and to you terry about how you started the paper how successful it is now and your upcoming event in may so terry tell us a little bit about yourself ok well first thank you very much for having me today this is really an honor and a privilege and i'm happy to share my story with  i actually have a marketing and advertising background out of college i started in yellow peach advertising sales which i thought and i find to be one of the most rigorous sales training out there actually was a part of the world's largest sales force really so my background was in direct advertising through yellow pages and after i started my family i did other advertise i did internet database marketing so that was when the internet started so this very very good learning experience as well then i actually landed a position as the national sales manager of a real estate publication so that gave me the experience in more of a creative medium and also with the national audience well for many many years you know in this marketing and advertising world you know in the back of my head i think every entrepreneur or decides or has a moment if you will yeah we're like you know what i'm doing this successfully for all these other people at some point i want to do it for i sell yeah exactly it is not what it really does he like that right it really does and it did for me and so of course then it was the  exploration of what can i do for myself as a mother of two young children at the time both in elementary school and a working mother or i mean i needed that balance as well so i started researching is money and i knowing that i have resided in mercer county i would have to travel to whether be mom of county or even north of that for that opportunity and then happened to be spring break in bethany beach delaware with my children and came upon a sussex county woman's newspaper and it said only in your state in your county and wow all i know is that access to a life have yeah yeah so i started researching that and just love the love to read love the newspaper knew absolutely supported by advertising that's my background and so i bought the licensing rights to publish the the mercer county woman back in july of two thousand and  and started i did well actually just to back up a little bit so i have two children in elementary school you know i was traveling with the magazine i work for my has been traveled in his job is very challenging all right the coordination which any working money mother can appreciate so then i got a call from my my daughter's second grade teacher at the end of september of her second grade year morning to have a personal conference  all this is really we are right when obviously they're young and school but ok so i meet with this woman just totally blindsided that my daughter was floundering miserably in second grade oh i was oh my gosh i was crying hysterically that she didn't have a box of tissues to console me and at that point my my husband i decided you know what this is just not working i mean the after school program the trying to get the homework done in the dinner on the table so i actually had quit my job and i so i was unemployed  but also that you know i need to have something that's going to allow me to still pick up my kids after school every day and have the flexibility for the after school activities and all that fun stuff and so it absolutely  honestly painstakingly my husband and i knocked on doors of these a position offices libraries senior centers you name it to make sure to get permission to distribute the paper at their l s and so we painstakingly developed the route i guess if you will and back then i thought you know it's really important that we do household delivery so we used to when my paper was printed and we delivered and it got the liver to i had  a warehouse facility where i'd have pallets of papers delivered and we would it would be my husband my daughter my son myself and often my kids would recruit their friends and neighbors and we'd been sitting there stuffing newspapers in bags plastic bags and we have mountains of newspapers in my living room that in the mornings before work my husband and i would go out and we pick upscale neighborhoods and we deliver the mercer county woman you know randomly just to build leadership right for many years probably five years in the beginning of the newspaper before i had the revenues to pay other people to do those tasks for me or so that we do you think about the advertisers want to know who is reading it and when you don't have it it's free you're going to deliver yourself make sure that you're doing two things and then all of us and the people start looking for it and then all of a sudden their advertisers are going to like but i think it's an accomplishment because cracking that net you know to be  a really difficult thing a lot of people go how do you start where if you don't have any readers where do you go you may happen so well and the other is a first issue so i published my september october issue in two thousand and one ironically my first issue hit the streets on nine eleven two thousand and one was you know yes exactly so it was it was anti climactic if you will it was or as much as yeah i mean it was so yes i was trying to establish this route personally knew numerous community reads and not just in mercer county but in the surrounding counties that went under really yeah because your business or if you have to make a decision between turning your lights on or advertising that you're going to turn your lights on right absolutely yeah yeah it's been painful so you know i actually decided to just put blinders on this is how i describe the experience and i just just forge forward and did not lead any of the negative influence my decision to just that move franchise as well it's not it's really just a concept by person i purchased the concept of educational read for women and then i created it and you create your own content absolutely so i can have special sections so it is categorized so we have health and medi legal education home and garden and fabulous food arts and leisure we do have a table of contents in every issue so the reader if they have an interest in you know women and heart disease they can find that the table