How to Get A Million Dollars In
FREE Publicity For Your
Portrait & Wedding Studio

Using free publicity is ideal for the portrait photographer. It’s easy to find ideas and strategies for creating interesting news items. After all, this is glamour business we’re in, isn’t it? Good thing we’re not in the widget business or any boring commodity or service. People love most things about photography. It’s exciting, it’s glamorous.

The possibilities are endless so there is no excuse for not coming up with and getting tons of free publicity for your studio.

Where to go after publicity?

There are several places you can go after free publicity, but first you have to decide on the actual geographic area that you need to pursue. You might be like me, serving a community and have no real ambition to go after the international or national stage. Although you could use all the strategies in this report to go after any size market, local, state or provincial or national.

It should be fairly obvious and goes without saying., but it’s always a good idea to simply look at what your goals and objectives are. For me that was simple. I work in a city of 96,000, with an outlying market of an extra 60,000 that feeds off the main city.

There is a daily newspaper, a biweekly newspaper, several radio stations and a TV station. I’ve had success getting publicity from all these media. I’ve had many newspaper articles in all the local newspapers, year after year, and I was on the local television station on several occasions.

You might be thinking to yourself “whoopeedeedooo, local news papers and television shows...give me a break!...” Okay, so you have much bigger dreams and ambitions then appearing in your local hick television interview program. That’s cool. I say go for it. But don’t underestimate the effect small city publicity can have on your business.

There is nothing wrong with using free publicity to grow as big as you want, but generally most studio owners will be very well done with local media coverage. It will help their studio gain exposure better than anything.

If you live in a city that is much larger, you may have to come up with bigger ideas and bigger more appealing angles to feature your story or idea. Smaller towns and cities are easier to penetrate.

You might feel that the big city in some ways will put you at a disadvantage, but this is not the case. Many feel that when you are in a smaller community you have the community feeling, whereas in a larger city you loose that feeling.

Likewise, if you are in a big city, you could, and should, seek smaller sections of the city and pursue those areas. Or you could go after the entire city. And if you have big hopes, dreams and aspirations go national. The same strategies for acquiring them are used and shown in this report.

Smaller areas will be easier to penetrate and more willing to highlight “one of their own”. For example, if you live in Mesa, part of Phoenix, use the media that is proprietary to Mesa. I’m not sure but am willing to bet that Mesa has a newspaper. Maybe not a daily, but one nevertheless. These areas are little gold mines and should be the first step you take in your pursuit of free publicity.

You would still want to go after the bigger city, but do not ignore the specific area you work and live in.

Make a list of all the possible media in you area. If you want to consider going big, then put ‘em on your list. Write down all the mailing address’s, emails, fax and phone numbers of the key people in the key departments.
When you discover what possible media contacts you can make in your area, you can start on creating press releases and ideas for your press releases. This is simple really. But first things first. You must recognize the golden rule of using media for free publicity.

Your pitch must be interesting and of value to their audience. Otherwise forget it. You could be pitching about the local ladies bridge club annual bake sale, and you could make that interesting, because it’s community and it’s of interest to the community. But if your writing about how great you are, your studio etc then forget it.

Listen, there are a variety of ways to craft an angle for media exposure with your studio, and I’ll help you uncover a great many ideas and get your creativity going. But do not make the same rookie mistake that many first timers make, and that is talk about their own place (boring!!) without any benefit to the audience, and expect free publicity.

I can remember watching videos from Denis Reggie, the wedding photographer who gained national media attention. Denis would get onto all kinds of national level and city level talk shows using the hook that he was going to talk about something very simple– cameras and how the average person can become better photographers using them.

Denis had the benefit in his bio of having photographed many famous weddings. This may have carried some weight, or may have been the main pulling power when those in charge at the media gave him consideration, but he still had to use some other hook to get them to get him on the show. Denis would have known this, otherwise he may not have had all the success he had with media and the tons of free publicity he amassed.

This publicity virtually skyrocketed his name and gave him mountains of credibility. He used the power of free publicity very wisely. But let me make this one point very clear, and I think that Denis Reggie, and others who succeeded with free publicity in whatever industry they came from already knows, and understands, and you will too after reading this report, and that is; when you are after publicity you are infinitely much better off bringing something to the world that is not only newsworthy but something that will benefit the audience. Let me repeat that a little louder:
When you want publicity, bring something that will benefit the audience.

