Can you afford NOT to know how to...

• Send first-class direct mail for as little as 5 cents per prospect-- legitimately?
• Become so much a recognized expert that the media call YOU when they want a story--over and over again?
• Take advantage of the easiest, simplest technique for free publicity in newspapers and magazines...and unlike a news story, YOU control the content?
• Find clients and customers on-line WITHOUT getting flamed?
• Pay only for responses an ad actually brings you?
• Run an extremely successful radio ad campaign with as little as one spot per week?
• Use precise copy and design and targeted placement to slash costs and boost results in any advertising buy?

Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring, by Shel Horowitz, tells all of this, and thousands of other ways to save money AND boost results. Click here to read the Table of Contents This 384-page book is a comprehensive, affordable one-volume reference on low-cost marketing. Though we could charge a lot more, we know our customers are "without megabucks" themselves. Thus, we provide this treasure-trove of practical, hand-son information for just for just $8.00 U.S., including shipping within the U.S. Our brand-new book Grassroots Marketing: Getting Noticed in a Noisy World is now available--and has a good deal more that is not in either MWM or the Update.

Which book should you order?

You'll find nuts-and-bolts techniques for every stage of marketing, whether your marketing budget is $10 or $100,000. Detailed information on free media exposure (including several often- overlooked strategies), Yellow Pages, classifieds, copywriting, in-store marketing, on-line and other electronic methods, and much more. Published by Simon & Schuster, and now distributed exclusively by AWM.

Successful marketing, like successful furniture, is built on four solid legs: 1] free publicity, 2] paid advertising, 3] self-made marketing, and 4] advanced techniques. All of them can be used to generate effective, affordable responses to your marketing--and thus sales! There are hundreds of ways to get the maximum benefit for the least cost in each of these four categories. Are you using all four to their best advantage?

MARKETING WITHOUT MEGABUCKS is perfect for:
small business ... freelancers ... nonprofit agencies ... craftspeople ...
issue-oriented grassroots groups

Don't Take Our Word For It!
Here are a few readers' and reviewers' comments:

"Thank you for your wonderful book 'Marketing without Megabucks'. It is the single most profitable investment I've ever made. With its superb advice, I managed to build a small company turning over close to 1,000,000 US Dollars a year within 2 years and I have not spent a single penny on paid advertising! With our special computer-noise reduction products we have obtained front-page coverage with the most important German computer magazine, and have been featured in 13 other magazines and newspapers. We (rather the product) even have been featured twice on TV...

"I want to thank you for a source of information that will most likely make the difference between the success and failure of a 30-year old business. I'm not even half way through Marketing Without Megabucks yet have already employed several of your suggestions. The small effort I've made to reach out to the community...has already opened doors."
--Carole Del Vecchio, Union Car Wash, Massachusetts

"Horowitz puts Jay Levinson's popular Guerrilla Marketing theory into practice by explaining, in detail, how to market... Also thrown in is a heap of useful examples and some of the best advice we've read for naming a business."
--Rodney J. Moore, Home Office Computing

"I wish I had gotten my hands on your book sooner... Thank you for the information on writing press releases and getting on the phone to follow them up... It worked and without your book it definitely would not have happened... The first follow-up call resulted in a newspaper reporter and photographer at my house yesterday!"
--Christine Smith The Babysitters Directory, Minnesota

"A scrappy and practical guide for a business owner or manager with limited means. Horowitz is a true salesman for his ideas and provides detailed examples of what can be accomplished...ideal for would be marketing mavens who just happen to be a little short on cash."
--David C. Walters, Christian Science Monitor

"The most extensive, least expensive marketing book I have found."
--Don Taylor, President, Internet Business Division, Virginia

"Packed full of ideas...a great deal of useful information here."
--Joel Jones, Library Journal

"Distinguishes the high-cost hype from hard-hitting, cost-efficient techniques...illustrates what can be done when ingenuity and imagination, smart research, and savvy follow-through are recognized as the real riches of sound marketing."
--Business Life

"Cuts through the glitz to the most effective, economical methods."
Oregon Business

"I read straight through Marketing Without Megabucks: How To Sell Anything on a Shoestring and thoroughly enjoyed it (I almost missed supper this evening)."
Kathleen Ryan, Publisher, The Frugal Bugle (private letter)

