Seems that on a weekly basis a new article or blog post arrives on my desk that puts forth the idea that the press release is becoming useless as a marketing tool. Not surprisingly, these articles or posts are often authored by “social media experts” or those that believe that embracing and executing a “social media plan” is the holy grail for businesses in this day and age.
Our old friend the press release still serves some very important purposes for the average business. I’ll give you an example. Last week, a new company/service was launched in a similar space to one of my ventures. Surprise, surprise…this company still believes in the press release, so they issued one via one of the popular wire services. I wouldn’t have known about the press release or the company, but within 24 hours the following happened:
- Three separate colleagues delivered the press release to me, so clearly they found it somewhere in their daily web travels.
- I received it via RSS feed from a tech blog I subscribe to.
- Someone in one of my LinkedIn groups posted the release, and when I logged into my account I discovered the post and the release.
Guess what? I don’t think any of these three things would have happened without the creation and distribution of a press release. It turns out that this new company looks like it may represent a complimentary partner for our new venture, so this press release not only drove some awareness, but it may turn into direct revenue for the issuer.
And we haven’t even addressed what the release may have generated from a media coverage standpoint. Still think the press release is dead?
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