Communications is one of those disciplines that touches pretty much all aspects of a business: thought-leadership, branding, media relations, reputation management, earned media, social media, content marketing, lead generation and so much more.PR can even boost your SEO.In a demand generation strategy, your communications team and their press release expertise are essential for success.As Corporate Communications: Demand Generation’s New, Indispensable Resource points out, “Press releases can be used to engage an audience beyond journalists, including prospects, customers and industry influencers, often exactly the audiences that marketers want to bring into the larger demand-generation framework.”But your standard press release isn’t going to do the trick.To promote a blog post, white paper, or other piece of marketing content, the entire press release must be reconsidered.Traditionally, press releases have focused on sharing company news with journalists and earning media coverage. In contrast, a press release written for prospective and current customers must sell (for lack of a better word) readers on the need to click over to the content you’re promoting.Content marketing releases must tell convincing stories, convey topical authority and convert. Pay attention to these 12 things when writing a press release for your demand gen content.1. Audience: You’re not writing a content press release for journalists. Your target audience includes potential customers and influencers – the same audience as the content you’re promoting. Write directly to them and focus on what they care about. Don’t know where to start? Answer these 15 questions to uncover your audience’s needs.2. Purpose: Like any good writing, start your content press release with “why” the reader should care about your topic. Hook them before telling them how your content will help.3. Headline: Press release headlines should always be concise; however, it’s especially important with content marketing press releases. Keep it short and snappy like a strong blog post headline – easy to tweet and intriguing enough that readers will want to click it. Check out Do Your Headlines Measure Up? for headline writing tips and examples.4. Brand name: Your brand has authority; be sure to mention who the content is from. Do this in the headline/subheadline or the first mention of the content title in your press release’s body.

Continue reading here on BEYOND PR.