Service Based Business Society Podcast

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Welcome to the show.

Mickie Kennedy:
Thanks for having me.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
So let's dive right in and get to know a little bit more about you. How did you get into PR?

Mickie Kennedy:
It's a long story, but I'll give you the short version. I was in graduate school pursuing a master's of fine arts and creative writing with an emphasis in poetry. And my career goal was to wait tables by day and write poetry by night. And so after I graduated, I spent a summer doing just that and realized that I wasn't writing or reading. I just felt like.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Okay.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Okay.

Mickie Kennedy:
psychologically drained at the end of the shifts, my knees hurt, my ankles hurt. And I just felt like this is not easy. So I decided I wanted an easy, safe office job. And I applied all over Northern Virginia and D.C. And I finally secured a position at a telecom research startup as employee number three. And they said, hey, you have a writing background, figure out press releases for us and send them out.

And so we published a lot of telecom data across different countries. And so I would pick apart the anomalies and try to figure out what the story behind those were, and I'd bring those into a press release format and send them out to the media and they got picked up widely, you know, financial times, economist, uh, Washington post, uh, you know, all the major publications, as well as telecom trades, uh, picked it up. And I felt like, wow, why aren't other small businesses doing this? Because.

we would see such an influx of sales after we get this media attention. And I just felt like, you know, this is an opportunity for lots of other small businesses as well. And that gave me the idea for, you know, starting e-releases to serve small businesses, to get their message out. It was basically just email when we launched where I had reached out to about 10,000 journalists over a year and asked if I could send them press releases and then, you know, went live.

And I was just a matchmaker. If I had a, you know, a fashion client, I'd send them to the fashion publications that I had in my database. And over time PR Newswire, which is the oldest and largest Newswire press releases approached me and said, Hey, you should also consider using our service. And I was like, Hey, my clients are small business owners. We're spending under $500. You're charging like $1,500 for a 600 word press release to go out nationally.

Tiffany-Ann Bottche:
Thank you.

Mickie Kennedy:
And surprisingly, they didn't walk away. They just felt like, well, we do like the small business community. We don't serve it because our salespeople, we just wouldn't have them reaching out to small businesses. And so we found a way to work together. So all of the releases that go out through e-releases get a custom national distribution over PR Newswire and all the same trades and everything that you would get going directly to them. And you're spending considerably less.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Hmm.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
What an incredible story. Because, and I love the whole how businesses are formed. It's something, because everyone's got such a unique story. And, you know, it's funny because I would feel, you know, going back to kind of the waiting tables by day and writing by night, it's such a different, you know, the being with people, the serving, I served for years while I was in school. And as an introvert at heart, that.

being on, like serving is such a, you're dealing with people, all of like ongoing and not all people that you enjoy, the good, the bad, the ugly. And then writing is that more kind of, you know, quiet, introspective piece. So very interesting and obviously fast forward to today and how all of these pieces, because now in PR reaching out to journalists and whatnot, that isn't necessarily that, you know, that is a little bit more, have to have some.

Mickie Kennedy:
That's right.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
extrovert qualities to be able to be reaching out and kind of promoting yourself and others, businesses and whatnot as well. Very interesting. So, you know, for those who say, what is a press release? How does this apply to my business? What is that kind of quick overview of what we're really talking about? People are talking about, you know, articles and press. And so how does that apply to the average business owner?

Mickie Kennedy:
So basically, a press release is just an announcement to the media. It's written usually in a third person. You can have a first person quote, usually the principal of the company. But it could also be just someone who's the appropriate contact at the company. Sometimes it could also be a client if you're doing a product launch and you have a use case study and you share that customer's experience and then here's a quote by them. There's usually a boilerplate section towards the end about company or about

the principal at the company and a media contact. And basically what you're doing is you're just sending it out, making it available, hoping that the media will write an article based off of that. And when an article is written, we call that earned media because you've earned it. And that's the real goal. And that's where all the articles that appear in the major newspapers and lots of trade publications begin as a press release because journalists are always on the hunt for.

a good story and something that's newsworthy and hopefully your press release will engage with them. And the headline is usually the most important element because that is what they see streaming the headlines. And of course, for the same reasons, the opening paragraph is very important. You want to just start with your lead and try to hook them in and get them to read through the press release.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Right. So what types of things, you know, someone may say, I don't, I don't even know what, what I would announce for my business. What types of things to get people's minds kind of going that right direction? What types of things would you even use a press release for?

