I haven’t sent out a news release for some time and wanted to try out the e-news release services available in South Africa.
My e-book on the business side of blogging was up on my blog and I was curious whether I could get free publicity, how easy these e-news release services are to use… and how effective they are.
With no prior knowledge of or experience with these news release services, I searched in Google until I found some that looked reasonably credible.
Cost-shock
My first shock was the sites that charge well over R275(+/- $30) to distribute your news release. These obscenely high prices are just not worth it for the start-up or small business, and especially not for a small start-up blogging business. I’d rather steer clear of people like this who act as news censors with high-priced toll-gates to news distribution.
Registration impossible
Don’t miss a word of this… several of the free e-news release sites were so poorly designed that it was impossible for me to register on them. Surely, if these sites are not even user-friendly, how can you expect them to have the competence to send your news release to the relevant print and online publications?
A few that worked
Among the many e-news release services, only a handful worked. That is they enabled fast and easy registration and were able to confirm that my news release had been published.
Impact
I have yet to find out the impact of the news release services I used. It’s still too early to tell. But one important thing that concerns me is that I have no way of knowing where these sites sent my news release. Do they just simply publish releases on their website or do they send them to media outlets?
I could have sent my news release to media outlets direct but curiosity got the better of me. I wanted to do this as an experiment to find out costs, ease-of-use, customer service, professionalism as well as impact.
Whatever means you use to distribute your news release, it’s critically important to write your news release so it engages editors as well as readers.
I promised you five proven ways to get your news release published. If you need a copy of this news release tip sheet full in your details below and I’ll email you a free copy.
Stay inspired
Chesney Bradshaw
