Most newspaper and media outlets will cover your Toastmasters event when you follow the basic rules of effective written communication for a news release. Today's organizations prefer articles, photos and story ideas via email. Below are key elements to include in your pitches.

Subject line

• Begin with the date if your event is upcoming.
• Be specific, i.e. “Feb. 6 free family fair” tells much more than “Press Release.”
• Tell your story ideas i.e. “Disabled people learn to surf” peaks more interest in a moment than “Story idea.”

Lead time

• Know each publication’s lead time.
• Newspapers may need 1 to 2 weeks.
• Magazines may need 4 to 6 weeks.

Message content

• Be succinct.
• Stay focused.
• Write straight forward as if you were talking to a friend about your story.
• Write for your audience: the editor and readers.
• What would they want to know?
• Why would this be important to them?
• What would you say if you only had 100 words to tell us about your subject?

Contact information

• Provide it!
• Read your email often in case the editor has a question for you - they have tight deadlines.
• Make sure your website works.

Photos

• Submit articles or photos of an event that has happened shortly after it takes place.
• A Toys for Tots Christmas event is more appropriately published in December than in March.
• Send via email whenever possible.
• Send in high resolution.
• Most photos copied from websites are too small and will not publish well.
• Include captions that tell editors in a nutshell what is happening in the photo and who the people are.

Publicity

• If you pay for a sign to say, “Circus Coming to the Fairgrounds Saturday,” that's ADVERTISING
• If you put the sign on the side of an elephant and walk him around town that's PROMOTION.
• If the elephant walks through the mayor's garden and the media reports on it, that's PUBLICITY.
• If you can get the mayor to laugh about it, that's PUBLIC RELATIONS.

Initial content above compiled and documented updated 09-06-2013 by Michael Varma, DTM, Founder's District Public Relations Office 2009-2010

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