The 5 Rules of High Quality Content (Press Releases)

Producing high quality content – and delivering it to a specific audience – is difficult.  Whether your target audience is a customer, investor or journalist, you are competing against so much noise out there – from long headline queues at 8 a.m. Eastern to instant public reactions on Twitter.A few seconds is all you have to get your audience to take the next step with your press release. People will move on if your message isn’t high quality right from the start.All too often, I see content that had good intentions fall flat because it was tossed out into the news cycle without much thought to execution.Don’t fall victim to headlines with 200+ characters, blocks of text that are difficult to scan because they lack formatting and visuals, jargon-filled writing that causes confusion, or stale messaging that doesn’t deliver relevant meaning to your audience.Follow these five rules and produce high quality press releases that don’t get lost.1. Make it insightful & relevant.This is probably the hardest rule to follow, and requires a lot of patience and preparation.Your content needs a purpose beyond filling your web site’s News section or company’s Twitter feed.Get started by creating an editorial calendar at least three months in advance. Coordinate with your product, sales, and other teams to produce content your target audience will care about.Do you have a new study to report on?  A new infographic with up-to-date data?  A white paper you’re proud of?  An upcoming trade show you’re excited about participating in?Readers and search engines will quickly know whether or not your message is relaying insightful and relevant information.Don’t make the mistake in thinking you can fool them.

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