Last updated on July 29th, 2010 at 01:45 pm

How do you go about writing a quality press release that will grab the attention of the media and your audience? Here are five simple tips to help you succeed :-

• Pick a “Newsworthy” Angle.
  Remember that press releases are not an advertisement for you – if you want an advert in a paper or magazine you will have to pay for it.
  Do not try to sell your product or service. Do not use “hype” in press releases (we sell the best widgets), although if you are the biggest producer of widgets and have signed a big contract mention this fact.
  Instead give the media what they want and they will give you what you want which is space in their magazine, paper or website.
• What do the media want ?
  This is very simple, all they want is a story that is backed up by facts!
  Just provide  the Who, What, When, Where and How in a story format.
  Who used your products and or services , what do they use, when and where have they used them and how have they used the product or service.
  Show examples of ways that people have used your products and services to their benefit. If you can include some emotions in your story all the better.  Ask yourself “Would this be something that I might read in a newspaper?”
• Start well
  The headline and the first sentence of the first paragraph are the absolute most important part of the press release. Many journalists get 100’s of press releases a day and will spend seconds looking at each one. If you don’t catch their interest here within those seconds  you will end up in the bin with all the others.
  The best way to do this is to use your most hard hitting information FIRST rather than build to a climax. This may be opposite to what you would normally do but it does work!
  Once you have grabbed the journalists attention the rest of the pres release can give the details that support your story or theme (the facts mentioned above).
• Aim your press release at the media.
  Remember your press release is being read by a journalist, editor or reporter, not necessarily a client. It’s not your job to sell them your product or service, it’s your job to give them an interesting story or piece of news that they will be happy to share and announce to their audience.
• Tell the media who to contact
  Don’t forget to add details at the bottom telling the journalist who to contact for more information – give them an email address and a phone number – if the editor is looking for something to fill some space in his
  paper or magazine and the press deadline is getting close he may want to pick up the phone to ask more questions and if it’s a choice between two press releases and only one has a contact number guess which one is going to be used.

You may wonder why you should bother with a press release, well consider the implications of one journalist or editor seeing it and publishing it in his paper / magazine.  Just one feature or a mention in a popular or targeted business publication and you could have your company seeing many new enquiries hopefully leading to new sales and extra profits.

One further bit of advice I would give is to target the press releases carefully (there is very little point in sending out a blanket press release to all the magazines and papers you can think off, send it to the ones that are relevant to your products or services)  and send them regularly, but only when there is something to announce.