ABSTRACT
Publicity, the lifeblood of effective public relations, provides accurate, honest, and timely information to people who want and need that information. This chapter focuses on the importance of newsworthy information and how and where it may be found. It offers insight into writing news releases, which are perhaps the most useful tools for communicating not only with journalists in all media (online, broadcast, and print) but with others of interest to an organization: consumers, employees, donors or stockholders, and government officials. The chapter looks into the structure of news releases and various types of releases. It gives guidelines on effective writing style, such as using simple language, attributing opinion, and avoiding promotionalism. The chapter also deals with alternatives to full news releases: news briefs, fact sheets, feature releases, advisories, interviews, and news conferences. It concludes with tips for writing opinion pieces such as op-ed pieces, letters to the editor, advocacy letters, and materials for online newsrooms.
