By Jonathan Henderson

Press releases are the single most important tool in PR. In this article I will explain why press releases are so useful and when they should be sent out.

The key aim of public relations is to get information about your (or your client’s) business into the media in the form of articles or news stories. This can be a very effective way of publicizing a business, as people are often more inclined to believe what they read in a news story than in a paid-for advert.

The main way to achieve news coverage is by sending out a press release. This is a short news story you hope will be published by a paper or magazine, or prompt one of their reporters to write an article based on it.

Press releases must contain something newsworthy, as newspapers will not simply print a piece saying how wonderful a business is. Nevertheless, local papers in particular are often under-staffed and welcome stories they can use, even if the news they contain is not particularly earth-shattering. A few events that might justify a press release include:

* the opening of a new business
* winning a big order
* moving to new premises
* winning a prize or award
* celebrating an anniversary
* offering a new service
* developing a new product
* sponsoring a local sports team
* assisting a charity or charitable appeal
* special offers, events, and so on

Your press release should start with an attention-grabbing headline. After this comes the body of the release, where you set out the news story you want to publicize. This should be double-spaced, i.e. written with alternating ‘empty’ lines. The release should conclude with a phone number and email address which the reporter or editor can use to request more information.

A press release should NOT be written in the same way as an advert. The idea is to achieve coverage in the news pages, so you should try to imitate the concise, factual style used by newspaper reporters. Your aim should be to produce a story or article that could be used by the editor without requiring any changes. If your press release is published more or less as you wrote it, you can congratulate yourself on a job well done!