Press Releases (PR) were such a strong marketing tool in the heyday of newspapers.
Businesses knew the power of creating a PR whenever they had any type of news about their company. They were extremely effective at bringing in business too!
Today, PR are still extremely effective at bringing in business... but many companies forget their value, because the strength of newspapers is waning. Don't ever underestimate the value of ONLINE PR though. They are still just as powerful and effective at bringing in business as their paper counterparts ever were.
When it comes to marketing, press releases are some of your most valuable assets. You can easily get an excellent PR written for a few hundred dollars, and you can publish your PR online for about as much with a high-quality PR platform. As with all things, however, there are some rules you want to follow to create the best PR for yourself or your business.
Do's
Press releases are actually supposed to announce newsworthy events. So, it isn't written like an advertisement. It's written more like a news article.
Answering the proverbial Who, How, Where, When, and Why in a press release is very important! Without these questions being addressed, your PR will be uninteresting and not really worth publishing.
You'll also want to get a competent writer to write your press release for you. Your fifth grader who made an A+ in English isn't going to cut it. Although you don't have to be Earnest Hemingway to write a good PR, there's a certain style, flow, and format that they all follow. Easier to hire someone than learn those skills yourself, if you don't already know them.
Finally, you're going to want to include your website, your social media profiles and pages, and your phone number, or at least a phone number of some sort in the press release. You do want people to contact you, right?
Don'ts
Accuracy is very important with press releases. Although, according to the industry, a certain amount of hyperbole might be acceptable, it certainly isn't with PR. Try not to use over used, emotional words like "excited"! That's a sure-fire way to create a boring, hackneyed PR. Try for more emotional accuracy, and especially work towards factual accuracy. Is your product the absolute best? Normally, that's debatable! If you've won an award, sure, that's a factual standard. But, if you're just tooting your horn, save that for your ads!
For more information, check out our free eBook entitled "Press Release Marketing For Local Business". You can grab it at http://bit.ly/2GHtaPs now.
If you need to have a press release written and submitted for you, please feel free to contact Debbie@burtondigitalmarketing.com or call at 616-326-1212.