Instant Marketing for Almost Free: Effective, Low-Cost Results in Weeks, Days, or Hours (Quick Start Your Business) [Paperback]

Susan Benjamin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 2007 | Series: Quick Start Your Business

Without a doubt, developing high-impact marketing is one of the toughest challenges for small and medium businesses.

The world of marketing is in the midst of a revolution, generating great new opportunities for entrepreneurs in Internet, street and stealth marketing. Instant Marketing for Almost Free presents tactics designed to deliver effective marketing quickly and at a low cost:

--Reaching out to Internet "communities"
--"Street" and other nontraditional advertisements
--Email marketing that's not spam
--And hundreds of other methods

Instant Marketing for Almost Free is a totally up-to-the-minute approach to marketing that will see businesses increasing their profits while reducing their marketing headaches.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Promote your business effectively
for next to nothing!

Your company might offer the most satisfying goods and services on the planet, but that won’t equal profit if potential customers don’t know you exist. Learn how to get the word out about your business in the most inexpensive and effective ways possible.

Developing compelling marketing plans and materials requires skill, knowledge and strategy. Let Instant Marketing for Almost Free teach you:
--How to identify the core words, strategies and images that define your company
--Tips and techniques for establishing your brand
--The ten most critical imperatives of marketing material
--Everything you need to know about creating your website
--The secrets of composing persuasive brochures, flyers and news releases
--How, when and where to advertise
--Ways of establishing yourself as an expert in your field
--How to make your office and sign say exactly what you want them to

“Susan F. Benjamin’s advice is fun, outrageous and at times, surprising. Every employee should read this book-and their bosses should read it too.”
-Harold Rauner, President, The Business Bank

Susan Benjamin has been helping small businesses and other organizations better market their products and services since 1989. She has established, trained and researched marketing strategies for organizations including Putnam Investments and MFS, and has trained thousands of marketing writers.

About the Author

Susan F. Benjamin has brought communications issues to the nation for almost twenty years. Publications from the Wall Street Journal to the Chicago Tribune have featured Susan's novel approaches, while her opinion pieces on language-related issues have appeared in USA Today, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the New York Daily News, Government Executive, and countless others. Her other books include Quick and Painless Business Writing (Career Press, December 2006) and Words at Work: Business Writing in Half the Time with Twice the Power (Perseus, 1997).

As a speaker, Susan has appeared on CNN and National Public Radio and other broadcasts. She has trained over one hundred thousand federal and private-sector employees in numerous venues and has given keynote and other addresses. Her clients have included the Carnegie Mellon Executive Program, the National Geospacial-Intelligence Agency, Liberty Mutual Insurance Group, Fleishman Hillard International Communications, and many others.

A former professor, Susan mentored academics at Harvard University and MIT. She participated in the White House initiative on plain language under the Clinton administration, overseeing the revision of countless documents affecting millions of citizens each year. Her clients included the State Department, Department of Defense, Food and Drug Administration, as well as hundreds of private-sector organizations.

Susan's research includes assessments of organizational communication processes and studies on how language affects reader responsiveness. Articles about these findings have appeared in numerous publications, including Scribes Legal Journal, Government Executive, and Employment Management Today.

Susan studied philosophy and writing at Boston University and Bennington College. She received her master's in writing from Lesley College, where she worked with C. Michael Curtis, senior editor of the Atlantic.

Visit Susan's website at instantmarketingforalmostfree.com.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: Sourcebooks (January 1, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1402208243
• ISBN-13: 978-1402208249
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 7.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,346,649 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Susan Benjamin is founder of Words at Work, Inc., which offers writing services and strategies for all sizes of businesses. "Few medium-sized companies, or big ones for that matter, can boast of its skill bank," wrote Tom Peters in his book Liberation Management. Benjamin has also taught writing at Berklee and other colleges in Boston.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A book that you can read in 30 minutes or less that will give you an overview of things you can do to help market your small biz, May 11, 2008

By 

Jeff Lippincott "JLIPPIN" (Princeton, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Instant Marketing for Almost Free: Effective, Low-Cost Results in Weeks, Days, or Hours (Quick Start Your Business) (Paperback)

This book was just OK. Nothing special. I looked at the author's bio at the end of the book and it appears she's a public speaker and professional writer. It did not look like she has the experience to be an authority on the subject of this book. And, quite frankly, when I read the book it appears to be little more than a term paper rather than a quality book on marketing in 2008 for the small business owner. The book is split into five sections and 18 chapters as follows:

I. Getting started (1&2)
II. Marketing imperatives (3-5)
III. The Instant Marketing Supply Kit (6-14)
IV. People, Places, & Things (15-18)
V. Appendix (A&B)

1. Taking the mystery out of marketing
2. Marketing from within: The heart of your marketing campaign
3. Love you, love your brand
4. Ten imperatives of instant marketing success
5. Get the right response
6. Signature materials
7. Brochures
8. Almost everything you need to know about creating your Web site
9. Direct mail and email marketing
10. Short stash: Tip sheets and flyers
11. Newsletters
12. News releases and other forms of publicity
13. Advertising: From newspapers to the airwaves and TV
14. Giveaways
15. Telephone marketing
16. The "Who" of instant marketing
17. Roadside marketing: Lobbies, windows, and signs
18. The people in the places: Marketing face-to-face
A. Worksheets
B. Samples

Why was Chapter 7 included? Today a Web site is imperative, and whatever goes in a brochure should already be listed in the Web site. Chapter 8 on Web sites was weak. Why wasn't Chapter 9 more about emails rather than direct mail. Direct mail is a dying way to promote a business (although it still has its place in nonprofit promotion). And I think the spam issue could have been better covered in the chapter. Chapter 10 and flyers? Oh my gosh! Flyers are such a waste of time and use of resources.

Chapter 11 discusses newsletters. Why didn't it cover ezines? Newsletters are pretty much ancient history now that we are in the Internet Age and Web 2.0 is in force. And Chapter 13 seemed a little inappropriate since the title of the book implies the book is about cheap ways to market and advertise. Radio and TV are not exactly bootstrappin. Chapter 15 on telesales? With the Don't Call lists out there, this is not the way to go today. I'm surprised this was included.

The chapters are short. And there is lots of white space on the pages. Don't expect too much coverage on any of the topics discussed. But if you are just looking for a book that you can read in 30 minutes or less and will give an overview of some things you can do to help market your small business, then take a look at this book. 3 stars!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Not even close to free, March 12, 2011

By 

Ken (Wisconsin, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Instant Marketing for Almost Free: Effective, Low-Cost Results in Weeks, Days, or Hours (Quick Start Your Business) (Paperback)

I bought the book because it sounded like it had some good ideas for the business I just bought. The reality a far different.

If you are very creative and own a printing company some of her ideas could be almost free. The problem is most of the world isn't creative enough to draw the logos or write the press releases she suggest.

The book is also geared more to those in retail and law firms. Not too many contractors or day cares will have a need for a press release.

My biggest disappointment came in her political view point being peppered throughout the book. If I wanted to read about politics I would have gotten a book about that. Here I wanted to learn about marketing and branding, not how some forms of marketing show you are hot headed but if you go a different route it shows you are intelligent. I am keeping my politics out of my review so I won't be able to give specific examples, but they can't be missed.

All told I took maybe one or two nuggets from the book that I will ever be able to use. I can't in good conscious recommend this book.