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. So, uh, could be a, uh, you know, launch of the company. It could be a reopening. It could be a pivot. We did a lot of press releases during the pandemic about companies, you know, how operations were working for them, what changes they were undergoing and, you know, what services were now being offered or no longer being offered. And, uh, you could also do, like I mentioned, product launch press releases. Those are very popular, um, personnel, uh,

type press releases where you've had a change, a new person entering the company could be as big as, you know, the president and could be as small as like an associate of HR or something along those lines. But there's also other different types of press releases. There could be, you know, you've won an award. You've, uh, you know, you're going to be presenting somewhere at a conference or something like that. Uh, there's, there's lots of, you know, anything that's a milestone to you and your business.

stands the chance that it would make perhaps a good press release. That being said, I do caution people that are approaching PR to consider starting with more strategic types of press releases, the more meaningful, the more newsworthy ones, because if you do that, you're more likely to get media pickup in a PR campaign and you really should judge PR by doing a whole PR campaign of six to eight releases. You don't have to do it all at once. You can spread it over a year and a half. If you're a small business doing

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Hmm.

Mickie Kennedy:
you know, maybe one a quarter. But you really don't want to judge it from a single press release because even the most successful people with PR generally don't get media pickup with every press release. And it is, you learn from what works and what doesn't and what your industry is engaging with. And when I talk about strategic types of press releases, you know, doing a survey or study within your industry is one that just always works. I've coached a lot of clients.

to do a survey or study and they've always done really well. And by really well I mean between like, you know, four to a dozen articles with just one press release. And I know when you say a survey, a lot of people get like, oh, this sounds like so much work. But really, you know, you can set up a survey monkey quiz, four questions per page, four pages, 16 questions overall.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Interesting.

Mickie Kennedy:
You want to ask really relevant questions that are timely, like what today is important. Are you having struggles in your business retaining people? They want to work from home perhaps? Is that a trend you've seen other people anecdotally talk about? That could be a question that you want to have there. Your marketing budget has been slashed for the next two quarters.

You know, you can ask questions like that and try to get a sense of whether people are growing and spending more money or contracting and spending less and You know other industry topics can just come in there naturally basically anything that you would be at a if you were at a conference and you would Sit around the water cooler and talk to other colleagues at other companies are really good questions that you can sort of incorporate Into a survey or study and then after you get the results

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Mm-hmm.

Mickie Kennedy:
You're going to pick the two to four most meaningful questions that had the biggest aha moments or surprises And you're going to make that the focus of the press release putting quotes in there about why you felt the numbers skewed a particular Way, and I know that I've jumped there assuming that you have an audience to send it to but if you don't it's really easy To just partner with a small or independent trade association in your industry and ask them if they'll send the survey

to their members in exchange for you mentioning them and a press release you'll be issuing. I have had some savvy trade associations ask if they can co-brand the survey between them and you, and I don't see a downside to that. But the thing I like about the small and independent trade associations over the larger ones is they don't get a lot of media attention. So they see this as a great opportunity for them as well. So they're more likely to send it through email, as well as social media to their members and get you, you know,

at least 150 respondents is the goal. Anything above that is really good. And on average, most of my customers get between two and 400 responses when they take that approach.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
So interesting. So, you know, where were you a few years ago? I was doing my MBA dissertation and there was this aspect where I needed to have this survey as part of the data I was doing. And let me tell you, getting those survey results was something else. And typically, like I feel like when it's something for education, people are more willing to help out a little. You know, it was like five questions or something, but I need, it was like, I absolutely needed a certain number of responses.

And it was like pulling teeth. It was one of the most stressful parts of my dissertation was actually getting these data points never thought to collaborate with some kind of trade organization or whatnot. So when you started with the, well, you should start with a survey. My mind immediately went, that's a no. And then as you continue, I was like, oh, so this is, but there's some inside knowledge for someone who's done it for so long, who's seen what works. And so it's very valuable, very, very valuable.

Mickie Kennedy:
All right.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
They don't talk about that when you're doing your dissertation. They say, well, you need to have this many results, so you need to do this. They don't say, this is how you get them. They don't teach you that. They just say, go get them. And you're like, I mean, I can do up a nice little survey. That's not the problem. But the people answering, that was a bit of a struggle. So awesome. OK, so you've decided that you're going to do this campaign. We know what types of events we're going to be doing them for. Now, is writing the actual press release

Mickie Kennedy:
Right.

