Journalists aren’t going to write a story solely about your company and how awesome it is – they’re not into writing adverts. Here are some tips on what you could do to get a bit publicity yourself:

1. Trends and chosen subjects to explore
   While a journalist might not be interested in featuring you and your company alone, they might be more inclined to explore the larger, related trends in that particular business area. For example, are you providing new ideas to grow the industry?

2. Stats, figures and results
   Does your product generate statistics? If so, you could be sitting on pitch-able material. Your stats – and related analysis could be of news to the media that cover your business area.

3. Tips and opinions
   Are you an expert in your field? Have strong opinions about what’s happening in it? Decent writer? Try putting together some top tips, send them to an editor. Remember this is not your chance to write an advertorial, it’s to show you are a knowledgeable writer. Also, stick to deadlines and preferable get the copy back before the deadline is up or you might miss the boat and the journalist will go elsewhere.

Make sure the spelling, grammar and punctuation is spot on.

As a parent I have just watched harrowing footage of school children emerging from the flattened building in Moore, Oklahoma.

My husband is originally from Kansas and tells me that when he was at school they had ‘drills’ whereby the kids would sit on the floor and put their hands over their heads.

What use is that when the roof is collapsing and debris is flying past at 200mph?

Kansas (and most I should imagine, Oklahoma homes) have basements and tornado shelters – not a pleasant site when I first visited Kansas – so why on earth don’t schools?

I feel for those mums and dads waiting in desperation for their lost child.

A great headline in a story or email pitch could make the difference between the media reading your news – or not.

Here are some v quick tips:

• Make it short and snappy – get to the point of what you are talking about, why is it interesting?
• Listen to your subject’s story and make it human – people like to read about people. A story I wrote was about a (now) successful plus size model. “I was continuously bullied for being fat, but I was only size 12″  This story got a slot on ITV!
• Use a number in your headline – lists and numbers are easy to read and get to the point
• Use the professionals – take tips from the top, keep a file of great headlines from the newspapers, magazines and those on the internet

A ST ALBANS-based husband and wife team have reached the finals of the FSB’s Hertfordshire Business Awards.

On Tap Plumbers, a Gas Safe registered business run by Anne Timpany and her husband Raff, are up for Best New Business and St Albans Business of the Year at the awards ceremony at Shendish Manor on June 13^th.

The business was created from scratch in 2010 when Anne pooled her background skills in hospitality and customer service with Raff’s plumbing and heating qualifications and experience.
Anne, who is originally from New Zealand, said: “Our aim when we started the business – and still is – is to create an all-encompassing plumbing service which provides a different approach to some others – those who are less scrupulous and provide often a ‘dodgey’  – and what can be –dangerous service.
“We’ve grown mainly through networking and word of mouth, as we had no family contacts or friends in the UK so it was tough. We literally had to start from scratch and again it was harder as we were not from Britain and hadn’t been in the country for a long time, although we are now both British citizens.

“In the UK, anyone can just start up a construction business without any particular training or qualifications, but in NZ you have to have accreditations. I think this needs to change in the UK to make sure customers don’t fall foul of bad workmanship, resulting in frustration and extra expense.”

The couple, who have never entered any awards before, describe themselves as professional plumbers ‘with an interesting twist’.

They provide all the services you would expect from a plumber and also install plumbing, heating and tiling, as well as creating householders’ dream bathrooms. Their work has been used in the revamp of the Samuel Ryder Academy nursery in St Albans, MartinsWood Primary School, Stevenage and several schools in Hackney.

They have also worked on the conversion of high-end, luxury offices to flats in Portland Place off Oxford Circus, which included intricate marble bathrooms, needing great attention to detail.

Their latest large scale projects include Revive Fitness and Spa in Potters Bar and 5-6 Connaught Place, Westminster.

Anne added: “Our customer-focused approach to all things plumbing means we provide a guarantee with all of our work, we are fully insured, our prices are totally transparent and reasonable, and our staff are helpful and reliable. I would like to help change how that works here in the UK and restore more respect, reliability and responsibility to the industry.”

