly grateful. It just surprised me, because these are big-time producers and reporters -- they are used to dealing with big-time PR people. I'm just an independent consultant.

Throughout this process, I just thought I was doing my job. How exciting to receive that gratitude! Kate said the reporter even complimented us on the ASBPA website, which is very exciting! We've worked hard to make it a great source of information about the coast!

The other exciting thing about this turn of events is that the ASBPA has had a formal media relations program in place for about a year and a half now. Our program does not target the big news outlets. We target weekly coastal newspapers with the hopes that the bigger outlets will pick up on it -- and it has been working!

It feels so fantastic to see hard work pay off! It just makes you want to keep on going! Well, it sounds like the story will air next Thursday. I'll be sure to let you know how it goes.

Got Passion?

I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing a woman from a non-profit organization yesterday. The interview is part of an annual report I am writing for a client. I won't give too much away, because we don't like to spoil the report before it is revealed in its entirety, but I was so moved by this woman that I had to share.

This woman is on FIRE for her non-profit. It is evident by the words she uses and the passionate way she speaks them. I swear, she had me near tears and ready to whip out my checkbook! All this during an interview for an annual report ... for a utility. Who'd a thunk?

I'll tease you with one quote. She said, "Give me a pencil, and I'll get a child to college." Wow. Powerful stuff. Doesn't that just give you goosebumps? She's not asking for enormous donations of scholarships -- just pencils. This woman totally moved me.

She inspired me so much that she set the tone for the entire report in my eyes. She made my job so much easier just by being passionate about hers.

I couldn't help but think, "What if everyone were that passionate about their job?" Can you imagine what we could do in this world? The mouths we could feed ... the children we could educate ... the diseases we could cure ... the possibilities are endless. The energy that radiates from a person who is that passionate about what they do is powerful.

Now I can't wait to interview the rest of the people!

Top 5 Tips to Craft a Media Release that’s worth a Million Bucks

Media releases have gained tremendous strength in recent years as search engine optimization has gained steam. Now, just by writing a news release and posting it online, you can drive visitors to your website – IF you do it right!

I learned a lot by writing and distributing the Million Dollar Coupon media release last year, so I thought I’d share a few tidbits about writing SEO releases with you in this column.

1. Write a fantastic, newsworthy release that is rich with key words targeted to your audience. Keep it short – around 500 words.

2. If you can, give your release a unique URL on your website, using key words.

3. Write a short summary to go under your headline – just one or two sentences – using as many of your key words as possible.

4. Include web page links to other pages on your web site – keep it to a maximum of one link for each 100 words in your release.

5. Take advantage of multi-media – add a downloadable photo and/or a short video. This gives journalists all the tools they need to write a story.

Although you can pay hundreds of dollars to have your SEO release distributed, there are many free and inexpensive news release distribution services out there today. You have nothing to lose by trying it!

Local PR Pro Susan Bennett, APR, CPRC told me about www.prlog.org, and a local colleague of mine, Tara Geissinger, co-founded www.onlineprnews.com. Check them out to learn more about how SEO releases can work for you!