Mark Nash of Evanston, Illinois writes:
“I am a subcriber to your ezine and it has helped this newbie PR junkie get on ‘The The Early Show’on CBS to promote my newest book ‘1001 Tips for Buying and Selling a Home’ as well as get a nationally syndicated monthly real estate article with byline.
“I have hit a publicity lull and need advice from your readers on how I can jump-start my book PR.”
The Publicity Hound says:
The obvious angle is the red-hot real estate market. You can provide background, insight and commentary on many issues. For example:
—Real estate agents ALWAYS say the time is right to buy, regardless of how high interest rates are. With prices skyrocketing, is it still the right time? Or might the market level off soon?
—A local financial planner says he thinks (naturally) stocks are a much better investment than the real estate market, based on returns from the last 40 or so years. If you disagree, why?
—Is real estate being priced so high that it’s out of reach for first-time home buyers? If so, what are some ways around that problem?
—Are there any sections of the country that aren’t seeing prices rise as rapidly?
Offer yourself as a resource to real estate reporters and be sure to mention your book. Authors automatically have instant credibility. Also, you might excerpt from 5 to 12 tips from the book that apply to today’s red-hot real estate market and send the tip sheet to business editors.
Mark,
Use what you’ve got. You’ve been on The Early Show. You’ve got a nationally syndicated byline. Now use that media credibility to get bookings on other shows. The media is very competitive. They will want you once they see someone else has used you. Look at the chapters of your book, look at the current real estate trends and pitch a new angle to competing media. Offer an exclusive. Send links to your byline. It’s all right there in front of you. Just step outside of yourself for a minute, so you can look at yourself objectively and see what you really have. You can work your national syndication all sorts of ways to all sorts of media: men’s media, women’s media, and more with angles on retirement, buying for your family (upsizing), home downsizing, etc. The sky truly is the limit.
Good luck!
Ayana Glaze
The PR Help Desk
http://www.getprhelp.com
ayana@getprhelp.com
I’d first like to know what your goal is in getting more publicity. Is it to sell more books? Is it to become better known as an expert in real estate so that you can parlay that into additional business for yourself?
If one of your primary goals is to sell more books, here’s an idea that may work for you. Approach real estate agents in different markets and encourage them to give your book away to their clients and prospects as a way of building relationships that can lead to more business for them. Owners will greatly appreciate receiving a book like yours from these agents.
You could even consider allowing the agents to have you print hundreds or thousands of copies of your book with their name as a “co-author” along with yours. This would give them more prestige with the people they are handing the books to, and you’ll get a lot more books distributed by doing this. In this situation you’d probably want to give agents exclusive rights as a co-author of your book for the particular geographical area they’re working in.
The above approach has already been working very successfully for authors of other real estate books.
In addition, consider contacting real estate offices and encouraging them to host events where you are the speaker and you have your books available for sale also. The homeowners who attend an event like this will be people interested in buying and selling, and these are exactly the kind of people real estate offices want to attract into their places of business. Have the offices encourage their agents to get the word out to all the homeowners and potential buyers in the area, and you’re guaranteed to have yourself a successful event almost everytime.
As an additional thought to what I wrote above, when working with a real estate office to host an event where you are the speaker, you could work out an arrangement with the office where they will give every attendee a copy of your book for free. The office, of course, would pickup the tab for this and buy the books directly from you.
This would guarantee you “selling” your book to 100% of the people attending the event. It would also give prospective attendees added incentive to attend the event itself, which will increase the number of attendees and the overall success of the event.
Any real estate company advertising an event like this and/or sending out flyers offering a free copy of your book to all who attend, is going to enjoy a huge, huge turnout for the event.
Great insight! I’ve bookmarked your site and will be back soon.