Sometimes When It Comes to Marketing Timing is Everything

I learned an important lesson this week. I use a service called Help a Reporter Out (it’s free) to find subject matter experts or contacts for books. I have been recently gathering profiles for Dr. Lance Casazza for his forthcoming book Habits and Attitudes. A few weeks ago I posted a request for more profile participants. I got zero responses (that time). I was perplexed and wondered if I had drained the proverbial pond of opportunities from HARO as a source. So I gave it a few weeks and posted a second request and guess what? I got a flood of responses.

Wow! What they say about timing is absolutely dead-on right. Timing in marketing and promotion is everything. A powerful lesson here:

Don’t give up just because your first or even second shot at promoting your book, product or service doesn’t get results.

Who knows why I got zero responses the first time. I felt discouraged. I assumed (which really stands for “ass out of you and me”) … don’t assume anything. Assumptions are often not based on facts. Unless you know it for a fact then keep trying. I assumed I had drained my pool of potential participants because I had sent two other queries out via HARO. So when I did the third time and got no results, here is thought process that leads to fail points: based on not quantitative information just assumption I thought I wouldn’t meet our goal of 52 profiles. I was absolutely wrong and my next action proved it. I decided to wait a few weeks and try again. Voile! Success.

So Friend-Os lesson learned. You just don’t know what is influencing people’s interests at any given time. You have to keep trying. It may not happen on the day you tried, but that doesn’t rule out the possibility it could happen in the near future. There is power to right place, right time. The key though is:

If you’re not trying to be in the right place at the right time you miss the chance altogether.

So many clients will give up when their window of opportunity just doesn’t seem to come around. What I’ve learned without a doubt is that you have to keep trying. Believe me when I say as a business owner I have felt discouraged. In fact right at this very moment I’m facing some issues and a great need to attract more business. But I’ve learned that change can come in a day! You’ve heard the phrase “What a difference a day makes” – it’s true. My life partner Chris says this all of the time. You never know when it can all shift and change. He teaches me to try not to worry about it.

Don’t give up! Exercise patience. When you’re promoting your book, product or service, you just don’t know when that opportunity or shift will come. You could be like me and go from 0 to 20 in a matter of two weeks. One day you could be out and sell only a book and two weeks later you could sell 20 books and maybe another day later sell 200 books. The key is to understand that the marketplace is moody. It kind of has a mind of its own. Your goal is to keep your product in front of the market so when its mood shifts your direction you reap the rewards.

So stay in the game and win it!