As a new freelance writer, I’ve been making a strong effort to do a large marketing push at least once a week. Here’s a summary of what’s been working and what hasn’t.

• Success: I sent a series of letters to vendors who sell goods and services to the professional association industry. I worked as an association director of education for many years before becoming a sales and marketing professional for a company who sold webcasting services to the association industry.These letters were fairly personalized, and I got a great response rate. I’ve picked up at least 3 jobs with this technique, and I’ve got more meetings scheduled.
• Success: Although I haven’t gotten any specific jobs from my eNewsletter yet, I’ve gotten a lot of exposure. Each week I add probably 10-20 names to my list, and once a month nearly 2000 people get a reminder that I’m here and ready when they are.
• Success: I’m an active member of a listserv in the association community, and I regularly offer resources and ideas to the group. I’ve gotten quite a bit of exposure this way, including requests for articles and speaking engagements.
• Not So Good: I spent another $300 yesterday buying a list of top companies here in San Diego to send them a direct mail postcard with my services. I’ve sent several of these out, but I don’t seem to get many calls back. The most effective postcard campaign came when I sent out the postcard then sent emails to the people who were going to be getting them (when I had the emails, of course). I met with a designer last week who will probably send me something to spec out soon.What I really need to do is to add cold calling to these direct mail efforts. Perhaps I’ll make some calls today. Ugh.
• Not So Good: I had high hopes that my column on small business issues in a local monthly newspaper would drive traffic to my blog and my site. I haven’t even been able to find a copy of the newspaper myself, and I haven’t seen a kabillion people stop by.
• Not So Good: I’ve been leaving piles of my postcard in public places here in San Diego: coffee shops, mailbox office counters, etc. I got a call from one guy who wants to market a product to prisoners, and another guy called me looking for someone who could put together a marketing plan to sell products to Hispanics who visited lunch trucks. Neither of these were really up my alley.