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● Introduction & Index ● What is PR ● Job Expectations ● Types of Media ● Building Relationships ● Media, Hams & FCC Rules ● The Basic News Release ● Interviews and Live ● Making your own show ● Easy P.R. ● Public Service Events ● Piggy-back to Events ● Pictures NOW! ● P.R. Research Aids ● Making Friends ● ARES® PIO ● Final Exam Information Next Page

What is a News Release? Quite simply, it is a communication from you as the person with information to someone at a news organization who needs stories to fill their daily news budget. Traditionally, they are written pieces that resemble the news stories you are accustomed to reading in your daily paper or have watched on the evening news. A good news release will tell your story in one or two well worded pages giving the reporter enough information to do the story or pick up the phone a call for more details. It will provide the W ho, W hat, W hen, W here, W hy and H ow of the event as well as Why this is important to the reader/viewer. Let’s start with the Who and What. They are something your club is doing: a public demonstration; licensing class; dinner; nursing home visits to get older hams back on the air; or it could be a feature on a club member who wrote a technical article; made a DX expedition; coordinated communication at a bike-a-thon. There are hundreds of other possibilities. Who and what are the hook you need to give the story some interest. Just as who and what are linked, When and Where are generally linked, as are Why and How. It is hard to have one without the other. Putting them together well gives news releases a better chance to be read and considered. Determination and practice as you begin writing news releases for your organization will lead to a more comfortable writing style and improved success at getting published. One more thing that is equally important, but is not considered part of the Who, What, etc., is the underlying principle of “What’s In It For Me?” This tenet applies to both you as the writer and the reporter. Commonly known as WII-FM, the reporter needs to see the value you are trying to present and you need to have a premise other than getting your organization in the press. For many writers, this is the hardest and most often overlooked part of “selling” your story.