If you find yourself in a job or career you don’t like, hang with us for this fifth in a series of posts about how to fix that.
Chapter five of Ernie Zelinski’s inspirational book, Career Success without a Real Job is entitled, “Not Just An Unreal Job, But a Real Business.” As the title implies, if you want to succeed in your unreal job, you need to treat it like a business rather than a hobby.
The difference between a business and a hobby? Marketing! If that word intimidates you – if it brings on visions of banging on people’s doors and begging them to buy from you – take heart! Zelinski proves twelve suggestions to publicize your product or service without having to turn yourself into a salesperson.
1. Get yourself featured in publications
Start locally. Write for you city’s magazine or your small town’s newspaper. Then when you get more polished, submit articles to relevant national publications.
2. Get interviewed on a talk radio show.
Talk radio hosts are always looking for guests to interview. So are many podcast hosts. Look around the Internet and you will find information on how to get yourself in line for free and long-reaching publicity.
3. Appear on the T.V. news.
For example, you might plan some kind of celebration and invite the local media. If there’s no hurricane, earthquake, oil spill or election going on, the media is desperate for any halfway interesting show to fill their airways.
4. Write a regular newspaper column.
5. Publish a monthly newsletter that goes to subscribers and to all media contacts.
You might offer something free in exchange for people subscribing, such as a free tip sheet or informational booklet.
6. Connect your product to a charity or cause.
For example, if you’re marketing a green cleaning product, talk up how its use will help save the environment.
7. Volunteer as an “expert source” for media people.
Sign up at helpareporter.com, and you may be contacted for whatever information you are an expert on by a media person writing an article on that topic.
8. Speak at conferences and/or seminars.
9. Conduct a survey related to the product and announce results with a press release.
Search “press release”, and you will get a list of both free and paid press release services. (Hint: the ones you have to pay for will bring better results.)
10. Sponsor a contest to promote the product and announce it to the media.
For example, if you’ve written a book, you might have people submit relevant stories. The best one will appear in future printings of the book, and the winner will receive a package of goodies related to the book’s topic.
11. If you are an author, write letters to the newspaper editor and list the name of your book with your name.
12. Provide producers of a talk show with a show or theme idea.
Related to your product or service, of course! The idea is that they will ask you to be one of the experts on their show.
There are many more ways to get free publicity detailed in Jay Levinson’s book Guerrilla Publicity, but the above list is certainly enough to get your brain cranking out ways to turn your Unreal Job into a successful business!
