Making magic happen – press releases – Lunad media and communication

I’m a blogger as well in my spare time (aren’t we all), and I get all manner of press releases in my inbox. Do you know what I do with 95% of them? Press delete.

Of course I’m not the only type of recipient when it comes to this kind of email, but when it all comes down to it, the key indicators of a successful press release, no matter the reader, are the same.

It should sell the story in the subject line so the recipient actually opens it.
The key image and leading paragraphs should convey an exciting and meaningful point.
Content should be engaging and informative.
Writing style should be easy to skim, but also comprehensive enough so that different recipients can translate the text to their own form of media with their own personal touch.

So, in the spirit of talking to my reader as above, I’ve mentioned all the key points already, so you can click off now. But, if you’d like a little more, read on to see me blast of an example press release, and link you to some other websites for more information.

I just plucked this out of my trash basket at random. This is why this press release, and all the other ones very much like it, fail on so many levels.

Subject: X Restaurant Set to Revolutionise The Vegetarian Dining Scene in Dubai

I saw this and didn’t even open it. It’s probably a lie, and the words are trite. It’s too long, and there’s no need to use capitals all the way through a sentence for a subject line in an email. Because I first read it on my iPhone, all I could see was “X Restaurant Set to Revolutionise Th…”, so I didn’t even pick up on the whole point of the restaurant being in existence.

Rewrite: Clever vegetarian street food at brand new restaurant X

Moving right along… Let’s assume that despite the terrible subject line, I open it.

X Restaurant Set to Revolutionise The Vegetarian Dining Scene in Dubai

Pan Asian Street Food Favourites are Going Vegetarian at this all-new Concept in Dubai

I’m then greeted with the exact same leading sentence in the header. This means that if I have a summary space inserted by my email provider, I just get the same twaddle in duplicate. The subheader has more or those dastardly capitals in sentences, misplaced hyphens, and another lie (street food and vegetarian restaurants, even pan-Asian ones are not a new thing in Dubai). And it’s one of those word salad sentences that lost meaning by the time I got to the end of it.

Rewrite: Chef xxx brings food stories from seven countries to Dubai

…And treats vegetarians while he is at it…

Now that’s got me in. There’s actually a reason the restaurant is different. It’s got a fairly famous chef who has travelled across Asia learning about local cuisine and adjusting the recipes to feed his friends, many of whom are vegetarian. His Asian name also hints at the origin of the food. (The press release doesn’t mention him until they get to the body text)

Now there’s a photo that doesn’t load, and a link to images.

Image link: For high res images, please click on the following link: https://blah.blah/blah

Don’t do that. At least not yet. Instead, give me a photo of this sexy young chef by a road in Vietnam eating something rustic and yummy. Make it small so it loads fast (landscape, not portrait so I don’t have to scroll through it). Link further images at the bottom and DON’T attach a series of images (this will cram my mailbox or be filtered by my spam bot.)

Body text:

Dubai, United Arab Emirates, October 2017: Located in the vibrant neighbourhood of XXX, X Restaurant is set to take the culinary scene by storm with its unique offering of the world’s most popular Asian street food, all perfected for the vegetarian palate.

As many Asian street food fans know, much of the traditional food from across the Asian continent contains fish, oyster or meat-based products, meaning vegetarians have had to miss out on some of the greatest dishes from the region. The brainchild behind the brand, celebrity chef XXX, travelled across Asia tasting his way through India, Myanmar, Thailand and Japan to name a few, to create an all vegetarian menu of dishes that taste as close as possible to their meaty counterparts.

“I have many friends who are vegetarian, who have been missing out on a whole world of amazing culinary fare, because no one has created vegetarian counterparts to some of the most amazing street food. I wanted to open up this world to the vegetarian palate so they could enjoy everything they have been missing out on.” says XXX, the brand’s founder.

X Restaurant’s menu will feature dishes from across 7 countries, which will include traditional Vietnamese ‘banh’, which is Vietnamese local bread. They have their roots in the French colonial period in France, but have a distinct difference to their Franco counterparts. Restaurant X offers up three delicious vegetarian ‘banh’ options including the ‘banh trang’, which are summer rolls of pad thai noodles and shredded cucumber with a ginger dipping sauce.

