Authors: Is it worth putting time and money into media releases?

As an author, you’re likely looking for as much visibility for you and your book(s) as possible. There are countless ways to achieve your outcome. One is with press releases aka media releases.

Yet, many authors never consider adding media releases into their marketing mix.

If you’re not using the power of media releases in your marketing, you may be missing lots of opportunity.

Paid vs FREE

There are many ways to get traction for your efforts. There are free services you can distribute to, but their reach may be minimal.

There are plenty of paid services that will get you lots of traction, but if you’re on a budget, this may not be the way to go.

With my last book launch, I got great results from PRWeb.

My releases were picked up by thousands of outlets.

However, there is a cost for the service.

This can be cost prohibitive for anyone on a budget, but the reach may be worth reconsidering your budget restrictions.

What’s Your Time Worth?

The first thing to determine is what your time is worth. If you have more time than money, manually distributing your releases may be your best bet.

However, if you have a budget, using services that get your release on the newswire are a great option.

The fastest way to get your media release out on the wire is to use a service like PRWeb. There are also industry specific services that can get you in front of the right media in record time.

A quick Google search will bring up services in a variety of industries.

You can search on virtually any industry to see what’s available.

Before jumping into paying for distribution, do your due diligence. Check with others in that industry to determine if the investment is worth is.

Local Media

If you plan to do local book signings, your local media can be the way to go.

Local media includes:

• Daily newspapers
• Weekly publications
• Monthly magazines
• Radio stations
• Television

When sending media releases to local media, you need to send in a timely fashion. Weekends are usually not the best time to send out your information.

How to Send Your Release

In days past, you had to fax or snail mail your information. Today, you can often post directly to the website of the media outlet.

Avoid sending your press release in an email blast. Authors mistakenly believe that sending their press release to the greatest number of people possible—journalists and non-journalists alike—is the best way to increase the likelihood that they will get “picked up” by the media.

This is not true.

It’s better to send to a smaller number of very targeted people rather than blasting a bunch of people who could care less about what you are doing.

You can also distribute to groups on social media sites such as Facebook and LinkedIn. Twitter is another viable source to post information about your book.

Writing The ReleaseThe bottom line is this; media releases do work and need to be a part of your overall marketing plan.

Take time to write media releases in order to get more visibility for your books.