“How to Write a Press Release
Your Editor Grabs”
by Eldo Barkhuizen
A press release (or email press release) is a short news story about your company, service or product. It is usually one-to-three double-spaced pages long and appears in a newspaper or trade journal (or can appear in email format). A press release is not an advertisement, but is a short informative account of something newsworthy.
Why Write a
Press Release?
1. FREE PUBLICITY – when a newspaper or trade journal editor prints your news story, it alerts the public to your business. And you don’t have to pay for expensive advertising space.
2. CAN BE MORE EFFECTIVE THAN ADVERTISING – because a press release is a news story, it has more credibility than an advertisement. Studies have shown that press releases generate more responses from potential customers than ads do.
So people take more notice of your press release than your ad.
Format of an Effective
Press Release
Your press release should answer the 6 journalistic questions:
- WHO – Who is the main actor?
- WHAT – What happened?
- WHEN – When did it happen?
- WHERE – Where did it happen?
- WHY – Why did it happen?
- HOW – How did it happen?
Your press release should also take the form of an “inverted pyramid,” with your most important facts in your first paragraph, less important facts in your second, and so on.
The reader should get the essence of your press release from your first para.
Also, your press release must be:
- WELL TIMED – must relate to something about to occur or that has just taken place.
- BRIEF– keep it short and to the point.
- WELL WRITTEN – correct spelling and grammar.
- FACTUAL– keep to provable facts.
Email Press Releases
That Work
The email press release is generally shorter than print press releases, say around 450 words.
Line lengths no longer than around 65 characters. And paras no longer than three sentences – much easier, on your computer screen, to read narrow columns of text and short paras.
Also, don’t send extra material, like photos, to a reporter in your email press release (can take a long time to download – reporters are busy people). Instead, you can post these to a web site for easy reference.
And remember, the most important parts of your email press release are the subject header and subject line. These should catch your reader’s eye at first glance – or he or she will just delete your email.
To work, your email press release subject line should include the four U’s:
- URGENT – have a sense of urgency
- ULTRA-SPECIFIC – use specifics, not generalities
- USEFUL – the reader should get some benefit from opening your email
- UNIQUE – your email should stand out from the rest
Your first line of body text after your email press release subject line should read, FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, which shows your email can go out straightaway.
After this line, the first para of email press release should expand on the subject title and include the “who, what, when, where, why, and how” of the story (as for a conventional press release).
Also include in your email press release your email address and phone number, so the reporter can contact you easily.
Plus, endorsement of your product or service from a third party adds credibility to your email press release.
At the end of your email press release include a short para about your company (how many years in business, specialisms, fundraising activities, and so on).
Close your email press release with a ### to show it’s completed.
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