Tin Shingle’s Blog Of All The Latest in Media, Money, Your PR and Marketing Strategy and Life as a Small Biz Owner
Happy Money Monday!
Another Monday, another chance to stay ahead of it. As painful as it may be, stay ahead of it today by paying a bill. Maybe two. Pay an invoice. Send an invoice. Be kind in your correspondence. Have faith in others and feed them encouragement. Your team will stay strong with you clear headed and hopeful.
Push through it. You got this.
Hello!
While New York doesn’t have the coldest numbers of the way below freezing polar vortex temperatures, we are having school closings in the most unusual way, which does impact our live broadcast delivery of the TuneUp. Being that we’re a family friendly company, when a school calls a snow day one day, followed by a 2hr delay the next day, followed by a phone call just as you’re taking your kids to school that says: “Just kidding! There is an early dismissal, you’ll be back in 2hrs to pick up your kids!,” followed by another 2hr delay the next day, your work-game is going to be a little off.
So. Deepest apologies for not broadcasting the TuneUp on Wednesday, but know this: it is happening. We are rescheduling it and will have new registration links shortly. We will also have new a new signup session for the Member-Only TuneUp, where Tin Shingle Members can come onto the call either by video or phone, and have a group strategy session.
Thank you again for your patience!
Wishing everyone warmth and safety.
Tin Shingle Members are getting Media Hits! Laura Borland, developer of Vyllage, the app that makes getting package deliveries easier by connecting neighbors, has been pitching and getting hits. Her latest is at The Story Exchange and a local news TV station.
Laura credits pitching to her success - pitching a lot. We asked her how she did it:
Repetition and Intensity. I followed your advice (from the Members-Only TuneUp) and made a commitment to send my pitch to at least 25 journalists everyday, and used your PR Planner and Tracker to know who I had contacted.
When I started looking at pitching to South Florida media, Local 10 was the only channel in which their journalists have an email address listed versus a Twitter handle. I’m also familiar with the types of stories that reporters on that station tend to cover. So, I sent my pitch to 10 recently hired reporters because I’m sure they could use the content.
Within 15 minutes, I received a response from a reporter, who asked if I had pitched to any other stations and I responded that I had not. He then requested an exclusive interview. We shot the footage the day before Thanksgiving and it first aired one week later and was in rotation for 5 days!
See who else is getting press in Tin Shingle’s Press Portfolio!
Join Tin Shingle today to up your PR game and have fun with us! You can do big things. Tin Shingle gives you the resources and support to believe and make it possible.
Right now as we speak, the Media Contact Database at Tin Shingle is getting a total refresh and shakeup. With the media landscape changing so quickly as more magazines are abandoning traditional 12 month publication cycles for 10 months or no months at all, we are finding more and more valuable freelance writers and editors, as well as regular contributing writers at magazines and other forms of media, including podcasts, TV programs and even business websites that offer services but have invested in a content campaign.
Our focus on the individual person working in the media profession is strengthening, as we want to highlight the different Media Outlets that these people work in. Therefore, we putting all of the Media Outlets onto the person’s page that they work for, write for, produce for, or host.
For example: From Tin Shingle’s Media Contact Database, let’s look at Mandi Woodruff. Mandi works in the personal finance world. She is the executive editor at LendingTree.com, and the host and founder of the podcast, Brown Ambition, a show about money, career and business. She’s a gold nugget, and most likely, a pretty good person to pitch about money, business, and careers.
We tag each Media Contact with a unique identifier we call “Area of Interest.” When you’re searching through our lists, you can search by “Area of Interest.” Mandi has been tagged with: Finance, Personal Finance, Black Media, Black Voices.
As a recommended Media Contact in Tin Shingle’s members-only database, you’ll find Mandi’s bio (as she wrote it from her Brown Ambition About Us page), as well as both of her job roles: one at LendingTree.com, the other at Brown Ambition. If she has different social media handles or email addresses that she may have recommended you use (or if she doesn’t recommend an email address, then we usually guide you to the writer’s Contact Us page on their website - those pages really are pretty effective).
