Skip to main content

Small Business Stories: Promoting in Person

 

I believe that every person who starts a business to do what they love will always and inevitably find themselves doing things they definitely do not love for that very same business.

I have resigned myself to the necessity of promotion.  What that meant today is that I smeared on eye liner, shoved on the tallest pair of heels I've worn since my wedding, and jumped in the car with a crumpled list of directions to retirement homes.

These non-writing errands were not the kind of things I had in mind when I started Memories in Print.  As hard to believe as it may be, I didn't have a burning ambition to walk across pitted parking lots in black pumps, to trade jokes with nursing home receptionists, or play awkward phone tag with activity directors at nursing homes.  But that's the stuff I did today.

When I started this, I did it for the people and the stories: for the chance to interview in great length and depth, for the joy of writing true and beautiful anecdotes, to learn and preserve the buried little wisdoms every person has.

But, unfortunately, the catch is that if no one knows what I do, no one will hire me.  That means no stories, no writing, and no money.  So this promotion thing is a means to an end I want (the interviewing and writing); a necessary evil, I would call it.

So, today, me and my new black heels drove all over town and found our way into 6 different retirement homes.

I would've preferred to sit cross-legged in my desk chair and make phone calls to those places instead.  That would've been easier, and would've taken less time.  I wouldn't have had to use the gas to get there.  I wouldn't have rubbed my heels raw, been forced to shave my legs, or even to shower.

But I knew I had to go in person, because of this one story my mom told me:
My mother spent a few years working part-time at Barnes & Noble.  One night, a few months after getting the job, she saw her manager shuffling a thick stack of papers - a week's worth of job applications.  
"Jerry," she said, "If you always get that many applications, why in the world did you end up hiring me?  I had absolutely no experience." 
"Well, did I meet you?" he asked. 
"Yes - I came in and turned it in in person, and you happened to be here when I did." 
"That's why," he said.  "I must've met you and liked you, so that's why I hired you."
I thought about that last night while chewing my nails and looking up the assisted living homes closest to where I live.  And I decided the top two things for my Wednesday agenda were: (1) buy black pumps (2) wear black pumps while personally promoting my business.

Not including the blister on the outside of my right ankle, I don't know how much I have to show for my day.        I was never in any one place more than ten minutes, and I only ever interacted with the receptionists and a few retirees sitting outside in their rocking chairs.  And, physically, all I have to prove my visits are six little business cards, each with the name of the activities director or resident services director or executive director that I need to call and follow up with (yes, even though I went in person, I still have to make the phone calls).  Bottom line for today, I laid groundwork and gained nothing: no contracts, no meetings, no promises or prospective clients.

But at least now I know who to ask for when I call.  And for every business card I received, I gave back my own business card and a brochure - a physical reminder that ends up (hopefully) on someone's desk.

And even if I never saw a single director, I made myself a face and a person - not just a voice on the phone to be transferred - to each receptionist I met.  A couple of them were even engaged enough to look through my sample book.  One receptionist named Terri even promised to write a detailed e-mail to her director to better describe the book to her.  I think Terri even liked me.

And maybe (hopefully) that'll be enough to get me hired.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

I Watch You Smile - You Steal the Show

Anyone ever see "Mean Girls" with Lindsey Lohan? When she was pissed off, she suffered from a symptom she dubbed "word vomit". Hers was the result of her convulsing anger, but I have a different word vomit. Mine is basically the result of my vocabulary and emotions upchucking at the same time. I'm not quite sure what to tell you guys; what's appropriate to say, what you don't need to know, what's too much to tell you. This is probably gonna be a pretty long entry, which might scare you off, but after hearing my unusally discouraging tones I have no doubt that many of you are now riveted. I guess...you guys love me and want to know me, and for some, this is the only way you keep up with me. I'll figure out the limit as I go, I guess. I had a very good talk with my momma today, which is a good sign for our relationship. It was violently and starkly splintered for quite a while, but it has progressed in leaps and bounds lately as I've better und...

The Core Four

What a wonderful delight - the Core Four are back and typing about their lives. Nothing makes my day quite like reading a fresh entry - or two even! - from Tricia AND Traci AND Jans. Nothing compares. Especially Jans; that was what, a two, maybe three month difference between entries? It made me sad, but I checked as often as I thought of it. What a tremendous treat to click your link and find my name invoked in the first sentence - I'll be on a high from that for hours to come. To the rest of you wondering what names I'm referring to, check on my links sidebar; the three of them and I used to live in three different cities and two different states (now three cities and three states), and our little-traveled blogs kept us connected. These girls are the reason why I started writing a blog at all; it's hard to imagine that I once was the worst at updating consistently...now I can't get enough of it, and I run out of stories to tell (which is saying alot for me...) We all ...

Shipwrecked

I always seem to come back here, to this place of writing and sharing.  It feels like a boulder on the shore - I may wash away in the tide for a while, but somehow I always end up washed back here. It's now been nearly twelve years since my first post here.  I was 18 when I started this blog for my Freshman English class; two months from now, I'll be 30 and freshly divorced. There is much, of course, that I cannot and will not write about that last detail; I am not here to tattle or list grievances.  Here is the short story: we were together for nearly 12 years, and now we are working on paperwork for our dissolution.  No, there was no infidelity on either side.  And no, I was the one who initiated both the separation and the dissolution.  Yes, it was - and is - very painful.  And yes, I do hope he quickly finds happiness after we part ways, even if it sounds trite. And here I am, back here on this seaside boulder, washed ashore like a ...