Tag: press release

13
Aug

Don’t invent new terms (and make sense)

The PR news wires steadily pump out stuff that is inconsequential and sometimes nonsensical, but I can usually at least figure out what the company is going on and on about.

Usually.

I give you this headline: <Brand X> Xtream Series launched, bridging the gap of borderless digital signage solution globally

What on Earth is borderless digital signage?

On one hand, the headline at least got me interested, though not for normal reasons. So I read and read the release, and never did get a sense of what borderless meant. And then there were the references to 3D that were lobbed in, I guess, because 3D is cool right now.

<Brand X> is introducing radical and revolutionary new Digital Signage Solution that sets this industry free from the limitations and hassle of personal computers (PCs)

<Brand X> opened a new chapter in this sector of information technology which allows businesses to communicate in 3-D

Turn waiting and working time into enjoyable and entertaining process with <Brand X>‘s next generation Digital Signage, the Xtream Series.

<Brand X>’s CEO, says: “For marketers and those in the advertising business the Xtream Series is an unbelievably effective tool that is easy to use and produces optimum results.”

<Brand X> ’s next generation of Digital Signage allows a company’s messages to be delivered in the environment of their choosing thus hitting precisely the target market and just when that audience is at its most receptive. With the new Xtream Series technology managing Digital Signage just got a whole lot simpler, more adaptable, more reliable and more environmentally friendly. The Xtream Series requires much less maintenance and it uses a fraction of the power that conventional digital signage systems use.

Where to start…

What is it? What does it do? What’s different about it? What’s the 3D bit? What does next-generation mean, other than nothing?

I could give these guys a little bit of a break because they are based in Europe, I think, and English is probably not the first language. But if you want to do business in English, communicate clearly and effectively in the language.

Putting out something that makes almost no sense, absolutely makes no PR sense. What it really communicates  to potential customers is that working with these guys is going to be , umm, work.

29
Jul

Add user-friendly to the archive of now meaningless marketing phrases

I saw a release recently for a company that was changing its name and releasing a new version of its product.

The big pitch was that the new version was “a game changer, as it is the most user-friendly DS application available at a price that is hard to beat.”

With some notable exceptions, damn near every platform out there in digital signage is pretty user-friendly. They’re pretty much all powerful platforms, at least in some sense. They can pretty much all do real-time content. And the so-called game gets changed every morning with the latest round of press releases.

At this point, user-friendly is going to be a given in the looking-for-software filter of even nominally educated buyers. It’s like leading the push by saying, “Our platform lets you schedule videos to play one after another!!!” The big value propositions have to be things that help a company stand out from the mob.

Saying the stuff is advanced doesn’t do it. Real-time isn’t going to make people tingle. To market in such a competitive environment, the people who make the marketing calls for software companies have to ensure what they put out in PR and anything else raises eyebrows instead of triggering yawns.

Choose your value propositions carefully and find ones that actually set you apart.

29
Jul

The problem with big, round numbers

I was just reading a press release about a media network’s plans to increase its footprint by 1,000 locations, starting with 500 by the end of Q3.

That may be entirely true, but as someone who has talked to hundreds of early stage network operators over the years, my BS Filter starts shaking and spitting out smoke and WD-40 when people start using big round numbers like that. Software biz dev guys hear endless variations on the “we’re going to do 1,000 sites” thing and struggle not to roll their eyes right in front of the client.

Once … just once … I had an early stage company’s VP Ops detail how they planned to something like 138 venues in year one. It was the one time I got a number that clearly wasn’t just pulled out of thin air. That one I believed.

So DOOH execs, when you issue releases with big, round rollout numbers like 1,000, just be aware that most of your industry brethren aren’t buying it.

19
Jun

Remember the basics when writing releases

I noticed a piece recently on ReadWriteWeb about media relationships, a guest post by the marketing guy for an e-commerce startup  specializing in co-created custom dress shirts.

Very different space, but what he has to say about getting media and general reader attention translates really well to justa bout any industry, and certainly an emerging one like digital signage.

He writes about starting with the basics, which is preparing something that is actually interesting and clearly understood by readers.

