Some advice to PR companies about new media

Say you’re a PR account executive and your agency has a client that distributes movies. You then head up that account so you ensure that all movie-related press and news releases get sent to all the relevant and influential journos, publications and websites. Here’s some advice from an owner of an entertainment news website.

When you include websites in your blanket email to all news and related channels, please ensure that you either have more than one release for the same thing or you have the same release with more than one spin on it. You see on a news website especially things move so quickly that whatever is on the front page today might not be there tomorrow. Unlike a magazine that that someone might read over the course of a month, our readers have RSS feeds that empower them to read our content without logging on to our sites so once they’ve read something they want to see something new when they come back again the next day.

So when we get a release from you for an event that’s only happening in 2 weeks the best thing we can do for you is to sit on that info until 3 to 5 days before your event and then only publish it. maybe a week before too. But trying to publish something in the digital space that’s only happening in 2 – 3 weeks will be long gone and forgotten by the time the event comes around. Our readers come by on a Monday to see what’s happening on Wednesday or Friday – and sometimes even that is pushing it.

So your best bet with us website people is to send us releases for anything that happens on the weekend at the start of that week. Alternatively have more than one release and let us know that you have follow-up releases. That way we can publish 3 weeks in advance, knowing that we’ll have follow up content to enhance the buzz around the event your releases promote.

There. Just some friendly advice.