Media Success Story: The Cinderella Project of Maine

The Cinderella Project of Maine, which had a great mission, but nobody knew about it! There are literally hundreds of Cinderella Projects across the United States that offer free prom dress giveaways for teen girls who can't otherwise afford gowns, but only one based in Maine. When I first met with Mandie Sawyer, the lead director, she'd been organizing this project for four years. She had a basic website and Facebook page for The Cinderella Project of Maine, but its Google rankings were practically nonexistent. You blinked if you missed it about seven or eight pages in. By the time I helped boost her website and Facebook pages with dynamic content, testimonials, photos, video clips and backlinks to an optimized website, within three weeks of typing in the keywords "Cinderella Project, Maine" on Google, The Cinderella Project of Maine popped up at the top of the search engine results, followed by seven related links on the first page.  And that was just the start. I wrote an optimized (keyword rich) press release and a feature story to go with it and submitted it to the statewide press. Soon, that generated interest and coverage from The Bangor Daily News, The Republican Journal, Channel Five WABI and a video news clip from WLBZ (of which I arranged for a special PR opportunity to highlight a teenage girl affiliated with  "Out As I Want To Be"  as she searched for the perfect prom dress to attend The Rainbow Ball. All in all, because of the Cinderella Project of Maine's statewide coverage and heightened Internet presence, 149 girls (some from as far away as two hours) checked in on the prom dress giveaway day and 132 dresses were given away--their biggest year yet. So, that's what I do. I use the passion of someone's product, service or message and find ways to get the media to notice.

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