Don’t be an exact copycat to stories that have already been published. In other words, if say Apple is using biodegradable materials for its hardware that reduces its carbon footprint by 20%, you shouldn’t pitch that you are using similar materials for your gadgets and that you are saving 20% off your carbon footprint too.

What would be compelling is you saying that you are using XYZ new materials for your hardware and how you have reduced your carbon footprint by 75%. (Hopefully there is already buzz about how awesome those materials are, but if not, this could be an opportunity to pitch your company as a case study.)

Is your content easy to digest?

This might sound overly simplistic, but use bullets if you can. Journalists dread long emails. They absolutely dread it. So make your pitch short, sweet and simple – and what’s simpler than some nice bullet points? Don’t be too vague for the sake of brevity. You don’t want to compromise the quality of your pitch by leaving out the meat, the important details. Numbers are useful and eye-catching too.

Does it make sense?

Can anyone other than you understand it? Is there too much industry jargon? Too much language only you and your team understand? Similar to the last point, make sure your content is readable. Put your Master’s degree and ego away. You want to make your message very easy to read and very clear, so simplify the language of the pitch.

Split up long paragraphs for a quicker read. Five, three-sentence paragraphs are easier to digest than one fifteen-sentence paragraph. One of the worst things you can do is confuse a journalist. Overwhelming the journalist with technical information could elicit enough interest that they respond to your pitch. But it’s most likely they will just trash the email.

Does it really sound compelling?

Did you fool yourself into thinking that your story has legs? What’s the benefit for the writer’s audience? You have to be giving in your pitch, not self-serving. What I mean is that you have to give the writer a story he or she can’t refuse because their audience will love it.

You can’t look at media coverage as simply a means for promotion. Media’s purpose is to provide quality content to readers who are waiting to gobble up important and relevant information, so heavily consider the journalist’s and their audience’s needs when crafting a newsworthy pitch.

Some additional tips on how to be newsworthy include getting a few objective eyes to check out your pitch and provide feedback. It would be ideal to have the eyes of readers of the publications you are pitching, too. After rewriting your pitch, test it out on a few journalists and see how they react! Not receiving a response at all is definitely considered a reaction, although it doesn’t necessarily mean your pitch is bad, it’s just bad for them. After receiving their reactions, you may have to iterate on your pitch to provide them with a story that they would be compelled to write about.

Nothing groundbreaking here, but as someone who reads press releases every day I can assure you many, many companies blithely ignore these basics. I had a release come to me the other day from a company I’ve started to get to know, and was interested in a new service they have developed.

The release was so filled with corporate chest-beating and jargon, it was hard  to figure out what the service was that was supposed to be new and worth the attention of readers. I got an unprompted email from a business friend – smart guy, a CEO – asking if I could figure out what the service was all about. He too struggled with the release.

Today’s news releases cannot, should not be prepared as they were 10 years ago, or even five years ago. The Internet has changed all that and most of the people who read the release will not see it as converted from PR Martian to English by an editor. They will read it unfiltered.

And if they are going to need to endure a bunch of crap about how great the company is, and then find a decoder ring to figure out what the release is all about, that’s a completely wasted effort and opportunity.

Remember the basics.

14
Jun

When IT people do marketing …

BLANK, the software house that develops the BLANK platform for digital signage, becomes officially a “Front Runner” and announces the release and immediate availability of its solution for Windows Azure.

BLANK is the first digital signage software platform in the world available for Microsoft’s Cloud Web Signage is the first digital signage software platform in the world available for Microsoft’s Cloud.

The solution consists of web based management application delivered as a service and a player software managing the multimedia content playback on digital signage displays. BLANK Player has successfully passed compatibility tests conducted by Microsoft for the 32 and 64-bit versions of Windows 7.

“We are particularly proud of having achieved first, in the software for digital signage arena, this important compatibility goal,” said the CEO, “that will allow us to further shorten the release and development times and increase both scalability and performance, thanks to the great flexibility offered by the Windows Azure platform.

