Chilli Tips #6

Press releases - it's not just about sending them out

By Nitin Dahad

In startup phase, you're trying to promote your product or service so you decide to send out a press release to the trade and business press yourself rather than use a PR agency. But, lo and behold, you do not see anybody writing it up. Why? Here we provide some tips on how to make your press release more effective if you've taken the path to doing it yourself.

There are many reasons why press releases get discarded by journalists and editors, but to make it easier to understand the reasons, let's take yourself as an example. Put yourself at home or in the office. Very likely, you receive lots of 'junk mail' from the usual suspects - window sales companies, finance companies offering loans, holidays and so on. And then there are all those from smaller companies trying to sell their services to you.

If you're regularly receiving material from all these companies whose services you never wanted in the first place, you've probably got used to filing them under 'rubbish' often without looking at them.

Now imagine the journalist as a 'consumer' - receiving all these press releases from large companies as well as the many small unheard of companies. If the editorial office is used to receiving these in hundreds every day, what do you think will happen? Add to this the volume of e-mails received everyday, and you can see why it's difficult to manage.

With this perspective, we provide the following tips if you want your company to be heard above the noise or even written about:

- Make sure your press release is properly targeted; don't send a press release about a new embedded processor to a magazine that targets the computer user; they're not interested in designing it in

- Make sure your headline says something that is new, unique, novel or groundbreaking about what you're offering in the press release, and how it differs to your competitors (yes you need to research their web sites and press releases too!)

- Make sure that your first paragraph sums up the entire press release; this serves two purposes: a) one is so that if the editor does become interested beyond the headline, then the first paragraph tells him/her whether it is relevant or not; and b) if the press release does get written up but editorial space is short, then your whole story gets told even when it is cut down

- This is the important bit: contact relevant editors either before or after sending the press release, and explain in one or two sentences that you've sent them something (or about to send), and what it is about; that way you get noticed, and if it is relevant then further dialogue might occur

- If you're sending the release by e-mail or by post, always provide a contact who'll always be available if the editor does decide to follow up; it's no good putting the CEO as contact if he's unavailable because he's in investor or customer meetings the whole week after the press release is issued.

- Make sure that the e-mail doesn't include large attachments; depending on what type of journalist or publication it is you are targeting, the download time can be a turn-off for the editor; also, with the spread of viruses, it's always better to offer to send images or other large files after you've established dialogue.

Getting your press releases published is not easy, but with the right approach you can increase your chances. Take the personal approach, together with the right 'angle' (ie: positioning) for your story. There's never any guarantee, but with the right approach, your chances of getting coverage get better.

Any comments on this article? Email the editor at Editor@TheChilli.com

© Chilli Publishing Ltd 2003

08DEC2003