Posts Tagged ‘Issuu.com’
How to Publish Your Print Materials Online For FREE!
Monday, June 14th, 2010
If you have been in business for any length of time, chances are you have many print materials (i.e. special reports, articles, marketing plans, tips etc.) that would serve you better online. It used to be a bit of a problem (and expensive) to re-purpose these materials for your Website or Blog. Not any more, here’s why…
Make An Issuu Out of Everything
ISSUU (pronounced the same as “issue”) is a free online service that allows you to easily and quickly take any digital document (i.e. PDF, Word, etc.) and convert it into a very interactive online format that anyone can read directly within your Website or Blog. Your visitors don’t need anything other than Flash to view these documents and they look and act like a real magazine or report.
It only takes seconds to convert documents and you can then embed them (with the code provided with the document) into any Web page. See the example below of the PDF handout I’ll be using for tomorrow’s session with ERA Top Producers at their convention in Atlanta.
In addition to making your documents look better, the “Wow!” factor will help you really stand out. Perhaps even more importantly however, you can track statistics as to how many times a document was viewed down to the page level. This will give you a very good idea as to whether or not your material is perceived as valuable by the viewers.
Once you create a new account (no credit card required) you start converting to your heart’s content. However you can also search to see what other Issuu users have published (and selected to make public) based upon key words and phrases. Search for “Real Estate Marketing Plan” and you will see how some sales people have put this tool to use.
While this is a very cool and powerful way to display your marketing plans for sellers, some might (rightfully so) be concerned that you are educating your competitors. Well, there are a couple of ways around this. First, you can flag any converted document as “Private” which means no one can view it unless you give them the URL. You can go a step further like Mega-Producer Melinda Estridge did and also embed it in a password protected page that only prospective sellers can view.
Turn “Wow!” Into Closed Transactions
As I looked through several of the real estate examples I noticed something glaringly missing from each one –a call to action. Most squander the opportunity to engage with the viewer by simply doing the typical “Show & Tell”. If you are going to use Issuu to publish your reports and plans on the Web, at least take the time to think through how you can make it so engaging that they will want to contact you immediately.
To sum it up it’s cool, free and completely worthless unless you use it and include calls to action.