Mickie Kennedy:
Yeah.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
You know, internally in someone's business, is that advisable? If someone has no experience, are they better off to hire? How does that work for you? Obviously you offer a service. Do you write the press releases and publish them, or do you publish other people's press releases that they've written themselves?

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. So we do offer a writing service, but I too tell most people to try to write it yourself. I feel like, you know, press releases aren't elevated writing. You may want to spend a little more time on the quote and make sure it's really, you know, has some pizzazz to it. It's powerful and concise. But I really feel like it's something that's within the capability of most people. And if you ever feel like you've written something and you're just not sure, you can always send it to our staff.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah.

Mickie Kennedy:
We usually will turn around a press release reviewing it for someone in about two business days. And we do that whether you're a client of ours or a prospective client, just to sort of help you out. The entire staff is editors, no sales people. So we just really are about education at E-Releases. So I would recommend that, you know, giving an attempt yourself. And if you're just horrible at writing, a little trick I'll tell you is go to chat GPT and say, rewrite this paragraph.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Mm-hmm.

Mickie Kennedy:
And read it to make sure that the messaging is there. But I will say chat GPT generally writes well. And I have played around with it to see if I can get it to write a press release. And it does write a really competent press release, but you have to prompt it paragraph by paragraph and you have to know what you want the press release to be about, just don't say write a press release, we're turning 10 years old this year and have it spit something out. You have to sort of build on.

what you want the opening paragraph to include, what you want the quote to talk about. But if you provide that ingredients and you don't feel like you're an amazing writer, I feel like using a tool like that is really good because at the end of the day, no one's going to be checking to see if it was written by AI like Google or something that would be on a webpage.

permanently, it's really designed to be turned into an article by a journalist and they're going to be doing the original writing.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Right, so the actual journalist is going to receive that press release, they're gonna use that as the information and then they are going to go on to actually write the article. Okay.

Okay. Yeah, it's interesting. You know, chat GPT obviously such a hot topic lately. A lot of people, uh, you know, pro chat GPT, other people not so much. I was actually having dinner with my in-laws recently and my father-in-law who isn't super tech savvy, I've talked to him about him a few times on the podcast. He says, he says, yeah, he says, have you ever heard of this chat GPT thing? And I said, Oh, have I ever? And so, you know, he's not on social media, you know, that kind of thing. So I was like, we were, we were chatting about it and

He was just in total awe of some of these things that someone else had shown him and whatnot. And I said, you know, ChatGPT could be a very powerful tool when you are prompting it correctly and when you are giving it the information. And so, you know, there's so much discussion about, well, the information it gives is wrong or this or that. And I think, you know, there's so much strength when you're giving it.

the actual content. So taking things that you've either talked about, maybe it's a lesson that you did, maybe it was a guide or something, and so you've actually written the educational piece or whatnot, and then asking it to rewrite things in a specific tone or whatnot. I think that's where, for a lot of business owners, that's a great place to get started because you're not, you know, then you can, it's still using your information, it's just writing it in a new way.

So you talked about doing a campaign for someone who wants to kind of dip their toe in the water. Is that the first step? Is that, you know, long sequence of press releases? Is there still strength in doing one and trying it out? What's that? What's the process?

Mickie Kennedy:
Well, it always starts with one. So even if you are looking to try PR, uh, you start with one and they just keep moving forward, you know, whether it's another one in a couple of months or a few weeks, it really depends on your, your capacity. And I, you know, that's why any releases were a la carte. So, uh, we do have packages available, but you know, we recognize that people who dip their toes in want to start with one and just see how it goes, see how the process works.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah.

Mickie Kennedy:
how taxing it was on them overall. And generally it's not very taxing at all. The worst case scenario is you may have a journalist contact you if they have some clarification questions or they want a different take on a different topic or something like that. But it is one of the things that I feel like starting strategically first works really well. Other types of strategic press releases are

uh, you know, perhaps identifying blind spots in your industry, um, that, uh, trade publications and people who cover your industry just aren't reporting. Um, so it's, it's surprising, but you know, a lot of times, uh, I'll ask people.

