Now lets go back to what I said earlier about posting in my blog once a week about public relations. There has not been one time this semester that I have not gotten my idea to write about a release posted on PR Newswire. I believe blogs and press releases could be used together in the public relations field. There are so many ideas I have to make blogs and releases work together. One, particularly the blog, could be used to spread the message out to a wide population of people with many different interests. Instead of going to PR Newswire, (a site I did not know about until I was in the PR major) you could go to a friend’s blog and read about the releases that were posted. The releases never let people voice their opinion on the news article. With blogs, your chance to comment is always there. This only helps to strengthen the public relations field.

Another aspect is that blogs can help to generate story ideas. A normal person writing in their blog that they consider more of a journal can spark a professional with an idea that could help large corporations and organizations. I just do not believe that the answer is to get rid of one and just keep the other. I believe as time goes on, they should be used together as one powerful tool to generate more news and views on the subjects.

If you did you could charge much more for your service,

My company provides a news release distribution service targeting radio reporters, called Talking News Releases (using pre-recorded sound bites). The number one question we get is “what’s your pickup like.” This shows a complete disregard for the fact that it’s the news value of the release and timing that will determine the answer to that. I don’t believe in average pickup rates for a release since as you point out, so many just aren’t newsworthy.

Services like ours and the ones you mentioned can only guarantee to deliver the release. We have no control over a reporter’s decision to use them. And short of subscribing to a clipping service (there isn’t one for radio!) I can’t provide the release sender with a list of all the stories that were done using their release. But as one reporter friend of mine says “If you don’t send me your release I can’t do your story!”

“(press releases)…it makes good sense to use them – where it makes sense. It makes equally good sense to continue to use press releases in instances where they will do the best job. And it makes the best sense to figure out how these tools can work together to produce the most satisfying outcomes.”

I agree that press releases are not going away. In today’s time, it is simply a matter of how they are being used. I still use them when I approach bloggers but the way that I approach them with the release is what makes the difference. For example, instead of sending the full release with text in a blanket format, I simply send them a brief note, pointing them to the press release link online. This way, we are not forcing the information on them, simply supplying them with the links and letting them work the magic that they do so well.