The compatibility with Microsoft’s cloud services of the Windows Azure platform, strengthens the offer towards the international markets: both software and infrastructure will be available as a service supplied through the Microsoft data centers spread throughout the world. Web Signage is always supplied by the nearest Windows Azure datacenter to ensure the highest performances.

Also, thanks to the evolution from SaaS to IaaS, a set of more flexible distribution and resale agreement, including OEM and co-brand formulas will be available to partners.

Nice. Awesome. Now apart from the handful of non-IT people who know what the Azure platform is all about, how many will know what any of this means?

Even if the only people a software company ever sells to are in the IT departments, this sort of release is still missing a critical component:  Why prospective customers should care.

When you are preparing marketing material like releases, always remember to think about what matters to and will intrigue the target audience. Does this make doing things easier? Faster? Better? Cheaper? More reliable? Anything???

14
May

DS PR 101: All but squealing with delight at the news

First a mea culpa: I believe I have been guilty of this, because it was what the client wanted and it was too much work to talk them out of it.

Press release after press release has giddy quotes from VPs and CEOs saying they are pleased, excited, delighted – everything short of “we wet our pants!” or “our nipples exploded!” – with mundane arrangements like partnerships and agreements.

You can stroke each other’s egos on your own time, but for the purpose of PR, it adds nothing to the story and is therefore silly and counter-productive. Editors who do more than copy and paste releases are rolling their eyes when they read such lines. They are also  nimbly hacking those quotes out of the piece or skipping right on by the release.

They’re happy that you’re happy … kinda, sorta. But mostly they could care less.

If you want to achieve something more than headline awareness that some deal was done, make your quotes real and contextual.

Instead of “We’re just delighted to be working with such fine fellows …” – and I am not really jesting here with that line – try something more like, “This agreement is critical to our company, because we’ll be adding new capability for our customers, and getting a clear competitive advantage.”

From that, all the readers will make the great leap in logic that you are happy about it.

28
Apr

PR 101 – Remember, they’re not stupid

Strangely, some of the worst work in press releases comes from companies that should have the money and experience to be really good.

Consider this work of art from ABC’s Family broadcast network:

ABC Family advertising sales executives Laura Kuhn and Mark Rejtig have both received increased responsibilities at the network, effective immediately. The announcement was made today by Laura Nathanson, Executive Vice President, Advertising Sales, to whom Ms. Kuhn and Mr. Rejtig report.

Laura Kuhn has been promoted to the newly created position of Senior Vice President, Strategic Sales Insights. She now oversees the revenue planning, sales research and sales marketing teams. Ms. Kuhn previously had served as Vice President, Sales Marketing and Promotions, ABC Family, since 2007.

Mark Rejtig has expanded his current role as Senior Vice President, National Sales Manager. The direct marketing group now reports to him, bringing all ABC Family line sales teams under his direct management. Mr. Rejtig has been a Senior Vice President at ABC Family since 2001.

“Laura Kuhn and Mark Rejtig each have done a tremendous job in bringing our advertisers top value from ABC Family, one of the most popular networks among millennials and viewers 18-49,” Ms. Nathanson said. “We look forward to Laura’s and Mark’s continuing accomplishments as they now widen their advertising sales responsibilities.”

OK, so first, it’s all about Laura Nathanson. Immediately, you can’t help but think this is someone you don;t want to meet, right or wrong. She could be Mary Poppins for all we know, but she comes across as Cruella de Vil.

The second and third paragraphs are just fine – who they are and what they do.

Next paragraph has the dreaded manufactured quote – in which people are quoted in a way about as far removed from conversational, and therefore believable, as could be imagined.

Finally, in the 5th paragraph, we get the nut of the story:

The expanded roles of Ms. Kuhn and Mr. Rejtig follow the decision by Joe Gallagher, former Senior Vice President, Sales Strategy and Planning, to leave the network to pursue other business opportunities.

So Joe got bingo’d and these two are filling his shoes. Aha!

When something happens, just report it. Don’t bury and hope no one notices. Pursue other business opportunities is code for he was punted. Everyone knows it. People are not that stupid. And don’t frame it up in a way that makes the protagonist look bad.