"Marketing Without Megabucks has proved to be a tremendous boon to our publishing business. The target marketing advice, media placement recommendations, and general message of hope has meant courage and sales. Bravo, Mr. Horowitz."
Amy Zuckerman, Co-Principal, IN/EX Information Export, Massachusetts

"A one-stop marketing shop. I can't think of a topic that is not comprehensively covered, from classified ads all the way to huge campaigns."
--Brandi Jasmine, freelance business reviewer and Web publisher

It's a jungle out there! We're bombarded by marketing messages everywhere we look, listen, smell, taste, or touch. If you have to compete for people's attention, you're up against the biggest and most powerful companies in America. They want your prospects--and they have virtually unlimited resources. You, on the other hand, run a small business or non-profit organization. You probably wear many hats and have constant and diverse responsibilities. And your promotional budget might be almost non- existent. How can you get people to listen to you?

Of course, if you have more to spend on marketing, you'll be more successful--if you do it right. But this book will tell you how to get results, even with an investment of 96 cents a week.

Why will you be successful? Because most people are doing such a bad job of marketing that the results they achieve are in spite of their efforts, and not because of them.

But you will learn how to do it right. You'll learn how to develop successful low-cost, client-centered marketing strategies that make your customers feel you're doing them a great favor by meeting their needs, rather than just feeding your own bottom line. You'll learn a wide range of strategies and specific tools, with actual real-life examples, applicable for small or large marketing budgets. Specifically, you will learn how to:

• Turn your local newspaper into your own free publicity bureau
• Create and distribute a wide range of effective do-it-yourself promotional materials, including direct mail, fliers, brochures, and much more
• Evaluate media buys, public relations, and ad agency suggestions, and advertising specialties for appropriateness and cost-effectiveness
• Enhance all your marketing by developing and maintaining a consistent and appropriate image
• Track the results of your marketing campaign so you know which tools are working most successfully for you

You'll have everything you need for success in finding prospects and turning them into customers! It's all in a book called Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring. 384 pages jam- packed with solid advice for low-cost marketing success. Traditional business thinking focuses on increasing efficiency and reducing costs. Standard nonprofit thinking stems from the idea of community service. And artistic thinking is based on creativity. Marketing Without Megabucks will show you how to combine the best of business, nonprofit, and artistic thinking.

Just to name four examples among the hundreds of proven strategies and techniques you'll learn:

1. 10 points to successful, selling copywriting
2. When to call a reporter or editor--and when never to call
3. Why most telemarketing is harmful--and how yours can really work
4. How to turn the media into your press agency with free coverage-- even of for-profit events

This is a book that every business owner, every publicity manager, and every nonprofit agency executive will want to own. You'll certainly want to read it before your competitors do!

Now, please read two small excerpts from Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring.

Excerpt From "Six Factors in Choosing a Name," Chapter 1 Personalization (In Grassroots Marketing, we add two more factors for a total of eight)

Every business or agency chooses between two types of names: 1] one that includes the operator's name(s), or 2] one that doesn't mention a specific person. If you use the latter, you will need to register your business with a "fictitious name statement" or "doing business as" form... The use of a first name in the business conveys a down-home, mom- and-pop image. This image could be appropriate if you stress personalized service and a convivial atmosphere, depending on the type of business. Garrison Keillor's mythical "Bob's Bank" always got a laugh, because banks wouldn't use a casual name.

But let's say you run a gourmet food store. If your name begins with A, even better. Call yourself something like "Ann's Fine Foods" and you'll contrast sharply with large chain supermarkets. A last name sounds more formal, but still lets the business feel personal and approachable... A straightforward fictitious name could be "The Gourmet Shop" or "Food Specialties, Ltd." Of course, there are other approaches. Sound, imagery, rhythm, and cleverness can all come into play. You could be: "Aromatic Aristocratic Food Specialties"; "An Exotic Place to Eat"; "Asparagus Gourmet Foods."

You can still have a personalized name while maintaining a professional image. Compare the tones of these variations: "Abe's Camels"; "Abe, Ike and Jake"; "Abraham, Isaac & Jacob, Inc."; "Three Guys From the Middle East"; "Abraham and Sons"; "Abraham and Associates"; "Camels and Desert Sands"; "A. Isaac, Jacob and Partners-- Camel Dealers"; "AIJ Associates"; "AIJ Desert Transportation Specialists, Inc."...

