Now is an ideal time to strengthen your workforce.

While your competitors are thinning their ranks through layoffs and attrition, you can be positioning yourself NOW to hire the capable people you will need as the economy continues to head north and workers are again in short supply.

Here are 13 tips on how to use valuable free publicity to position yourself as an employer of choice:

1. Compile your company's "good stuff" list - all the reasons why people should work for you. If you're not sure, ask your own employees why they stay. Then start pitching the "good stuff" items as individual story ideas to the media.
    
2. Pitch story ideas to the local and national media about your company's fun events - things like chili cook-offs and theme parties. A direct marketing firm in Wisconsin got fabulous publicity - and dozens of job applications - after it gave away a free trip to Disney World to every employee at the annual company Christmas party. The story ran on the front page of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, and a local TV station aired a 6-minute segment on the trip.
    
3. Let the media know about innovative training programs for employees. Today's job-hunters want to work for companies that will train them for their NEXT job.
    
4. Target your trade publications for story ideas about unique things your company is doing to attract and keep employees. Job-hunters and new graduates frequently read the trades to find companies that are great places to work.
    
5. Write articles about innovative things your company is doing and pitch them to the big job boards and electronic magazines.
    
6. On the homepage at your web site, let visitors know "Why You Should Work for Us." Reporters - not just job-hunters - frequently peruse web sites, and they too might find this list enticing enough to write an article about you.
    
7. Be willing to talk to the media about how you are dealing with the labor shortage.
    
8. Each month, ask your employees to suggest story ideas about your company. The person who suggests the best idea wins a pair of movie passes. If the media use the idea, throw in dinner for two.
    
9. Create an "experts list" and give it to reporters who cover your industry. The list should include people within your organization who can speak on various topics. Post this at your web site. Include their office, home and cell phone numbers.