What is it in the trade publications that you wish was there? And they scratch their head and can't think of anything, but the moment you get two people together in their industry and they're starting talking about rumors in the industry and other types of trends and things like that, and sometimes they haven't been talked about. And so, you know, we, we did that research with a local carpet company in New Jersey that was dead set on getting, uh, put in floor trade publications.

And so we found out that they don't cover marketing and they don't cover, uh, basically big box home improvement stores, which is according to them, the biggest enemy for local carpet companies because they're not providing a good carpet installation process and the longevity of the carpet suffers. And so we did press releases just on that. And you know, the first one, I think got like 10 floor trade publications picked it up because it was a, a gap.

that wasn't being served currently. And as soon as the journalists read it, they're just like, wow, yeah, this is great stuff. And we continued to milk that. We continued to write about marketing and, uh, you know, competing David versus Goliath against the big box, some improvement stores and how this local carpet, the company was differentiating itself and it did extremely well. Uh, at the end of a year, they had about 30.

Mickie Kennedy:
publications that they got picked up in, fortunately a local newspaper and New Jersey magazine, but all the rest were predominantly floor trade publications. And they put them together in a big book, they called it a brag book. And every time they went to have their salesperson give a quote to someone in their home for new carpet, they would show them that they were picked up in floor trade weekly in this publication in New Jersey magazine and just sort of thumb through it. And they started converting about 17% more.

of those quotes into actual sales, which was extremely meaningful for a small business.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
When you start to, I'm a huge proponent, I talk a lot about small changes making big impact. And so sometimes it's not a complete redesign. A lot of times people are like, oh, I wanna do better and they change everything. And here's a business who was already doing their service they were obviously, and they've taken something and they've added some PR secret sauce that really, why? Why is that? Well, they...

a little bit of brand authority, a little bit of reputation, all of these pieces were adding in. And so to hear such a huge impact on the conversion and, but the actual service they're doing, that didn't change, it just helped more people see them. It helped the awareness, it helped the authority. What a, you know, such a great feel good story for the, you know, promoting PR and looking at that piece. And who doesn't want a brag book? I mean, that sounds great.

Mickie Kennedy:
Right.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
As a business owner, I actually, years ago, I knew of, you know, I had another business owner that I knew quite well. And one of his, I remember we were doing some kind of, you know, brand business vision kind of weekend. We were getting together. We were all talking. And one of his things was he wanted to be on the cover of a magazine. And as a super intro, you know, that was probably eight years ago, maybe. And you know, that was long before my social media podcast, YouTube, whatever. And I thought I would.

Mickie Kennedy:
Right.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
never want to be on the cover of a magazine. And now I'm like, ooh, cover of a magazine sounds appealing. Right? It's just so interesting how things shift and these different opportunities and whatnot. But more than just, of course, the picture on the magazine is the piece that comes with it, that it helps serve your business in a different way. And I think that's what the knowledge of this to other business owners. You know, big.

Mickie Kennedy:
All right.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Big businesses know lots about PR. A lot of times they have someone on their team that does that. But bringing that to smaller businesses is just something more unique.

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. And when you get this media pickup, it is like third party corroboration or social proof in a way. You know, that implied endorsement of a journalist writing about you, it's a huge credibility boost. And that's why I encourage my customers when they do get media pickup to share the links with their social media, share it, you know, in newsletters, with their leads and with their customers, because you would be surprised at the people who are on the fence about using your service and just probably are going to not.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yes.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Mm-hmm.

Mickie Kennedy:
fall your way. But if they were to read that and get that sort of warm feeling that you get when you read an amazing article about a company, you know, they could they could flip the other way. And the same thing with customers, customers often will get a little complacent and feel like they have to shop for a new company every couple years just to make sure they're getting the best product or the best service or the best price. And when they see you in print, they just feel more comfortable saying, yeah, we picked the right company. There's no need to shop this year.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Mm-hmm.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Absolutely, absolutely. So, you know, when we're looking at PR, a lot of business owners will be, they'll get the Instagram reach out. So, you know, what does that look like? Well, typically it's some kind of DM and someone's saying, hey, we were checking out your content, everything looks amazing. You know, we are doing this article and would love for you to be considered, you know.

Click the link here and see if you qualify. And it's usually going to cost between $500 and $800 to be listed in this list of people. Top 10 this or top 20 those or whatever. How does that tie in? How is that different? Is it different? Are those worthwhile? What's your thoughts, Mickey?

