It’s Easier Said Than Done
Emphasizing the centrality and importance of a well written press release in the field of Public Relations is not nostalgia for the 1990’s, it is, apparently, a fact of life even in the age of SEO and social media. Oddly enough, these all too familiar Web 2.0 realities aren’t a major threat to the newswire/press release method for disseminating information to the right people. In fact, most of these web-based applications create a greater need for a well written press release to get the ball rolling - something we’ve been suggesting for some time now.
PR Newswire (a client) is one of the examples cited in a recent TechCrunch post on the ongoing Evolution of the Press Release. Written by Brian Solis, author of the PR 2.0 blog, the post reinforces the importance of well written text for integration with SEO, as well as providing tips for how even the standard press release format/template can be easily calibrated for re-distrubution on news aggregators, and other social networking tools along the lines of Twitter, or Tumblr.
What is so particularly refreshing about this re-interpretation of PR’s relationship to media is that the “correct” use of social media (as in a killer YouTube video) isn’t treated as the definitive solution;
“…it’s not just about multimedia content, it’s about connecting information across social networks, the people looking for it, as well as the conversations that bind them together.”
The press release format doesn’t have to dramatically transform or evolve into some multi-media medusa of YouTube videos, audio clips, and interactive tools to be effective in reaching the correct audience. Text based releases can of course be supplemented and supported by embedded content, but the “correct” word choice will ultimately play a more decisive role in how a given release is distributed, discovered, and received.
Hopefully, this “news” will find its to the right people in a timely manner, and function as evidence that a well written nugget of information is more than enough momentum to stir the social media pot.
Filed under: Innovation, Public Relations, Trendwatching
[...] to Better Video Production May 13, 2008 — goodmind Piggybacking our earlier post on the importance of well-crafted press releases, how about a few helpful hints for maximizing the effectiveness of web videos in the PR process? [...]