It’s been loaded up with jargon. Weighed down with buzzwords. Scrubbed clean of any meaningful executive quotes. Don’t pity the press release, though. In spite of our best efforts to make it obsolete, its influence and impact on the market continues to grow.
Consider a recent report from market research firm Outsell that found press releases to have surpassed trade journals as the leading source of information for knowledge workers. Outsell VP and analyst Roger Strouse took a half-hearted stab to explain this result when he told Informationweek, “It may be that press releases are easier for people to get their hands on.”
Accessibility is part of it. Press releases are now easily available from the wire services, as well as directly off of a company’s Web site. However, releases also tend to be concise and timely. Our world is about escalating information overload and, as a result, they have emerged as an excellent source of insight for customers, prospects, partners, employees and investors.
That’s right…press releases aren’t solely for the press any longer. They’re a sales tool. They aid recruitment. They stimulate investors. Today’s press release has gone high-impact and to take full advantage many companies need to spend more time and energy crafting a release strategy. Here are a few suggestions:
1. View each release as a chapter in your corporate story. Don’t write them in a vacuum. Rather, weave consistent messaging into all of your press releases and build upon previous announcements.
2. Understand your audience and their information needs. Adhere to the inverted pyramid writing style. Cut out the technical jargon. Clearly explain what has happened, why and provide relevant industry context.
3. Incorporate new media – such as hyperlinks, PDFs and other multimedia elements – to provide quick access to additional background information. Boston-based PR firm SHIFT Communications recently introduced a template for what they call a “Social Media Release” . I do not recommend adopting this format, but the use of new media is rather innovative.
July 10, 2006, 1:54 pm
No Longer Just Press
Posted by jeffM
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June 2, 2006, 3:33 pm
The News Avalanche
Tomorrow has two guarantees: 1) the sun will rise and 2) there will be news.
Lots and lots of news – delivered by traditional outlets like broadcast television, cable programming, daily newspapers, wire services and trade journals, as well as emerging media such as podcasts, blogs, e-newsletters and streaming media. We live in a world where there is always someone recording and reporting.
This non-stop news avalanche presents an opportunity for your company. Professional and amateur journalists typically need sources and industry insiders to validate facts, share opinions and provide meaning to what’s happened. The awareness and credibility they confer is paramount to helping your company execute on its growth strategy.
Big budget TV advertisers spin the same 60 and 30 second spots multiple times because it is well understood that a target audience must to be consistently exposed to a brand for its messaging to be retained. In a business-to-business environment, you can achieve a comparable result by positioning your company’s executives as resources and thought leaders to the scores of journalists and other market influencers.
Here are a few suggestions:
1. Invest time in upfront planning to identify the most influential and credible journalists to target. Also carefully select your company’s designated spokespersons and make sure they are trained to stay on message. Finally, pick a set of topics, industries and/or technologies that your company is appropriate to comment on.
2. Be proactive in your outreach and relationship building with your target journalists. Read their articles. Understand their beats. Become a trusted source of information by talking to them about their stories and finding out what they are looking for in a news source. By demonstrating that you are there to help them do their job more effectively (rather than merely hawking your company’s wares), you will find a much more receptive audience.
3. Respond quickly when a story emerges that your company can comment on. Speed is so essential that we actually refer to this at Strategic as a “rapid response” program.
Consider our recent campaign on behalf of long-standing client Kelly FedSecure. When the issue of security clearance backlogs re-emerged as a hot topic in the trade press, our established media relationships and ability to quickly add business context to the story produced big-time results.
Feds May Ask Vendors to Pay for Security Checks
Government Computer News
http://www.gcn.com/online/vol1_no1/40638-1.html
Security Clearance Pause Puts Agencies, Contractors at Risk
Federal Computer Week
http://www.fcw.com/article94304-05-08-06-Print
Biz Hit Hard by Stalled Security Clearances
Washington Business Journal
http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2006/05/15/s
tory2.html?i=44476
Defense Agency Unsure When Clearance Process will Resume
Government Executive
http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=34077&dcn=todaysne
ws
Lots and lots of news – delivered by traditional outlets like broadcast television, cable programming, daily newspapers, wire services and trade journals, as well as emerging media such as podcasts, blogs, e-newsletters and streaming media. We live in a world where there is always someone recording and reporting.
This non-stop news avalanche presents an opportunity for your company. Professional and amateur journalists typically need sources and industry insiders to validate facts, share opinions and provide meaning to what’s happened. The awareness and credibility they confer is paramount to helping your company execute on its growth strategy.
Big budget TV advertisers spin the same 60 and 30 second spots multiple times because it is well understood that a target audience must to be consistently exposed to a brand for its messaging to be retained. In a business-to-business environment, you can achieve a comparable result by positioning your company’s executives as resources and thought leaders to the scores of journalists and other market influencers.
