Hi guys! How`ve you been? :)
I feel like the happiest person in the world today - I have moved to a new gorgeous flat, my mom has Birthday and I am becoming famous! :) For those who knows Russian, check this piece at Media Marketing Review.
Thanks again for reading me!
Ok, let`s do business now. Today I am going to share with you something that I have learnt about Press Releases. PR-gurus might find some of these tips pretty obvious or simple - just skip this part and go to the last paragraphs (this is where all the cool stuff will be). Enjoy!
1. Press release is like Masters dissertation - needs deadline and/or inspiration to be produces.
Moreover, I compare this two types of written materials, because they both have to be informative, logically structured, clear and useful (probably, 'critical analysis' and 'contribution to the field of knowledge' are two things which make dissertation more demanding). Thus, it does take time to decide what to write and how. The important point is that not every single piece of information is newsworthy should be sent to journalists. Traditionally, the list of newsworthy items include: events, products and services launches, awards, sales, celebrations, scandals etc. (hm...why would you want to be involved in scandal? Unless...you are Miley Syrus :).
However, even the worst story can be 'newsjacked' and you can always make a big story from nothing...well, almost nothing or make the big story huge! For instance, with this 'Yahoo changing logo' story, initially you would think of two stages for publicity 'we are going to change our logo' and 'here is how we did it'. Yahoo managed to get 30 days long on-going buzz around the brand with proper Twitter campaign and involvement of every social media channel. People were looking forward, guessing, offering their variants of logo. It might be argued that the outcomes of the brand icon change are rather dissapointing, but the PR was great!
2. The 5 “W”s and an “H” is what makes press release work. These are the five question that must be answered in the first couple of sentences , so that it is clear what it all is about. Here is a check list for you:
And these are for Journalists:
I feel like the happiest person in the world today - I have moved to a new gorgeous flat, my mom has Birthday and I am becoming famous! :) For those who knows Russian, check this piece at Media Marketing Review.
Thanks again for reading me!
Ok, let`s do business now. Today I am going to share with you something that I have learnt about Press Releases. PR-gurus might find some of these tips pretty obvious or simple - just skip this part and go to the last paragraphs (this is where all the cool stuff will be). Enjoy!
Moreover, I compare this two types of written materials, because they both have to be informative, logically structured, clear and useful (probably, 'critical analysis' and 'contribution to the field of knowledge' are two things which make dissertation more demanding). Thus, it does take time to decide what to write and how. The important point is that not every single piece of information is newsworthy should be sent to journalists. Traditionally, the list of newsworthy items include: events, products and services launches, awards, sales, celebrations, scandals etc. (hm...why would you want to be involved in scandal? Unless...you are Miley Syrus :).
However, even the worst story can be 'newsjacked' and you can always make a big story from nothing...well, almost nothing or make the big story huge! For instance, with this 'Yahoo changing logo' story, initially you would think of two stages for publicity 'we are going to change our logo' and 'here is how we did it'. Yahoo managed to get 30 days long on-going buzz around the brand with proper Twitter campaign and involvement of every social media channel. People were looking forward, guessing, offering their variants of logo. It might be argued that the outcomes of the brand icon change are rather dissapointing, but the PR was great!
2. The 5 “W”s and an “H” is what makes press release work. These are the five question that must be answered in the first couple of sentences , so that it is clear what it all is about. Here is a check list for you:
- Who? Is the story about
- What? This person/group of people/company etc. have done
- Where? Did he/she/it/they do it
- When? Did it happen
- Why? That is always a tricky question :) Why does everyone (target audience) needs to know this
- How? Details on the previous points.
3. Design for journalists and technology. Interestingly, the tricks of making journalists to actualy read and consider you story differ from country to country. Well, at least this is what I discovered in th UK. Back at home I was taught to always send releases as attachments in .doc format - it is convinient to edit the file, so your release (slightly changed) can be published as a news story within half an hour or so. On the contrary, in Glasgow I learnt that journalists are IT-geeks :) I mean, they always check emails on their smartphones or tablets. Thus, if press release is attached - chances to have it read decrease significantly. Every extra click (Save as - Rename - Open etc) costs extra time --> time is money --> look for your email in the Trash. To sum up, the safest way to go is to both insert press release into the body of the letter and attach it. However, you should never write stuff like 'Hi, I am from this PR agency, find our release attached'. Say no to impersonal, template emails without any specification of why you deserve attention!
4. It is all about the journalists. Yes, about 50% of the press release success depends on how you approach journalists. There is a lot of secrets to building sustainable relationships with press people and you can check them here. The most important idea to remember is that headline is a king - if it does not stand out from hundreds of other emails, your story will get lost. Secondly, every person loves attention. Show some knowledge of their previous articles, do not forget to complement and do not send press materials about 'new bar opening on the corner' to the person writing about health and medicine!
I have found this two amazing Twitter accounts (@DearPR & @DearJournalist really helpful in this sense. These are the two pages and Dear Journalist (one for PR people and another one for journalists) full with great and witty tips on Do`s and Dont`s for those who wants to be be professional.
Just to give you an idea, here is a tip for PR:
@DearPR: please don't send pitches that are pages long and aren't even on my beat.
@DearPR Morning media events should always have coffee available. Always.
@DearPR I'm not the boss of my colleagues, so stop asking if I can send someone down to attend the event in my place.
And these are for Journalists:
Funny how when more celebrities were added to the tip sheet you are suddenly available to attend the show.
Dear Journalist: What part of one giftbag per person can you not understand?
Dear Journalist: You misspelled the clients name. AGAIN!
I think this is hilarious and useful :)
5. One last tip. In this digital world there can be so many new ways of delivering the story without having a casual press release. The above mentioned Twitter is a great place for making news. Just Tweet what`s happening for your client and make it special. Like in that story with Susan Boyle and her new album. In a nutshell, her PR agent decided to make a special hashtag for the event, which did not look ok. See for your self - #susanalbumparty :)) Later on it was changed to #SusanBoylesAlbumParty, but I guess hashtag fail was a great PR trick on its own.
Tell me what you think and may all your press releases be successful! :)
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