Getting The Right Style For Your News Release

Professional news releases have a conventional layout style that prompts what information should go where. An editor who receives your news release should be able to instantly know what the document is and where to find particular elements, such as contact details. A professional news release not only adds credibility to your news, but to you and your organisation.

Aim for 500 words of text organised into five paragraphs of two to three sentences.
Always use third person.
Keep the headline to eight words or less.
Capitalise only the first letter in the headline, except proper nouns such as the organisation’s or individual’s name.
Never use all capitals, with the exception of FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE or EMBARGO.
Do not use and or %. Spell out.
Spell out abbreviations, such as ‘street’, ‘Victoria’ and ‘Queensland’.
Never use underline.
When in doubt, refer to the newspapers and magazines you are communicating with.

Spelling reminder

Spelling and grammatical mistakes can mar the credibility of an otherwise professional news release, especially the misspelling of a name or phone number. It is best to run the news release past two or three other individuals as a safety net.

TERMS OF USE

By sending a press release and/or signing up for a subscription of our service Get The Word Out, you agree to the following terms of use, limitations, quality policy and fair use policy. Get The Word Out reserves the right to suspend or delete your account if any of the terms below are believed not to have been adhered to. Get The Word Out reserves the right to delete any content that does meet the following terms and policies.

1. Accuracy

By using Get The Word Out, you agree to only publish information that you know to be true and accurate. You are solely responsible for the facts and accuracy of all information submitted by you for distribution by Get The Word Out. Get The Word Out will make reasonable efforts to correct any error of fact brought to its attention.

2. Acceptable content

You agree to only submit content that might be classified as a “news announcement”. That is: it is a new event or statement related to the company or organisation that the release is being submitted under. You agree not to use Get The Word Out to distribute how-to articles, generally-information articles, whitepapers, or opinions. You must not submit content that infringes on copyright or the proprietary rights of a third party, or is unlawful or offensive. Releases must adhere to professional standards and may be deleted if they do not. You acknowledge that we reserve the right to edit your release's headline, subject and body text to ensure it is appropriate, relevant and suitable for the purpose.

3. Attribution

You agree to submit content only on behalf of the organisation that the release is being submitted under. Content that may be considered misleading in terms of who the material is being submitted by, or in terms of who the content is related to should not be posted and may be deleted or edited. When submitting a release you must be the owner of the email that is being used to send emails via Get The Word Out.

4. Categorisation

You agree to categorise content only under those categories that are relevant to the content. In general, we advise attempts to categorise content under more than five categories will lead to that content being reviewed and possibly removed. You acknowledge that we reserve the right to edit release's tags to ensure your release is sent only to relevant people.

5. Linking and fair-use

You agree not to add more than one link to a website in any press release. Over-linking solely for Search Engine Optimisation purposes is not allowed and is advised against due to penalties that may be associated with over-linking. And our gremlins will hunt down over-linking and delete such transgressions.

Inquiries concerning any Get The Word Out content including text, photos, video, audio and other content, or that may be related to the use of the Get The Word Out service should be addressed to The Director, Digitaliyf Pty Ltd of PO Box 3045, Newstead, 4006 Australia.