E-Mailing Your News To Editors? Do It Right!
Mike Martel, MMC, Inc.
Anyone who has ever suffered the tedium of stuffing, sealing, stamping, and mailing envelopes as part of a multiple-piece mailing will understand me, no doubt, when I indicate how much I truly dread such exercises. Unfortunately, if you are in the marketing or public relations business, large mailings are a fact of life, much, say, as the occasional smashed thumb is part of carpentry; or the occasional life-threatening jolt or ‘zap’ is part of being an electrician. There are enough steps involved — from printing the labels or envelopes, to printing press releases, attaching photos, etc., to boggle the mind, yet for the longest time, a physical mailing was the only reliable way to get news in the hands of editors. Even after e-mail became an accepted part of most textual communication in other quarters, it was still verboten for sending press releases to editors.
Why so? Isn’t it cheaper and faster to send out press releases and news announcements via e-mail? Is a press release printed on letterhead and mailed in a neat envelope the only guarantor of fair consideration and editorial attention? Must the only things in life that are effective have the aura of difficulty? Do only home-cooked meals taste good?
Since the anthrax terrorism scare, e-mailed submissions to magazines have jumped exponentially in terms of acceptability, but it’s still not unconditional. If you want to distribute your news announcements to the press electronically, there are a few hurdles that you must jump, otherwise you may find yourself the recipient of a few curt, nasty ‘REMOVE’ notes, or worse, find yourself on someone’s Blocked Senders List and never know it.
For the record, I strove mightily to convert to e-mailing press releases and announcements over the past few years, and to obtain acceptance for distribution of my clients’ news in such manner. I wanted to get my news into the hands of editors more rapidly, cut down on time, labor, paper, and postage costs, distribute higher volumes, and simply be progressive. So my first step was to ask every editor I knew if e-mailed news releases would be “OK.” Some editors outright refused; others gave grudging acceptance; and yet a few enthusiastically said ‘yes,’ but with conditions.
Whence the resistance? Is it simply a matter of being too easy? Not really. There are a couple of reasons why it has been tough. First, spammers have given multiple-list distribution of anything via e-mail a bad name. Suspicion and cynicism rule.
Secondly, only recently have the sizes of mailboxes increased dramatically (or networks), and the greater availability of high-speed connections become available to editors so that they can handle photo attachments. Overseas editors were, if I recall, the first to give the OK to send press releases via e-mail. Even then, some were emphatic about the “No photo attachments” rule. Even that has been relaxed now.
So, if you want to send your news items out over e-mail and benefit from the instant delivery and cost savings associated therewith, you should follow these simple rules, to the letter. I have been mistakenly sent some e-mail press releases from some companies, and some of them are utter garbage — badly written, salesy, etc. — if I were a magazine editor, these would be instantly deleted.
1. Create a good list, or many lists, based upon individual editorial preferences. Contact each editor FIRST by e-mail or telephone, tell them about your company and your products, and ask them if they will accept your press releases via e-mail. Most important, ask them what the conditions are. File size limits? Photos OK? Word attachments OK (some editors will NOT open Word attachments, since they can carry viruses)? Listen, and take notes.
2. If you send a photo attachment, it should have a minimum resolution of 300 DPI, 3” x 3” in size, necessary for print media. This usually generates a JPEG file size of around 150 Kb or so. Don’t send large photo files (over 1 Mb) without asking first, or unless the editor requests a higher resolution file.
3. Write your press release properly, in proper style, with the appropriate contact information. There are few things editors hate more than sloppy or badly-written press releases.
4. Paste the text of your press release into the body of the e-mail message, and format it there. Editors don’t care too much about your formatting; they will change it completely anyway.
5. If someone asks to be REMOVED from your list, remove them promptly, but always ask why, and if there is someone else on the magazine staff who would be the appropriate person to receive your releases. The magazine does not necessarily want to discontinue the relationship with your company; rather, it could be that you are simply sending the release to the wrong editor. Sometimes they will refer you to the appropriate person; sometimes you need to ask.
Above all, be courteous, do a good job, and try to let the editors know who you are, and let them know that you want to meet their requirements for submissions. It really is a lot of work — pushing the ‘SEND’ button is the quickest — and last — step in the whole procedure. However, if you haven’t done everything else right first, you would be better off not pushing that button at all!
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