calendars

Pin-ups for Vets nonprofit needs publicity ideas

Gina Elise of Redlands, Calif., writes this week’s Help This Hound question:

“I am the Founder of Pin-ups for Vets, an award-winning non-profit organization that supports hospitalized veterans and deployed service members.

“We produce World War II-style pin-up calendars that raise money for hospitalized veterans. We use the money to buy rehabilitation equipment to help our veterans in their physical, occupational and cognitive therapy sessions. Although we have won a number of community service awards, we have never been funded. We’re using hundreds of volunteer hours to keep the organization operating.

“Our biggest challenge has been to get the word out there to the rest of the U.S. about our small organization with the big heart so we can help more wounded warriors .

“As the 1940′s-style calendar girl in the Pin-Ups for Vets calendar, I have made thousands of personal bedside visits to ill and injured vets in VA and military hospitals across the U.S. and overseas to present the donated calendar gifts from my supporters . The response to the hospital visits has been overwhelming!

“We would love to find a way to spread the word about our organization and have had some publicity on FOX news, in Stars & Stripes and in other media, but we need more. We can’t afford a publicist right now. Can your Publicity Hounds give us some ideas on how to spread the word about what we’re doing so we can sell more calendars and help more injured vets?”

How to thrive as an author, speaker, expert in any economy

boardgame2 The most successful authors, consultants, speakers and experts do one thing differently from most others.

They figure out creative ways to spin their expertise into multiple products and services. Many of the most successful authors, for example, never intend to rely on income solely from their book, even if it’s a best-seller.

That’s because they understand that, first, writing a best-seller is a long shot. But more importantly, even if they don’t write a best-seller, the book is better used as a “carrot” to pull in readers who are interested in a topic, and who can then buy more products and services related to the title of the book.

Here’s a short list of what those can include:

Calendars
Board games
T-shirts and other clothing
Consulting services
Membership sites
Subscription newsletters
Special reports
CDs and DVDs
Joint ventures with other non-competing authors who target the same audience

Add it all up, and the revenue from those offerings can surpass the revenue from a book. And many of those products and services have far less competition than a book has.

On Thursday, Oct. 22., Steve Harrison will host a free 90-minute teleseminar on “How to Thrive as an Author or Expert in Any Economy” at 2 and 7 p.m. Eastern. You will learn:

22 super-lucrative income streams which most authors overlook — but are surprisingly easy to implement (and certainly MUCH easier to produce than writing another book).
Some surprisingly simple ways to quickly and easily make another $5,000.000 to $15,000.00+/month from your book or expertise — even if you haven’t made any money so far as an author/expert.
3 ways to turn what you write into strong passive income month-after-month.

The call, which will last about 90 minutes, is the third preview call for Steve’s upcoming Quantum Leap Publicity & Marketing Program.

If the time is inconvenient for you, recruit somebody to listen and take notes because Steve seldom offer the replays.