DWC 100th Issue Freebie

The 100th Issue Special

100 Ways to Get Publicity Without Social Media

One hundred issues. Forty thousand outlets. One hundred and six countries. Not one of them reached by posting.

DWC Magazine · Issue 100

When DWC started in May 2024, there was no audience and no budget. There were PDFs, sent to people one at a time, with a request attached: if this is useful, put it in front of your team. That request is the entire growth strategy. The PDFs became one-click reads with no sign-up, because a gate stops a thing being passed around, and being passed around was the only thing that worked.

What follows is one hundred ways to be seen without feeding an algorithm. Thirty of them carry a mark — We did this — and those are the thirty that built this magazine. The rest are used every day by women who decided posting daily was not a business model.

Each one is a single line. Deliberately. The work is in the doing, not the reading.

One caution before you start. Growing without social media is entirely possible, but it is not an argument for deleting your accounts. Keep one public post going on your page or profile at least once a week. A brand, an editor or an organisation considering working with you will look you up, and a dormant page reads as a closed business. Post to stay findable, and so people know what you do.

Do these in your own time. Pick one, do it properly, then pick the next. Small steps taken consistently will out-perform a burst of activity that stops in three weeks. A hundred issues were built exactly that way.

Section One

Ask, don't post: private groups and channels

The rooms your customers are already in, where nothing is public and everything is trusted.

  1. Ask one reader to share your piece inside their internal work chat.We did this
  2. Send the link directly to three people who will use it, rather than a hundred who might.We did this
  3. Join a members-only professional forum and answer questions with no link attached.
  4. Offer your work to a company's internal wellbeing or women's network.We did this
  5. Message an alumni group organiser and ask what their members need this month.
  6. Ask a supplier to circulate your news to their trade list.
  7. Contribute inside a paid community you already belong to, where sharing is expected.
  8. Ask a former colleague to include you in their team's weekly round-up.We did this
  9. Approach a group admin and ask what they allow, before posting anything.
  10. Write a personal note to the ten people most likely to forward it.We did this
  11. Give a group's members something that is not available publicly.
  12. Ask the people who share your work what made them share it.We did this

Section Two

In the room

None of this scales, which is exactly why it works. People remember the person they met.

  1. One coffee chat a week, with no agenda beyond finding out what they are working on.We did this
  2. Business breakfasts run by the local chamber.
  3. A co-working day pass in a town you do not live in.
  4. Local markets and craft fairs, even when you sell nothing on the day.
  5. Industry meet-ups where you attend rather than speak.
  6. School gates, sports clubs and choirs, where people discuss work anyway.
  7. Ask to be introduced at an event, rather than introducing yourself.
  8. Hand over a card with one sentence about their problem written on the back.
  9. Host a table for six people who should know each other.
  10. Volunteer at an event your customers attend.
  11. Visit a stockist or client in person and ask what their customers keep asking for.
  12. Attend the annual meeting of an association in your field.

Twenty-four in. If one person in your team, your group or your network needs this list, send them the link now while you are thinking of it. That single act is how this magazine reached a hundred issues.

Section Three

Write where their readers already are

Borrowed credibility beats owned reach, every time.

  1. A guest article for a trade publication in your sector.We did this
  2. A letter to the editor of a regional paper.
  3. Commentary quoted inside someone else's piece.
  4. A column in an association's member magazine.
  5. Write for a client's blog about the work you did together.
  6. Contribute a case study to a supplier's website.
  7. Answer a journalist's request for a source.
  8. Submit to an open editorial call. DWC's is free, so start there.We did this
  9. Write the foreword or endorsement for someone else's guide.
  10. Publish something genuinely useful on your own site and ask people to pass it on.We did this

Section Four

Borrow an audience

Someone has already spent years building the list you want.

  1. Guest on a podcast that already reaches your buyers.
  2. Swap newsletter mentions with a business that shares your audience, not your offer.We did this
  3. Co-host a webinar and split the invitation list.
  4. Run a joint workshop with a complementary business.
  5. Sponsor a small newsletter instead of a large one.
  6. Ask to be added to someone's published resource list.We did this
  7. Offer a code to another business's members.
  8. Appear on live radio as the expert on a phone-in.
  9. Contribute a section to somebody else's course or guide.We did this
  10. Partner with a charity on one specific project.

Next 24 hours only · Conversations £7 each · Unlimited £55 

Halfway · Go deeper

You now have the list. The pitch is the hard part.

Numbers 25 to 44 all end the same way: you have to ask a stranger for their audience. Two Conversations cover exactly that — what to say, who to say it to, and what makes an editor or a host say yes.

DWC Conversations 23: How To Get Featured in the Media

Get Featured in the Media

£7 today · then £17

Read it
DWC Conversations 30: Mic Drop

Mic Drop: Podcasts

£7 today · then £17

Read it

Section Five

Email, used properly

The only channel you own outright.

