Final Draft:
Journal 24:
Despite promoting a service or product, news releases must be objective in their presentation. Thus, the word choice for a news release must matter because it can decide if a newspaper editor decides that the paper will run the news release. Thus, promotional language about a new product, such as a cure for baldness, is discouraged. The news service must present the facts and be as objective as possible. On the other hand, a news release that reports on the cure being announced by a company would not be revised as heavily because it reports a story and then promotes it through the news release. The wording and placement of the information are also important to the news release. The 5 Ws are highlighted in the chapter for this reason, as you have limited space to present your information. When giving quotes, for example, unless the company or spokesperson is well-known by the audience, you should briefly describe who they are between their statements or after them entirely. This is not the most relevant information to the audience compared to what the person quoted has to say. This all stems back to the fact that press releases are supposed to be only a page long, around 250-300 words. This means that being direct and not wordy allows the most information to be conveyed in the least amount of time.
Journal 26:
Thankfully, any revisions that we had made were minor due to being written well in the first draft. My main thought in writing the press release was how the product could interest the local community. Having the press release be an advertising campaign would make it less likely that the press would publish it. However, if the press release highlighted it being a local company with roots in Maine, it would be seen as more of a news story to a paper like the Portland Press Herald or even the Boston Globe. Because of my experience writing press releases, I wrote them with the other two group members, using our previous notes to add further information. We mostly used testimonials we had previously written to include in the press release. Since the story also emphasized the local aspect, we made up quotes from the founder and other management within the company to the story. We also researched what would sound authentic and accurate when discussing using local materials such as fishing gear or the materials in the soap to make it environmentally friendly. The only minor changes that we made were to shorten the press release and to fix any typos that we had spotted during the peer review session.
First Draft:
