First, Editors receive around 200-300 Press Releases a week.
That is 10,000 to 15,000 a year. Just to let you know.
Leading business magazines are heavily targeted. Many get more than
500 a week. Editor’s employ assistants just to wade through them.
Editors reveal there are six main reasons why most Press Releases get
binned (or not paid attention to), and often not even read.
Irrelevant to their interests
Every day, Editors receive Press Releases which have no conceivable relevance
to the subjects they cover. It is clear those sending them have made no attempt to
target. They probably have not even looked at the publications. They adopt a scatter-
gun approach of sending Press Releases to every e-mail address they can find. In
the good old days when they arrived by snail mail, at least PRs had to pay for the
postage and take the trouble of stuffing them into envelopes. Now those cost and
work constraints have disappeared. Because those who do take care to target
carefully are rare, editors tend to look much more closely at what THEY send.
.
No story or weak story
A Press Release ought to contain some intrinsically interesting information that an
Editor would want to pass on to readers. Those who do understand the kind of
material a publication uses score because they look for relevant ideas, then tailor
their release in a way which makes an editor sit up and take notice. Editors apply
the so-what? test to Press Releases – so what would happen if we did not run
this story? If the answer is “not much”, the release goes in the bin. If you believe
a Press Release wouldn’t pass the test, it shouldn’t be sent – or the story should
be strengthened so that it will pass muster.
.
Self-promotion or puffery
Too many people who send out Press Releases do not seem to understand the
difference between news and advertising. Editors hate having to wade through
pages of boastful hype extolling an organization and all its works. Even Press
Releases which do contain the germ of a story sometimes get killed off because
they are wrapped up in exuberant puffery. I am not surprised that some Editors
pass Press Releases straight to their advertising departments as sales leads.
.
Poor English
A significant proportion of Press Releases contain spelling, grammar, or punctuation
errors. Most Editors are turned-off, but a few forgiving souls do not mind correcting
the English. Even so, howlers such as wrong use (or non-use) of the possessive
apostrophe and failure to make the verb agree with the subject – two of the most
common mistakes – undermine a release’s (correct use of possessive apostrophe)
credibility.
.
Confusing jargon
Some Press Releases seem to have been written by computer. They start with
the latest management-speak (“pushing the envelope” is a current favorite), add
a layer of baffling jargon, and sprinkle in plenty of those impenetrable acronyms.
The finished result reads like a secret code. The most skilled writers know that
stories are best told in simple English which can be read and understood quickly.
Editors do not have the time to decode jargon or play guessing games with
unknown acronyms.
.
Too long
Many Press Releases combine the twin faults of being too long – but not
providing enough information. That is because the information they do provide
tends to be irrelevant background about the company, while key facts about
the story – the value of the contract, the date of the product launch, the
job title of the newly appointed individual – are left out. Skilled writers judge
the “weight” of a story. Most stories can be told in a page. Some may need two.
A story must be pretty close in importance to the Second Coming to warrant three.
.
A final word of good news. Editors and journalists do admit from
time to time, that they get a “really good” story from a Press Release.
.
Irrespective of your business goals, vision, or content, Press Release distribution
is indispensable to flag a successful growth curve in the salient years to come
within your organization. Press Release distribution has opened the scopes of
Small Business Owners especially who can participate in the digital movement of
audience engagement and market visibility without the liability of too great of an
investment. Marketing Consultants and Business Coaches and their Press Release
services stand as a major initiation to something bigger in terms of capturing
market and consumer demands. It definitely should not be overlooked.
