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The Seven
Habits of Highly Effective Emailed Press Releases
Summary
The Seven Habits will increase the number of your
releases that are opened and read by journalists. They give you an advantage over those who haven’t
figured out that emailing is easy, but that emailing well requires either a
little extra effort, or a little expense. As you compete for space and coverage, the advantage
offered by the Seven Habits will boost your results.
1) Send a relevant and helpful
subject. Use the
headline of your release because it is supposed to inform and grab the
reader’s interest. Many people
scan the hundreds of emails received daily looking mostly at the subject,
so this is your chance to convince the recipient your email is worth
opening. Amazingly, some
emailed press releases have no subject or just “press release” as the
subject. Simple but
critical: Journalists are more
likely to open your email with a relevant and useful subject.
2) Send consistently from the
same email address.
The other thing commonly looked for when scanning email is
recognized senders. Some
people use a “white list” that treats email differently from known versus
unknown senders. And some ISPs
(e.g., Earthlink) have a feature that forces a manual confirmation from a
new sending email address. So
regardless of the reason (whether because multiple people use their own
addresses to send your releases, or because you have different addresses), sending
your releases from other than one consistent address leads to having fewer
emails reach and read by your recipients.
3) Comply with each recipient’s
email preferences.
Some reporters are adamant about the format of emails sent to them
(either by technical limitation or just personal preference) and some won’t
even open releases sent to them in other than their preferred format. So, obviously, you need to find out
what their preferences are, and comply with those preferences or else just
know that some of your emails won't be read. You can maintain and send to separate lists by format,
or you can find a vendor who will do this for you. As expressed by 1,139 sports
reporters answering a poll by RacingPR.com,
a journalists-only web site, the minority, 18%, prefer the plain, simple
text; 41% of journalists prefer HTML and 34% prefer PDF attachments. Sending your releases in
multiple formats to accommodate recipients' preferences will boost your
open and read rate.
4) Make sure each email is
addressed to the recipient. If your email looks like bulk mail, it will be treated
like bulk mail. While a common
spam filter blocks email not actually addressed to the recipient, your
email will be improved by courteous and accurate addressing. Some emailers include just the
sender’s name in the “To” field (common for those using BCC addressing),
and others include the recipient lost in the middle of a sea of names in
the “To” field (CC list emailers).
Make sure your emails are addressed to the recipient because this
courtesy not only helps get your email past spam filters, but shows
appropriate professional respect.
5) Don't send ugly emails. Have you seen emailed press
releases where you had to scroll down two screens to get past the CC
list? How about a table of
past performances or results sent by plain text email, where the table
either is mush because the columns don’t line up, or worse, shows as 10
pages of single-column garbage?
If you are trying something new, send it first to several associates
with different email programs.
Ugly emails are harder to read, so fewer recipients will, and
they embarrass your team and affect the perceived professionalism of your
organization and you personally.
6) Get your emails past
filters. ISP,
corporate, spam and personal email filters are used more every day and can
prevent your email from even be delivered to journalists’ desks. The elements that trigger common
filters are known and are preventable: If you send more than a certain number of emails at once
(50 at one we know), some ISPs and corporate mail servers add an invisible
header line that the message is likely spam or is low priority. (For example, one Charlotte PR firm
with several Nextel Cup clients used to send out every release with a
header line that said “Precedence: Junk.") Subject lines can trigger common filters: Do not use all
caps in the subject or exclamation points, and do not use the word
"free" in the subject (or if possible anywhere in your
email). Get past email
filters because emails that don't even make it to journalists' computers
have no chance of being read and used.
7) Track your emails and act on
the results reported.
It is not effective to spray out releases and cross your fingers for
results, but without tracking, this is what you are doing. Professional tracking will tell you
successful deliveries and even emails that are opened, and will report failed
emails to save you from going through individual mail kickback
messages. Tracking gives
you the information you need to improve your lists and increase your
delivery and open rate.
Bonus Recommendation: Do not use the email list strategy that has you send
email to a specific address that triggers a forward to your list. Just today I saw a message a
journalist sent trying to reach the team press officer asking a technical
question about why his race car was so slow -- but he sent it to the forwarding
address accidentally, so all journalists on that team's press list got the
email. Not good.
Sports Systems' distribution service fulfills the
Seven Habits, and the Best Practices learned from our clients and others
throughout the sports industry.
If you want an advantage at an efficient price from the only expert
in sports communications, give us a call.
Whether you use us or another service bureau, or
whether you improve emailing on your own, recognize that you are competing
for space and coverage for your team, athletes and sponsors. Emailing is an easy and inexpensive
tool to communicate with the media, but emailing well requires either extra
effort, or outside assistance.
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Emailed Press Releases gives
you the information to be an effective competitor to boost the successful
delivery and open rate for your emailed press releases.
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