Mickie Kennedy:
Those, those are generally not worthwhile. Paying for placement generally doesn't work. It's, it's usually not organically in the publications website, the way real articles are, um, a lot of places will have so that you can pay a fee and get an article written for Forbes and other, other little places like that. And generally they're not where all the Forbes articles are. They're usually relegated to a section that gets minimal traffic.

Uh, I, I feel like, you know, paying for distribution. Yes, that's appropriate, but paying for actual placement, it's, it's not. And I just feel like it, you know, if you follow it correctly and give irresistible newsworthy, uh, content via press release, you can get that stuff organically and you can get it, you know, integrated on the site.

in the same way all their content is. And I feel like that's much more natural. It's gonna give you a lot more visitors, a lot more eyeballs. And it's just like when you send a press release, all of it gets syndicated. So this press release gets replicated on a few websites like Yahoo Finance and things like that. And some people feel like that's the end all. And there are actually a lot of companies that specialize in that, where all you get is your content syndicated to a few hundred websites and you don't reach a journalist ever.

So you will never be turned into an article. And so I feel like that as well as paid placement is kind of a distraction. And what you really are looking for is that meaningful opportunity where you do get turned into an original article contextually and exist on their site and in print where appropriate, just like any other article.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Mm-hmm.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah, I feel like some of those pieces, it really comes back to like, what is the objective? It's something we talk about often on the podcast, what is the objective? And so, you know, like for the syndication you're talking about, we have used that quite extensively for like SEO backlinks and actually linking some geo signals for GMB profiles and whatnot. But we know it doesn't serve any kind of reputation, authority boost, it's typically on very, what I would call like the D-list.

uh you know sites that don't have but and so it's from an seo perspective it offers value and i think that it comes down to knowing why are you doing something so if you're gonna you know go oh i'm gonna do this that whether it's content syndication just as our example here you know is that going to get me that brand authority that credibility that all of these things for the bragbook no it's not is it going to get you some backlinks and going to help maybe with your

And so it's kind of different strategies. And I think as long as people are very clear on what piece they're using for which strategy. So an actual press release that's going into some of these other bigger name media sites where journalists are gonna get that opportunity to read it, that serves just such a different purpose. And so in anything in business, it really comes back to what is the objective and really aligning which piece you decide to proceed with

time in your business with the desired objective of that time.

Mickie Kennedy:
Yeah, absolutely.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
So, where can someone begin that process? They've heard you talk and they're like, hey, I really wanna decide, I've decided I wanna learn more about this, I wanna get started on a PR strategy, I want a brag book. What is the next step for that person?

Mickie Kennedy:
I would recommend that, uh, they take my free masterclass. I have a video masterclass. It's less than an hour. It's a great introduction to strategic types of press releases. And these are the meaningful types of press releases that get media pickup. Um, and I feel like if you go through that video masterclass, you can basically give yourself an audit of like, yeah, this is relevant to me. I've, I've walked away with five or six really good ideas here.

And it's available at erreleases.com forward slash plan P L A N. And again, it's completely free. Um, I, I'm all about educating my clients and trying to get them to do more strategic types of press releases so that they will get the media attention that they're looking for and sort of avoid the press releases that don't, you know, I had mentioned before that, you know, um, employee hires is, uh, a popular type of press release.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Right.

Mickie Kennedy:
But the truth is that very few places pick them up outside of your local newspaper and maybe an on the move section in a trade publication and maybe a business journal or something like that. So I really feel like if you're going to spend money to go on a wire, make sure you're doing more strategic types of releases that have a better chance of getting meaningful media pickup.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Right, right. So, you know, basically the information in that press release needs to be something of substance and value that is gonna interest those journalists so that they're picking your press release to then take further to that next step.

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. Journalists are basically gatekeepers and they're very protective of their audience. And what they have to determine every time they look at a potential story is, is this going to be engaging? Is this going to excite my audience? Are they going to want to know more about this issue? And so many people approach it as here's a press release presented in a way for me to try and best sell my product. And there's ingredients missing for journalists to build, for example, maybe a whole story art.

