I went to a Minnesota Interactive Marketing Association (MIMA) event this morning. The topic was writing for the web.I’ll admit that at first I wasn’t terribly excited about the topic. It seemed so basic, I was worried the subject matter would be a review of things I already knew.And while I did understand most of the information, the presentation was a good reminder of how we as professionals can effectively present information to clients.Writing Press Releases for the InternetI was most impressed this morning with Ginny Redish’s (the presenter and author of the best-selling book Letting Go of the Words – Writing Web Content that Works) explanation of how the Internet has effected writing press releases. She showed a great diagram depicting the differences between writing press releases for an online audience vs. an offline audience. I recreated the diagram below.

As you can see from the diagram above, before the Internet, press release writers were focused on writing releases that attracted the interests of journalists. The release had to be sent directly to the journalist and followed up with a phone call. In addition, if the release wasn’t timely, journalists didn’t care.Today, when a press release is written it should be posted online and optimized for Google search engines. The release will last as long as you post it and the general public reads it when they are interested in the information you have.In the ideal world, press releases would be pitched to the media and posted to your site. If you are really interested in the next generation of press releases, check out the social media press release pictured below. Click on the image below to enlarge it. 

The Social Media Press Release