Eee PR

We all know press release is the basic yet important tool in PR. Has press release died after the emergence of Web 2.0? Of course not. In fact, press release has relived and transformed into a PR 2.0 platform so called the Social Media Release (SMR).

I recently read the book “PR 2.0: New Media. New Tools, New Audiences” by Deirdre K. Breakenridge and here are some useful information on what to include in a SMR according to him:

• Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feeds (direct news feeds on content related to the subject matter as well as links to content).
• Photo libraries with high resolution images. (These images are for download into a print publication.)
• MP3 files (a digital audio encoding method to reduce the size of an audio file for easy download) or a podcast.
• Video footage for Video-On-Demand (VOD).
• Links to previous coverage on a topic with the ability to use del.icio.us or Digg for social bookmarking. (Journalists can tag their favourite information by locating, classifying, and ranking noteworthy references and resources.)
• Technorati is a leader in “what’s happening on the World Live Web.” Because bloggers commonly link to other blogs, Technorati searches and organises blogs, and tracks how blogs are linked together (by recording the relevance of the links to your subject matter).

Therefore, press release is now more than just a page of paper filled only with graphics and texts. Now, journalists can get more data from SMR in shorter time period. Journalists can download materials that are useful in the publication such as pictures, videos, podcasts directly from the SMR. All of these information could also help journalists to cover news completely as more and more journalists go online to retrieve news. The “2004 Media in Cyberspace” study described in an online article by John V. Pavlik Ph.D. (p.5) discovered that:

• 76% of reporters go online to find new sources and experts.

• 73% of reporters go online to find press releases.

• 81% of reporters go online daily to do searching.

• 92% of journalists go online as part of their story research.

Furthermore, the other important aspects of SMR is that it is not only for use by the journalists. It is also for bloggers who are interested in writing about a certain company or subject matter. Consumers or public who are online could also gain access to the SMR. As such, SMR also helps the company to communicate directly with its consumers.

Here is a useful SMR template from Shift Communications – a known PR agency in the USA. Shift Communications claimed to be the first one to create a PR 2.0 SMR template. This template is free for download from their website:

Click for Original PDF Document

You’ll notice that some basic press release rules are still there. Contact person, headline, main facts, quotes and boilerplate statements are still important in SMR. So don’t forget the 5Ws and other rules in writing a traditional press release even though we are now living the Web 2.0 world.

I also found one video on YouTube about Social Media Release by WebitPR agency. It is quite useful to help one understands SMR even though the agency is promoting itself with the video Put that aside, take an unbiased look at it here: