Gaining publicity about a company, its services, and products can be one difficult task. In today’s modern era, companies are finding themselves sitting in front of computer screens for hours, trying to contact millions of consumers to become more familiar with their company. Businesses using social media sites have been on the rise in recent years, all for publicity and sales. One should question whether the countless hours sitting restlessly in front of social networks is actually worth the stresses of getting unfamiliar consumers to comply. Companies have gotten so accustomed to gaining ‘Likes’ via Facebook, ‘Tweets’ via Twitter, and ‘Views’ via YouTube, that they have totally abandoned the good, old fashioned press release. So, to the forgetful companies that can’t remember what the press release is or what it does, allow this informative piece to refresh your memory.

The press release is the backbone to almost every publicity plan. Its primary reasoning is to achieve a company's objective; to gain more publicity. This press release is a one to two page document highlighting the company. It can be written in any way to promote anything about the company that you want. Events, new products, new location opens, change in management,  unfavorable situations, and any company news to highlight can be put into a press release. Sounds too good to be true? Well, here’s the factor that can make or break a press release; the quality of writing. Anyone from the company can create a press release, but one should remember, the release is not a newsletter that only goes to employees. The press release works for itself, it’s its own boss. If it’s written correctly it will capture attention to the masses. How can this be? The next section highlights the effectiveness of the press release.

The Beauty of the Press Release
Is the company low on advertising funds? Is it taking too much of work time to sit in front of social sites trying to persuade and promote to consumers? If you answered yes to these questions, you’ll fall in love with the beauty of the press release. The press release is cost effective. Companies can add press releases as often as they want to their own website. The press release can serve as the websites professional blog postings to keep visitors informed. Press releases can also be sent electronically to any publications, news editors, promoters, businesses etc. at the cost of the company pushing send through email. If you didn’t catch on to the beauty of it, the connotation was that the press release is cheap advertising. While off-line press releases can be completely free, effective online press releases can be sent out for as little as $120.  Companies don’t have to pay for expensive advertising slots. If the press release is written in an effective, interesting, grammatically correct way, then the entity it was sent to will promote it as well as pass it along to others. According to Feature Photo services, it’s estimated that daily newspaper editors receive about 2,000 press releases on an average day, and 20,000 releases monthly. Business Wire and PR Newswire says there’s 55 per cent chance that the company press release won’t be promoted or even read to its recipients. To avoid this from happening to your company, review the next section on how to compose the press release.


Creating the Masterpiece
While in creation of the release one should ask questions such as:

• What is the subject of the message?
• Who is this message designed to reach?
• What are the benefits of passing along this release?
• What goals is the business trying to accomplish?
• What key messages should be highlighted     

Printed Press ReleasesOnce those questions are answered, the writing is set to begin. There are six components to the press release, make sure to use them all. They include, the company letterhead, the contact information to the company, a headline, dateline, lead paragraph, and body of text. Releases are double-spaced with two inches from both the top and bottom of the page as well as one-point five inches from the sides. Use 10-12 point font with popular fonts like Times New Roman, Courier, or Cambria. Remember to number the pages of the release and use a slugline (a short description of the message)  to indicate the continence of the release to keep order. If the release is one page, one should indicate it at the bottom that it has ended using signals like ‘-30-” ‘###” or ‘end’, If the release continues to another page, add the word ‘more’ to be bottom. Finally, try to write the press release in AP Style to make it easier for reporters and editors to release to the public.

Online Press Releases
With online press releases you have the beauty of going around the middle man.  Quickly create an account at places like prnews.com or marketwire.com and submit your press release.  The audience can be far greater then that of a newspaper, but the effectiveness isn’t always the same.  The same AP writing styles apply, but the format is designated by the press release company.  The two sites listed above can post your press release on 1000’s of online locations including the .com versions of each newspaper you would be sending your press release to offline.  This can help in a few ways additional to your news being announced.  Your search engine optimization efforts are the beneficiary, helping with link building, social media interaction and general referrals to the website.

Following all these components will generate cheap and even free publicity for the company, highlighting anything needed, and will save time on promoting as the recipients of the release will find interest in spreading the word about what your company has sent to them.