and of content or you know special recipes for your thanksgiving table they can find that in fabulous food so you know it's there so i can do a special go off section a special camp section i mean because i own the paper right now i have  what happens with that process was interesting and i learned this the hard way in the publishing world really page count dictates cost and every time you publish a page without revenue on it it takes away from the bottom line and as a small business as much as i love the fact that people think with this huge conglomerate we're really not more shoestring small business you know thankfully it's grown and it's you know afforded me my lifestyle but nonetheless it's still small business and so in the beginning i would try to fit every press release every you know lovely worthy non profits event in the paper only to realize that every time i added one page i actually had to add four pages book for printing purposes and i was cutting i was really but i try you know real hard to try to you know get as much in as i can if they absolutely want my readership you know we can work with them and they obviously have a budget if they're going to spend their revenues or their their marketing dollars right  thousand women absolutely they can buy now because with you is a loser because i love to work with them not because i do i've had so many and i also actually started last year a section in the paper it's called the buzz ok so it is actually free so everyone always says oh put this in your calendar events for me never had a calendar of events but my feeling was yes this will give them an opportunity to at least have a listing in the paper with a little bit of the meat of their event and then hopefully they'll see the result from just even having a little mention in the bu sure and then they'll buy an ad the next year thanks in advance because i get lots of testimonials where they're saying terry thank you so much for placing that because we had more attendance than we've ever had in previous years i think just from a mention right oh my gosh just yeah what about right now it is limited people have you know there's a lot of opportunities on line that people can post their events that well but if they're going to get in print they're getting it out there it does cost you money so what's interesting the online component so way back when two thousand and one two thousand and two two thousand and three didn't have a website didn't really see the significance on the print medium i want you to think about when you worked in the online before the internet marketing right but i was a print i was a newspaper i wanted people to pick it up feel it see it touch it pass it along yeah then then i had a webmaster save me but when people are interested in advertising how do you get you know disseminate the information i go either meet with them face to face or i send them a media kit in the mail he's like wouldn't it be easier if they could just go to your website and i'm like post every issue online so not only and not only do i do the issue where you can actually find your page as an advertiser print it as a p d f utilize it in your you know in your lobby or again with every patient if you're a physician  then we also every article gets uploaded in a resource guide in text because the search engines won't pick up the p d f they only pick up the text so they get all that extra exposure as well that's fantastic and i also did it again the value of the internet i never really looked at the analytics of my website yeah we are we going over thirty thousand visitors a month that's into the market i don't think woman really is that crazy awesome yeah and it is fun i have to agree with you that the analytics is just like oh my god you know what i mean it's just like you know exactly what's happening how could we ever live without exactly i don't know who exactly what about tell us now about your upcoming event because you've got a very exciting event coming up may allow you to do we do and that's an interesting story because i'm in the publishing world and for two years two thousand and five to two thousand and seven i had so many clients ask me if i could put together a venue where they could meet women consumers face to face and i kept saying no i don't think so i'm really busy you know with my newspaper and just getting that out every other on and then but then at some point i was like you know was there saw how many times you have to get hit over the head now i finally bit the bullet and created the head to toe women's expo kicked off in may of two thousand and seven so this is our seventh year and honestly it was a success from the word go so it's absolutely an expo component where we have booths and table sponsors who are people who are exhibit every category that's represented in the newspaper is represent expo and we at this point draw all over one thousand women in attendance so we really go to the ends of the earth to promote it every function that has women we want to be at the mercer county woman to invite women to  right and so on saturday may eleventh this year and robbinsville high school and every year we always add something new and exciting this year we have a component called the psychic corner where we actually have a partner with someone in that world if you will who is inviting about a dozen mediums and leaders and so our guest can can if they so desire can get a reading and that's what was so popular it is and what that might be the reason that one ventures to event that's why we go to new i mean we have a holistic wellness center we put together this year so we that's a beautiful component where we're going to be interactive so you can have health screenings and  right is robbinsville high school which is a state of the i think it's the newest high school in mercer county you know util full facility and we utilize about ten classrooms throughout the day to have educational seminars everything from women and heart disease to the psychology of color in decorating how to write a book how to organize your home we have a book knock this also grew as a people you know wanting an opportunity to reach women in the community so we put together we call it the book but it's literally local