This article was originally posted on Business Insider.
- EZ Newswire hopes to disrupt press release distribution, dominated by PR Newswire and Business Wire.
- The company uses OpenAI and its own algorithm to automatically write press releases.
- 2,500 companies, including Alibaba and 3M, have trialed an early version of the product.
Writing and distributing press releases is time consuming and expensive.
"It's about $5,000 every time, with some additional fees," said Lesley Klein, senior vice president of strategy and brand marketing at the travel company Priceline. "I also think about the business cost — hours and hours of laborious drafting, editing, reviewing, and alignment across all levels of the organization."
That cost also makes it difficult for smaller businesses that don't have the same resources as big companies like Priceline to draft and distribute press releases.
PR tech startup EZ Newswire launched in beta on Wednesday to remove these challenges and give smaller businesses the ability to cheaply write and distribute press releases. The company hopes to massively disrupt the press release distribution space and steal share from its two legacy stalwarts: PR Newswire, owned by PR tech giant Cision, and Business Wire, owned by Berkshire Hathaway.
Users input information like what type of company they have and the key details they want to cover. Then, EZ Newswire uses a combination of its own algorithm and OpenAI's large language model to automatically write press releases, said company cofounders and co-CEOs Caitlin Kelly and Neel Shah.
ChatGPT alone isn't good enough to write press releases on its own yet, said Klein.
"ChatGPT is okay for some things, but isn't there yet in terms of delivering a practical document with the sophistication and pragmatic application that we'd need in a press release," Klein added.
While Priceline has only demoed the EZ Newswire product, Klein said it would be part of its beta, and that she has more faith in its output because it was "built by someone with years of practical and operational comms experience."
Press release generation is a free part of EZ Newswire's service. The company instead makes its money by offering targeted distribution of press releases and it plans to release metrics in autumn that show how many people actually saw the release.
"The legacy players throw this content in the basement of their sites, where these press releases are barely seen," said Kelly. Metrics from the legacy distribution companies are usually the total visitors of the entire site, not the people who saw the specific release, said both Kelly and Priceline's Klein.
"Those total potential audience members are very misleading," said Shah.
EZ Newswire will send press releases to websites where the news is actually relevant, so a release from an automobile manufacturer would go to a site that's devoted to automotive coverage.
At launch, EZ Newswire hosts the press releases on its own site, and has a partnership with the Associated Press to distribute them. It is hoping to expand from there by adding one to two new publishers a month to its distribution network, Shah said.
Instead of thousands of dollars per release, EZ Newswire charges its users in tiers: $25, $100, or $125. Publishers get the largest cut of that fee, though Shah wouldn't specify how much since it varies across publishers.
Around 2,500 companies, including PR agencies, small businesses, and larger brands like Alibaba and industry products company 3M, have used the pre-beta version of the product. Shah hopes to have 10,000 customers over the next six months.
EZ Newswire, which has seven employees, raised a $1 million pre-seed round in 2020, from investors like MediaLink Vice Chairman Wenda Harris Millard, Madison Park Ventures principal and former Hearst president Cathie Black, and Forbes Vice Chairman Mike Perlis.
The company plans to raise between $5 million to $10 million in additional funding this summer, said Shah.
In making press release generation and distribution accessible to both big and small businesses, EZ Newswire hopes to blow wide the market around press release distribution. Shah believes that market is worth between $2 billion to $3 billion, but sees an opportunity for its value to increase since, currently, only large companies are willing to pay high rates to distribute press releases.
"Our contention is that by removing that exclusivity and building a product that any company can use, we'll greatly expand that user set," Shah said.
You Published Your Press Release—Now What?
Business owners often think they don’t have news significant enough to publicize, and that drafting a press release is complex. The truth? Your news matters.
Business owners often think they don’t have news significant enough to publicize, and that drafting a press release is complex. The truth? Your news matters.
Every company has moments that count. Even a small win—a partnership inked, product update launched, or sales goal reached—when publicized well can lead to a breakthrough tipping point. So when it comes to writing something as seemingly formulaic as a press release, every small business should explore how technology can handle the heavy lifting.
But the actual art of the process is promoting the release after it has been published, and this part of the process is where companies, both big and small, often fail. During her time in the media and PR industry, EZ Newswire co-founder, Caitlin Kelly, saw businesses make this same mistake again and again. They would publish a press release and hope it would magically reach a target audience.
