EDUCATION BASED MARKETING – PARTNER WITH CREDIBILTY
I read a lot… mostly business, marketing and self improvement books.
One of the most enlightened books I ever read was Tim Ferris’s “4 Hour Workweek.” Brilliant…
He talked about this simple marketing tactic.
Then two years later, I read another book…”The Education of Millionaires.” Once again…this simple tactic was mentioned.
Then I read an article written by marketer David Frey about Barbara Corcoran, one of the billionaires on the TV Show Shark Tank. And once again…this simple tactic popped up…only this time, it was the best example of this tactic I ever heard!
Here’s the story…enjoy (AND IMPLEMENT!)
Yesterday I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed and found an interesting link about a women named Barbara Corcoran.
Barbara is a real estate mogul, entrepreneur, and business professional, as well as one of the judges on the T.V. show, “The Shark Tank”.
She started her entrepreneurial conquests with a $1000 loan, eventually creating a $5 billion-dollar company that sold for $66 Million in 2001.
You may be wondering how Barbara took a $1000 loan and became so successful…
Well, after she started her tiny real estate company in New York, all her agents were upset because she wasn’t spending any money on advertising.
The problem was there wasn’t any extra to spend….
Barbara decided to turn her attention to a tactic that involved reaching out to the media through a series of informational reports.
She took some of the best properties she sold that year, divided them by the selling price, and wrote a one page report about the average selling price of homes in Manhattan.
She then sent her reports to almost every news writer at the New York Times. It was called the “Corcoran Report” and guess what happened…
NOTHING!
About two weeks later she happened to open the real estate section and sure enough, there it was! A headline that read, “New York Real Estate Prices Hit All Time Low”.
The article quoted her statistics and no one even called or contacted her regarding the information she sent them? Regardless, Barbara’s tiny real estate company now had an advertising partner that would be instrumental in the growth and exposure for years to come.
Barbara then started submitting more and more reports that used different types of statistics and information regarding her industry. It made perfect sense… The media likes a good news story but they LOVE statistics. Statistics and real information adds credibility to any news story and the public expects the media to publish only credible information.
This new type of Cross-Media is referred to as “Contact Marketing” or “Education Based Marketing”.
It is as simple as creating informational reports and sending them to the media.
Start by asking yourself this question, “What kind of statistics based report or articles can I create that we can publish in our respective industry.”
From there you can easily implement this strategy by starting with your local news stations and websites or going directly after the big guys, or both!
Just put together a strong email, article, statistics, and some solid information about your industry. You can usually find a publishing directors email address on media company website.
Don’t be afraid to keep sending your reports until you get a response, and remember, include relevant, credible information!