Kill the press release

I'm up late tonight working on a press release that's not a press release. It's a "social media release." Sure I wish I was sleeping. But it could be worse. I could be working on a press release.

A social media release recognizes that the web has changed the game and journalists don't want to get a heavily canned press release that's dense with run on sentences like this one that contain a million bits of jargon all awkwardly architected in language that pushes the bounds of grammar and often never seems to get to the freaking point already.

When I was writing for the Globe, the releases I received largely went unread. The pitches I really payed attention to were very short interesting emails. But even then, if they didn't contain a link directly to more info, I just passed them by.

Social media releases have a headline, a short summary and then bulleted lists below that contain key facts, approved quotes, and links to media (blog, site, video, image, etc.).

Mark Glaser has a nice piece on the current state of the social media release.

Help to kill the press release!

Comments

[SoftwareSweatshop]

I'm with you. The press release is dead.

Best,

Raza Imam
SoftwareSweatshop.com

[brian halligan]

Maura. Give www.pressreleasegrader.com a try. It is a cool, free tool we built to help folks build better press releases that drive more business value. Bh.