Here’s Mandi’s bio:
Mandi Woodruff has been reporting on finance and business for more than seven years. She joined personal finance startup MagnifyMoney in June 2016 as Executive Editor of their personal finance content. Less than a year later, the company was acquired by LendingTree.com. In her newly expanded role as executive editor, she leads a team of 20+ freelance writers, two full-time reporters and two editors to create stellar personal finance content for half a dozen LendingTree.com-owned websites. Mandi was previously the personal finance editor at Business Insider and a personal finance reporter for Yahoo Finance, where she hosted the weekly web series “Money Minute” and “The Payoff”. She’s an alumna of the Grady College of Journalism at the University of Georgia (go Dawgs!) and an active member of the National Association of Black Journalists, the New York chapter of NABJ, the Society of American Business Editors and Writers, and the Journalism & Women Symposium.
The update to the Media Contacts is underway now, but you can still access them and dig around for your research. Thank you for your patience, and you encounter anything amiss, please Contact Us about it! If you’re not a member yet of Tin Shingle, join today for instant access to our media research lists! See what others have to say about their membership.
Tin Shingle Members can log in for details and click on the PR Leads tab, but here’s the gist:
Seeking Galentine's Day Gifts for a big gift website.
QUALIFICATIONS:
Must be $100 and under.
Before you submit - be honest with yourself - is the product you are thinking of really good for a girl gifting her friend?
If selected, the final photo must be sent in a high resolution with an all white background.
Due Saturday.
INCLUDE IN THE PITCH
Name of Product.
Pretty picture of it (get it on a white background if you can, or it can have a cool backdrop). Keep this picture a low resolution so that it can email easily. Use the high resolution if you get chosen.
Link to specific offering.
Cost of product.
2-3 sentences about what it is and why it's a great Galentine's Day Gift. Keep this super short! Seriously - you are basically texting this to the media person.
Good luck and keep us posted!
People have been seeing the magazines in our Instagram feed and blog. The print. The physical books. And they’ve been asking: “What do you do with your old magazines? Can I have them?”
Answer: I KEEP them! Proud magazine collector over here. How you gonna collage with no pages? You can’t collage your Instagram! Unless you print it. And that’s work. Where you gonna find the easy amazing pictures? What inspiration are you going to hang on your walls? Subscribe! Get them to your door! At this point, they are a dollar. an. issue.
Will this help the big magazine industry stay afloat? Will this help journalists, artists and production people stay in their jobs? Maybe. Probably not because corporate thinking at magazines - excuse me - “brands” - are behaving erratically and cutting off their arms by stopping printing magazines. You know what? The indie magazines are going to do well (if they market right) while these corporate leaders at magazines like Glamour, Seventeen and Redbook get confused and cut their arms off.
Prepping for today’s TinShingle TuneUp: practicing what I’m about to preach during the Inspiration section: unplug from computer at least 1 Morning a week to do Morning Work. This means kid’s forms and #magazining. One of my 2019 Resolutions is to read more magazines and Media Monitor. This is how it’s getting done.
Tune in today with me at 3pm EST to hear action steps for Polishing Your Brand During the Winter. Now is the perfect time to lose the old and replace with new content, new designs, new bold moves. Sign up for in the TuneUps section, or here: tinshingle.com/tuneup
Simple tip for you this Monday - because you are going to kick booty this week:
Stay ahead of what you need to pay, or be paid.
If you owe someone a bill right now, go ahead and pay it. We've all been there. Even the small amounts. Just pay them, and get that bill off of someone else's to do list. You'll feel much better.
If someone owes you a bill, send them a kindly reminder. Or if you use Quickbooks, have Quickbooks auto-email them the bill again.
If someone owes you for work, but you haven't invoiced them yet, invoice them today! Don't worry if you feel that it's been too long. You did a great job for them, now just bill for it.
If you need help keeping track of everything, download Tin Shingle's Expenses + Income Tracker spreadsheet. It's a place to put the bills for your brain. You could use apps and software for this, but sometimes a simple spreadsheet suffices.
If you need a better place to track your client work, download Tin Shingle's Client Project Time Tracker. Easily know what projects are complete and open.
The Wall Street Journal Magazine’s editorial calendar has been added to Tin Shingle’s Editorial Calendar database, which makes discovering article ideas easier for you!
