How to write a newsworthy press release, with examples

Afiya
press release distribution

The press release can be seen as an effective tool to generate some public awareness through press and print media. If well written, a press release can be picked by multiple reputable resources. Unlike many other paid sources of advertisements, a press release is a cost-effective approach. Once written and syndicated to multiple news outlets and journalists, it can bring a good amount of traffic and visits.

However, it isn’t easy to accomplish such an extended outreach with a press release as most of these are not targeted to a focused community or poorly written that nobody likes or wants to read. Above all, a poorly written press release can make your company look naïve and non-serious about its marketing.

So, how do you make sure that the press release is good enough? Here are five simple rules you can follow to get the intended results out of a press release distribution.

Rule # 1. Have something newsworthy to say.

Before you start writing the press release, think about why this is important? What news or message do you want to deliver through the content? To get your message out to the world, first, you need to convince the journalist that your message is important for his audience.

Rule # 2. Heading or Subject line should be interesting

Press release’s heading or subject line is the first thing a user or journalist would read. If it is boring or sounds like a sales pitch, chances are that no one would care what’s inside the press release. Make it interesting for the audience that they want to read or know more about it.

Rule # 3. Write it like a journalist while keeping it simple

The journalist receiving your news release is the first person to read or approve it for further publication. They are busy people and don’t have time to edit or correct simply typo mistakes in your content. If you don’t want your news release to end up in a trash folder, check for grammatical and spelling errors before sending it to the journalists. Other than that it must be written in simple-enough English for the entire readership of the publication. Getting too much jargon and niche-specific words may confuse the majority of the audience.

Rule # 4. Get to the point without any fluffiness

The last thing you want for your press release is to be confusing. The first paragraph of the press release is the most important one and should carry all the necessary information about the story you want to share. The next paragraphs tell the story in detail. You can add some good quotes or your company’s vision in the subsequent paragraphs.

Rule # 5. Add call to action

Last but not the least one is the inclusion of address information of the company and call to action. It could be visiting your website, blog, or product’s sales page but make sure that you include everything a potential customer might need to make a sales or visit.

If all that sounds too complicated, you might want to invest a few extra dollars to hire a press release writer. Any good PR writer can make a story newsworthy and share-worthy press release, which increases its chances of getting picked and published.

Press Release Examples

What follows are examples of press releases, written by one of the best press release distribution services in the US working with small businesses like yours for almost two decades.