This is a dangerous question to ask and if you haven’t established a reputation as a careful listener, a credible confidant, and a thoughtful leader, don’t ask it. If you do ask it without these credentials, you will be perceived as nosey, intrusive, and even phony.

Walk into your favorite bookstore or log on to Amazon.com and look for books about meaning and purpose in your life and work. You’ll find lots of them. Even if you can’t bring yourself to leave the business books, you’ll find chapters on purpose and meaning in almost all those books too. Finding meaning in life is important. Before you run around dropping this question on others, you need to answer it for yourself. It’s okay if you can’t answer this question when you ask it for the first time of others, so long as you are willing to share your ongoing quest for your own answer. This question is actually more about the process then an answer. Some people find their purpose early in life, some grow into an understanding, and others need many years and experiences to reach an Aha! It is the people who never ask themselves the question who miss out. Find Viktor Frankel’s book Man’s Search for Meaning, read it, and give copies away. Ponder Socrates’ words, “The unexamined life is not worth living,” and have it printed on cards that you can give to others. Listen to what others say (and don’t say) when you ask this question, and be willing to ask it of yourself.

Let the world know you are here!

One very effective marketing technique that is often overlooked is the press release. If you want a publisher to give your press release even a second glance, it is going to have to be written correctly, be interesting, and extremely newsworthy. Before you even begin writing your press release you must begin to think about it from the publisher’s perspective. They are looking for news. They are not looking for your product or service - they are looking for interesting and relevant news items that are linked to current affairs and trends.

How to write the press release

The secret is to keep it short whilst providing just the right amount of information in getting your message across in the most effective and interesting way. Its very important that the press release is interesting enough to catch the attention of the reporter. After all, who want to read anything that is not interesting In the upper left hand corner of every press release, write the words “FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE” unless there is time sensitive material involved. The upper right hand corner of the press release should contain your contact information and should always contain your name and telephone number which must be a valid number that is not going to be left unanswered. If a reporter cannot contact you then the article is not going to get printed.

The headline

A major part of the press release will be the title which should grab the attention of the reader and entice to read on. If the headline is not interesting or is irrelevant to the rest of the article then it will not be used. The headline is extremely important and will be the main reason why the release is published so concentrate on an eye-catching phrase that will stop the reader in their tracks and will invoke curiosity to continue reading the article. If the headline is exciting and newsworthy, you will start getting calls. If it isn’t, then most publishers will never get past it

The body

The body contains three major sections:

Summary: This should be a continuation of the headline and should tell the entire story in one short paragraph. Let them know the who, what, when, where, and why so that they would understand the release without having to read any further.

Credentials: The credentials section will involve giving your credentials and/or showing a quote which enforces the power behind the story that you are giving out. In most successful press releases, this section is based on a quote about the story inside of quotation marks. Then, the name and the credentials of the person giving the quote are listed. Make sure that this quote is extremely professional and specific (just as if you were using a testimonial inside of a sales letter).

For example you could write in the third person and quote yourself. You could say: Colin Hartness - Director of Web-At-Work Ltd says ” The new control panel that was introduced will provide clients with Total Domain Control etc……”

Closing Statements: In the last section, you will want to close the sale. The closing statements will advise the reader how to obtain further information but will not try to make a direct sale. The statements will provide enough intrigue and create sufficient interest to provide a follow-up and then hopefully a sale. In other words, don’t tell them how much your product or service costs in this section. You just want to get them to call you or visit your website for more information.

Then, in the center of the page at the bottom of the press release, include the symbol “###” which means that this is the end.

If the press release has been written and created correctly then you are now ready to send your message to the media. TrafficZilla offer a range of media blasters within their members section, one of which is the press release blaster. Simply enter your press release in the box provided and choose the type of recipient that would be interested by category, and submit to a full of potential publishers. Use the Media Blaster to blast your press release to 1,935 Radio stations, over 1000 Cable & TV Stations, over 100 News Syndicates, over 3,000 Newspapers and over 1200 Magazines! If you don’t already have a press release written, you can use the templates provided.

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Audience: subordinates of the new executive
Message: This new executive has all the right credentials—and he’s modest.
Tone: informal, light
Timing: 2 minutes

Thank you for taking time out of your schedules to show up to meet our new chief. And yes, I think, he probably knows what a rarity it is for any of you to leave your desk and responsibilities for more than a couple of minutes during the week and how eager you are to get on with your usual challenging, exciting, dynamic, and excellent work. So I’ll be brief.

To summarize his résumé: (Name) has served as a vice president in two small corporations you may have heard of—Exxon and General Motors. At GM, he was responsible for [insert details of position]. At Exxon, he tried his hand at [insert details]. Trained in his undergraduate work as an engineer, he has toyed with a few technical ideas in his spare time and holds (number) patents. Oh, and along the way, he has managed to get his doctoral thesis published in a Prentice-Hall book entitled (title). A few other editors of technical journals have asked him to share what he’s learned with the rest of the industry, so he’s published a few hundred articles.

(Name) didn’t start at the top, however. Through the ranks at GM and Exxon, he held positions as design engineer, regional and divisional sales manager, and manager of operations. As you can see, he had quite a little difficulty in holding down a job until he got to the top of these organizations.

But from my understanding now, he’s here to stay. They say that a good executive is judged by the company he keeps… solvent. (Name), we’re placing our bets that you’re going to keep us solvent. And I’m very pleased about your decision to join us here. Meet your new chief executive, (name).