ask the expert | how to write and distribute a press release

Today we have a guest post from our PR/advertising expert partner: Nicole Leedham from Black Coffee Communications.

I am often asked how to guarantee press coverage and my answer is always “it can’t be done”.

What you can do, however, is shorten the odds by

1. Making your press release interesting and engaging; and

2. Targeting it to the right place.

Journalists – especially those with daily (or even hourly) deadlines – work in a hectic environment and their attention span is short. You have about 5 seconds to catch their interest before they move on to the next lead.

A lot of us that read build a little biz are mums, so let me explain something in a term that most mums will relate to – it helps to think of journalists as the toddlers of the professional world.

It’s not their fault, it’s just they are constantly bombarded with information from all sorts of sources and need to quickly sort the wheat from the chaff.

What this means is that not only does your press release need to have impeccable spelling and grammar – it needs a “hook” in the first paragraph.

So forget the flowery language and the “Drawing the reader in” that you would do if you were writing a creative piece, and get straight to the point.

At University, we learnt that this is called the “inverse pyramid” style of writing – the important information is up top and much of the rest is just padding.

Some tips for writing good press releases, and how to get them published:

1. A press release is merely “bait”. Don’t put every single thought you’ve ever had about your business into them. Just the key points that will intrigue the journalist enough to go to your website or to give you a call and find out more.

2. Make sure your name and phone number is at a prominent position at the end of the release so the journalist can contact you.

3. Don’t send releases to the general email or fax address.  Major news media get thousands of press releases every day; you don’t want yours to get lost. Make sure you are familiar with its style, and what journalist has what round. Never send at press release into the ether and cross your fingers. Find the journalist who writes about your subject matter, give them a call, and then send the release directly to them – maybe following it up in a day or so. Or, better still, send them to your community or suburban rag, which loves stories about locals succeeding at something.

4. Find the “angle”. Journalists will probably not be interested in your paintings/photography/whatever as there are hundreds just like you out there. But if you’ve won a national award, or work in a non-traditional field, or even built a successful home-based business as a single mother raising four kids – there’s your story! I recently told a sculptor friend that she needed to sex up and drape herself across her huge metal creations for a photo opportunity. I was only half joking.

5. Think about sending your releases via PRWeb, a Web-based service which automatically sends uploaded press releases to online newspapers and bloggers. You may not get anything, but if you put some backlinks into your release, it could help with search engine optimization.

6. Sign up to  SourceBottle and/or HARO (Help a reporter out). These are great sites where journalists post “call-outs” to people in order to interview them for a story or feature. Recent ones that have landed in my inbox have been asking for some who works in a non-traditional field, and one for event planners with juicy tidbits.

No matter what you do (or what you pay someone else to do on your behalf), there’s no guarantee that sending a press release will result in media attention. If you want guarantees, buy advertising space.

But you can reduce the odds (and, in the interests of self-promotion, it does help to have someone that knows the ropes write the release for you, or at least fine-tune your words.

Nicole Leeham is the owner of her own little biz: Black Coffee Communications. She specializes in helping small to medium businesses with writing, editing, marketing, public relations and media.

do you have a PR/media/advertising question for nicole. post it or send us an email. your question could become the next 'ask the expert' post!

ask the expert | dubunking fears and myths about PR & advertising

Today we have a guest post from our PR/advertising expert partner: Nicole Leedham from Black Coffee Communications.

Welcome to my first blog post for build a little biz. I am very excited about demystifying public relations and advertising for small businesses. After all, I’m a small business myself and I too struggle with some aspects (bookkeeping anyone?).

So, I thought the best way to start would be to debunk some myths about PR and Advertising. Which, by the way, are two very different beasts.

Public Relations

Let’s talk about Public Relations first, and what it is not.

PR is not sending out a bucket load of media releases into the ether, crossing your fingers and hoping for the best.

Nor is it standing around in skimpy outfits in nightclubs handing out free samples.

And it is definitely not glamorous, or exciting.

Building relationships

What it is about is establishing relationships with stakeholders. This might include customers, media, licensing and regulatory agencies, suppliers, neighbours and more.

These relationships mean that when you do have something to say, people listen.

Let’s imagine, for example, that you have an online service that supports small businesses. Probably the best type of PR in that scenario is word-of-mouth (either on- or offline). A happy client will tell others about you.

Collect these testimonials and use them on your marketing material. Third-party endorsement is the best PR you can get.

As for media, you also need to do some research so you can target your news releases. There is no point sending out a general release to the general email address of the nearest metropolitan paper. They get thousands of these a day. You need to discover which journalist writes about small business and contact them personally.

And never underestimate the power of local media or trade journals. The former lap up stories of “local kid done good” and the latter is often crying out for decent content.

None of this has to be expensive - although if you are not a writer and want to prepare a press release, or submit an article, I suggest it is worth investing in someone who writes for a living and knows how to get your message across.

But if you have built a relationship with the journalist, getting the story printed will be a piece of cake. It’s the cultivation that takes time and effort.

Advertising

Advertising is not (always) big bucks for mass media campaigns targeted at a broad audience.

Nor is it a guaranteed return on investment – especially if it is not done properly.

Advertising is about being clever with your marketing budget – and it is just one component of that budget (which might include sponsorship, flyers, trade show exhibitions and more).

Granted, the likes of Coke and McDonalds have more money to throw at mass media advertising than most of us will see in a lifetime, and they wouldn’t be doing that if they weren’t seeing results. But for small businesses, success can come far more cheaply.

Again, don’t underestimate the local rag. If you are, for example, a solo tradesman, or a cleaner, you will likely get a great response from a small, targeted classified advertisement in your neighbourhood throw-away.

In kind

Some smaller, niche publications also offer “in kind” advertising space. Maybe you have a service that you can “trade” to get your branding on someone else’s website or flyer?

Another great option is “pay-per-click” online advertising, where you don’t pay a cent unless a person “clicks” on your ad – and you can set a daily maximum.

While this is a very broad-brush post that hopefully makes PR and advertising less daunting to you, future articles will go into more details on specifics.

What questions do you have about PR and advertising for your little biz? Please comment below and I will answer the best I can. Your questions will help me with future blog posts so I would love to hear from you!  

Nicole Leeham is the owner of her own little biz: Black Coffee Communications. She specializes in helping small to medium businesses with writing, editing, marketing, public relations and media.

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