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| Five Strategies To Make Your News Release Stand Out |
By:
Wes Upchurch |
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It’s no secret that one of the best a company receives free publicity and builds its expertise is by garnering media attention. Although it takes time and work to get noticed by journalists, the basis of a superior public relations campaign is the media release. If you’d like to build a working relationship with the media, often times a media release is your way in.
However, not all media releases are created equal. The bulk of them wind up in the trash. If you want members of the media to call you about stories you pitch, or the stories they are already working on, you must send the appropriate message in your media releases. The following five elements should help you communicate your message effectively:
1. The Foundation of Reporting – Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How
Facts are the groundwork for every news article, and when reporters need fundamental, facts they often turn to media releases. This is the why who, what, when, where, why, and how of the story are so important. When creating your media release, take a few minutes to sort the facts about the news you want to communicate. This information will be the foundation for the entire document, and you should emphasize it in the first paragraph of your release so reporters don’t have to read more than a few lines to get the gist of your message.
2. A Concise, but Clear Headline
The headline of your news release should communicate what the story is about, capture the attention of the reader, and so in as few words as possible. Your headline present the news in in a catch, but informative manner, such as “Teen Smoking is On The Rise” “Despite Improves in Technology, Productivity is Down”.
3. You’ll Need a Hook
Once you’ve gotten your readers’ attention, you need to hook them. It should be something to compel the reader to keep reading, such as a startling fact or statistic, a compelling question, or a common problem. This hook often communicates a common problem and a startling statistic, such as “This year 40 percent of high school students will try tobacco” or “At least 30% of adult males have an undiagnosed learning disability.”
4. A Quotable Quote or Two
As you go into more detail about the who, what, when, where, why, and how of your news, providing as much detail as possible in the least amount of words as possible, you will start writing the main body of your media release. In doing so, you should also include quotes that the journalist can pull directly from your release. The media loves getting quotes directly from the source of the news and by providing a quote or two, you make the their job that much easier, and better your chances of getting mentioned in the paper. If possible you should use quotes that really highlight the impact of your news.
5. The Call to Action
Even though you got your main points in, you still have to close your media release with a call to action. If you want reporters to book you for an interview, you should say so. If you want them to cover your event, make that your call to action. Don’t forget to include your contact information.
Remember the goal of your press release should be to get media mentions for your business. It’s like free advertising and it establishes you as the expert in your field. Remember, even if they don’t write a feature story from your press release, media professionals may keep your information on file for when the do need your expertise. So the better your press release is, the greater your chances of receiving that free publicity, everyone is seeking.
About the Author:
This article was written by http://www.wesupchurch.com. He is the creator of http://www.pressdr.com, a quality http://pressdr.com/distribution/rss/article-distribution-service.php. |
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