Getting your news out There

Why Do We Use Press releases?

• Press Releases are a way for companies to promote their work or news features across the internet.
• There are traditional, text-heavy press releases or more modern Social Media News Releases (Otherwise known as social media press releases)
• Online press releases can help your news and company to reach millions more people than a traditional paper press release, or for that matter, more than a small web 2.0 campaign could.
• This is because of the advent of SMNRs and their ability to go viral with the touch of a couple of buttons.

Die! Press Release! Die! Die! Die!

• On 27 February, 2006, Tom Foremski posted an article on his SilliconValleyWatcher Blog entitled Die! Press release! Die! Die! Die!
• He lambasted traditional press releases for serving no purpose in today’s age of new media.
• Foremski called for more multimedia and linkage in press releases so that they could be accessible by many on the internet.
• He also said press releases should be divided into sections so that journalists could pick and choose and quickly find the information they needed.
• So on May 23, 2006, SHIFT communications offered the first SMNR.

What Do SMNRs Feature That Traditional Press Releases Don’t?

• The structure and make up of SMNRs is different to traditional online press releases. They can contain;
• Contact Info displayed at the top of the release
• A basic list of facts
• Quotes from company employees/experts in the field
• Any company logos and headshots of contributors, writers etc.
• Related audio or visual material, including YouTube videos.
• Social bookmarking/sharing links for maximum exposure
• An RSS feed
• A space for comments

Press Releases And Search Engines

• Press Releases have to readable for humans and search robots, otherwise their viral-ability is reduced.
• Laura Sturaitis, VP at BusinessWire said they are telling clients how to get their press releases showing up in the SERPs more. Logos and images influence Google to show a result AND if an image is displayed next to the clipping, users are 2.5% more likely to click through.
• Google New’s Josh Cohen says that PRs are not crawled on a company’s website, only from the PR distributors. The robots label them as PRs and they are treated differently from other news sources. For example, a PR will not lead a cluster of news stories.
• However, Gabe Rivera for Techmeme said they do not treat press releases differently from other news stories at present, although the algorithm may change in the future.

Are Press Releases Any Good?

The Cons

• Greg Jarboe (president and co-founder of SEO-PR and correspondent for the Search Engine Watch blog) wrote an article in 2007 titled “Is the Social Media Press Release a Meatball Sundae?”
• A ‘meatball sundae’ is when mixing two good things result in something not so good.
• In Jarboe’s metaphor, the press release was the meatballs whilst everything else included in an SMNR was the toping and ice cream. Greg looked at several factors which made SMNRs less than perfect.
• On digg, press releases were more likely to be buried than digged, so it was better for a blogger to write about your news than submit a PR.
• Comments on early SMNRs were full of spam, and there was no way to control this without removing the feature all together. This can cause serious brand damage as well as distracting attention away from your story.
• As of 2008, traditional & multimedia releases – which would include most of the SMRs released to-date –were not readily discoverable by ’social’ search engines like Technorati, not even if Technorati tags were used. In other words, adding Technorati tags to your social media releases doesn’t get them into Technorati, which was tracking 112.8 million blogs at the time.

The Pros

• A case study of ITV television which used SMNRs to promote its winter 2007 programmes.
• Ben Ayers used WebitPR’s SMNR design and he had good things to say about it.
• Results from SMNRs were higher internet coverage of ITVs winter schedule and other companies in their industry and the traditional/online PR firms gave ITV kudos for exploring new distribution methods.
• The main drawback that Ayers noted was that not enough journalists and publicists were using social media tools, which limited the effect that any SMNR could have until this changed.
• One of the biggest advantages of using SMNRs is that you can track their success. Following comments, the amount of times your PR has been bookmarked, linked to and from and how many times your multimedia has been viewed.

The Structure Of A Press Release

• 300-800 words long, including title and contact information.
• Title-needs to be punchy , contain keywords, the story and the company name. Needs to be in Initial Case, ALLCAPS titles will be rejected by PRWeb. PRWeb found that Google and some other search engines reject headlines that are too long.
• Summary and 1^st paragraph-one or two sentences detailing what the story is and why it is important-it needs to hook the reader. Should also include a dateline with location. If the reader stopped reading now, they should know the basics of your story.
• Body-provides the details, precise information every thing your story is about. It needs to tie in with the headline otherwise readers will be alienated from the PR and your company.
• Bulk Up-Fill your PR with SEO friendly multimedia and links. This provides the reader with a diverse PR experience and crawlers with lots of info. If you sell products include product shots, a link to a video advert that you may have made etc.
• After the first couple of paragraphs you can insert quotes-these add personality and can be easily re-used by journalists/bloggers etc.
• If you have any charts or graphs (especially in finance-focused PRs) these should be attached as a PDF.
• Keywords-choose one or two keywords, put these in the title and first line of the summary. Link from them to your site.
• Boilerplate-brief company history, any awards, how long you have been going etc.
• Contact Information-name, telephone #, address and fax. Also company name and website. Do not enter an email address in the body of the PR or in the contact info as PRWeb will remove these to protect from spammers and your PR will not be as good.
• Don’t be too technical. SMNRs are meant for a general readership and even if you have a niche product, don’t confuse people.
• There should be only one link to every 100 words to prevent overcrowding. Also, if you have a list, don’t have too many bullet points as some search engines do not like this.
• Have an angle. Your PR will get a lot more coverage if you link it to current news, social or political issues, any new reports or studies etc.

Anything Else You Need To Know?

• A successful PR has many benefits for the company; free publicity, a reputation as an authority in the industry, inbound links to the website.
• If you don’t have any news about your company, releasing a response can be a good way to get in the news. If something big has happened in your particular industry, lets say Google does something BIG, release a response saying you agree/disagree. BUT…don’t just publish a PR based on general opinion.
• Target your distribution; if you have a niche story, use PR distribution categories and locations to target the most relevant audience. Give your PR to relevant bloggers as well.
• Follow up; A few hours after you have sent a press release, follow it up by contacting the newspaper/journalist to make sure they have received it. You can also give them extra info at this point and exclusive quotes to get their attention.
• MAKE IT PERFECT; your credibility could be ruined if your PR contains spelling and grammatical mistakes.