authors the two book selling and signings and then i put together a publisher's corner or a panel where they say everyone has a book in them they say well this is how you can get published i don't think it's so interesting like you said there's certain draws you are doing so many roaming fashion show so we have a ladies boutique that's going to have models that will be roaming around the entire facility you know the latest wares yes now what about for exhibitors or someone who's interested in actually getting to those thousand e robbinsville high school head to toe but now after that you go back to your newspaper and how you've grown to fifty thousand destination readers and what about more about the paper analogy up to date as far as   business with a small or large internet being probably the biggest contributor so let's say the real estate market and the automotive industry were thirty percent of the newspapers combination of all and if you really want to direct that internet traffic then you should have an aggressive print campaign to promote your website but you know i'm saying it yes it even if it's just that your website that is going to draw people what it was like is about this website and they'll investigate and then also building your list i think that's up most important these days i mean it's not a matter of email marketing is a big component today people really do welcome they don't you may consider it spam junk do ask permission to reach them but once they give you permission they're there asking for your right now and here you have email marketing you have a program yourself don't you we do tell us about that and again i mean i didn't come up i do kind of sort of consider myself the idea lady but really it's people requesting from a server so we all know how when we have a women then we're going to advance that we run and i also do a women's networking group called when women interested in networking that meets once a month to really review that we're meeting at villa many knows one thirty in hamilton and it's the third thursday of every month well through this women's networking group the women's newspaper of events that we do just to promote the newspaper and the women's expo as well as the expo itself we have compiled a i think a rich very rich database of women consumers in central new jersey and i market via there is this there are services like constant contact where they give you a template but it's very dull and i think the more vibrant it's more than just the message it's the actual piece that you're sending out there and i think that my pieces are i always get tons of compliments because they're mostly graphic you know like a beautiful woman with you know flowers or saw something very vibrant that catches their eye and then i get all these compliments and this is of course they don't necessarily love the message but they love the piece right of course and they'll i mean i was a crazy woman i mean i would literally go to reinvent in one night i mean it was crazy actually it was crazy and i don't recommend that because you're not effective anywhere when you do that you might make an appearance and say hey and yes i was seen there but you're leaving there because you really have to get to the next event and then you're heading your scene there and then you're leaving that event to get to the next event and i finally realized after many years of really being a chicken without a head that you know you need to pick and choose where you're going to be most effective but i would absolutely and many times people say to me you're asking where how do you do and i've been thinking myself i am everywhere i don't know how i did it i know what i need to find out how to clone myself and and you really have to pick and choose where what your objective is when networking maybe you just want to meet a certain individual that you hope will be there or know will be there so guess what your objective is to go there to meet that person that you thought would be there right or it might be just to in my case maybe promote the expo so i might have postcards on my person and when i'm speaking or postcards so you know i'm saying you're have to have you know what your objective is in going but it's but it absolutely works absolutely works you never know i had an introduction at one of and i went it was a fundraiser went to it i had a client who introduced me to o of a company who said well we're in your paper aren't we and i said well actually you're not why aren't we i go let me take you to lunch and we'll talk about it right there one of my biggest clients and you're through networking tell us a little bit about the of these organizations and various chamber of commerce's just promoting the women's x show there's i say fifty percent or professional women that are not only attending but exhibiting and participating and then the other fifty percent i would say twenty five percent are probably you thing don't let anybody influence what you know you can make work very what is it confidence you know i don't often think that although yes no you could say no no means no but it doesn't mean never right ok so just because you make it that no doesn't mean stay present you know because in three months their situation might change and that's what you are so yes you might have more to offer because like i didn't offer an internet component i didn't offer an comfort right so i didn't offer an echo venue component so things change so no it does not mean never i would also say do not be afraid to know your limitations i know i'm not a graphic designer so i knew from the from the word go i would be hiring a great graphic designer and i would work with them but they make at that and i'm perfectly happy i have a saying in life where i'm good at a lot of things i'm perfect at nothing and i'm perfectly fine with know your limitations that's perfect way to end our shows that you couldn't agree our guest again was terry petri she's the publisher of mercer county woman newspaper and i'm sure that if you're in the area you've seen it before but i think we've given you a lot of information on the background  thundersnow thank you so much for being here today it was my pleasure well before to see you get on talented people