National Media Blitz - SkinnySongs Journey
Heidi Roizen has blazed a trail of success in her endeavors as an entrepreneur and then venture capitalist. Now she’s on to something new and exciting SkinnySongs: Music to motivate you back into your skinny jeans. She’s received some great publicity, so I recently sat down with her to get the inside story on getting publicity.
1. What was your strategy for a national media campaign?
The strategy was to initially contact members of the business press with whom I was familiar to launch with the business story (“tech entrepreneur and VC starts new venture aimed at helping women lose weight”) and then use the resulting press to gain credibility with weight/fitness journalists. We were focused primarily on national morning and womens talk show television, and national newspapers. I worked with two great pr firms, www.fifteenminutes.com and www.kfgroup.net. We would brainstorm together in person and on the phone about which media people they each had good relationships with, what the proper pitch was, etc. We went out to a pretty large pool immediately while the story was fresh as a new release, then went back a few months later once we had a track record and ‘user success stories’.
2. What’s the timeframe for getting on a major show?
CBS cold-called me after reading USATOday and wanted me on within 10 days. Donny Deutsch on the other hand was something Michele Kelly at Kelly Fogelman group worked and tended for probably six weeks before I was booked. Martha Stewart happened very quickly, but this is because I could approach her directly since she already new me socially.
3. What’s the secret to getting on a major show?
I think key to all of these is to really understand what the program is trying to accomplish, make it easy for them to want you by giving them all the materials they need and organizing your pitch to match their focus, and then being very flexible about getting there when they want you. For me, it has been a combination of knowing people (either I knew someone, like Martha, or my publicist knew someone) and also timing. I was really lucky that Martha Stewart was taping the same day as CBS, CBS was already flying me out and hosting me in NY, I got through to Martha through a close mutual friend, and her producer was able to move another segment by a few days. They were just terrific to work with. With CNBC’s Donny Deutsch, they also, once they decided to book me, moved very quickly, IE I was on deck within a week.
4. What has driven the most $$ and conversions for SkinnySongs?
The Martha Stewart show drives more business by far than any other appearance — she has a huge following and the fact that she herself liked my music and my teeshirts really helped! She was kind enough to also share with me a photo of the two of us together with my CD which is on my homepage, and allowed me to put the full interview on my electronic press kit. National print like USAToday also really draws well. And some blogs, like the Huffington Post, also have large followings.
5. What have been the positive and negative experiences in doing this campaign?
It clearly drives online sales and also credibility for doing business deals with others. On the negative side, you always get the random email (when you have a website that has a ‘send us your comments’ which I find overwhelmingly positive and useful) — you just have to take it with a grain of salt. With the web and anonymity, and lots of unhappy people out there, you can get everything from ‘I think you are fat and stupid’ to ‘your music is awful’. Luckily 99% of the feedback has been positive.
6. Which PR agencies are you using and do you recommend them?
I used three great companies: www.kfgroup.net, www.fifteenminutes, and an interesting company www.theconversationgroup.com who is great at generating buzz among bloggers, I highly recommend all three!
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