“Companies often publish an announcement and then close their eyes and wait for the phone to ring,” she said. “But the real value of a press release is gained from promoting the news effectively with the right audience—prospective customers, investors, and other stakeholders—when and where they are most receptive to it.”
A press release is a digital breadcrumb that helps companies tell stories of growth and momentum and reaching as many existing and potential customers, news outlets, industry experts to alert them about how your business is growing requires a multi-touch and multi-pronged approach. Deploying the information in a variety of formats, and timing the promotion to reach your target audience when they are interested in learning about your business can create meaningful ripple effects.
To make promoting a press release easy, the EZ Newswire team created a checklist of tactics to consider when promoting your release, which is free to download here.
In the meantime, as a founder who is tight on time and wears many hats, Caitlin has identified three critical next steps after publishing your press release to create momentum and get the most out of this unique moment:
1. Email blast to key stakeholders
From internal team members to existing and prospective customers, industry-specific reporters, investors, advisors, and others, sharing your press release with your core network is critical and email marketing remains one of the most effective marketing channels for growing businesses. This email can be as simple as leveraging your press release copy (no need to reinvent the wheel!), dropping the email list into the Bcc line, and closing the email with a call to action (CTA) that encourages recipients to further share your press release and business news with their communities helps build organic visibility and virality.
Don’t be shy about highlighting where your press release has been published. For example, if you publish your news in the Associated Press, your email subject line could include “As seen in the AP…”.
2. Sharing on owned social channels and in industry-specific forums
Share your press release news on your business’s social channels and in industry specific forums—whether that’s a Slack community, Discord server, and/or email listserv. Similar to the email blast, you can repurpose copy directly from your press release and leverage multimedia assets like video summaries of the content, too. Soon, EZ Newswire will make it easy to create a video asset to easily extend the content to platforms where video performs best.
3. Updating your and your team’s email signature
How many emails do you send a day? If you think of each email as an opportunity for awareness of and engagement with your business, your email signature should include clickable content like a link to your business website, LinkedIn, and latest press release. Make sure that your press release includes an eye-catching CTA that teases your business news.
Here’s an example for CodingNomads’ latest press release: Become a certified software engineer, data scientist, and/or AI prompt engineer for $0. More here! ("Here" = insert press release URL)
If writing a press release from scratch sounds daunting, let us help! Create, publish, and strategically place your professional news release in minutes by clicking here.
Stagwell's PRophet Teams with EZ Newswire
Generative and predictive artificial intelligence software-as-a-service platform PRophet has inked a strategic partnership with EZ Newswire.
This article was originally posted on PRWeek.
NEW YORK: Generative and predictive artificial intelligence software-as-a-service platform PRophet has inked a strategic partnership with EZ Newswire.
With this partnership, PRophet users will have access to EZ Newswire’s news distribution service. EZ Newswire will be integrated as PRophet’s preferred newswire for all customers, offering them the option to use the tool to generate press releases on their behalf and distribute them to their network.
By combining PRophet’s capabilities with EZ Newswire’s features and reach, the two companies hope to make it easier for users to create and share content with audiences.
“I’m incredibly excited about our partnership with EZ Newswire, which reflects our continued commitment to revolutionizing the PR landscape with new and exciting technologies,” said Aaron Kwittken, founder and CEO of PRophet, via email. “Together we’re setting a new standard for accessible and affordable news release distribution for our PRO monthly customers.”
EZ Newswire exited stealth mode last spring, helping brands share their news with targeted media. The platform’s founder and CEO, Neel Shah, is a member of PRWeek’s Dashboard 25 class of 2023.
This partnership marks the latest in a series of developments for PRophet, which released a generative multi-pitch feature and biography generator over the summer and inked a partnership with B2B digital marketing and publishing services provider Multiview last month.
PRophet’s Taylor is a generative AI writing tool that helps users quickly create content. Combined, its features allow users to generate, analyze and test content, using AI to predict media interest and sentiment.
How to Write and Distribute a Press Release in Seven Easy Steps
If you’ve never written a press release or think your business news isn’t significant enough for a press release, this guide is for you! Press releases are key to promoting any business momentum or growth (e.g., product launch, signing your first commercial deal, or making your first big hire). Each press release published into the world is a bread crumb of your business’s story and provides visibility of your traction to media outlets, potential customers, and the broader web (read: Search Engine Optimization).
If you’ve never written a press release or think your business news isn’t significant enough for a press release, this guide is for you!
