Laura M. Foley Design is no longer in business. This website remains up for archival purposes.
Crafting compelling stories, developing and giving webinars, organizing and executing events, blog writing, presentation design and coaching, and public relations activities are just a few of the content marketing skills in my toolbox!
Content Marketing
From blog posts to newsletters, from Twitter to Instagram, from podcasts to YouTube, content marketing is how we foster relationships with our target audience and build online communities.
Find out how I’ve helped the following organizations:
Early Risers Toastmasters Club
As VP of Public Relations for three years and counting, I’ve created:
- Established and maintain a club Facebook page, LinkedIn group and website
- Shot and edited videos to promote the club
- Designed, wrote, and published a monthly newsletter.
- To reach a broader audience, I’ve organized and developed special events, such as Halloween Spooky Storytime and a virtual panel on the future of work, post-pandemic. Events like these are promoted through social media posts (complete with custom-designed banners) and press releases.
Hubbardston Vietnam Veterans Memorial Committee
In 2021, I became a member of this committee whose mission is to build a monument to honor my town’s Vietnam War-era veterans. Here’s how I build community, promote the mission, and raise funds:
- Maintain and develop content for the group’s Facebook page, Instagram account, and website
- Write press releases
- Shoot and edit promotional videos
- Write and record PSAs
- Added online donation functionality to the group’s website to extend the reach of our fundraising efforts
- Constant outreach and publicity helped eliminate the need for taxpayer dollars to fund the project
Keep Hubbardston Beautiful
In 2018, I established an annual townwide cleanup event that coincides with Earth Day in April. Here’s how I promote the event each year:
- Maintain a Facebook page, Instagram account, and website
- Write press releases and grant interviews
- Design flyers
- Design promotional materials such as t-shirts, buttons, environmental graphics, and bumper stickers
- And stand outside in all kinds of weather, waving people into the event!
Laura M. Foley Design
I wouldn’t have gotten this far as a freelancer without some solid marketing skills!
- Design and maintain a company website since 2001 (God, has it been that long?!?)
- Continually published a monthly newsletter about presentation design and marketing since 2005
- Developed promotional items like buttons, stickers, and a client onboarding kit
- Written and delivered several workshops and speeches about marketing and presentation design to audiences ranging from just a few people in a conference room to a couple hundred in a convention hall.
- Oh, and have I mentioned the Cheating Death by PowerPoint blog, which I’ve published since 2010?
Presentation Performance Coaching and Training
For many, the idea of incorporating marketing concepts and performance techniques into presentations can seem strange. “Won’t people just do what they’re supposed to when I give them the information they need to make informed choices?” they ask. No. No they won’t.
Marketing 101
It’s important to inject a little marketing into our presentations to drive the outcomes we want. I help speakers to develop:
- SMART goals for their presentations to help them focus on key messages
- Bottom Line Up Front, or BLUF, statements that summarize presentations and articulate outcomes
- Content that focuses on benefits over features
- Storytelling
- Visions of aspirational futures
- Calls to action to ensure that every audience member knows what they’re supposed to do next
Performance Coaching
Often, it’s not what you say, but how you say it that makes all the difference.
Every presentation is a performance. People with good presentation skills are viewed more favorably in a competitive marketplace than those who appear uncomfortable speaking, who ramble, or who don’t project confidence. What’s more, you can’t just present your information, you need to persuasively sell it!
I coach people on their delivery: the way they sound, move, and act onstage…or online! You only get one chance to make a first impression, and I give people the skills they need to make a great one!