There are three types of blogs a company can incorporate onto their website to keep their consumers more engaged and informed. Each has their own effect on it’s readers as the information shared is typically quite different.  Although the setup and structure is usually the same, it is the writers who differ in creating content for any of the three: corporate, employee, and/or third party blogs. A few reasons to consider adding these blogs include:

• To keep key stakeholders informed on company matters

• To share information that others may find interesting

• To present a friendlier presentation with consumers as well as other businesses or organizations

• To add more audience participation and conversation to retain beneficial feedback for the company

• To boost company credibility through employee, executive, or customer testimonials

The Corporate Blog
The corporate blog is usually written by an executive of the company and represents the voice of the organization. This is different from that of the employee blog. As the corporate blog should be more structured and presentable for when other businesses, organizations, and media outlets look to read about what the company is currently doing and working towards. Sometimes, companies will hire a public relations firm to compose corporate blogs but this job is an easy task for executives who have time to basically sit down and write a briefing about daily, weekly, or monthly advancements and news about the company. Corporate blogs should incorporate and provide opportunity for the public to post comments as well as provide them useful information they can use. The corporate blog also provides opportunity for the company to address issues concerning the company and clear up mistakes or problems the company may have been associated with or have encountered.

Employee Blogs
The employee blog can provide information and perspective coming from the sole of the company, their employees. They can write about their experiences with the company, projects they’re working on or any relevant industry information. Giving a brief synopses of jobs they are working on can enlighten the reader that something big is being developed, a great way to keep anticipation and interest in the company. Employees should get approval about a blog topic and/or content to share before it is written as not all information is meant to be public. The employee blog should consider these methods:

• Reply to individuals who post comments in a timely manner no matter if the comment is negative or positive about the material

• Only incorporate links in the blog that are relevant to it

• Make sure to take responsibility for the blog and explain to readers these are not the views of the actual company or its clients

• Make sure work material is original, this can create more buzz and passing of the blog post

• Be transparent with mentioning clients, former employees, and other companies in the blog

Third Party Blogs
Companies are usually presented with the opportunity to interact with other blogger’s over time. Some blogger’s will also take it upon themselves to compose blogs about the company based off a blog they have read on the website. This adds opportunity for the company to incorporate this blogger into composing pieces about the company that can be hosted on the blogger’s own site or the blogger can write for the company and that material can be added to the company’s site as long as it contains subjected material that is relatable to the products and services of the organization. When this relationship occurs the company should treat the blogger as a journalist, providing them with truthful information, provide some sort of payment to them, and in return also promote their personal blog if it is asked. Often times bloggers ask for links back to their own website in return.  Unless this is a competitor, this isn’t necessarily a bad idea.  As most things just weigh the pros and cons and value of the blog post before doing so.  Third party blogs also present the opportunity for more information about the company to be passed along to more individuals and to be entered on more blogs and search engines.

Blogs have been exploding on the Internet since about 1998. Today, blogs have almost practically become the face of mainstream media. Blogs are a way to share a company’s commentary and opinions as well as company information like innovations, promotions, events, news, etc. In recent years, businesses have grown more accustomed to adding blogs to their websites because of their cost effectiveness and ability to reach large amounts of individuals.

Here are some reasons a company should consider blogging:

• Start up costs are minimal.
• The writing format is informal, they can provide a friendly, helpful feel to readers.
• Readers have the ability to post comments which gives the company a way to converse back and forth with their users.
• Blogs provide the company with a voice against traditional media.  They allow a company to take media news into their own hands adding their own opinions or comments.
• They are beneficial towards search engine optimization (SEO) efforts via fresh, unique and relevant content.
• Allow users to see you’re up to date with any of the latest headlines or trends in your industry.  While most of your site is full of relatively static content, your blog is fresh and new.
• Gives your readers another reason to come back to your website, which can only help with your sales process.

Blogs aren’t hard to maintain and often take less then 5 minutes to publish once the article is written. They don’t require a web expert to facilitate each post or be present upon creation. Most blog interfaces have very basic content management system (CMS) tools to help you post information quickly and not be bogged down by html issues.  

