HOW TO WRITE A PRESS RELEASE WHICH GETS PUBLISHED

• GIVE HEADLINE MATERIAL -
" 22 year old girl kicks the shit out of 3 eve-teasers at Nungambakkam "
Now compare it with "KravMaga is popular in Chennai."

• Remember the publication is looking for NEWS, which will interest its readers. So give headline material the journalist can build his story upon.
• ( … and get an opportunity to slip in the info you want to convey. :-) )

• GIVE A SYNOPSIS UPFRONT

• Remember journalists are always running against deadlines. Especially those in dailies.
• So start with a bullet pointed Executive Summary, which captures the salient points in less than 150 or 200 words. Most of the experienced journalists can immediately churn out a good story with this synopsis itself.

• DONT WRITE A COMPANY PROFILE IN THE GUISE OF A STORY

• Don’t C&P the "About Us" from your company website. It’s an immediate put off.
• Make the story relevant to the headline. 

• CUSTOMIZE TO THE PUBLICATION'S PROFILE
Slightly reword the story to suit the Publication's profile.

• General Interest - " 50 million computers infected with SreeRam virus"
• Business - " 60% PCs of corporate India infected with SreeRam virus"
• Life Style - " Are you spamming? SreeRam virus targets your mail box. "
• Teens - "Beware! Torrent downloads come with SreeRam virus."

• HAVE GOOD MANNERS

• Don’t mass mail a general draft to every journalist in your address book. Address them by name and send individual mails.
• Don’t be bossy - “PFA our press release as a word doc. Kindly Publish". Remember the DELETE button is a few cms away. So, at least give a synopsis in the body of the mail and then inform the journalist that the story is in the Attachment.
• Please don’t attach 20 MB high resolution images as a zip. If you are attaching pictures, take the trouble to optimize them to say 10 cm width @ 300 dpi., preferably in CMYK.
• Send large files separately after getting the consensus of the journalist.
• Wherever possible, follow-up with a phone call or email.
• And for Dog’s sake rum a spll cheque.

SreeRam is a Chennai based marcom professional.
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