A press release is the normal way of communicating with most of your press contacts.
The advantage of a press release is that it can be sorted, filed, retrieved, and used directly by a publication. It can even be saved in someone's Inbox. On its own, however, a press release won't build the relationship you want. You want the writer to think of you and email you when he needs information. A regular series of press releases will help. A good point to note though is that this is not entirely crucial. If you merely want to have press releases for publications to download or obtain directly from you, then this ‘relationship’ is not quite as important. Sure, you want to attract the publications back to your releases, but as you are not working with individuals as such, this is not so important.
The first step is to build a list of publications. While you certainly want to include the majority of computer orientated and technical sites/magazines, unless you are marketing a horizontal site or a service appealing only to sophisticated users, you want to concentrate on the specific sites covering your vertical market. Unless you develop applications, the majority of people who can use your product don't read HotWired. Generally speaking, the sites and publications you want are oriented toward your target ‘customer’ base, whether they are stamp collectors, Star Trek fans or fans of the Royal Family.
After searching the 'Net, subscribe to any e-mail publications that you can find which you feel could be useful in promoting your site or service.
The second step is to build a list of people. Many people who write for Web site or magazines are free-lancers. They generally have an area of expertise and have to sell their story ideas to editors before getting a commitment. They may also be writers offering their services for free -- do not forget this very important fact when corresponding with them. They may be willing to promote your site for free, even more so if they get something in return, a link for example. You can cultivate these people and obtain an occasional mention by keeping them informed of what is going on with your site and alerting them to new trends and ideas useful to them in earning their living, or keeping their writing positions open. Most sites should supply email address for their writers, or their webmaster may be the writer themselves.
You might also want to consider becoming a writer yourself. If you run a network of sites, or if you have ‘ally’ sites then promoting your sites and putting your press releases on these sites is very wise.
Now that we have discussed what a press release is, and who we could send it to, we should discuss the actual write up and presentation of the press release. This is one of the most important factors of the release. If it has poor grammar, spelling or presentation, it may be discarded. People do not have time to tidy up your messy documents for publication.
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