Westminster Lodge’s parking problems continue to stump swimming lesson parents

PAYING parents of children attending swimming lessons at the recently-developed Westminster Lodge continue to suffer financially due to ongoing problems with parking facilities.

The lack of spaces, due to the unfinished demolition of the old Westminster Lodge site, combined with the previous opening of the new building, has landed many parents in the swim.

“My son has swimming lessons every Friday at 4pm”, said St Albans-based PR Consultant, Laura Berrill.

“That was fine before the new development and although the facilities are improved, there is more than often nowhere at all to park without going into ‘unauthorised’ areas, such as the grass or on lined zones, which will result in a ticket from the – I will call – predatory council ticket inspectors.

“Last week my husband had to abandon taking my son to his lesson purely because there was absolutely nowhere to park and as we know other people have received tickets, so it was not worth it.

“As a result, we are losing money every week when this happens. I blame it both on Everyone Active and their contractors for not having the foresight to sort out additional parking, which, let’s face it, was inevitable; along with the council for being way over zealous with their ticketing.

“The question is, does Everyone Active and the council want us to continue to use Westminster Lodge or not? I am sorely tempted to go elsewhere, or lodge a complaint to get my money back.”

www.lauraberrill.co.uk

The Silicon Valley Internship Program (SVIP), a new consortium of start-ups and industry organizations led by Michael Hughes, co-CEO of LoopUp, has announced today its initiative to inspire entrepreneurialism in the UK.

Its programme will offer select, recent computer science and software engineering graduates a year’s experience in Silicon Valley, the quintessential hub for entrepreneurship and start-ups.

SVIP will match each programme participant with a sponsoring start-up in Silicon Valley, where they will work full-time for one year, earning a $60,000 salary.

Each participant will learn the ins and outs of building a company by eating, sleeping and living the life as an early employee of a start-up.

To further enrich their experience and development, each participant will also receive a mentor from outside their startup, plus formal training on subjects such as business strategy, fundraising and team building.

To remove the barriers of their one-year move abroad, travel costs to and from theUS are paid and SVIP is working with the British Consulate and British American Business Council in San Francisco to arrange working visas – a key barrier to preventing UK graduates from finding internships in the United States.

“We welcome this opportunity to further exchange knowledge between the US andUK. This internship gives our students the chance to study with some of the brightest entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley and put these new skills to work upon returning to the UK,” said Priya Guha, the British Consulate General in San Francisco.

Michael Hughes, who created SVIP, added: “There is something intrinsically different in the way Brits and Americans approach innovation and entrepreneurship. In Britain, we see too many barriers, and any stumble or fall is seen as a potentially career-ending failure. But in the U.S., wrong turns are more likely to be seen as lessons to eventual success.

We envision the SVIP engendering willingness to take the first step and determination to succeed in the UK’s most capable engineering talent at the very beginning of their professional careers.”

He made his way from the UK to Silicon Valley and entrepreneurial life after he was awarded a Sainsbury Management Fellowship to pursue an MBA at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. The Fellowship develops engineers to become leaders in UK industry.
The president of The Sainsbury Management Fellowship, David Falzani, added: “Michael Hughes is one of 300 Fellows who have benefited from the generosity of our patron, Lord Sainsbury of Turville. I can’t think of a better way to reciprocate than the SVIP program.  A fantastic and creative way to encourage entrepreneurialism in the UK.”

Hiring a PR Agency – advice

Hiring a public-relations agency for your business can be a difficult decision. There’s no guarantee that a PR campaign will produce the desired results and the costs can sometimes be quite high. Yet a successful campaign can help you expand your business in ways you never could on your own.

So how do you find one which is likely to benefit your business?

Basically it comes down to a combination of your budget, expectations, their track record in delivering results, and your chemistry.

