EXAMPLE OF PRESS CAMPAIGN

THIS IS A FOLLOW-UP TO PREVIOUS POST -- "PRESS RELEASES AND ADS SHOULD BOOST WRITERS UNION MEMBERSHIP"

EXAMPLE OF PRESS CAMPAIGN

Two days ago, I submitted a 3-page plan that advocates investing money so the NWU becomes far more visible and, thus, eventually dramatically increasing membership.
Below is the follow-up that I promised. It shows how a campaign would work – and demonstrates that a long-run effort to reach out to the media will SAVE MONEY.
Here is step-by-step how a press campaign works.

A. Chicago is selected as the site of a national convention. The National Writers Union (NWU) sends a press release to Editor & Publisher (E&P) trade magazine.

B. The next week, the NWU sends a release to E&P on announcing its new leadership – and repeating the information in press release A.

C. The new leadership announces a campaign to create a new division that will focus on free-lance writers (I’m making this up, but the leaders will have better ideas) and sends this info to E&P. At the end of Press Release C, the NWU concisely summarizes Press Releases A and B.

D. The NWU places an ad in the same E&P that it expects Press Release C to run in. The ad seeks new members and makes reference to recent news events.

E. The NWU announces the speakers at its national convention. Press Release D summarizes the facts of the first three at the end.

F. The NWU places an ad in the same E&P that it expects Press Release D to run in. It also seeks new members and makes reference to recent news events.

G. Future press releases and ads are sent that follow the same formula.

Now how do we know a campaign in E&P will work? We have NO bleeping idea.

And that’s the point of having labor. The NWU needs to spend money efficiently and needs to figure out SOONER RATHER THAN LATER where our efforts will pay off. Using hired help, for example, could help us ascertain that E&P is a waste of time and money and the same campaign should be run in a different magazine.

The NWU needs to pro-actively contact publications to figure out where to run its material BEFORE going through steps A through G.

The union is better off finding out these things ASAP when the labor is cheap and before spending thousands for nothing.
Martin Zabell