Several hundred responded – thank you so much – and here are the results:

(click each image to make it larger)



Where would you be happy to travel for a free one day PR & marketing seminar?

We’ve done a lot of seminars in London this year and clearly there is still a demand for more. We’ll be launching some central London events at the end of the year.

What are the biggest marketing challenges in your business right now?

No massive surprises there. Lead generation, website traffic and getting free publicity always seem to be the three biggest problems when I talk to business owners.

Have you previously invested in professional marketing to help you grow your business?

Would you prefer to learn how to significantly improve your marketing, or have it done for you?

This is reassuring. It tells me that business owners want to know what to do in their business, even if someone is doing it for them. This is good. Marketing and sales is the most important thing in your business. If you’re going to learn about one thing, make it marketing.

And your individual comments

Lots of positive feedback on the Tuesday PR & Marketing Tips, so thank you.

One business owner said: “Personally, I prefer workshops without the ice-breaking time-wasting exercises. You have so much useful information to impart, I would rather pay for full-on, in-depth strategy and specific techniques that give real benefit and justify my time, rather than a free day that gives some, but limited, benefit; and therefore less value.”

That’s a really good point, and it’s the reason why I recently launched the two day Intensive Business Focus event.

And I had a really interesting email back from a business owner in Wales.

She said:

“Hi Paul,

By the way I’m in Cardiff South Wales, & if you know of anyone who could fill this gap, as they say, “I’d love to hear from you”. “

Of course, she’s completely right. That hadn’t occurred to me, I guess because we keep our private clients’ websites updated for them so don’t see this problem with the people we work closely with.

Website designers – defend yourselves!

Oh, and if you are based near Cardiff and can help this lady, please contact us and we will put you in touch.

If you send a lot of email marketing like I do, it’s always good to approach your email in a different frame of mind now and again. With more than 50+ emails to read in just 30 minutes, I had little time for messages that weren’t totally relevant to me.

Email newsletters that I would normally scour for something useful didn’t get a glance before I hit the delete key. It goes to show why you need to send regular emails to prospects; I might open and read the same email next week.

But I got one email today that really made me chuckle, from a company called MarketingFile.com. I think I bought some data from them a few years ago.

The email told me that I hadn’t logged into my account for 12 months, so as a security measure they had changed my username and password from the familiar login I know, to a bunch of random characters.

Why? What’s the benefit to me, the customer? There isn’t one; in fact they have just made it harder for me to buy from them in the future as my usual account login won’t work.

And since that will probably frustrate me (as I will have forgotten about this change by then), surely that can’t help the company either, as they could lose a sale.

The email suggested I login right now and change my new “random” login to something I’ll remember. Er, no thanks, don’t think I’ll bother.

Is this a case of the IT department ruining the marketing? Security is very important, but really there was no need for them to change my account details without being requested to. Nobody benefits here.

In London today I did a double take… when I thought I saw a Smart car covered in grass.

It was a bit too speedy past St Pancras for me to see the name of the business, but a quick Google search found this photo and the company behind it.

Here’s the YouTube video of the Grass Bugs:

Stunning! There are lots of business that would talk about doing something like this, but very few would have the balls to actually do it. Easigrass deserves to do well.

This is a concept made popular in a book by Seth Godin a few years back. You can still get a few chapters free here.

The concept is simple. It’s where you only market to someone who has explicitly agreed to be marketed to (by your business).

This is excellent for your business, as you focus your marketing spend on people who have already put their hand up and said they are interested in what you sell. As you can imagine, that has a very positive effect on conversion rates. 

The future surely has no place for non-permission marketing. Already this morning I have fielded four calls from people I don’t know trying to sell me something I don’t want (mostly advertising). It’s got to be pretty soul destroying for those poor telesales people who can clearly hear the annoyance in my voice.

It would be much more constructive for these businesses to spend their time finding people who want what they sell, and then phone them to follow up. I bet they could get more profit out of fewer telesales people. They would also discover if people actually want what they sell.

Publicity Heaven’s marketing is built round getting your permission. This is why we offer the free printed report – we are asking you for permission to market to you (and in return we are giving you something free).

(If you haven’t had your report yet and would like the fortnightly PR tips email, sign up here. Don’t worry, you can unsubscribe any time.)

Permission marketing removes the need for trying really hard to sell things. I already know from previous PR product and seminar launches that it is much easier for me to sell good value products and training to people who want to receive information about them. 

My gut feel says that people who make a willing purchase after giving their permission for marketing have also got to know you and your business properly. This must surely make them the best customers you can have.

Paul Lashmar is a very experienced former press photographer based in Northamptonshire, and has launched this new gallery.

You can buy images online to use in your work. Plenty of Northamptonshire ones in there which is very handy.

This is my absolute favourite shot Paul got of MP Ann Widdicombe.

One was from a new supplier of PR tools we have just signed with; another from our friendly accountants.

But the other two had no company name on them, and just scribbled first names at the bottom.

Er… who sent them? The first names were both common ones, which could be one of a number of clients, suppliers and contacts.

Pity to go to all the effort of sending Christmas cards to get none of the benefit!

If you’re doing cards on the cheap and not having your business name professional printed inside, why not get a stamp made up and stamp each one?

Or don’t bother sending cards. This year we have made another donation to charity.

A man opened a delicatessen and sold delicious Italian foods. He was hard of hearing so he had no radio. He had trouble with his eyes, so he read no newspapers, but he sold the most delicious Italian food. He created a beautiful window display, and put a large sign outside telling people how fantastic his food was, and advertised in the local papers. He stood outside his shop and shouted “get the finest Italian pasta, cakes and ice-cream here” – and people bought. He increased his orders with his suppliers. He bought more kitchen equipment and a bigger oven to bake more bread and cakes to supply his increasing trade. He got his boy home from University to help him.

But then something happened….

His son said “Dad, haven’t you been listening to the radio? Some people are saying we’re heading for a credit crunch. There’s a recession coming. We had better prepare for poor trade.” The father thought, “Well my son has been to University, he reads the papers, watches television and listens to the radio, so he should know.” So the father cut down his orders. He took down the sign, stopped the advertising and no longer bothered to stand outside his shop and sell his fantastic food. And his sales fell almost overnight. “You’re right son” the father said. “We are certainly heading for hard times”.

A consulting firm has ripped apart Google’s business model and put together a report for anyone to see.

Probably a good week’s work, but a smart way to demonstrate their analytical skills.

Pity for us UK folk then that the English version of the company’s website is still written in French…