Here are some questions to help you assess PR agencies:

How are you going to measure your success?
Before hiring, you need to know how it will measure success. “Likes” on your Facebook page and print media placements are common metrics for success in the PR business. But it’s advisable to use someone who looks beyond those measures to factors that will help your business grow, such as how much traffic to your website has grown because of a PR campaign, for example.

Which media reach my target audience best?
Whether it’s traditional media placements or online promotions, your PR agency needs to know precisely which newspapers, magazines or Web sites reach your target demographic most effectively. You also want an agency which has experience with both old and new media if you plan a variety of campaigns.

Who will be working directly on my account?
When PR agencies pitch your business, they send in their best people. But sometimes they send the main person of expertise out to meetings and then pass you along to someone with a lot less know-how when back in the office. It’s important to find out who you will be working with day-to-day and spend time with them before deciding whether to hire the agency.

Am I locked into a long-term contract?
Most agencies will put you on retainer, requiring an upfront payment so they will be available to offer their services as needed. But you want the option of getting out of such an arrangement. It’s recommended that you require a review after the first three months and if they are not delivering after 90 days, you’ll have an idea whether it’s going to work or not.

How much do you charge for specific services?
PR experts typically will offer you a range of services based on your budget. Ask for an a la carte menu of costs for such services as press releases, features and social media campaigns. You also will want to find out if the agency offers a pay-per-performance model, which allows you pay a lower upfront retainer with payment bonuses linked to results. This approach ensures that the PR firm is sharing the risks with you but can also work out much more expensive if the agency is getting you great results.

Do you provide media training?
Teaching you how to deal with the news media can be invaluable to small-business owners. Find out if the agency offers training for media interviews for example.

How are you going to communicate with me?
You want to know how often the people on your account will be updating you on their campaigns. Can you call them on weekends? Will they be available when they are on vacation? You ideally want someone who can let me call them when I have something important to discuss or to update on any developments.

What will you need from me to make the relationship work?
Some people hire a publicist and expect their workload to be lightened, but that’s naïve thinking. You’ll need to be involved in your own PR, whether by tweeting, blogging or being available to speak with the media on demand and often at short notice. Find out what your commitment will be and make sure you can do what’s needed. There has to be a clear understanding of what the client is going to do and what the agency is going to do.

Note to companies and individuals wanting publicity:

Except for relatively rare occurrences and when you have actual news, journalists aren’t going to write a story solely about your company and how awesome it is.

They’re just not – becase they’re not in the business of writing adverts.

But when you’re between news moments, there are ways for you and your business to earn a little coverage which don’t rely on hard news or that elusive glowing company feature.

1. Roundups and trends
   While a journalist might not be interested in featuring you and your company alone, they might be more inclined to explore the ecosystem in which your company lives and the larger, related trends in that particular business arena. Are you providing new ideas to grow the industry, for example?

Now you’re delivering a pitch that’s not all about you. And that’s refreshing. Instead, you’re pitching a trend in the space the reporter covers and in which you’re a participant and expert.

2. Stats, figures and results
   Does your product generate statistics? If so, you could be sitting on a treasure trove of pitch-able material. Your stats – and related analysis and presentation – can be news to the media that cover your industry’s area.

3. Bylines
   Are you an expert in your field? Have strong opinions about what’s happening in it? Decent writer? If so, putting together top tips for relevant outlets might make sense. The advantage here could be a byline, with a link back to your company or product page. Capture a few concise trends, send them to an editor and see what sticks.

But remember a few guidelines. First, anything you write needs to be original and unpublished elsewhere. Secondly, this is not your chance to write an advertorial. Nothing promotional, nothing self-serving. You’re writing this piece as a knowledgeable writer, not the CEO of your company. Lastly, adhere to deadlines. If you tell an editor you can turn a piece around in 48 hours, then you must get it to them within 48 hours. And make sure the spelling, grammar and punctuation is impeccable.

