Ten tips for press release writing

I’m about to write my first press release, any tips?

By Chris Cooke

Well, I’m going to put my journalist hat on for this one, if that’s OK, and give you ten tips on making press releases better from that point of view. Of course, every company and agency has their own ‘house style’ for media releases, and you should make sure you fully understand those first, but once you’ve got those basics mastered, think about these points.

1. Get to the point, fast. What’s the story here? That’s to say, think about what the ‘news story’ is that you’re communicating, and make sure your opening paragraph is a summary of that story, nothing more nothing less. The story might simply be that you have a product release coming up, or that your company or client is making a corporate statement. If it is that simple, keep your release simple and resist the temptation to make things more complicated than they need to be.

Also resist the temptation to put a long introduction of “how we got here” or “why what I’m about to tell you is so great” – the journalist will pick up your release and immediately ask “what’s the story here?”. If the answer to that question is in the first sentence, the journalist is more likely to read on. If it’s not answered by the second paragraph, they’ll probably bin it.

If there are a number of stories in one release, separate them out and write a short paragraph about each with a clear section header (don’t have too many stories per release).

If the aim of your press release is to get a review or interview, rather than a news story, then make sure that is obvious from the top – say something like ‘review copies available on request’ or ‘interviews available with Mr X’.

2. Adopt a neutral style. An increasing number of websites, and even newspapers, will take a good press release, do some moderate sub-editing, and publish it as is. This is a great opportunity for a PR person, because it means your company or client’s message may be published almost in your own words. However, to enable this to happen you need to use a neutral style of writing – so, not too obviously sales speak, not too much jargon (unless it’s a press release for specialist journalists) and nothing overly stylised (overly informal, full of metaphor, clever words etc).

3. Always include a quote. The fact you are releasing a new product, or staging a new offer, is often not really a news story, but if you offer a good quote from a named individual (preferably a senior executive, or anyone associated with your product that is well known) a desperate journalist with space to fill is much more likely to use your release anyway.

4. Present lists as a list. If you are providing stats, or data, or lists of names or stores or products, present that information in a simple list, rather than a piece of prose. If you want to provide some analysis of the data, it’s always better to provide that in your named quote, then the journalist may well take it verbatum. If you are presenting lists, try to make it easy for the journalist to cut and paste the data into another word document – ie don’t use excessive tabbing or complicated tables.

5. Push anything but the core information into ‘notes for editors’. Background information is always useful, but push it all to the back of the press release under the heading ‘notes to editors’. Everything in the main body of the release should be directly relevant to the main story. Notes to editors can be as long as you need them to be, but try and keep the main release under one side A4 (and no 8 point text to make it fit – you should aim for 12 point text with decent line spacing).

6. Always include a photo (or maybe a link to one). Many news websites need a picture to go with every story, and if you provide one you’re saving the journalist work, and they are much more likely to use your release. If you are providing a picture of a product or executive (which often you will be), try and make them interesting pictures (ie not on a white background, not too formal). For websites pictures should be provided as JPEGs at a decent size (in terms of centimetres) and at 72dpi. For print publications pictures need to be 300dpi at a decent size (in terms of centimetres). If pictures are 1MB plus, it is probably better to provide a link to where people can download a picture (ie on your website) rather than attaching excessively large files.

7. Keep layout simple and image-lite. It’s tempting to spend lots of time making your press release look pretty (pictures, logos, text frames). Don’t. Simple text press releases are most user-friendly, in fact I prefer to have the text of the release in the body of the email instead of in an attached Word document (perhaps include in the body of the email and in a Word document). Don’t send press releases as PDFs, it’s not helpful.

8. Always include a date, and make any embargo very clear. If you do need to embargo a press release (ie give a date before which a journalist is not allowed to run a story – normally because you have given a certain publication the exclusive first use of the story, or because the release contains timely sensitive information) make sure the embargo is at the top in bold large type. It is worth resending the release once the embargo has passed (with the embargo removed, obviously) – many journalists will have ignored your release when they saw the embargo and forgotten about it by the time the embargo passes!

9. Make sure contact information is correct. Sounds obvious, but you’d be amazed how many times you call the number given on a release and it goes through to the wrong person or department! Make sure the number you give is a manned line (or has relevant voicemail), there’s nothing worse than following up a press release and being met with an unanswered phone.

10. Distribute internally. Pass copies of your release to your colleagues. It’s just a little bit irritating if you call the agency listed as a press contact, only to find that the relevant account manager is on lunch and that no one else knows what you’re talking about. Obviously your colleagues won’t be able to deal with all media enquiries for your accounts, but at least if they are in the loop they can sound informed and take more effective messages. I’d forward copies of every release to my receptionist too – they are often a media person’s first point of call, and it’s great if they have an idea of what a journalist is talking about when they answer the phone.

Finally… Less is more. Read and re-read your press release – does everything need to be in there? Simple is always best.