Week 7: Introduction to public relations and media releases CMNS1090 Introduction to Professional Writing In this class students will continue the discussion about news writing. New techniques are introduced. This is followed by an introduction to public relations and media releases. Character Profile due this week.

Summary of Hard News (see Week Five) News structure  Inverted pyramid Rules of news writing  Less than 25 words in the intro par (short and sweet)  One sentence pars throughout  Use simple language  Delete unnecessary words  Take out wordy phrases News values  Impact, timeliness, prominence, proximity, conflict, unusual/weirdness, currency

Introduction to Public Relations Who wants to be in PR? What do you think of PR practitioners? What do PR practitioners do? What is a media release? KEY MESSAGE: Dealing with the media is only one aspect of a PR practitioner’s role, and media releases are only one communication tool that PR practitioners use (albeit a bread-and- butter one).

Introduction to Public Relations PR practitioners are the professionals whose specialty is to deal with the relationships between an organisation and its PUBLICS  What is meant by PUBLICS? PR practitioners must match an organisation’s communications (internal and external) to its objectives. They must ensure that the messages an organisation is sending are the messages it intends to send and that they produce the results that match the organisation’s objectives.  What might some objectives be?

Introduction to Public Relations In your role as PR agent, it’s not your job to make events happen. It’s going to be your job to get the client’s message (or the best form of that message) to the media and hence the public. KEY MESSAGE: But they don’t make the decisions on behalf of organisations – that’s the job of others (management, management committees, executive officers, CEOs, etc). What they do is communicate a message. They try to influence the news.

Journalism and Public Relations What do journos and PR practitioners think of each other? Reality is: Journos and PR rely on each other, a very symbiotic relationship. What are some of the reasons for this dependence on media releases? Why isn’t it like the old days? Any problems with this? Key message: All of this is important to keep in mind when doing your first media writing assignment

Journalism and Public Relations – Relations (see handouts) LEFT: Former “Australia's Next Top Model” contestant Cassi Van Den Dungen on the runway at Australian Fashion Week. Picture: Attila Szilvasi Source: News Corp Australia

Introduction to media releases The Prime Minister’s office University of Newcastle Newcastle Knights Greenpeace

Media releases Where do they fit into the production of news? Who produces them? What is their purpose? What is a PR practitioner trying to achieve in a media release? What is their audience? Who are you trying to reach? How does it get there? Where does it go? KEY POINT: Note importance of the media release being factually correct - if a journalist reports it as fact and it isn’t, the PR practitioner loses credibility in the eyes of the journalist - usually irretrievable.

Media releases The Prime Minister’s office – See Brandis example in the handout – what are the uses of Media Releases illustrated? What would be a good publication for this media release?

What is in a media release? Structure  Inverted pyramid style  Follows journalism’s rules Content  Hard-Hitting Headline  Strong Lead  Body  Direct quotes Other  Professional  Fast and efficient and respect deadlines  Provide competent spokespeople and background information at the drop of a hat

Important KEY MESSAGE: Must provide something NEWSWORTHY. That’s one reason why media releases use the same structural principle as news stories (inverted triangle). Note also the issue of providing material in this form because it happens to be the form that the immediate audience (journalist) is used to.

Class exercise Break into groups of four and write a headline and the first two pars of a media release for Wally Driver’s Defensive Driving School. Remember to use the news writing rules.

Media release layout/format  Must say ‘MEDIA RELEASE’ in the subject line  Include pithy info in the subject line  Usually with a letterhead  Date is important  Headline, lead, body  Must provide Contacts  Must be visually appealing  well-presented  typed  wide margins  simple font – Times New Roman  1.5 to double spacing

Media release layout/format KEY MESSAGE: Most PR practitioners can’t give the whole story in the media release (length constraints). They want the journalist to contact them - they need to twig the journalist’s interest, to get the journalist to follow it up. Some PR practitioners boast about the fact that a media release is used verbatim as a news story. Is this good?

Tips to Help Your Media Release Make the News  Make sure your message is newsworthy.  Send your media release to the journalists most likely to be interested in it.  Your Subject Line is the most important parts of your release.  Use simple language.  Present your facts clearly.  Proofread your media release before you send it off, and correct any spelling or grammatical errors.  Make it easy for the media to contact you.  Follow up your media release the next day with phone calls to the journalists you sent the release to.

Letterhead usually goes here Letterhead usually goes here Date Headline/Heading Media Release Text of media release goes here, structured according to news values Use single-sentence paragraphs Use attributed quotes in direct speech Give contact details for media contact: include name, title, contact numbers

Use Most Direct Contact Possible These days Media releases would normally be transmitted by . See the example from Mindframe which includes a pdf version, a plain text version and a HTML version. Media Releases would also be available, in the case or larger organisations, on Web Sites, via Twitter and Face Book. Additional supporting materials, such as free-to-publish photographs would often be provided.