When it shouldn't be a no

This is all about the reasons people tell us they don't need us, and why that's almost certainly the wrong call.

Here's what you'll find discussed below. You can read through them all, or just pick the ones that you think apply.

 WE HAVE A PR AGENCY AND THEY TELL US THEY HAVE ALL THIS COVERED
 THE THINGS WE'RE ALREADY DOING ARE EFFECTIVE
 WE'RE ALREADY REACHING EVERYBODY WE NEED TO REACH
 READ MY LIPS: WE HAVE IT COVERED
 IT ISN'T IN THE BUDGET RIGHT NOW

Ready?

WE HAVE A PR AGENCY AND THEY TELL US THEY HAVE ALL THIS COVERED

Please understand that we don't compete with PR agencies - we do what we do and they do what they do, and both can help you a lot.

But that doesn't mean they're familiar with what we do. Even if they are, please consider that they may think they're working against their own self-interests to recommend us.

While most PR veterans understand this, not everybody has thought it through, so here's why they may not acknowledge that Newstips can add significantly to what's already going on.

First, when you ask them about us, you're telling the agency there could be another $2500/month available to spend on PR. If the agency can convince you we're unnecessary, they may also be able to convince you to open up that budget to them. So they could see endorsing us as leaving some of their own money on the table.

Second, a PR agency may think it's dangerous to admit that anybody covers the ground better than they do, because to do so would be to invite an agency review and lost client income.

And third, for some agency people - not necessarily anybody you know - such an admission might be incompatible with their own self-esteem.

Please consider these agency self-interests before putting an agency in the awkward position of potentially seeing their own interests in conflict with yours.

THE THINGS WE'RE ALREADY DOING ARE EFFECTIVE

We hope so. Really! Sincerely, we hope so.

It's important to our interests that your organization understands the enormous potential power of PR. And we're not suggesting that you have to change anything else you're doing for us to be a productive addition to the mix.

The issue is whether adding us will make your efforts even more effective. I'll use a different word: more productive.

It's a question of approach. We send our weekly Bulletin items (each essentially a one-paragraph story or coverage pitch) to thousands of journalists. We know from experience it's almost certainly more media than you're reaching, and more often than you reach them. And because ours is a more persistent, more consistent presence than traditional PR programs produce, we eventually compel more of those journalists to respond to our messages - at a time cost of zero to you.

So, unlike proactive PR programs (where you make pitches and beat the bushes for coverage, and not all those efforts are productive), our activities get the press to initiate the contact. We put the press in touch with you, and you can respond to interest that we already triggered. This lets you spend your time doing more responsive and less proactive PR work, so your own activities become much more productive. Life gets easier.

WE'RE ALREADY REACHING EVERYBODY WE NEED TO REACH

This tells us that you have a clear idea of the people you need to reach, and have put a lot of effort into making sure you do. That's good. But what if you could reach significantly more?

We try not to let our own definitions limit the reach of our programs. We let the journalists tell us. We frequently send sample issues and invitations to be included to large numbers of media people (including many you'd never expect to be interested) we add to our database. But we don't automatically treat them as active recipients; nobody gets our materials who doesn't ask to get them. Every time we do that, we add hundreds of names to our circulation. We're beyond predicting that any category of media is going to say no because they always surprise us with the number who say yes.

So I have no doubt that - in addition to reaching all the people you reach - we reach a lot of journalists you don't. Make that a lot of audiences. Meaning a lot of prospective customers. More than enough to easily justify our little fee.

But even if we didn't, we also (through the same kind of effort) reach more journalists within the media your current efforts are covering. More freelancers. More contributing editors (read: columnists). More parts of the book. More frequently (weekly). More effectively (unlike the wires, where 95%+ get a headlines-only feed, all of our readers get the full text of a new one-paragraph story pitch each time).

Have you heard the old myth that says readers of computer media influence a lot of product sales? They did years ago, they don't today. And look at the numbers! The population you reach through all computer print and broadcast media is short of 30 million people. The universe of users of machines that are candidates for your products has a population of more than 320 million. To choose to concentrate on the computer industry is to choose to deliberately ignore more than 90% of your prospective buyers. Want to see how close to Joe Beercan this gets? Spend a weekend at Wal-Mart!

READ MY LIPS: WE HAVE IT COVERED

How do we say this kindly?

To whatever extent you have your targets covered, and to whatever extent that's effective, by comparison, they may be only thinly covered, and wouldn't it be nice to be even more effective?

It honestly may be impossible to identify how much can slip through the gaps without trying us for a while, or at least doing a little more diligence and talking to the companies that use and renew us, year after year.

So here's an easy way to prove the point, one way or the other.

Spend $6,750 and use us for 3 months. See the difference. Make us show you the difference. No matter what other resources you have at the time.

IT ISN'T IN THE BUDGET RIGHT NOW

Budgets aren't immutable. Together, we can make the case for widening your budget to include what we do and take it as far upstairs as it needs to go - even to a lead investor, or the CEO.

Budgets may be a hurdle, but our programs have "legs" and we can get over that hurdle. Just ask.

So what do you think? If any of our points make sense, let's roll up our sleeves and go at this opportunity together.