As the world’s leading luxury magazine covering art, entertainment, fashion, travel, design and more, there is ample opportunity for pitching your unique brand to the magazine of WSJ. Recent articles at the publication include:
Jazz Musician Kamasi Washington’s Favorite Things
Ghetto Gastro Opens Labyrinth 1.1, Their New HQ in the Bronx
The 16 Best Denim Looks for Him and Her
This year’s themes at WSJ. include a hotly anticipated Spring Fashion series, with one issue dedicated towards women’s fashion and another focused on men’s styles. What or who will you be wearing this season? Or will they be wearing you? They just might!
Their summer issue will focus on seasonal destinations, escapes and activities. Who can resist a relaxing getaway, a well deserved respite from the bitterness of winter. Also, an entire issue is being dedicated to the INNOVATORS of our time.
Be inspired and find your creative launchpad with the WSJ. editorial calendar, available in Tin Shingle’s PR Center with an All Access Pass of Membership (Level 4). Find every deadline, every theme and anything else you need to know to make your pitch a successful one.
Additionally, Tin Shingle’s community is available to you to bounce ideas off of. Everyone needs support when getting ideas out there. All Access Pass Members get free group-consulting sessions every other Wednesday during our Private Training TuneUp sessions.
Keeping up the momentum from 2018, we are going to glide into 2019 with that same bit of enthusiasm and positive thought for what will happen. Making that easier on you is getting paid, getting paid faster, and greenlighting more new projects. If you provide a service to people, you know you are the Hustler In Chief, and you are in charge of bringing in new work, getting paid for that work, and nurturing a family of happy clients - clients you picked by putting out there the type of people and projects that are good fits for your business - and then treating them well.
Keeping an eye on the positive, here’s how you’re going to get paid faster this year, and how you’re going to greenlight more new work - without compromising your price. I’m a pay up front kind of girl. None of us have time to chase rainbows and payments anywhere after 10 days - so the whole 60 or 90 day terms thing is a thing of the past for you. Who can live on that?
Thanks to payment subscription services from Recurly, Paypal (haven’t tried Squarespace’s yet, so can’t vouch for it) and even perhaps your own merchant bank, you could offer payment plans on larger projects that might make it easier for a client to pay. Consider offering incentives to your client to pay in full, or on a tighter schedule. If you do a payment schedule, like 50% up front, and 25% at Point A and the final 25% at Point B, be sure to kindly stop the work if the payment doesn’t arrive on schedule.
PRO: When using an automated payment plan subscription service, the payments come in on time, automated. No more billing and chasing payments.
CON: If the business goes out of business, your payments might end. Be sure you structure a timeline that is not too long. This is also difficult if you have to pay sub-contractors who do not wish to be paid on payment plans. Have enough cash on hand to make payroll and pay your contractors their bills.
Monthly retainers are dreamy for some, and if you have a client ready to commit, this can be good for both of you. The client knows what to budget each month, and you know how much work to put in. Just be sure to keep track of the time your team is spending on each client. If you begin to put more time in than budgeted, you should kindly bring this up with your client and revisit the budget, or the scope of work.
RECOMMENDED: Present a Status Report at the end of each month to let your client know what you did for them.
There’s nothing worse than chasing payment for a flyer design. It’s only $30, gah! This is where Pre-Paid Project Packages come in handy. Either estimate spot-on how much a smaller job will cost and bill that amount, or if the client sends in little jobs over the course of the month or couple months, then encourage them to pre-purchase a package of time (discount it if you want), and credit your work to that. Deliver a Status Report to them to let them know how their time is being spent, and how much time is left. Our number for a small job is $2,000. Anything under that gets paid in full before the job starts.
All of these recommendations are based on the fact that you accept credit cards. Getting paid via credit card is much faster. If you don’t like the credit card fee, simply build this into your overall cost of services. Credit card payments will be difficult with corporate clients. But you could try. Unless your payment amount is just too high to justify the credit card fee. Consider Direct Deposit, and offer a (tiny) discount.
This is the traditional way of getting paid - billing after the work is done. This can also be where the race is on for chasing that payment. You may want to consider nixing this, or only offering to clients with “Good Credit History” with you. I’m not talking Dun & Bradstreet or Transunion. I’m talking Good Credit History with YOU. Do they pay quickly and on time? If so, they can remain in the Pay After The Work Is Done crowd.