Press releases are key to promoting any business momentum or growth (e.g., product launch, signing your first commercial deal, or making your first big hire). Each press release published into the world is a bread crumb of your business’s story and provides visibility of your traction to media outlets, potential customers, and the broader web (read: Search Engine Optimization).
Let’s get started!
#1. Isolate your business news and why it’s important to your customers and your industry. (This will also help you write an attention-grabbing headline!)
Once you’ve identified the business news, start by writing your headline. This will be the blueprint for your actual press release.
We recommend sticking to the tried and true 5 W’s:
- Who is the press release about? [Your business here]
- What is happening that is newsworthy?
- When will the newsworthy action take place?
- Where is the newsworthy action happening?
- Why does it matter?!
The most important W? The “why”. Editors and reporters estimate they receive dozens of press releases in their inbox, every single day. You will get their attention by making your business’s news pass the “so what?” test.
Here are two EZ Newswire headlines that pass the “so what?” test:
- “Flume Health Announces SOC 2 Type II Certification, Demonstrating Commitment to Data Security”
- So what? A healthcare company gets a key data security certification that highlights its commitment to protecting patients’ sensitive health information
- “Former MasterClass Talent Executive and Emmy Award-Winning Producer Launch SonderCo To Reinvent Talent and Brand Partnerships”
- So what? Talent and brand partnerships are being reinvented at new digital agency by two talent sourcing experts (an Emmy Award-winning producer and MasterClass’s ex Head of Talent)
#2: The first paragraph matters (a lot).
The first paragraph of your press release is the most important. Attention spans are limited so all the key information (the five W’s) needs to be captured in the first paragraph, especially the “why”.
Here’s an example from a Jersey Mike’s press release published via EZ Newswire:
“Jersey Mike's Subs announced today the return of its elementary school creativity competition in partnership with the world-famous Harlem Globetrotters. Known as the ‘Court of Creativity presented by Jersey Mike's Subs,’ the contest will award $1,000 to 10 finalists, and one grand prize-winning school will receive a visit from the Harlem Globetrotters before the end of the 2023–24 school year.”
Why is this press release newsworthy? A major fast food chain, Jersey Mikes, is partnering with a major sports franchise, the Harlem Globetrotters!
#3: Show, don’t tell.
Brevity is key in a press release. You want to share your business news concisely and have the body copy driven by supporting data points and quotes.
For quotes, avoid filler. Include quotes from key stakeholders that drive the narrative forward.
For example, we love this quote from a Glamorise press release published via EZ Newswire:
“Our bra designs are rooted in the idea that no one knows more about a bra than the consumer," said Glamorise CEO Jon Pundyk. "We conduct extensive consumer research, spend years in the fitting room developing a new bra, and then run consumer wear panels to refine our designs so they really work. We’re proud to say this new line is perhaps our most focused and thoughtful in the company’s history."
The quote not only stands out because it’s from the company CEO but because it underscores why the company’s business update, about the launch of a new bra line whose design is informed by extensive customer research, is newsworthy.
#4: Don’t forget a boilerplate and a media contact.
The boilerplate is a standard component of a great press release. It is a 2-3 sentence overview of your business that is included at the end of the press release under the heading “About [Your business here]”, usually ending with the company’s website so that readers know where to go to learn more.
And don’t forget to include a media contact! That is who media outlets will reach out to if they want to report on your business.
#5: Optimize for keywords.
Once you’re done writing, ensure your press release copy, especially your headline is optimized for search discoverability. Include keywords that are aligned with the topic of your press release in the headline, first paragraph, and at least two other times in the press release body copy.
You can leverage free keywords tools like Ahrefs, Semrush, and WordStream to find the best topic-specific keywords based on your press release topic.
#6: Be thoughtful about where you distribute your press release.
Your press release doesn’t need to reach everyone, only your key customers (publishers and potential buyers of your product and/or service). To reach your key customers, you need to have a firm understanding of their media diet. You want to ensure your press release appears in publications and properties they regularly read. Leveraging a tool like EZ Newswire allows your business news to appear where your key customers already are.
#7: Don’t forget to share the press release with your network.
Your news matters to those in your community, including existing and prospective customers, employees, and investors. Be sure to use your social channels and an email campaign to distribute a press release and amplify your business announcement. Remember that momentum begets momentum!
If writing a press release from scratch sounds daunting, let us help! Create, publish, and strategically place your professional news release in minutes by clicking here.