From veteran journalist Ronald Ted Smith (once senior editor of United Press International in New York, and now managing member of JournalistPR) to help your press releases get more media attention. JournalistPR produces press releases for clients, and major interviews and articles – all from journalists, NOT “PR People.”

1. You’re writing for a news organization, not for your management. So if you have a management willing to learn, then only in rare cases start with your company name and braggadocio. Try to figure out what is the news, and lead with it.

To illustrate, DO NOT start this way:

XYZ Company, a leader in something, proudly announced today…

Instead, start this way:

A cure for cancer has been announced by XYZ Company…etc.

Or, given that a cure for cancer is going to attract a lot of critical attention, you might start qualifiedly like this:

What is described as a likely cure for cancer has been announced…

And then within the first few paragraphs, quote someone as saying, “…it’s likely to be a cure for cancer.” You need that quote to back up your lead.  

2. Avoid opinion words or phrases. Avoid opinion words or phrases. Words like “proudly,” above, are verboten. So is the phrase, “A leader in something…” which is meaningless and not journalistic. Instead, if you can rank your company, you’re home free:

…has been announced by XYZ Company, one of the half-dozen largest research firms…etc.

3. Keep your lead (or lede, as many newsrooms call it) paragraph brief. One or two lines, ideally. Amateurs commonly write overwhelmingly long opening paragraphs — six or eight lines — and such ponderous, turgid openings simply make it difficult for the editor to understand your story in the 15 or 20 seconds he or she will give it before deciding whether to use or discard it.

4. To get a major interview or feature, don’t write the entire proposed piece. A quality news organization — the kind you really care about — will assign a staffer to do that. All you need write is a nugget — a few sentences or a couple of paragraphs with the core of your story idea. If they want you to write a draft for their consideration, then ask “How long, and by what deadline?”

5. And write that nugget in the style of your target publication! Better still, find a section or category which your target uses, and write in that style, and propose it as the next entry in their series.

6. Here’s an example of a nugget the way we write them:

He’s a major architect. And oh yes, he’s also a banker. This unusual combination is Don Lawson. He founded Lawson Group Architects in Sarasota, one of the southeast’s majors. He’s also chairman of Bank of Commerce here, which he helped launch, and he frequently lectures architectural clients on how to approach a bank for financing.

7. Avoid calling an editor and saying that you have a great idea for him or her. It’s their decision, not yours, as to how powerful your idea is. I counsel diffidence: “Do you have a couple of minutes to hear a story idea?” (When press agents would call me as a New York editor proclaiming a great story, my response would be, “I’ll tell you if you have a great story for us; please don’t you tell me.” Arrogant, but true.)

8. If you’re hiring someone to dig up and report press releases for your firm, find a journalist. A journalist will already know these rules.