What is a Press Release?

Quick reference

• 00:05 Great, so what then is a press release?
• 00:07 In short, a press release is a news worthy bit of information that can be
• 00:12 delivered through various media channels.
• 00:15 Since the beginning of human history, there have always been news.
• 00:20 But really, what has changed now is the ways in which the news is being spread.
• 00:26 So let's look at a history of press releases.
• 00:30 So some centuries ago,
• 00:31 the important news reached us through the booming voice of a town crier.
• 00:37 This town crier would ring his bell to get people's attention and
• 00:42 then he would shout out the news of the day for everyone to hear.
• 00:46 Now as time went on, the town crier got replaced by newspapers which
• 00:51 gave people the luxury of reading the news at their own homes when they've got time.
• 00:57 And then journalists gained access to these stories through leaked information
• 01:02 and letters, and other sources..
• 01:04 Journalist would further investigate the news and
• 01:08 then they wrote the articles on story that they deemed to be newsworthy, and
• 01:13 this is how the traditional press release came about.
• 01:16 Now we progressed from traditional press releases to online press releases.
• 01:22 Press releases needed to be approved by respectable editors before
• 01:27 they can be passed onto publishing houses.
• 01:30 So a business owner typically needed to have good relationships with excellent
• 01:35 editors and well-established publishers, because these contacts
• 01:40 increase the likelihood of press releases being featured in top newspapers.
• 01:46 So with the internet then,
• 01:47 recent information have become only a click away and journalists really needed
• 01:52 to up their game in order to continue to produce cutting edge press releases that
• 01:57 people actually wanted to read in the midst of such an information overload and
• 02:02 this is really where we are today.
• 02:05 And so press releases quickly evolved into the form that we can see right now.
• 02:10 So nowadays, the broad term press release includes so much more than just news.
• 02:15 Press releases cover new products that's gonna be launched on the market.
• 02:20 It covers reviews, business trends and business communications and
• 02:25 events and they're easily and conveniently published on the web.
• 02:31 But sadly, many of these press releases are just a waste of time.
• 02:35 The main challenge with press releases is that the content can be quite poor.
• 02:41 Now since so little thought is given to what should be relevant and
• 02:46 since so much pointless information is put out and
• 02:50 perhaps it is also worded poorly, we have some challenges to deal with it.
• 02:57 And because of all these reasons,
• 02:59 press releases are actually passed over without much care from the reader.
• 03:04 And so what can we do to really work around these issues would be
• 03:09 a critical question to ask as we go forward.
• 03:12 Let's start by considering the characteristics of a press release.
• 03:18 And here we're gonna look now at a successful template that
• 03:22 you can follow to make the whole process better.
• 03:27 So the press release really would be a one or two page document and
• 03:32 it's gonna start by containing some newsworthy information.
• 03:38 So these are the 15 components that's going to be included.
• 03:42 We'll start off by naming the brand.
• 03:46 So it's gonna be your company or your letterhead or your logo and
• 03:50 then with we've gotta include some contact information, so
• 03:54 that the press can actually get hold of us and then the release time.
• 03:59 In other words, if we feel it's for immediate release or
• 04:02 they should hold until Monday, whatever the case might be,
• 04:05 we're gonna specify that and then the headline normally
• 04:10 would be around eight words, then we're going to continue by adding a subhead.
• 04:17 This is really some more information that couldn't fit into the headline.
• 04:23 That's the easiest way to think about it and
• 04:26 then we're going to include the body here.
• 04:29 The body will open with a dateline.
• 04:33 And so here, this has gotta be appropriately formatted,
• 04:38 so that it's easy for the press to use.
• 04:41 And then we're gonna follow that with a lead paragraph, which typically would
• 04:46 have an opening sentence that's gonna get the reader's attention.
• 04:54 So in our template, we wanna have a main body and
• 04:57 then we're going to progress onto some quotes.
• 05:02 Now a quote could be something that adds a human element and
• 05:09 it may have been something that the CEO or
• 05:12 the director provided us with, and this supporting statements
• 05:17 is really great at taking that piece of information and humanizing it.
• 05:24 Now in the description, this will typically be pertaining to the event or
• 05:30 the product of the piece of news that we want to release.
• 05:35 The description is gonna say exactly what that is in the shortest possible way and
• 05:41 then we've got the closing paragraph,
• 05:43 which is going to include some calls to action.
• 05:48 Of course, we are going to be careful, so
• 05:51 that it doesn't sound like just a sales pitch.
• 05:53 And then at the end, we're going to add what we would call a boiler plate.
• 05:59 And so this is just a section about a company going
• 06:03 with a link to the company's website.
• 06:07 For some extra mileage, of course, you can add some photographs and media footage.
• 06:12 And nowadays, of course, one can easily embed a video.
• 06:19 Now press released all end at the public at large, as well as journalists
• 06:24 who might then contact the company for further confirmation.
• 06:28 So to some it up, the press release is a business bulletin that's
• 06:34 going to provide the readers with some helpful details.
• 06:38 It's gonna say where something is, what is happening, why and when.

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