Last post we discussed Knowing All About You.  It is important that you know who you are and what your goals are in order to know where you want to take your group/ministry.  It is a key factor in determining how you reach your potential fans.  Hopefully by now you have prayed about it, thought about it, and come to some sort of goal to reach.  You must find your niche, your message before you can go any further.

Bob Baker, who in my opinion is a genius, has a book that he wrote entitled Unleash the Artist Within.  He says “Most people have it backwards. First BE. Then DO.  Eventually you will HAVE.  You can’t DO unless you ARE.  Reaching your potential fans shouldn’t be all about hard work and no fun.  It’s about using your creativity.  That’s that part of your brain that you put aside to become an “adult”.  Bring it back out and have fun with it.

It doesn’t hurt to try to come up with a Statement.  In the Marketing world, it’s called a Brand Identity Statement.  To do that, we need to know what a Brand is.

Brand
A trademark or distinctive name identifying a product or a manufacturer.

A Brand Identity would be how you want the consumer to perceive your product or your brand. Which would then make a Brand Identity Statement a motto, phrase, sentence, paragraph, etc, that defines WHO you are and what you do.  When we determine who we are and what we do, we can determine who our fans are going to be.  Then we can work on the best way to reach them.

Now, let’s work on that brainstorming.  We know our goals, made our statement, and now we need to “get to work”.

There’s all kinds of things we can do: 

Send news releases regularly (Joan Stewart - The Publicity Hound - offers a list of 89 reasons to send a News Release when you sign up for your email newsletter!  She also offers free articles on her site regarding publicity.)
Donate Time for Charity Events
Give-Aways, Contests
Write articles in e-zines, magazines, your website
Create an informative website
Send out an email newsletter
Get to know your local newspaper - They are always looking for interesting photo opportunities
Call your local Cable company - Find out details on creating your own TV Show
Participate in online discussion groups, message boards, etc
Billboards
Magazine Ads
Newspaper Ads
E-zine Ads
Radio Ads
Posters
Mailing Lists
Postcards
Flyers (you can even go as far as Door Hangers)
Word of Mouth
Brochures
Air Blimps

MarketingProfs.com has amazing articles you can read, one in particular which lists a lot of the above ideas.  You can find that article here. You may have to register, but it’s well worth giving them your email address!

Don’t forget that you’re going to need a way for your fans and industry to contact you.  You will probably want to think about HOW they will do this.  Web, Phone, Fax, Email, etc.  Before you start reaching fans, they need to be able to reach you.  When you have your contact information all set, paste it EVERYWHERE.  That in itself is advertising.

The best advice is to open your mind to the creativity you’ve stored away.  You’ll be surprised at what you can come up with.  Check back to my next blog to see where we go from here.

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