Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I just started my online business a few weeks ago and am looking for ideas on how to build a buzz without spending much money or none at all.  A friend had told me about getting some type of publication to do a product review.  How does one do that?  Did you do something that worked well for you? 

I`ll offer two pieces of advice. First is to check out easymedialist.com, owned by Mondo Times. You can purchase mailing lists at EML at very low cost in very specific areas of interest. I use their lists for press releases, and have had excellent responses. My total investment in lists is under $200.

As for product reviews, in a past life I was editor-in-chief of a consumer electronics magazine. We had an editor who just worked on product reviews and the New Products pages. Pick a handful of publications that are appropriate for your product, and find out who handles product at each. Just call them up if it isn`t listed on their masthead.

At my magazine, we had a fixed number of pages for New Products and basically published whatever fit. Photos were a plus. Reviews of products from the leaders in our space were initiated by the magazine and farmed out to a teamof free-lance reviewers. In those cases we`d buy the product and do the review. For lesser-known manufacturers it was typically quid pro quo, we`d offer a review of the product if they bought advertising in the magazine.

Hope that helps, and good luck!

Perry

Checked out the link you provided KidPub.  Thanks for the info!  They`re really affordable and it beats sitting in a Borders looking through all those mags for contact info :)


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Business should be all FUN and not work.

Soy Candles by Purbliss Candle Co

CB Photography

That`s easy. My colleage and I write artices and submit them to a couple hundred sources for a very Inexpensive fee.
http://www.eMarketMe.com

Thanks for the input KidPub!  I just got my Mondo membership and am drafting my Press Release.  Put some good vibes out there

Hi Everyone,

There is some good advice here. And in addition to using all of the free sites and low-cost services to help build awareness and SEO, it`s also a good idea to make contact with targeted media members directly.

By starting media relationships, you are more likely to get a feature story about your product or service in the future.

Just my two cents...

Thanks,

Melanie

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Melanie Rembrandt
CEO, Rembrandt Communications®, LLC
Visit www.rembrandtwrites.com for valuable PR tips and SEO copywriting help!
Twitter: @RembrandtWrites

Another great resource is Peter Shankman`s Help a Reporter Out (HARO) twitter/ email list. It`s a group of about 50,000 people in all walks of life, and free to sign up and use. Reporters, bloggers, authors, journalists, and others send requests three times per day via the list looking for experts to help them with their story. For example, this past week I sent out a request looking for Young-Adult authors who would like to be interviewed for a monthly feature on my site. I honestly expected four or five repsonses...how many YA authors could there be on the list?...and received OVER 100 emails from authors who wanted to participate.

Peter also send our urgent HARO requests on Twitter.

On the flip side, I respond regularly to reporters working on stories in my areas of expertise. It doesn`t cost anything, and help establish me and my company as the `expert` in the field.

Good luck with HARO!

Perry

Thanks KidPub.  I signed up for the email list.  Hopefully, there`s a reporter looking for something that is relevant to my business.

Wonderful! Don`t be discouraged if you don`t receive replies, I`ve found that most reporters are too busy (or think they are) to respond to every email they receive from a HARO request.

Perry