Category: Articles about Publicity

Kinksgiving of Curiosities

A major challenge I have as publicist is sometimes I have to do publicity for something that can’t have press coverage. This would be next to impossible if it wasn’t for social media. For example, many BDSM events don’t consent to being in press releases or having press show up for an event. The original plan for The Dungeon Store was conceived during COVID, when events were cancelled or virtual, and emphasis was placed on interviews, new products, and content placement. This weekend, The Dungeon Store is keeping busy. They’re at the Baltimore Playhouse on Saturday November 11th for Kinksgiving of Curiosities, a food/clothing drive and play party. More on this event can be found at https://fetlife.com/events/1355465

The Dungeon Store will also have a table at the Academy of Fetish Arts Vendor Fair in Cleveland, Ohio this weekend. Visit https://cle-afa.com/event for more on the event, and for what the academy has to offer ahead. For these events, instead of a release, this got sent out over social media profiles for The Dungeon Store, and I’ve used my Fetish Artist profiles on social media to boost them further. The food drive party also went out on The Dungeon Store’s newsletter this week. This allows us to push in the directions we need to, without drawing mainstream attention.

When Do I Dial Back on a Social Network?

Social media has become at least 60 percent of my work day, monitoring sites, making posts, gathering data. Social media has even become a big part of sending press releases out as we’re directing traffic to where the stories place.

We think of the big names as the only social media, but that’s not always the case. Sometimes a smaller network has more of who we’re selling to, like Tumblr has more fandom oriented profiles. Given that social media is also about the next big thing, we have to keep looking for where to jump next.

The Dungeon Store is spread across many social networks you may have never heard of, like PinXsters, and Lips.social, making them early adopters with varying degrees of success.

Is there a reason to pull back on such campaigns? Yes, and this goes back a long way. While it’s handy to have dominant branding for free across a social network, one has to consider how many people are watching and who are left.

When I go to post, I’m looking at how many others have posted? When was the last time I posted? How much of this feed is from my client?

When anyone goes to a social network and find posts from only one or two members, that’s bad. It makes the web site look bad. Guests feel they’re going to be drown out by spam. While I can give some engagement, if a client or two are the only ones left, there’s a liminal creepiness as if our brand is haunting the site, not participating in it.

So if I go onto a site, and I’ve been the only one posting recently, I’ll hold off so someone else can get a word in edgewise. This becomes a very good gauge as if it’s worth the energy too. If even the admin isn’t contributing, it may simply be time to move on.

 

Is Publicity Marketing?

Publicity is marketing, right?

Not necessarily. What I primarily do is work with the press. We call it The News, for a reason. It isn’t The Olds.

Traditionally, marketing is sales, and the vague term covers everything from someone knocking on doors to advertising in the biggest outlets.

With marketing, you may be working with something that’s old and been around for decades. That’s not necessarily bad, as if it’s something essential, solid and reliable, that can be the easiest sale. But a marketer might be stuck with something that’s old and won’t sell.

When that happens, part of the challenge is for marketing to find something new and exciting, and a publicist can be brought in to brainstorm that and work with the marketer to find something newsworthy. There could be a celebrity endorsement or a contest.

But a publicist might not even be in that picture at all. What might be necessary is advertising, or a new market.

High Octane Heart does have some middle ground. We’ve created ads, logos, and branding. But it is important to understand the differences.