  1. One line about your current offer in your signature.
  2. Ask every satisfied client for one introduction, by name.We did this
  3. Reintroduce yourself to twenty dormant contacts, individually.
  4. Send a monthly note to people who are not customers yet.
  5. Put the sign-up ask at the end of every free read, never before it.We did this
  6. Use your out-of-office to point at something worth reading.
  7. Forward a relevant article to a contact with no ask attached.
  8. Email the ten businesses you would most like to work with, once a quarter.
  9. Ask subscribers to forward the email to one person.We did this

Section Six

Print and physical

A card in a hand outlasts an impression on a screen.

  1. A card inserted in every order.
  2. Printed copies left where your customers wait.We did this
  3. Noticeboards in libraries, gyms, surgeries and community centres.
  4. Packaging that gives the reader a reason to look you up.
  5. One well-placed poster near a venue your audience visits.
  6. Branded stock on a partner's counter.
  7. A sample handed to one buyer in person.
  8. Vehicle signage, if you already drive to clients.
  9. A physical copy posted to someone who will never open the email.We did this

Section Seven

Be useful in public

Give the work away in a form that proves you can do it.

  1. A free audit for five businesses, with no obligation.
  2. Answer questions in a specialist forum where expertise is scarce.We did this
  3. Teach a thirty-minute session at a community group.
  4. Publish a checklist people keep on their desk.
  5. Hold a clinic hour where anyone can ask you anything.
  6. Fix one small thing for someone publicly and ask for nothing.
  7. Mentor through a scheme that lists its mentors.
  8. Contribute to an open resource in your industry.
  9. Run a free workshop at a library.
  10. Publish your own numbers when nobody else will.We did this

Next 24 hours only · Conversations £7 each · Unlimited £55 

Seventy-two · Go deeper

Publicity is wasted if it reaches the wrong room.

Every method here assumes you already know where your buyers gather, and what to charge once they arrive. Those two questions are what stop most of this working.

DWC Conversations 28: Where Are My Customers?

Where Are My Customers?

£7 today · then £17

Read it
DWC Conversations 39: Charge It Like You Mean It

Charge It Like You Mean It

£7 today · then £17

Read it

Section Eight

Institutions and industry

Slow, unglamorous, and still the most durable credibility available.

  1. Enter an award you could realistically win.
  2. Judge an award somebody else runs.
  3. Chamber of commerce membership, used rather than held.
  4. A trade association directory listing.We did this
  5. Council and enterprise partnership supplier lists.We did this
  6. Speak at a conference's smaller side session.
  7. Sit on a panel about something you disagree with.
  8. Join a professional body's committee.
  9. Get listed as an approved supplier somewhere.

Section Nine

Word of mouth, deliberately

Referral is not luck. It is a request most people never make.

  1. Ask directly for a referral rather than hoping for one.We did this
  2. Tell customers exactly who you want to be introduced to.
  3. Thank the people who refer you in a way they can show others.
  4. Swap referrals with a business that serves the same person differently.
  5. Give a customer something worth mentioning to a friend.
  6. Follow up three months later, once they have results to talk about.
  7. Ask for a written review you can use in print.
  8. Send work to someone else, and tell them why.
  9. Make what you do explainable in one sentence.

Section Ten

Owned, and findable

The last ten are the ones this magazine was built on.

  1. Answer the questions people type into search, on your own site.We did this
  2. Open Google Search Console and write more of whatever you already rank for.We did this
  3. Claim and complete every free listing, starting with your Google Business Profile.
  4. Publish the page that explains your prices, when nobody else will.
  5. Keep an archive people can still link to years later.We did this
  6. Give one thing away with no gate at all.We did this
  7. Make your best work readable in one click, with no sign-up.We did this
  8. Put the share request in the middle of the piece, not the end.We did this
  9. Answer every message from a reader personally.
  10. Publish on the same day every week, and keep doing it for a hundred issues.We did this

The ones that go all the way down

One hundred lines gives you the map. DWC Conversations gives you the method.

£7 each, then £17 · Unlimited £55, then £147 

DWC Conversations 23

Conversations 23

Get Featured in the Media

Without a PR agency or a budget. What to send, who to send it to, and why most pitches are deleted unread.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it
DWC Conversations 30

Conversations 30

Mic Drop

Launching and promoting a podcast, and getting booked on other people's. Numbers 35 and 42, in full.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it
DWC Conversations 200

Conversations 200

The Newsletter Nobody Dreads

Thirteen chapters on the one channel nobody can take away from you. Numbers 45 to 53, properly.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it
DWC Conversations 28

Conversations 28

Where Are My Customers?

An interactive audit that tells you which rooms are worth walking into, before you spend a month walking into them.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it
DWC Conversations 39

Conversations 39

Charge It Like You Mean It

Number 94, in full. Day rates, product pricing, and the calculator that settles it.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it
DWC Conversations 11

Conversations 11

Meta Ads Uncomplicated

For the day you decide paid reach is worth it after all. Fifteen chapters, no jargon.

£7 Then £17 tomorrow Read it

Or take all of them

DWC Conversations Unlimited. Every title, including the ones that come next. £55 for the next 24 hours, then £147.

Conversations Unlimited · £55

Submit your story

Number 32 on this list is an open editorial call, and ours is free. Pitches, press releases and interviews are all welcome. The media kit explains what we publish, who reads it, and how to send it in.

Read the media kit

One hundred issues, built by people passing things along. Thank you for being one of them.