Tips to to consider when writing blogs:

• Write Often: A blog that is updated daily has a higher chance of keeping a steady active audience to communicate with. Keeping a steady audience can enhance the sharing of the company’s content with others, thus driving additional readers to your site.  At the very least you need to update the blog at least once a month.  If time and resources are limited once a week should be your goal.  If optimizing your website for search engines, 5 days a week is the goal.

• Think about the Audience: In order to keep the attention of readers the company must incorporate broad topics users can relate to and comprehend. Keep news as relevant to the company and its products/services as much as possible.  When news breaks, mention the news and how it effects your users and the company.

• Don’t Over Do It: Blogs that are too long won’t be read effectively. Keep them short and simple.  If you do feel the blog needs to be long, make sure to cite data and examples to keep the reader involved throughout the article.

• Spell Check: Nothing is worse than noticing a grammar or spelling error days after a blog was published, but after several of your core users read it. Errors like these invalidate your content and the company if it happens often.  This is a sign you aren’t educated and/or don’t care enough to edit your material.

• Provide Links: Proof is one of the biggest criteria asked for by readers. Consumers don’t want to be apart of lies and deceit, provide links to information to further ensure what the blog is talking about.  Links also can help you as a company.  Other websites who you link to will see they are receiving traffic from you, and often times will reciprocate the links back to you.

Blogs have been exploding on the Internet since about 1998. Today, blogs have almost practically become the face of mainstream media. Blogs are a way to share a company’s commentary and opinions as well as company information like innovations, promotions, events, news, etc. In recent years, businesses have grown more accustomed to adding blogs to their websites because of their cost effectiveness and ability to reach large amounts of individuals.

Here are some reasons a company should consider blogging:

• Start up costs are minimal.
• The writing format is informal, they can provide a friendly, helpful feel to readers.
• Readers have the ability to post comments which gives the company a way to converse back and forth with their users.
• Blogs provide the company with a voice against traditional media.  They allow a company to take media news into their own hands adding their own opinions or comments.
• They are beneficial towards search engine optimization (SEO) efforts via fresh, unique and relevant content.
• Allow users to see you’re up to date with any of the latest headlines or trends in your industry.  While most of your site is full of relatively static content, your blog is fresh and new.
• Gives your readers another reason to come back to your website, which can only help with your sales process.

Blogs aren’t hard to maintain and often take less then 5 minutes to publish once the article is written. They don’t require a web expert to facilitate each post or be present upon creation. Most blog interfaces have very basic content management system (CMS) tools to help you post information quickly and not be bogged down by html issues.  

Tips to to consider when writing blogs:

• Write Often: A blog that is updated daily has a higher chance of keeping a steady active audience to communicate with. Keeping a steady audience can enhance the sharing of the company’s content with others, thus driving additional readers to your site.  At the very least you need to update the blog at least once a month.  If time and resources are limited once a week should be your goal.  If optimizing your website for search engines, 5 days a week is the goal.

• Think about the Audience: In order to keep the attention of readers the company must incorporate broad topics users can relate to and comprehend. Keep news as relevant to the company and its products/services as much as possible.  When news breaks, mention the news and how it effects your users and the company.

• Don’t Over Do It: Blogs that are too long won’t be read effectively. Keep them short and simple.  If you do feel the blog needs to be long, make sure to cite data and examples to keep the reader involved throughout the article.

• Spell Check: Nothing is worse than noticing a grammar or spelling error days after a blog was published, but after several of your core users read it. Errors like these invalidate your content and the company if it happens often.  This is a sign you aren’t educated and/or don’t care enough to edit your material.

• Provide Links: Proof is one of the biggest criteria asked for by readers. Consumers don’t want to be apart of lies and deceit, provide links to information to further ensure what the blog is talking about.  Links also can help you as a company.  Other websites who you link to will see they are receiving traffic from you, and often times will reciprocate the links back to you.

Blogs have the ability to enhance traffic to a company’s website. The more often you post the more often they show up in search engines, thus driving more traffic to the site.  Blogs are often passed around from industry professional to industry professional because of the unique and relevant content that is being written.