Publishing Press Articles

May 15, 2000 -- Here's a marketing weapon you may want to add to your arsenal. We've launched it successfully for clients and recently, for i-Genuity.

Instead of publishing press releases, we publish "press articles."

Press articles do not blatantly promote your company, product, services or event. They are written as magazine or newspaper articles. They quote real sources. They entertain or educate. They are slanted for the particular audience of selected periodicals.

Press articles must be written by a professional. If they aren't, you will incur the wrath of pissed-off editors who resent receiving unsolicited submissions. They will remember your name and your company's name for a long, long time, and you won't receive any column inches in their publications.

If you don't have the time or talent to produce professionally written press articles, call Betty Sosnin at 706.736.7353 or e-mail her at bettysosnin@knology.net. Betty is a freelance writer and marketing and public relations consultant. Her work has appeared in numerous consumer and trade publications. She knows all about press articles, because she's written several for our clients. (We've worked with her for over 10 years.)

Press articles are formatted the same way a press release is with three exceptions:

1. Where you normally put "Press Release," put "Press Article."

2. Include a sentence at the top telling the editor he or she may publish the article free of charge as long as you are given credit and your company and its Web site are mentioned.

3. Include another sentence telling editors what to do if they want to be removed from your database.

Here's an example of a press article.

It's titled "Climbing the Corporate Ladder, One Hole at a Time." It was written for a company I used to run that sold socks to golfers. The article was a big success, as measured by the number of times it was published and the number of site visitors who said they heard about the company because of the article. (You do track this kind of information, don't you?)

Here are some ideas. If you're:

* A treated wood products manufacturer, publish an article on "Alternatives to Non-combustible Materials."

* An antiques dealer; "Silver Polishing 101"

* A commercial builder; "What You Should Know About Effective Project Management"

* An ad agency; "Does Your Corporate Brochure Answer These Questions?"

* A financial and business management consulting firm; "How to Maximize Your Company's Return on Payroll Expenses"

* An antimicrobial acrylic fiber or sock manufacturer; "What Should Be In Your Sock Besides Your Foot"

* A golf car manufacturer; "10 Ways to Murder Your Golf Car"

* A blues festival organizer; "Why Your Child's School Should Have The Blues"

We tried something a little different for i-Genuity. We sent a column and a cover letter to a list of editors whose readers would be interested in Web site development, business and marketing strategies for on- and offline businesses and Internet-related topics.

I wrote the cover letter and told the editors I would periodically send columns, which they could publish free of charge as long as I was given credit, and i-Genuity and its Web site were mentioned. If they didn't want to receive future columns, I asked them to e-mail or call me. I included a summary of my qualifications along with a URL where they could download a copy of my resume as a PDF file. And I mentioned I would be glad to discuss producing an exclusive monthly or weekly column for their publication.

We sent the column and cover letter the traditional way, via U.S. mail. Experience has taught us that you do not send anything via e-mail to an editor you'd like to cultivate a relationship with unless he or she requests it. Several editors called to thank us for the column and asked us to submit all future columns via e-mail. This thrilled us, because i-Genuity's extensive media database is set up to merge, purge, customize and send whatever it is we need to send for ourselves or clients via e-mail with the click of a button. An editor of The Atlanta Constitution sent an e-mail asking for more samples of my work, and we've been tracking the number of times my resume has been downloaded via our site's log files.

To get more mileage out of the effort, we made the column available for download on our Web site and submitted it to numerous places on the Web that solicit free articles. Seldom does a day pass without an e-mail from a publisher or Web site owner asking for permission to reprint the piece.

The average consumer sees a company’s name five or six times before the name begins to register, so strive to publish one press article each month.

One reason press articles work is that approximately six times more people read the average article than the average ad. Should you discontinue your advertising campaign? (What's a nice way to put this?) Only if you're stupid.

It's the combined, cumulative effects of consistent advertising and public relations that make them worth the investment of your time and money.

Questions or comments? feedback@i-genuity.com

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About The Author

Mary A. Sicard is president of i-Genuity, the Click-Here Strategy and Services firm in Augusta, Georgia.

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