The world is currently living on the internet where maintaining a strong internet presence has been tremendously important for a business. Press releases, or PRs are an effective way to create an online presence and maintain it affordably. There are various advantages of posting PRs on social media platforms. One can easily build strong relationships with the media while increasing brand awareness and web traffic through a continuous publication of press releases. Before moving forward with what you should and what you should not include in your social media PRs, let's understand what a press release is.
What is a Press Release?
A press release is a text-based announcement that brands make to media houses and news sites. The aim of publishing PR content is to inform the public about any recent noteworthy event or incident of material significance. Press releases and their publications are usually handled by the PR (Public Relations) department. Press releases can be of different kinds, such as any product or service launch press releases, event press releases, managerial update press releases, branch opening press releases, crisis press releases, etc.
How Does a PR Work?
The written content is sent directly to the reporters or journalists at the media outlets. This is in no way the result of reporters doing independent journalistic work, however, these are sent to them with the expectation of publishing as a news story. Journalists and editors then take up the content and if they find it worthy of publishing, the PR gets posted as a news story for the general public to read.
Why are Press Releases Still Relevant?
Many businesses and marketers may think that press releases have lost their relevance in this age of digital media. So you might have a question about why you should be writing a social media press release. However, this statement is far from the truth because press releases are still relevant and they have evolved with time and technology. Here are the reasons why they are still important for business growth -
- Press releases help businesses build a strong connection with media houses and news outlets. Publishing press releases frequently makes the brand a well-known name in the industry and opens doors to many investors.
- Press releases help brands increase awareness among the general public and stakeholders. The more frequently people will read about the brand through PRs, the more they will be aware of the brand’s existence.
- Frequently publishing press releases also helps with a stronger brand positioning. The reason why successful companies are thriving today is because people have made them synonymous with their services or products and press releases are one of the ways to do that. If you publish PRs continuously, you are highlighting the brand and the features of its products and services which will help people view the product and the brand in the same light.
- Publishing PRs in top-rated media and news outlets will help a brand gain credibility and authenticity among the stakeholders and its target audience. The more people will see top-rated media and news outlets publishing your brand's PR and associating it with the content, the more credibility will increase.
- Another reason behind PR's relevance and popularity is its affordability. Through a press release, a brand can have SEO benefits, more web traffic, more potential sales, and increased brand awareness and credibility. However, all of these are the benefits of an advertising or marketing campaign too, yet a PR is far more affordable than running advertisements on national television or social media platforms.
Now that you have understood what a press release is, let's move on to how you can perfectly write them. To know how you can write PR content for its maximum effectiveness, you first need to learn what the attributes of a successful PR are.
Press Releases and Its Most Important Qualities:
i) The press release must be newsworthy and must contain information that will interest the media and target audience.
ii) Press releases must be written in clear and concise language that readers from any background and industry can make an understanding of.
iii) PR content must be factual as they are directly sent to the media publications and are being posted as serious news stories.
iv) A press release must also be well-structured, so it is easy for people to follow the entire information.
The Dos and Don'ts to follow when crafting social media PR:
What Should You Follow?
Make sure you are including these in your next PR content -
- Have a Clear Goal: When crafting a PR, you must have a straight goal whether you want more visibility for your company or you want to rank better on Google searches or you are just trying to get the news out to social media.
- Target Market: Think of the audience you are trying to reach because they will be the target audience for whom the PR will be published. Your press release must be the answer to the queries of your target audience.
- Keywords in the headline: It is very important to place your primary keyword in your content’s headline. You would want people to find your PR in Google when they are keyword searching.
- The 5-second Rule: This is the same rule that people apply to get the reader's attention to their business website. It is important to gain the attention of your readers in the first five seconds, so make your headline, summary, and opening sentence catchy.
- Usage of Multimedia: if your story has pictures and videos, do not shy away from using them with your PR. The general public or readers love to see pictures and videos as reportedly they catch human attention faster and keep them interested for a longer time.
- Website Link: Do not just leave the keywords on your release, but use hyperlinks on them. Make sure these links revert to the relevant sides on your business website. You can use 1 hyperlink per 100 words but do not use them on headlines and summaries.
- Professional and Plain Language: As has already been discussed, your PTR content must be understandable to even people who are not from your industry. So you need to use plain and simple language and avoid using any industry jargon or something complex that only an industry expert can understand.
- Tags: Tags are given to the content to categorize in the social media platforms. It uses simple keywords to help readers understand what the PR is about and they appear at the end of the release. RSS feeds, social bookmarking sites, and Google, all rely on these simple tags to help find their readers relevant content.
- Share It on Social Media: Well, social media is there for a reason, and if you are not already sharing the published PR on every social media platform, then you are already staying far behind. By sharing the release on internet applications, you are also giving an option to your followers to share it with their friends and followers, increasing your visibility.
What Should You Ditch?
Avoid making these mistakes in your PR content -
- Capital Letters: When you are writing a press release, you must remember that this is going to be on social media which has its separate language. So if you think that writing something in all capital letters is considered highlighting it, then you are wrong. It is considered shouting on social media. In addition to that, all capital letters seem tacky and not sophisticated.
- URL in the Headline: Another mistake that you need to avoid is putting the URL in the headline itself. This will keep you off from Google News and any other news and media outlets and at the same time it will make your PR look like a sales pitch.
- Long Headlines: If you are trying to gain attention for your brand and increase visibility on the internet, getting on Google is the perfect way to do so. But you can easily lose your spot if you make the headline longer than 75 characters, as the search engine will only read the first 60-65 characters.
- Long Summary: Another place where you need to check the size of your content is its summary. Make sure the summary is no longer than 175 characters which would be a short description of your PR story.
- The Focus of the Content: too many press releases are being issued every day which focuses on too many places at once on the website. An effective press release has something clear to say. Whether it is to highlight some new product or service, or about any newsworthy achievement or event.
- Too Many Links: Nothing overboard has ever served a successful purpose. This rule applies to links as well as keywords. While choosing keywords, you need to select based on their relevance and you cannot put more than 3 keywords in the content. The same thing goes with links too, as you can include one link per 100 words in a press release.
- Dead Hyperlinks: Another great mistake you need to avoid is inserting dead hyperlinks on the PR content. Several times these hyperlinks do not go to the business website, in fact, they don't go anywhere. So you need to make sure the hyperlinks are active before including them in the content body.
- Boilerplate: Every press release must include an About Us or Boilerplate section that tells the reader about the company. It is essential to add this information so the readers have a clear idea of which company they are reading about.
Follow these tips and you will reap the rewards of a successful social media press release. The world of the internet can be really advantageous if used correctly.
