Five Considerations for Better Press Releases
There is a scene from a movie about Vince Lombardi the famed Green Bay Packer coach that has stuck with me over the years. Lombardi had been brought in to turn around a losing football team. In one of his first meetings with the players, he holds up a football and tells the locker room filled with seasoned veterans, “Gentleman, let’s get back to basics. This is a football.” One of the players then raises his hand and asks, “Coach, can you go a little slower?”
Recently my corporate communications team got down to some basics with a writing coach to discuss our department’s written materials. Now I know that folks like Todd Defren have been leading the charge to embrace a social media press release. I think his format offers great promise, but I am moving a little more slowly and am not quite ready to make the switch.
The session was very instructive and well worth the modest investment. We spent much of the time on our press releases -- what they said, how we wrote them and equally important how they were read and by whom. I sat back rather sheepishly as our coach pointed out areas for improvement. I knew he was right.
For me, press releases serve three objectives – 1) announce news, 2) serve as the company’s official record for a news announcement and 3) function as an internal vehicle to shape messaging and recognize key employees. To achieve these objectives more effectively, I submit five points for your consideration:
Your audience – Who is your audience? The media is still your number one target followed by investors and consumers who can now read your announcements online. Project managers and executives are another audience. Tread carefully here. They are most familiar with the announcement at hand, but their perspective may color your descriptions and lead you down jargon filled paths that keep you from more reader-friendly language. Your challenge is to avoid this trap and push back with alternative phrases and terms that keep the media and public in mind.
Your voice – A lot of time and money is put into the tone of your ads. Is the same amount of time devoted to your releases? Beyond the AP style book, can you differentiate your releases from those of another company? Clearly the news in a release takes priority, but you should not neglect the voice of the release. While the brand must stay consistent, a voice may vary. It should reflect the gravity or lightness of the news being announced. In my department, there is no pride of ownership when it comes to a release. Our clients get the last word so to speak, and I am learning to be more accepting of individual styles of the folks in my department.
Your style – How often do you see a release begin with company X “announces?” Reviewing our releases and those of other companies, more often than I realized. Note to self: STOP. There are times when “announce” is the exact verb to use, but not every time. Be selective. And speaking of verbs – they power your release. As our writing coach told us, don’t let adjectives tell the story for you.
Your format -- Normally our draft releases are written and formatted in Microsoft Word and circulated as email attachments. Yet releases are often not formatted when they are distributed over the wire. Reading online is very different than reading from a piece of paper. Our eyes move differently when looking at a screen. We process information differently. Even the best woven string of paragraphs needs some visual breaks with sub headlines and bullets. Take a cue from newspapers, use pull quotes. Consider stats and pictures. And where you can, incorporate hyperlinks to bios of quoted spokespersons, studies that are cited, and products that are highlighted.
Your purpose -- With the advent of social media, are press releases your only option to deliver or dare I say announce news? Blogs and viral PR are fair game in the battle to capture attention. Releases are becoming less impactful as the blogosphere can generate buzz long before the release hits PR newswire. Sometimes the news doesn't warrant a release. Here a blog posting may be more appropriate. Clearly releases are here to stay. Only now they are but one variable in a news equation. The informality and individuality of social media may also free us to be more creative in how we write and present our company’s news.
Recently my corporate communications team got down to some basics with a writing coach to discuss our department’s written materials. Now I know that folks like Todd Defren have been leading the charge to embrace a social media press release. I think his format offers great promise, but I am moving a little more slowly and am not quite ready to make the switch.
The session was very instructive and well worth the modest investment. We spent much of the time on our press releases -- what they said, how we wrote them and equally important how they were read and by whom. I sat back rather sheepishly as our coach pointed out areas for improvement. I knew he was right.
For me, press releases serve three objectives – 1) announce news, 2) serve as the company’s official record for a news announcement and 3) function as an internal vehicle to shape messaging and recognize key employees. To achieve these objectives more effectively, I submit five points for your consideration:
Your audience – Who is your audience? The media is still your number one target followed by investors and consumers who can now read your announcements online. Project managers and executives are another audience. Tread carefully here. They are most familiar with the announcement at hand, but their perspective may color your descriptions and lead you down jargon filled paths that keep you from more reader-friendly language. Your challenge is to avoid this trap and push back with alternative phrases and terms that keep the media and public in mind.
Your voice – A lot of time and money is put into the tone of your ads. Is the same amount of time devoted to your releases? Beyond the AP style book, can you differentiate your releases from those of another company? Clearly the news in a release takes priority, but you should not neglect the voice of the release. While the brand must stay consistent, a voice may vary. It should reflect the gravity or lightness of the news being announced. In my department, there is no pride of ownership when it comes to a release. Our clients get the last word so to speak, and I am learning to be more accepting of individual styles of the folks in my department.
Your style – How often do you see a release begin with company X “announces?” Reviewing our releases and those of other companies, more often than I realized. Note to self: STOP. There are times when “announce” is the exact verb to use, but not every time. Be selective. And speaking of verbs – they power your release. As our writing coach told us, don’t let adjectives tell the story for you.
Your format -- Normally our draft releases are written and formatted in Microsoft Word and circulated as email attachments. Yet releases are often not formatted when they are distributed over the wire. Reading online is very different than reading from a piece of paper. Our eyes move differently when looking at a screen. We process information differently. Even the best woven string of paragraphs needs some visual breaks with sub headlines and bullets. Take a cue from newspapers, use pull quotes. Consider stats and pictures. And where you can, incorporate hyperlinks to bios of quoted spokespersons, studies that are cited, and products that are highlighted.
Your purpose -- With the advent of social media, are press releases your only option to deliver or dare I say announce news? Blogs and viral PR are fair game in the battle to capture attention. Releases are becoming less impactful as the blogosphere can generate buzz long before the release hits PR newswire. Sometimes the news doesn't warrant a release. Here a blog posting may be more appropriate. Clearly releases are here to stay. Only now they are but one variable in a news equation. The informality and individuality of social media may also free us to be more creative in how we write and present our company’s news.
In the end, I know the coverage is far more important than the release. Even the most beautifully written and well formatted press release won’t get coverage if there is no news. And I would take a badly written release and great coverage any day, but that seldom happens. So willing to try most anything once, I am going back to basics, embracing verbs and seeing if my coverage benefits.
Let me get back to you.
Technorati Tags: Social Media Press Release; PR; Press Releases;
I'm also thinking it has other apps. Like product support, ....or vacation de-briefs. Of Machu Picchu. (Comment this)