27
Apr

DS PR 101: Don’t bury the good stuff

This isn’t terrible, it could just be better. So I’m not too concerned about using the name of the company that sent me a release today. There’s good information in it – if the readers are patient enough to read on and find it.

Magenta Research is proud to announce a state-of the-art installation equipping Colorado State University’s College of Business for global communication. Magenta was chosen to provide a connectivity solution that would allow the routing of video audio and control signals to classrooms, conference rooms and common areas.

Colorado State University (CSU), is located in Fort Collins, Colorado, and hosts approximately 25,000 resident-instruction students who come from every state and more than 80 foreign countries. CSU has an extensive distance learning program with students attending from around the world.  The distance-learning program allows students who cannot physically attend classes to attend lectures via Internet or DVD. One of the challenges that the university faced was keeping the distance-learning students up-to-speed with lecture materials.  Distance-learning students depend heavily on internet lectures and receiving recorded DVDs of previous lectures.

Professors only have seven minutes between classes to set up microphones, mixers, switchers, and cameras. The set up and testing of this equipment is time consuming, labor intensive and subject to errors. Having localized video equipment in each classroom required the professor to physically be in the classroom to make changes to the AV configuration.

In my old newspaper days, we called this burying the lede. I am not sure why newspapers called the leading paragraph the lede and spelled it like that. But they did and still do, I think.

The good stuff here is that this new connectivity solution is saving time and resources and removing considerable aggravation for the profs and the AV department. Unless I am missing it, THAT’S what higher ed AV and IT people would get excited about. They will not normally get excited by a lede that drags out the “state of the art” cliche and then just flatly says the school put in some Magenta gear.

There’s too much background info in the 2nd paragraph and again nothing about the good stuff. All that 25,000 students, 80 countries, 50 states belongs further down in the release.

The net result is a release that says: We’re proud to announce we did something that’s the bee’s knees at this place and if you bear with us long enough we’ll eventually let you in on why you should care.

Magenta is known, by the way, as a supplier of premium gear for moving content around large spaces, and I’ve used their VGA over Cat 5 in past operational lives.

Approach your news releases as stories, and grab the readers from the beginning. Your goal with the first paragraph is to get them continuing on to the next paragraph, and so on.

The headline – Magenta Bridges the Gap for Colorado State University – also does absolutely nothing to pull readers in.

How about “Magenta central AV controls save time, money and resources for college’s AV/IT group”

23
Apr

The Dreaded Grip and Grin Photo

grip and grin

Not enough companies include visuals when they send out press releases and other material. This is a visual medium, and a great shot or two really adds some context and helps people get their heads around what’s being announced.

But not all photos are good. Every now and then I get what are known as grip and grin shots – two people or more staring at the camera with fixed grins, shaking hands. Or holding a check.

Resist all temptation. Tell your bosses, if they insist, that they will look goofy if someone actually runs the shot. I’d run it on my Sixteen:Nine blog, but for all the wrong reasons.

Stick to visuals that add to the story.

22
Apr

Is the press release dead?

No, but it’s certainly evolving, and if you push out releases, you need to make sure you are evolving with the medium.

Some keys:

1 – In this sector, press releases are not enticements to get editors to write stories. They are the stories. The formulaic corporate style of traditional press releases just annoy trade publication editors and bloggers. Remove most of the chest-beating hype and jargon and tell a story that interests them and their readers, and you’ll get play.

2 – Make it easy for them. Send the copy as text so they can copy and paste, and then edit. Include logos and web-ready images that help tell the story. If you have video, get it online so it can be embedded, easily, in the story. Do not send PDFs. Note: this is a visual business, but few companies use it to market their services.

3 – Be natural in your quotes and comments. We’ve all read quotes from executives in press releases that make you instantly think, “No one actually talks like that.” If you are manufacturing quotes, make them conversational and actually contributing to the story.

4 – Put things in context. Probably the biggest problem I see with press releases is the lack of context. I see countless releases hyping some new technical advance or doodad, but providing little or no clue as to why anyone should care. Think in terms of. “This new version of ___ will save time and money and …” THAT gets people interested.