Publicize Your Brand With Jill Lublin

Publicity is one of the things in in life that can come for free if you happen to have luck on your side, which most of us don’t. What can you do to publicize your brand and become more visible to the people you want to serve? Get a load of golden nuggets on this topic as Gerry Foster chats with the Queen of Publicity herself, Jill Lublin. Jill is an international speaker, publicity consultant and author of four bestselling books. Learn a lot about working with PR agencies, leveraging client testimonials, refining your brand message and other things you can do to enhance your business’s credibility, get recognized in public and boost your clientele. Plus, don’t miss out on her publicity crash course giveaway.

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Publicize Your Brand With Jill Lublin

I am excited because I have my special guest, a dear friend and someone that I’ve known since the early ’90s. I’ve been a fan of hers for quite a long time. Her name is Jill Lublin. Let me tell you a little bit about this amazing individual. Jill is an international speaker on the topics of radical influence, publicity, networking, kindness and referrals. She is the author of four bestselling books including Get Noticed… Get Referrals published by McGraw-Hill, and the co-author of Guerrilla Publicity and Networking Magic. Jill’s latest book, The Profit of Kindness went number 1 in 4 categories. Jill is a master strategist on how to position your business for more profitability and more visibility in the marketplace. Who wouldn’t want that? She is the CEO of a strategic consulting firm and has many years of experience working with over 100,000 people plus national and international media. Jill teaches a virtual Publicity Crash Course and consults and speaks all over the world. She also helps authors to create book deals with major publishers and agents, as well as obtain foreign rights deals. Visit PublicityCrashCourse.com/freegift and JillLublin.com. Everyone, I cannot put into words how exciting this is to have her here. Jill, how are you doing?

I am doing much better talking to you, Gerry.

You look great. Jill, what would you first want our audience to know about Publicity and all the things that you do? You’re a rock star in what you do.

Thank you. The biggest thing that I love to raise my white flag about is the issue of the message that you’ve got to have a great message. Gerry, I know that you and branding also harp on this because we know how important a great message is. My version of it though is for the media, which means it’s simple, quick and focused on what’s in it for the media audience, like your branding would be for their audience. I want you to be thinking about that as a solution provider and as an expert in the marketplace. When you’re looking at media, what’s the problem you solve? That’s something big that is important.

You’re hitting upon two real critical topics. One is what problems do you solve that drives the message and then people don’t know what their message is. How does one go about dealing with those two issues? What advice can you give to people?

Number one, get focused on, what do people say that you do for them? The thing that people need to get off of is what I call the beat the chest publicity. I, us, we, it’s not important. I want to shift all that message to the audience, the people you serve. Listen to people, what are they saying that you do for them? It may surprise you. It may awe you. I remember one of the people in my Virtual Publicity Course, he said, “Your connections and what you’ve opened up for me has changed my life.” I thought, “I’m good in publicity,” but he told me that it’s my connections that changed his life. I realized that I’ve got to be talking about that more. I do have tremendous connections. I know amazing people like you. It’s important that we listen to other people about also who we are because we’re in our own box and I include me. We all are. It’s good to listen to what your clients are saying that you did to change their lives. In that case, this leads me to another piece about Publicity, ask for testimonials. You must be asking for testimonies all the time. Keep them fresh, new and what are people saying. That is super and then it keeps your name out there. I’m using an automated service for testimonials and they go directly to Facebook, which is terrific. It keeps that name recognition going. By the way, only 4 and 5-star reviews. Anything less than that doesn’t go there.

You’ve also hit upon something else, which I love about you, which is the connections that you have because there are a lot of people who say, “I can get you publicity. I can get you featured in a ‘magazine or newspaper article.’ I can get you featured online. I can get you on talk shows.” However, they don’t have the juice. They don’t have their media relationships. Expand upon that because that’s one of the things that separate you from a lot of other publicists in media.

I had a PR agency for years and I do more PR strategy, but I’m still connected to many media people. I can immediately get someone, for instance, on a former Fox TV interview host. I love this man. He knows that anyone I send his way is going to be good. For me, what I know that I also bring to the table is a way to look at things differently. For instance, my coaches who are black, I have them talking. We dropped every other message and we’re talking about Black Lives Matter. They’re doing it from their perspective and that’s a beautiful thing. Like a woman who’s not been talking about that for a long time and now is talking about being a black woman in this world and what that’s like. I had a woman, a business consultant who was in my Virtual Publicity Course. She’s on the course and goes, “I’ve got to tell you something. I’ve got a problem.” I said, “What?” She went, “I’m not a math teacher. I don’t know math and my nine-year-old wants me to do math with him and it’s driving me crazy. I’m a business consultant.” We use that as her story, because how many other people could relate to that? Trying to do their thing in the world with their kids running around. All of a sudden, they’re teachers too. That creates new and unique problems in the marketplace.

