The headline of this post may sound stunningly obvious, but let me repeat and explain: the vast majority of journalists prefer to find out about your press release by getting it in their email inbox.
According to a survey of more than 2,300 journalists conducted by Bulldog Reporter and TEKgroup International, email was the preferred method of delivery among 75% of respondents. Other methods trailed far behind:
Commercial newswires (such as PR Newswire or BusinessWire) 8%
Official alerts sent from a corporate online newsroom 7%
U.S. Postal Service 2%
Fax 0.8%
Express delivery 0.5%
So, should you skip using expensive wire services altogether? In some cases, that may be the right and cost-effective way to go. But wire services offer an important secondary benefit: giving your release third-party credibility and placement of your release in databases like Factiva, and on web sites that simply post press releases verbatim.
Nevertheless, pay a lot of attention to your email pitches -- they're crucial. Write good, non-spammy subject lines. Keep your story pitch at the beginning of the email brief. Include links to background material -- not the materials themselves.
It does seem as though this would be obvious, but with the unfortunate glut of shabby practitioners spamming news releases to a poorly developed media list or worse, blanketing a release to a bought list, the practice of sending news releases by email to the media has been attacked of late. We've written about effective use of email on our blog as well: http://inmedialog.com/index.php/archives/phone-vs-email/
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