Incidentally, you don't have to use your own name. One firm began as Sandy's Secretarial Service When the business was sold, the new owner cleverly dropped the leading S; Sandy's became Andy's. There had been a Sandy, but there was no Andy. Yet this tiny name change moved the business from the dregs of the Yellow Pages to the second listing in the category, while at the same time maintaining a clear identity that previous customers could recognize.

Excerpt From "Ask for a Bargain," Chapter 14

An advertising rate schedule is something like the listed sale price on a house, or the manufacturer's suggested retail price on any expensive item--a starting point for negotiation. However, unlike those situations, you can't just try to purchase advertising and say, "That's too high; let's negotiate." Instead, you have to play the game: use the accepted methods of paying less than full price.

Many of these methods are applicable in any paid advertising medium: print ads, Yellow Pages, radio, TV, even such devices as advertising on your community weather telephone hotline. However, individual media outlets may or may not be interested--and virtually none will inform you of most of these tricks. If the ad sales people at a particular broadcast or print outlet believe they can sell so much at full price that they don't need to negotiate, you're basically stuck with a take it or leave it choice.

But until you start talking, you have no way of knowing whether you might be able to save hundreds or thousands of dollars. It's up to you to initiate the discussion, explore all your options, and make the best deal you can.

If ad sales are down, you'll have a better shot than if the ad seller has all the business s/he can handle. But also, many of these bargains are easier to arrange if you have a good relationship with the seller; your account executive will be more likely to be flexible if you've worked together for a while. And if your account rep won't talk about any of these things, try talking to the advertising manager. Some places will have rigid policies eliminating most of these budget-stretchers--but you have absolutely nothing to lose by asking about them! At the very least, you will be treated as an informed consumer who deserves some respect, or even preferential treatment. At best, you'll save oodles of money.

We'll start with three methods you might hear about from your account executive, and move on to the ad industry's insider secrets. (End of Book Excerpts)

For more free marketing advice, please visit our Marketing Resources page.

By Shel Horowitz, marketing/frugality consultant and author of Grassroots Marketing: Getting Noticed in a Noisy World, Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring, The Penny-Pinching Hedonist: How to Live Like Royalty with a Peasant's Pocketbook, and other books. Visit Shel's 350+ page Website, https://www.frugalfun.com, for free advice and monthly tipsheets on frugal marketing and frugal fun, as well as Global Arts Review, Global Travel review, and Down to Business magazines.

To visit the most important pages on our site, make a selection from the drop-down menu below, then click on "Visit Now!" (Several of these pages are also accessible from the menu on the right.)

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Marketing Resources from Dr. Ralph Wilson of Wilson Internet Services & WilsonWeb.com:

Web Commerce Today newsletter

Report on Affiliate Management Software

12 Ways to Give Your Webstore a Sales Boost

Click here to explore Ken Evoy's excellent site for marketers--learn how to Make Your Site Sell

Does your marketing dollar never seem to go far enough for the results you achieve? What if you had a roadmap to achieve marketing success at astonishingly low cost?

Here are TWO roadmaps by international marketing consultant Shel Horowitz

Grassroots Marketing: Getting Noticed in a Noisy World

Marketing Without Megabucks: How to Sell Anything on a Shoestring

Learn how to: make the most of free media exposure (including many unexpected tips and tricks)...

• get the most mileage out of every marketing tool, from a press release to a trade show to a sales call to a paid ad...
• write hard-hitting copy that moves your prospects to ACTION--and is appropriate for the medium...
• send postal direct mail for as little as three cents...
• market "flame-free" and successfully on the Internet...
• create a spiral of "expertise opportunities" to bring your business to the next level, and beyond...

Preview either book by clicking on the links above--or go directly to our order page and get your own copy!

This site is brought to you by Shel Horowitz and Dina Friedman, Directors of Accurate Writing & More--bringing you marketing, writing, and career assistance since 1981.
(800) 683-WORD or (413) 586-2388
info@frugalfun.com
https://www.frugalfun.com/
https://www.accuratewriting.com