The COVID-19 and anyone who in my world, who is a health, wellness, transformational, mindset person certainly is talking about, how do you survive and thrive in these days? I’ve got my financial planners and all people in the financial and mortgage industry and all that related insurance. They’re talking about financial wellness and what do you do in these times. These are all great topics. I want you to be thinking about what’s going on and where can you switch your message? People get stuck in a little bit of, “Here’s what I do, and here’s what I deliver.” They’re not moving into what could be interesting. Another example, I have a woman and she wrote a self-published book about a statue on top of the Capitol Building in Washington DC. With all the statues coming down and all the hoo-ha about that, I call her up and I’m like, “Statue is coming down. You wrote a book about a statute, right? It’s not coming down, but you have opinions about statues.” We’re able to get her into that mix of conversation. I’m going to ask you and advise you to get in the mix of the conversation, whatever the conversation is that’s going on out there.

Publicize Your Brand: Don’t just share what you do. Get into the mix of the conversation.

Get into the mix of the conversation, which taps into what’s trending that could be hot that people might find interesting. What else in your experience can a small business owner be? If they offer services or products or if they have a nonprofit, what are some of the other angles or approaches that they can take? I’ve found that a lot of owners, they’re not quite sure, “What is it that makes me interested in appealing to the media? Why would someone want to interview me? Why would someone want to do a story on me?” What are your thoughts on that? That’s a challenging part for a lot of people. It’s trying to figure out, what is the wow factor that’s going to first be interesting to someone like you? 

A couple of things, one is that it’s a stretch sometimes about your message. I went on media in Louisville, Kentucky, in a huge radio station, talking about the Dixie Chicks, dropping Dixie out of their name, which I had to google before I went on. Even though I worked in the music business for many years, you’ve got to get yourself up to what the people are saying. Be willing to switch and extend your message and know that interestingly enough, your personal story, like the business consultant teaching math or my relationship expert, she’s been talking and being the Quarantine Cupid and that’s been powerful. Even though what she does is write letters to people to help them express themselves. She’s a psychologist, but now she’s the Quarantine Cupid, which got her on WGN, a major talk show in Chicago, Illinois. What can you be doing that’s stretching your story? If you had breast cancer, you want to go out for Breast Cancer Awareness Month in October. Think about the months of the year and how what you do applies to that. My goal as coach in December and January, big goals month, and then I had to go out now every quarter, how are you doing a quarterly and as we reached the final stretches of the year? We increased her message. She’s also African American. I’ve got to go on out about that.

I call it everything you’ve got. My Hispanic clients go to Hispanic media, which there are many. My Christian clients go to Christian media of which there is much. If you’ve been in the military and you’re a vet, not only would you celebrate Veteran’s Day, but there’s also a lot of military media for example. These are great ways of using parts of who you are, not leading necessarily with that, except for that media. In my Virtual Publicity Courses, there is a Pakistani but he lives in LA. We were going deep on this and I see this headbang over there in the Zoom box. He says, “Jill, I never thought of this.” He started googling LA and Pakistani newsletters and he found five particular newsletters oriented toward that community in his culture. He got in three of them using this particular strategy. He increased his reach, web and enabling to reach people. Did all of them become his clients? Of course not, but what we want is the opportunity to reach a lot more people quickly, easily and what I love about publicity is it’s free.

This is outstanding because you are getting into what it takes to do, what publicize your brand. How can you get the attention of a mass number of people? We’ve heard all the horror stories about a publicist, “You put them on a monthly retainer and your money goes into this black hole. You don’t know if it’s paying off.” However, one of the things I’ve always admired about you is that you generate a return on the investment that people pay you for the services you provide. My whole thing is to know what to look for, know how to sort out the best from the rest of the crowd. What are your thoughts on that? What advice would you give to someone who’s looking for someone like you?

