Chris Heuer is the project lead: Signups for the new media press release (really!)
By Tom Foremski - June 30, 2006
I've been working with the PR industry to figure out a better way to create press/news releases that are more useful to reporters and others, in this multi-media channel world we live in. Why limit press releases to the standard text only format and with only one link, or none?
We need a vehicle that can easily integrate podcasts, vidcasts, text, and company information that is labelled and tagged so that the right information can quickly be pulled together. We have the technologies to do that, to partly preassemble the information needed in preparing a news story.
The key, however, is to have all the PR agencies and media/comms departments in corporations to agree to a baseline standard new media press release format. We need to make sure that everyone uses the same labels/tags for things like "company founded date" or "CEO today said" etc. And agrees on other aspects of the format.
To help things along I've agreed to offer a neutral third party platform. The PR companies are very competitive and won't take the lead from each other and so we will end up with a tower of babel of different labels/tags and different formats, and we won't be much better off than before.
I've found someone with the ideal abilities to coordinate this new media press release project, Chris Heuer. Chris knows the business world, he knows the marcoms world and he knows the geek world. He's a new media renaissance man and he has agreed to coordinate this project.
I have already received many requests from people to join me in this project, and I will pass those onto Chris but please sign up again just in case. And anyone else that wants to be involved please join this discussion newsgroup.
Chris will choose the collaborative technologies we'll use to take this project further. By the way there was a nice write up about the new press release in BusinessWeek and Shift Communications' efforts, Julie Crabill and Todd Defren in pushing things forward.
Richard Edelman, head of the largest independent PR agency in the world is a strong supporter of the new media press release. Winning the support of global giants such as Edelman is key because it validates this new approach to communications. Edelman and the other giants such as Ogilvyetc have the muscle, and the influence to educate companies and individuals on how best to communicate in a multiplicity of media worlds and communities.
What will be interesting is how the PR companies and others, use the new media press release format to differentiate themselves; how they make the content compelling and available in a multiplicity of media; and how successful they are in explaining to their clients the need for new ways of communicating. Here is Chris Heuer to explain more.
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June 30, 2006 | Permalink | Comment | Category: Mediasphere | Subscribe to SVW
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Comments (2)
Hey Tom, it's really odd, that we haven't crossed paths yet. I'm one of the co-founders of theWeblogWire.com, an online newswire that connects companies and their press releases solely with bloggers in a new media format. Everything you've been talking about: more dynamic text, video capabilities, podcasting/ audio additions, rss delivery,etc. We're launching this upcoming Monday, and have gained some good traction/ attention since announcing the project earlier this week. Integrating the new standards that it seems are being organized now, will be something we'll have our eye on very closely/ be waiting to integrate as soon as it is ready. Hopefully we can chat sometime soon, as we have tons to talk about. Our goal is to integrate the new standards decided about, as soon as they are agreed upon. Its truly awesome to see so many other people with the same goals and thinking that the current state of the press release, NEEDS to go. Thanks again, and I look forward to speaking soon.
Sincerely,
Jason L. Baptiste
Co-Founder of theWeblogWire.com
Posted: June 30, 2006 8:30 AM
Thanks for the post and for being a great proponent of this strategy, Tom. I have been following Todd's efforts on this for some time and as you suggested in your post, the Digital Influence team here at Ogilvy PR is already educating a number of our clients on how to use this model to help their press releases be found more easily, travel further, and encourage a dialogue rather than simply exist online as a fading monologue. Clearly, a press release posted online today is read and written about by a much broader audience than just members of the press.
Posted: July 5, 2006 3:09 PM