Here are a few suggestions:
1. Invest time in upfront planning to identify the most influential and credible journalists to target. Also carefully select your company’s designated spokespersons and make sure they are trained to stay on message. Finally, pick a set of topics, industries and/or technologies that your company is appropriate to comment on.
2. Be proactive in your outreach and relationship building with your target journalists. Read their articles. Understand their beats. Become a trusted source of information by talking to them about their stories and finding out what they are looking for in a news source. By demonstrating that you are there to help them do their job more effectively (rather than merely hawking your company’s wares), you will find a much more receptive audience.
3. Respond quickly when a story emerges that your company can comment on. Speed is so essential that we actually refer to this at Strategic as a “rapid response” program.
Consider our recent campaign on behalf of long-standing client Kelly FedSecure. When the issue of security clearance backlogs re-emerged as a hot topic in the trade press, our established media relationships and ability to quickly add business context to the story produced big-time results.
Feds May Ask Vendors to Pay for Security Checks
Government Computer News
http://www.gcn.com/online/vol1_no1/40638-1.html
Security Clearance Pause Puts Agencies, Contractors at Risk
Federal Computer Week
http://www.fcw.com/article94304-05-08-06-Print
Biz Hit Hard by Stalled Security Clearances
Washington Business Journal
http://washington.bizjournals.com/washington/stories/2006/05/15/s
tory2.html?i=44476
Defense Agency Unsure When Clearance Process will Resume
Government Executive
http://www.govexec.com/story_page.cfm?articleid=34077&dcn=todaysne
ws
Posted by jeffM
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Send this
May 10, 2006, 3:32 am
PR's Holy Grail
What is the right amount of media coverage for your company?
It’s an important question for anyone who works in corporate communications, public relations or marketing. That’s because in spite of the acceptance of new technologies such as blogs, podcasts and wikis that help us reach our target markets, editorial coverage remains the holy grail of public relations. Effective messaging through the media increases awareness. It confers credibility. It’s high impact.
In the ten plus years since launching Strategic, I have worked for clients that answered the question about media exposure quite differently. Some were enamored with the homerun placement. They saw their story on page one of the Wall Street Journal’s Marketplace section or their CEO chatting up Joe Kernen on CNBC’s Squawk Box.
Others were focused – dare I write obsessed – with quantity of placements. A former client practically shrugged off a national feature in Leslie Walker’s .com column in the Washington Post where they were positioned as true market innovator because a competitor had more “hits” that month.
The appropriate quality and quantity of media coverage is driven by your company’s business goals mapped against the maturity of your market, sales strategy and competitive environment. If you are planning to create a new market category or if your company is positioning against a market leader, then investing resources going for quantity makes sense. This can be a great way to demonstrate momentum. Vertical trades, online media and relevant blogs are all viable targets.
With a more mature market or a sales strategy focused on C-level executives, then the focus should be on generating visibility in top-flight media outlets like Financial Times, National Public Radio, Chief Executive Magazine and CFO.
Ultimately, there is a fairly straightforward evaluation process. Visit your corporate Web site and click on the “News” section. What impression do you get? Would a customer, prospect, partner or employee candidate want to have a conversation with your company? That’s the benchmark.
It’s an important question for anyone who works in corporate communications, public relations or marketing. That’s because in spite of the acceptance of new technologies such as blogs, podcasts and wikis that help us reach our target markets, editorial coverage remains the holy grail of public relations. Effective messaging through the media increases awareness. It confers credibility. It’s high impact.
In the ten plus years since launching Strategic, I have worked for clients that answered the question about media exposure quite differently. Some were enamored with the homerun placement. They saw their story on page one of the Wall Street Journal’s Marketplace section or their CEO chatting up Joe Kernen on CNBC’s Squawk Box.
Others were focused – dare I write obsessed – with quantity of placements. A former client practically shrugged off a national feature in Leslie Walker’s .com column in the Washington Post where they were positioned as true market innovator because a competitor had more “hits” that month.
The appropriate quality and quantity of media coverage is driven by your company’s business goals mapped against the maturity of your market, sales strategy and competitive environment. If you are planning to create a new market category or if your company is positioning against a market leader, then investing resources going for quantity makes sense. This can be a great way to demonstrate momentum. Vertical trades, online media and relevant blogs are all viable targets.
With a more mature market or a sales strategy focused on C-level executives, then the focus should be on generating visibility in top-flight media outlets like Financial Times, National Public Radio, Chief Executive Magazine and CFO.
Ultimately, there is a fairly straightforward evaluation process. Visit your corporate Web site and click on the “News” section. What impression do you get? Would a customer, prospect, partner or employee candidate want to have a conversation with your company? That’s the benchmark.