I owned a PR agency. My fee many years ago was $5,000 a month. Typically, people were laying down $30,000 to work with me. What I did is I revised all of my offerings and made this Virtual Publicity Course incredibly affordable. What I started doing is empowering because my heart is with entrepreneurs, speakers, authors, coaches, consultants, and what I call small business owners. The reality is there’s often not that budget to help those people. I revised some of my offerings and I do a hybrid approach where I do it with them, not for them. If you’re going to hire someone to do it for you, there are a few things I want you to look for. Number one, there are people who do it on a guarantee. You will pay more. For instance, when the Profit of Kindness came out, I did hire someone who was getting to me. I got on seven Fox TV News interviews in the first ten days, but for everyone I got, I paid several thousand dollars because for me, that was worth it and I kept it at a certain place. I kept it at $7,000 and that was great. I was in major markets on Fox TV for 4 minutes and 20 seconds, which by the way, I paid several thousand dollars every time I got booked, however, it was guaranteed.

For me, I tend to like the guarantees, but there are some people I trust to pay a retainer fee too and invest consistently. The way I structured it was to find a new way to make offerings to people in an affordable way, including using a project manager, which would be a major PR piece. I work with people, staff or someone they hire at a reasonable rate. I will give them the script of what to say, everything a PR agency does, except I shave off a lot of time and make it a lot faster. There are many ways to approach this. The truth is, when you do hire a PR agency, you’re shooting a little game of craps a bit, and we don’t always know how it will turn out.

What I love about what you’re also saying is you provide the “full services” of a PR agency for the solopreneur, little guy or gal, and someone who doesn’t have a PR agency budget. However, you’re saying, “I can give you that same depth. I can give you the same thinking, strategizing, connections, hookups, and relationships that you can get over there.” I want to go back to the whole thing about messaging because it’s a big obstacle for many people. How do you help them uncover their message? How do you help them find their voice?

I listen for a few things. I do have a formula and it is the problem now. I want you to fill that in. I want you to think about what’s the problem out there. I have them fill that in and then I want them to give three solutions, give people value and benefit. When I wrote Guerrilla Publicity, I was privileged to talk to media across the country, like Entrepreneur Magazine and Fast Company Magazine. Those were two of them. The media didn’t agree about everything, but they agreed about two things and that is to give value and benefits. One of the things I’m always listening for as people are giving their value and benefit. For me, it comes in the formula of a problem solution. I’m hearing what they say and what lands. I would like things to be what I might call a little bit sexy, sound-bite, memorable.

People will come up to me years later and I have this one called Create Your Ooh-Ahh Factor. They’ll come up and they’ll repeat that to me. That’s when I know that it’s landed. For people’s messages, I want it to be authentic to you. You need to be able to say it quickly and easily, including 4:00 in the morning because your media interviews are in New York, let’s say, and it’s 7:00 drive time there, for example. Your message needs to be quick, simple, easy and focused, and in five-year-old language. I have a bit of a gift from God, as I like to call it, for the ability to listen to what are people saying and go underneath it and hear what might be a more interesting message or recreate a message so that it lands simpler. I also like to tell people, “Give appetizers, not full meals.” You don’t want to be given all your secrets away, but you want to be telling people some good things and have them get that value and benefit and they’ll want to work with you.

You certainly are the Goddess of Publicity and you are gifted and talented at navigating what for a lot of people seems daunting, confusing, and overwhelming. At the same time, people wonder, “Who am I to be interviewed by someone?” I love what you’re also saying which is, “You partner and work with your clients. You get to know that person.” That’s one of the things I love about you. You’re personable. You have the heart of an angel. I can tell everyone who’s reading. Not only are you incredibly good at what you do. You work with integrity because you’ve always had this high standard in this thing called Publicity. You’re like me, we’ve been at this for a long time. We’d like to tell people since dinosaurs were roaming the earth, since the dawn of personal computers, but that says something to our staying power. In your case, your staying power is because of all the things that have been happening in the world and whatnot. What is 1 or 2 nuggets that you would like to say to the people who are checking this out in terms of how to best publicize your brand? What would you say they need to do as a next step?

Publicize Your Brand: When you hire a PR agency, you’re shooting a little game of craps a bit; you don’t always know how it will turn out.

Thank you for all the wonderful compliments. To say that every one of you has a unique gift and you deliver it in terms of your product, your service, you bring something unique to that. The point is, let’s find that, expand it, create it and to say to you that publicity is a lot easier than you think. That is the place I hold in the world to say to you that you can do it, now is your moment, and publicity will bring you prospects, profits, and clients like you can’t imagine. I have to tell you a woman, who followed my system, said she got one article in the Houston Chronicle and that led to two major speaking engagements for her. She is a speaker. That’s one of the things she does, which is somewhat of a nebulous product, but part of it is finding the right message. What I’ve seen again and again is the opportunity of publicity that drives business for people. It’s that old like, “What are you waiting for?”