This is the biggest mistake. Expecting results with lame and “all about me and my studio” press releases and pitches.

Oddly enough the first step we need to do is to look at you and your studio. Take stock and create a list of your accomplishments, experience, credentials, titles, and everything that you are and have done.

I know, I said you weren't going to use your studio or yourself because that’s too much talking about yourself, but that’s not what this list is for. It will serve a unique purpose but first you must make the list. It will be helpful when you are creating press releases, and possibly for creating ideas for publicity.

So the first thing you need to do is write out a list of personal inventory about you and your studio.

Let’s analyze the press release. There are three basic components to using press releases. The press release itself, which is the first and sometimes only contact that the media sees before they decide to run your story. For the most part this is all I’ve ever used, but there are several more steps that empower the whole process.

The second part of your press release is the bio sheet. This is basic information about who you are.

The third part is the question and answer sheet.

Let’s look at each component.

The press release
This is your first contact with the media. The first thing they will see. You can mail it in, or courier, but it is much faster and easier to simply to fax it in. Remember when you listed all the local possible media and contacts. In your research you will ask for the fax number for press releases.

The main job of your release is to get media folks calling you. It will not tell the entire story. In it you must create curiosity, intrigue and have compelling reasons to have them call you. You never ever want it to be boring.

The main angles you could use are as follows:
*be controversial (speak out on something sensitive)
*have a “pet rock” (gimmick)
*solve a problem (very popular)
*be a fringe lunatic (avoid this approach)

It is 8.5x11 and one page. Do not use funny pictures or cutesy anything. No gimmicks here, just words.

In the upper left hand corner put either “For immediate release” or a time value, for example, “For release during (or before) the Christmas season”. The vast majority are immediate release.

In the upper right hand corner there are two lines: Line one– For further information contact and line two– name of person to contact. Make sure it is a person’s name, not the studio or company name.

Next, have a compelling headline. You will find some ideas at the back of this report. But remember to make your headline scream out the very essence of what the big promise, the big picture, the huge benefit that the story you are pitching is all about. One way to write a headline is ask yourself when looking at a headline idea: “ and why should that matter” and your answer will be the very nugget of truth…”it matters because……”

Make sure your release is double spaced. In your release do not take yourself too serious. It’s totally okay to have some fun. Try to solve a problem. Try to find interesting angles on common stories.

Do not under any circumstance write about your studio in the release. Any attempt at selling will fall flat. The reporter reading your release will likely say “ya, right, go buy an ad!…” as he/she chucks your release. Never sell blatantly. Instead, offer a solution to a problem. When you find a problem, make the reporter reading it aware of it. Agitate it. Then offer a solution.

The press release is three paragraphs.

The next page that is part of your release is your bio page. Remember when I asked you to do a list of your personal inventory, facts, accomplishments, titles, etc. You can draw from this list to help you create your bio sheet.

The bio page is typically single spaced. Use three paragraphs, just like the press release. You can use good testimonials about you if they are good and enhance your expertise or you main point. Stay focused in you bio sheet. Don’t cram everything into it.

The third page is called the Q&A sheet. The question and answer sheet. This will put your release in a whole new category, since most reporters don’t see them all that often. It shows you are organized, prepared and you know what your doing. Never ask questions that can be answered with a simple yes or no.

You could email your release, which does work, but follow these basic guidelines. Pitching by email can sometimes be more challenging because of the sheer number of releases the average reporter receives:
*Call and find out first that they want to use email
*In subject line do not put:
*Media release
*Information for you
*A story idea
*The name of your studio
*Use catchy words that briefly explain what your story is about. IE...
*In the body of your email the first two sentences should be very powerful to grab the reporters attention
*Try to limit your pitch to one screen of copy. Make your pitch very compelling using visual and descriptive words, but do not overdo it. Use links to outside pages that they could go to see the entire release.
*Never put more than one reporters email in the “TO:” line in your email. If you do they will all see who you sent it to and perhaps knowing it is not an exclusive story may hurt your chances.
*Send to each reporter individually, even personalizing each email wherever possible
*Use their first name, especially if you know them. If you met them before mention that in you email body
*Many reporters like to see two paragraph releases. You can offer a link to another webpage with more information or simply ask them how they would like to know more. Never send an attachment with your email.

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