A to Z Challenge: P is for… Press Release

The Visibility Planner is all about raising your profile and visibility through the things you do focusing on 4 main areas: PR and Marketing (inc Social Media), Networking, Presenting and Writing. For the 2020 A to Z Challenge we decided to focus on one of these aspects – writing! As the world continues to go into lock-down due to Covid-19, it is the perfect time to work on raising your visibility through your writing as you can do it from the comfort of your home.

P is for… Press Release

Write a press release. A press release is a short, compelling news story.

It is usually written by a PR professional and sent to a targeted list of journalists or publications. The goal of a press release is to pique their interest.

The press release should contain all the essential information (who? what? where? when? how? and most importantly why?) for the journalist to easily produce his own story.

If you don’t have a PR professional you can still do it yourself and many small businesses and bloggers will write their own. It is supposed to look and feel like a newspaper story so this is the style you should use.

The standard press release contains:

• contact information
• the headline
• date
• a brief summary of the press release
• the press release (summarising the main news at the start, before expanding to answer questions/provide more details)
• end with a short description of the company/business and;
• a call to action.

Although a press release is a PR tool, it should not read as overly promotional and you should avoid sounding too much like a sales pitch.

Further Reading:

• Establish your Reputation as a Thought-Leader by Commenting & Providing Commentary.
• Be Interviewed to help raise your profile
• Guest Blogging: How to Prepare and Submit a Guest Post