Let’s take a baby step, put your message out there. It can go local. Local is a great way to start. Start on podcasts. That’s another great way to start. People won’t see you. You just talk and that’s easy. Most podcasts are short enough that you can maintain it. I like to joke that with The Profit of Kindness, when I was on Fox News for 4 minutes and 20 seconds, as an average TV interview, anyone can sound smart for four minutes and twenty seconds. You can too with good points that you can read in front of you if you need to. Don’t be concerned. What I know is when you know your message and it’s resonant for who you are, it’s authentic to who you be, you can say it anywhere, anytime to anyone. You can use it for media, for networking and social media. There’s a multi-use for your publicity. The truth is, Gerry, and I’ll leave you with this. Publicity is happening all the time in the Zoom rooms, when you do go out, in your world and social media, you are doing publicity. Let’s do it the right way and get your message to focus, simple and putting yourself out there in easy, ongoing visibility building activities. That’s important because your message matters.

Those are golden nuggets from the Goddess of Publicity. She is the Queen of Publicity. I could come up with different names for how we would describe you, Lublin. What she also said was, “Everyone, this is free advertising here. It has not died. If anything, it’s more important now than ever before. You have to mesh it with all your other online marketing activities so that you can maximize its impact.” I love what you also said, which is, “You’ve got something to share with the world.” Sometimes it takes someone like yourself to reach within you to help you uncover what your voice is but that’s part of what your special talent is. Jill, I want to thank you for spending time with me. I love you. I admire you. I respect you. You are the best of the best. Thank you so much. 

Thank you, Gerry.

Everyone, make sure you go to GerryFosterBranding.com, go to the Big Brand Formula podcast, or go onto one of your favorite Big Brand Formula podcast platforms, whatever those may be for you. I’m on most of the major ones. You can also search out Jill Lublin online. She’s all over the place. She walks her talk. I gave you her website information. Jill, thank you. Take care.

Important Links:

• Get Noticed… Get Referrals
• Guerrilla Publicity
• Networking Magic
• The Profit of Kindness 
• Publicity Crash Course
• PublicityCrashCourse.com/freegift
• JillLublin.com

About Jill Lublin

With 200+ speaking engagements each year, master publicity strategist and consultant, and bestselling author, Jill Lublin, consistently wows audiences worldwide with her entertaining and interactive keynotes, seminars, and training programs on publicity, networking, kindness and influence marketing.

Jill has shared her powerful networking and publicity strategies on the stages of Tony Robbins, T. Harv Eker, Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Loral Langemeier, James Malinchak, Lisa Nichols, Richard Simmons, and many others. Additionally, thousands of people have attended her popular “Crash Course in Publicity”, which she teaches live several times a month at locations around the U.S. and Canada, as well as a live online class. Her popular home study system is used by clients worldwide who are ready to create greater success and revenues for themselves and their companies.

Over the past 25 years, Jill has worked with ABC, NBC, CBS, and other national and international media as a highly regarded publicity expert. She has been featured in The New York Times, Women’s Day, Fortune Small Business, Entrepreneur, Forbes and Inc. magazines.

Jill is the author of four bestselling books, including: Get Noticed…Get Referrals (McGraw-Hill), Networking Magic (Morgan James), and Guerrilla Publicity (Adams Media), which is regarded as the “PR Bible”, and her latest book The Profit of Kindness (Career Press), which went #1 in four categories. With four international bestselling books, Jill is acknowledged as the go-to person for building success through influence marketing, networking, and publicity. She helps authors to create book deals with agents and publishers and well as obtain foreign rights deals. Jill is also the Producer and Host of the TV show, “Messages of Hope”, which inspires people to take positive action to improve their lives and create a better world.

In addition to her speaking engagements, Jill trains and consults with executives, sales teams and marketing departments in Fortune 500 companies, as well as in small-to-medium-sized companies. Her innovative influence marketing and publicity techniques consistently increase bottom line results for her clients.

Visit JillLublin.com or ProfitofKindness.com, or call 415-883-5455 for more information. For media interviews or to book Jill to speak contact Jennifer Ellis – jennifermarieellis@outlook.com /

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