Further highlights to the menu include ‘100 Karat Gold Tempura’ – made using the finest tempura batter and sprinkled with the restaurant’s secret gold spice mix, a wide range of dumplings, pani puri, a delicious snack of crisp puffed balls filled with an irresistible spicy mixture, sushi and bao. A carefully crafted selection of mocktails include the palate cleanser ‘Barrel Blast’ – a smoky passion fruit chilli cooler concocted with a dash of tamarind, making it a must-try for those who need a soothing mocktail fix.

Geez, that was boring. A press release is supposed to be a marketing tool. It must educate, excite and should be designed to be replicated easily. You need to focus your talk on your point of difference and give the reader a reason to believe their readers in turn need to hear it.

Let’s break it down.

First paragraph: The date and place are fine, pretty standard for a press release, let’s leave them. The neighbourhood mentioned is low income and already full of Asian restaurants, not exciting information for a leading paragraph. A cheap-eats style restaurant can’t really take the culinary world by storm with cheap eats, and the rest of the words are more of that salad verbiage I mentioned previously. This paragraph should explain the header and subheader, be snappy and make the reader want to progress. This is probably where they should have put the chef’s quote, but shortened it, and knocked off the repetition.

“After tasting amazing, simple street food on my travels, I realised my vegetarian friends have been missing out. I’ve adapted some of my favourites from the traditional recipes I learned across XX, XX, India, Myanmar, Thailand, Japan and Vietnam, and I’m opening Restaurant X to bring them to light.” Founder, Chef XXX

(The last two countries are not mentioned in the press release – another mistake.)

Now you’ve given me your raison d’être, the central paragraphs should explain the offer in detail. Let’s go back to year four English, and look at the five Ws – when, where, what, why, who.

1. When should be first – the date is mentioned above, but we also need to know when the restaurant is going to open, because, after all, that’s what the news is supposed to be about. Let’s merge that with where, and throw in a little marketing reasoning (the vegetarian population is true – it’s an area densely populated with Hindus, Jains and Buddhists).

Restaurant X opens on October 15, 2017. Chef xxx has chosen the neighbourhood of xxx to bring his range of vegetarian dishes to Dubai; He saw a gap in the market for its large proportion of vegetarian residents, and its vibrancy and cultural diversity makes it the perfect place to serve up authentic Asian flavours.

2. Let’s now go into what. I won’t elaborate here (mainly because the original press release did not, so I have no idea what to write), but this is where the restaurant ambience and design should be mentioned. I want to know how big it is, if it has a bar or outdoor seating, who designed it, and what the general feel is (e.g. contemporary, rustic, classy, simple – but don’t use those words, be expressive).

3. Next, we’ll go a bit further with “what” by going into the menu in a little more detail, isolating the difference in Restaurant X’s offer. Ideally you would not highlight something as basic as bread unless the restaurant has its own onsite fandangled bakery. Personally, I’d want to read about how he has adjusted some particular recipes that famously include meat. Mention points that draw interest (e.g. ‘100 Karat Gold Tempura’, because anything gold in Dubai will sell), but don’t flow them into a large list – describe them properly (tempura what?) and don’t throw meaningless words in there (e.g. “finest” when referring to batter mix). Considering there are seven countries mentioned, you might want to take a recipe from each country.

4. We should expand on who and why, because we only touched on this for the leading paragraph. The conclusion is a good point to put this in. I’d want a mini-CV on the chef here, and his mission for the future of the restaurant.

Don’t worry about the number of paragraphs, just their length – keep them snappy. If you were going to lose your reader, they’re gone by now anyway, anyone still with you at this stage in the piece is looking for how they will be tailoring your information to their publication.

Layout

This email, like most received from this particular company’s mailouts, appears as plain text with a Word file and two images attached. Plain text is fine for a press release, as it keeps the weight of the email low, but if you’re going to attach files anyway, then what’s the point? Consider linking further information (e.g. to a WE transfer file or place the press release in a folder on the company website) rather than attaching it, and using the extra kilobytes to insert a meaningful and evocative image in the opening spaces.

Don’t forget to use size and bold face for the most important elements of the text – headers are a given, but also consider your most important paragraph. Making words pop with fontwork is a little old hat for a press release but don’t discount it – this can make paragraphs easy to skim, and when you need to get an impression across to someone who has 100 similar emails to wade through, it makes the going fast.

Lunad media and communication

colourful creative from collective grey matter