“Opticians learn about optics – very few learn about cosmetics”

Creator of The Frame Style Guide, Robert Roope, speaks of why he signed up for a 12-week a make-up course with 20 women.
OPTICIAN Robert Roope, the founder of Black Eyewear who has created glasses and sunglasses for men and women for more than 30 years, tells how and why he fits his designs to customers’ faces and why he took a make up course to do just this.

“I’ve always advised my customers on how wearing a certain frame can affect the facial characteristics, but I always found it difficult to talk to male customers about aspects of face shape and suitable frames. I struggled to get the message across face to face and sometimes got some strange looks!

“I thought I really had to say a bit more than ‘oh, that’s nice’ and you can’t only say ‘oh yes it suits you’ – I wanted to explain more on ‘why does it suit you?”, he said.

So naturally he decided to sign up for a cosmetics course at a local college in St Albans.

“I found a 12-week evening class with 20 other women and went along to join up. Well, they looked me up and down – as they probably would – and I was told the course was only for women. They were kind of saying, I suppose, that they didn’t allow ‘funny blokes’ in!”

But Robert’s reason behind his interest in the course was simple, despite being a little unusual. As he said, opticians study optics – not cosmetics.

“I wanted to learn more about the face shape and what women (and men) do to make the face look nice: eyebrow shaping, cheek shading, colours etc, so I suggested to the teacher, a lovely Polish woman, that I could bring my wife along to be a model.”

After some persuasion, Robert was signed up.

“We had a lot of fun and laughs along the way, it was a very funny experience, but at the same time it really helped in what I was trying to achieve,” he said.

Among other things, Robert learned about different face shapes and how make up, applied in the right way, could make the eyes look bigger and wider, how cheekbones could be shaped and how nose shapes could be changed by different shading and colouring.

And he began to understand that spectacles can have the same effect as make-up. For example, spectacles with a colour emphasis on top of the frame, or a light lens tint can work the same way as eye shadow. Or, the upswept curve of a ‘cat’s eye’ frame can create an uplifting soft line also achieved by eyebrow shaping.

He also took in some of his frames designs and tried them on the other students to see how they affected their facial features. He completed the course and by the end had a perfect understanding of how glasses can change the appearance of a face. For the first time he knew that glasses could also be a cosmetic tool, rather than simply making you see better.

Since this course – 20 years ago – Robert has put the emphasis, when designing frames, on the character of the individual face.

He gave the example that one particular client was interested in a couple of his frames, the Alice and the Tatum, but was undecided about the colour.

Robert explained: “She was undecided between the dark maroon/red colour and a brighter, red transparent shade. She had dark circles under her eyes and as a result, the darker colour, which does not allow much light through, left her eyes in constant shadow, which made the circles look worse. However, with the red transparent colour, the light filters through and makes the eyes look brighter. It also gets rid of shadows and makes the skin look warmer. It knocked ten years off her age.”

However he still found it difficult to communicate to male customers what he had learned. So, he recorded some youtube videos with tips on how to choose frames for different facial characteristics and got some really positive feedback, showing there was real demand for professional advice of this kind.

“I knew if I could give tailor-made advice to each individual, instead of just generic tips like a square frame makes an oval face look squarer, that this would be popular.

“I needed something with which the general public  – and I mean all over the UK and worldwide – could go to the website, use a webcam, leave a photo of their face and send it to me. I could then get back to them within a week with a free consultation and advice on frame shapes, designs, colours and size which would suit their facial features  – and head – best. It’s a personal, tailor-made service you don’t get anywhere else,” said Robert.

As a result the ‘Frame Style Guide’ was born and Robert has received enquiries from all over the world.
Since initially setting up in 2009, he has given more than 1000 consultations.

“As far as I know the Frame Style Guide was the first of its kind in the world as it was the only optical interactive consultation service,” said Robert.

And he added that he works best with imperfect faces, which he says is most of us, the everyday person on the street, so the guide’s appeal is practically universal.

To access The Frame Style Guide, go to:
http://www.robertroope.com/framestyleguide/

www.framestyleguide.com

For Youtube tips of finding the right frames for the individual face, go to:http://www.youtube.com/user/specster