What promotion really is and how you can do it anywhere and everywhere

Promote : to help or encourage to exist or flourish

When you think of promotion do you automatically start thinking about advertising, posters or banner ads? Perhaps you think of sending out 1,000 pieces of direct mail or physically knocking on doors. Or maybe that hairy naked dude who stands on the street corner downtown talking religion.

Those things are promotion in a sense, yes, but that’s also sort of a shallow view of it and lacks an incredibly important element. And this element, let me tell you, can make you sick amounts of money and teach you that promotion can be done anywhere and always. Actually, scratch that “can”. You ARE engaged in promoting always and everywhere.

Promotion is making something known AND well thought of.

People tend to think promotion is just getting the word out, but is not enough. The word has to be acting to your benefit.

Promotion has to further your cause, not just garner attention. Any freak can get in the newspaper, but not every freak is doing real promotion.

Lest this is coming across as cryptic, let me give you a silly example.

If you put out 1,500 direct mail pieces that look horrible, contain misspellings, have the wrong contact info and a picture of people bowing down before Hitler, you HAVEN’T DONE ANY PROMOTION. You’ve missed 50% (probably more, actually) of the promotion formula: the appear respectable part.

Real-world examples of poor promotion

Remember, by our definition, promotion is to make known and respected in people’s eyes.

Here’s how real people and real business are doing it wrong right now:

• The customer service representative who answers the phone by saying, “WHAT?!”
• The IT support lady who, 3 seconds into the call, cracked jokes about my last name (Pabst) and asked me if I get all the free beer I want. Being personal is fine. Being chit-chatty on my dime is not. And shit, if you’re gonna joke with me, you better not pick the most obvious and uncreative path.
• InMotion Hosting, who has been shutting down client websites with hardly an explanation. And when asked to provide solutions, they don’t really have any. When a host offers no solution for their own shortcomings, of course the best solution becomes: switch hosts. Obviously not promotion. You listening, IMH?
• Any website with more ads than content.
• The bus-driver who let’s the bus continue to roll as passengers get off.
• The barista who doesn’t ask what I’d like, but just lifts her eyebrows.
• Anyone ever who doesn’t smile.
• The guy who sold me my car and picked at his fingernails nearly the entire time.
• The gym where I work out that has the fucking heater on right above the free-weights.
• Airplane food.
• My buddy. I love you, dude, but when you have Skype, text messaging, two cell phones and email, there’s no reason why I should have zero confidence in getting in touch with you. Also explains the loss of a five-figure project as well as the impending litigation on another. You. Need. To. Communicate.
• The dude, who SERIOUSLY, right this fucking second, is being patted down by the cops outside the coffee shop…one sec. K, I’m back. Wow. That was entertaining. They’re letting him go now, but they apparently thought he robbed the bank across the street. Thing is, he looks like a bank robber. Shabby and sneaky, hiding under a hat, fat coat and facial hair. Hmm…he’s not promoting the right thing, is he?

Bottom line, you may be getting attention and “doing your job,” but if you’re not furthering your cause, you’re not promoting.

People and companies doing a great job of promotion

• Washington Mutual bank, who dropped $80 of overdraft charges as a result of my own idiocy. Their reason for helping me? I’ve been a great customer for 16 years.
• Bluehost (aff). As a hosting company they kick total ass. Always pick up the phone. Always have a solution to offer for any problems.
• Ron Paul, the badass politician and epitome of integrity who fights tooth and nail so that the US Constitution doesn’t go (more) away, even though his cohorts and the media do their best to ignore him.
• The IT dude who says, “I can help you with that.”
• The pizza parlor that says, “It’ll actually be cheaper if you get another pizza.”
• Macintosh salesmen. They don’t talk about gigs and megs and hertz and backside quad inverters over the flux capacitor with the negative database restructuring. They simply show me what the computer does and does well.
• The barista who says with a smile, “What can I getcha?”
• The girl sitting next to me who smells fantastic.
• The guy I often pass on the sidewalk who looks me in the eye and says, “Hello.”

If someone likes you, wants to approach you, wants to do business with you…you’ve promoted. And as you can see, it sure doesn’t take much effort or invention.

How promotion can you make you sick amounts of money

When I first started my graphic design business I didn’t do any traditional online promoting. None at all. And by traditional I mean banner ads, sidebar ads, AdWords, etc. A lot of folks pour money into these traditional methods and are disappointed in the results.

Well, I just didn’t have the cash for buying online advertising real estate, and, being a new business owner I didn’t want to spend a single dime that I might need if times got lean.

So the sum total of promotional activities that I engaged in was: talking to people.

In my first week of business, I landed a large percentage of the projects I tried to get. While that’s great, it’s not even the interesting part. The amazing thing is that when I asked clients why they’d hired me (you do do this, don’t you?) I got one answer more than any others.

It wasn’t my strong portfolio (I didn’t really have one).

It wasn’t my fancy website (at the time it was fairly average).

It wasn’t my ads (I didn’t have any).

It wasn’t my reputation (I was brand new and unknown).

It wasn’t my testimonials from past clients (I’d never had a client).

The reason I got every single job that week was that I communicated better than the other bidders. I had numerous compliments that first week on my speed of email responses, the fact that I’d respond even if I was out on the town and even that I let my personality shine through in my emails.

I had one client say something extraordinary to me, and this has ever since been in the back of my mind as a rock-solid truth. She said, “I wasn’t looking for the best or the cheapest. I just needed someone to be there and do it. Thank you thank you thank you for always writing me back.”

So here I was afraid I wasn’t doing any promotion, thinking I was going to fail and starve to death. But I was actually doing some of the best promotion I could have done. Promotion, by the way, that was WAY better and said WAY more about me than any advertisement could have. I was simply communicating well and making my services well thought of.

That is promotion. Getting the word out and ensuring it’s making you look good.

While all these little things, like smiling and answering the phone with manners, add up to promotion, the real magic lies in getting the word out in huge numbers and getting massive amounts of people to believe. There is no limit to the creative means of getting the word out and promoting yourself. On that, much more to come later.

In the meantime, what can you do to get your word out? And perhaps more importantly, what can you do to make yourself well thought of?

Need help? Ask me what you can do for your own promotion and marketing?