How successful is a press release?

[Hoss]

Hi everyone - How successful is a press release?
http://www.fastmetal.tv started ringing off the hook today.
It's got constant traffic because of this...

http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikatotimes/4168595a6415.html

I had no idea that the story had been run but traffic was really banging - so I went looking for the paper's website to see.
I know that the traffic will die down however when it does the next phase of press releases will start.



I encourage you all to give this some serious thought.


Of note is that sign-ups are almost non existent as I thought that they might be due to the viewing type nature of a vid site.

Cheers
Hoss

[galnet]

Hi Hoss,

I sent away a press release to my local papers, so far I haven't heard anything back from them :(

Hopefully 1 of them will pick up on the release and print it, if not then I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board unless you have any tips?

Regards,
Mat.

[karlmay]

Hi Hoss,

I sent away a press release to my local papers, so far I haven't heard anything back from them :(

Hopefully 1 of them will pick up on the release and print it, if not then I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board unless you have any tips?

Regards,
Mat.

keep on writing to them, try other medias also, i wrote to more than 20 medias before one or two begin to have interest.

Dont give up.

To Hoss, hey, thats cool for you dude :D

[Hoss]

Hey there Galnet - you've got my email, I'm really happy to help if I can.
One of my lecturers at uni was a guy called Roger Brooksbank. He's a Pom but I won't hold that against him (tee hee).
He gave me a book which he wrote called 'Hot Marketing - Cool Profits'.

This guy isn't just an academic - whilst I was doing his marketing paper, he released the book and used he very techniques that he was expounding to gain an interview on national breakfast television (business segment) - ok so NZ isn't a large country but that still takes a bit of doing.

He's not advertising his book anymore as he's just brought out another on 'sales', but I imagine he's still on the shelves here with the original.

If you're interested I'll contact him to see if it's on amazon or anything. However I'll give you all of the help that I can - just drop me a line or skype me.

Karlmay - thanx for the encouragement.

Cheers
Hoss

[SportsGamingTV.com]

Hi Hoss,

I sent away a press release to my local papers, so far I haven't heard anything back from them :(

Hopefully 1 of them will pick up on the release and print it, if not then I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board unless you have any tips?

Regards,
Mat.

It's difficult to get the attention of the local paper unless they are really short on news, or unless your release is truly newsworthy material, which web site PR usually is not.

However, I have had a great deal of success in the past using both free and paid press distribution online. A lot of web sites and blogs that are in your niche will pick up on this and use the press release as content for their site, which in turn generates long-term exposure for you. Sometimes it causes a rush of traffic, sometimes it is not noticable but continues to trickle in for a couple of years (which ads up over the span of many releases).

[Hoss]

Hi there sportgamingtvdotcom - yes it can be difficult, I seem to have no trouble though.

As mentioned elsewhere the image provided is key.
If I had dropped the press release without a decent photo I may and only may, have got some sort of a mention. I've had experience with that before and it's frustrating, just as you allude to.

It's that wacky picture that sells papers and gets your story in, unless you're prepared to make a fool of yourself or do something really oddball to attract attention - you're unlikely to succeed. Like all media centers, papers gobble information constantly and need a steady stream of new material. So they'll seize on anything that gives them content even if it's a crap story with a great image.

I'm really interested to know what you know about 'free and paid press distribution online' - I'm always eager to learn more about promotion.
If I log onto your site can we talk through you mail system about it - or I'll provide you with my skype once there.

I'm also keen to get your opinion on fatrat tv and what I might need to change to make it look better.

Cheers
Hoss