The product launch press release is one that is often here's the product and here's a list of features. And by incorporating a use case study and having someone who had a problem, they came to use your product as a solution. These were the results they saw. Here's an amazing quote by them, you know, discussing how this product worked and how, you know, simple it was to use or whatever you want to say, you know, that

gives a lot more elements for journalists to build out a story arc, and it makes it more likely that they will choose to do an article on that.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
So if someone has an upcoming launch, kind of tying into what you just said and kind of the timing of that. So someone has an upcoming launch, whether that's their business is launching, they're going in a new direction, whatnot, should they be sending those press releases? Should they be trying to get that stuff out leading up to the launch? Or should they be waiting until things are launched? Is the press aspect to help build up to something? Or is it really more an announcement once something is taking place?

Mickie Kennedy:
I think it's completely appropriate to send it out when the product goes live for public sale. If you have some of those use case people who beta tested it and you have some results because I think that that's going to be the important difference between a product launch press release that succeeds and one that doesn't is that you've got some context and some use case so that it has a lot more elements for a potential story.

Um, you know, that being said, uh, you know, the big guys, the big companies always do product launches and very few people get to see, uh, the, the beta product beforehand. And they can afford to do that because, you know, everything that they do generally gets covered, but I think for a smaller business or someone, I think it really is important to get some opinions of people who've used the product or service and be able to incorporate that into the product launch press release.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Amazing, amazing, great, great valuable information there. So, you know, we always finish off with one tangible tip that someone can implement in their business. You know, we're really looking for those pieces that business owners can take, you know, the recommendation from the episode and really go forth. And so we've talked a little bit about, you know, the masterclass and kind of those next steps in terms of, you know, delivering that PR.

What is one more piece of advice that someone could implement in their journey towards additional coverage for their business?

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. I think when it comes to local media, my advice to people is you don't need to use a service like he releases. Um, get it yourself. If you think about it, there's probably less than 10 people in your market who would ever write about you. Find out who they are, uh, by reviewing the newspaper reviews and reviewing the local business journals. Um, if there's radio that sometimes spotlights businesses, what program that is, and then find out who the producer or Booker is of the radio or TV show.

who the writer is, the reporter who wrote the articles in your industry, and just ask for their email address and tell them you'd like to send them a tip for a story. And, you know, they're members of the community. I've never had people say they, they refuse to give me an email address. They will, and they generally try to be accessible to the community. And then just introduce yourself and your topic, you know, what it is that you feel would be really relevant. If there's something trending in your industry, like maybe going green,

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Yeah.

Mickie Kennedy:
and you're a local dry cleaners who's just incorporated all these new processes to ensure that there's no chemicals or anything hazardous or, or environmentally unsound, then you know, you can just write a few sentences explaining that maybe put a great quote in there, uh, by you. You don't have to write a whole, uh, press release for this. This is just something where you're just, you know, giving a hook and a, and a real pitch and sending it directly to them. And you know, just,

you know, own that Rolodex and try to reach out to them on a regular basis, like maybe four times a year as a goal or something along those lines. And I think that, you know, this is why, when you look at local media, many times you seem see the same small companies mentioned again, again by journalists, because when they're writing an article and they know that they can just plug in somebody and there's someone they have a relationship with, because they occasionally receive emails from them, then you have the opportunity for them to actually

reach out to you and say, hey, I'm doing this story. I thought of you. Could you give me a quote or tell me a little bit more about how this impacts your business? And I think that that's a great place to start with minimal effort. And it just takes a little bit of research initially finding out who those people are.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
And what a powerful tip, because we do see those. You see things, whether it's in the press or even podcasts, people who are guests on podcasts or whatever, and people are like, how do these people get these opportunities? And if you've never done some research into anything like that, but you do, you see someone mentioned or you see, we have a veterinarian in our community who's often on the cable news.

And so I was like, how does that one fit? And so I'm sure there's some relationship that's been built. I mean, he's been doing it for years now, but it's some relationship that's been built along the way. And so now he's featured often and then does become that voice of authority in that industry. So very interesting how that can apply to so many businesses and taking those next steps. Well, Mikey, thank you so much for being here on the podcast. Really appreciate it. So where can, let's just go over that website one more time, make sure people can connect with you.

and get that master class.

Mickie Kennedy:
Right. So our website's ereleases.com. All our social media is on the lower right. The free video masterclass is at ereleases.com slash plan, P-L-A-N. And again, less than an hour commitment. And I think you'll really walk away with some, you know, real opportunities that you could utilize to, you know, start a PR campaign.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
Well, thanks so much. Really appreciate your time.

Mickie Kennedy:
Thank you.

Tiffany-Ann Bottcher:
There we go, it's just stopping.