Hey!
Happy Monday! Way to do your Money Monday business, be that sending invoices in the morning, paying a bill, or addressing your customer service questions right away.
In the Publicity department, emails have started coming in asking us about how and when to pitch Holiday Gift Guides, for those amazing opportunities to showcase your designs, or special services you offer around the holidays.
Truth Bombs: Holiday Gift Guides Are Done!
Sadly for your todo list today, the print magazine editors put these together in July, August and a little bit in September. Here’s a special video message about it:
Really? Nooo....
Yes. So your job now is to sleuth around in Hashtags and get your Instagram game on, hard. In fact, if you wanted to activate an Instagram Ads campaign right now, we'd advise it, since this holiday season is so clogged with everyone trying to show you their must-have gift ideas. Listen or watch this Training TuneUp about building buzz in social media:
[GIFT GUIDES] How to Work with Social Media Influencers for Holiday Buzz and Beyond
Start collecting great Hashtags that will get your gift ideas in front of the right people. See Tin Shingle's huge Hashtag Cheat Sheet, which includes hashtag collections for a variety of industries and interests.
Listen/watch to this TuneUp that we begged you to listen to in July when you were at the pool or on summer camp drop-off:
[GIFT GUIDES] TuneUp: The Ultimate Holiday Gift Guide Pitching Guide
Don't Not Know This Again
Tin Shingle gives you as-it-happens learning. We call this "In The Trenches Training." We're business owners just like you. So you're going to get training in your language, in a way you understand.
1. Watch the Training TuneUps
The first Wednesday at 3pm EST of every single month, you can call into a free Training TuneUp that gives you a breakdown of what media is working on when: Magazines, TV, Blogs, Social Media. This Training TuneUp is recorded and added to our library of TuneUps, which you can access here.
2. Plot out when You'll Pitch Magazines - In What Month
Easily remind yourself! Tin Shingle's easy to use Template is designed in Excel and works in Google Drive for you to organize when you'll pitch what kind of media outlets. Download it here.
Members of Tin Shingle (Level 3 +) can access these recordings for free at any time.
All Is Not Lost!
Pitch Valentine's Day Gift Guides - Right Now
Seriously. October and November are the times when the big print magazines are putting together their Valentine's Day issues. Listen to this Training TuneUp for ideas on how to pitch:
[PR] TuneUp: Preparing for Valentine's Day Gift Guides - The Early Bird Edition with Kelly Kepner
How Do I Find Anyone To Pitch?
Who Even Cares About My Business?
We have a list of writers, producers and editors who are looking for very specific things. Like "Social Media and Body Image." Who knew? We do, now, after we research them and put them into our Media Contact Database (available to Level 4 All Access Members).
Your job is to find these writers, and get in front of them with a "pitch" aka an email you send to them with an idea for a story on your business.
Meanwhile, List Your Gifts Ideas
In Tin Shingle's Holiday Gift Guide!
Tin Shingle's Shopping Guide is a living Shopping Guide that anyone can search through, but only Tin Shingle members can add to. Gift ideas for anyone: Foodies, Book Readers, Jewelry Lovers, Corporate Client Gifts. Don't see something that fits? Email us. We'll create a new category to fit your business (service or product).
Adding to it is easy. We made you a video of directions:
Note For PR Agencies:
Adding your clients to Tin Shingle's Shopping Guide is a great idea! But they will need their own Level 2 Directory Membership for promotion on Tin Shingle's website. They can activate that level of membership here.