5 Tips for a Killer Press Release
By Angie Dixon   ©2004 All Rights Reserved

Will your press release get the media's attention? If I could answer that question, I'd have so much money I'd be living in Tahiti, getting a tan right now instead of working for a living. The simple truth is it's just impossible to know whether your press release will work. But here are five ways to really improve the response to your press release. 1. Send your release on a slow news day. Okay, this is hard to predict, but if you have a release you've been planning to send, that's not time-sensitive, watch for a day when nothing really major (at least not much) is happening in the world and send it then. 2. When there IS something going on in the world, link your press release to a big news item or event. This will grab the editor's attention and increase the odds of getting your release used--or even getting an interview! 3. Make your release newsworthy. If it reads like a sales letter, it will get pitched, not printed. It's okay to mention how to find your product, even include a URL (and maybe a phone number, depending on the type of company you operate), but beyond that, leave out the commercialism. 4. Address the editor by name. It takes time to find out the editors' names, and your list might be shorter if you do this. You might have 500 names instead of 5,000 anonymous addresses. But wouldn't you rather be targeting specific people than sending out blindly? It certainly makes more sense. 5. Write a grabber headline. Make your headline sing. Don't say, "Web site offers free items." Say, "New Site Highlights Thousands of Totally Free Offers." Think of your press release as an alternative type of sales letter, one in which you can't use sales copy, but have to be persuasive without sounding like you're trying to sell. With that in mind, write a headline that persuades the editor (and then readers of the publication) to read your story. So, will your press release work now? Sorry, I'm still working for a living and I'm not living in Tahiti. But chances are that if you follow the tips above, your release will get the editor's attention, be printed, and get the reader's attention.