Arizona Press Release Service

Reach 115 newspapers in Arizona

We can deliver your press release via e-mail to Arizona newspapers within hours of receiving your release. Press releases are distributed separately from the other ANA information and are clearly marked as press releases.

Get your message out to the public now! Click here to print an order form and see how the Arizona Press Release Service can benefit you.

For more information, contact Sharon Schwartz at (602) 261-7655 ext. 108.

Press Release Archive

Date Release
9-1-09 5th Annual Real Estate Investing – Making it Work for You! Conference and Expo
8-24-09 FBC Music Fest 2009
8-4-09 From ironman to aquaman: One Arizonan qualifies for world triathlon championship | (photo)
7-21-09 SLOAN opening Phoenix branch
7-16-09 Tombstone HW Brand Heavy Duty Brown Feeders | (photo)
7-6-09 Vigil on July 9 for U.S. journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee
7-6-09 Jim Painter elected president of International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors | (photo)
6-30-09 Arizona State Treasurer, Dean Martin, to Address Real Estate Investors
6-23-09 August 8 is LaidOffCamp Phoenix
6-23-09 NIATx and the State Associations of Addiction Services will host annual summit in Tucson
6-8-09 Debut novel explores eternal mysteries in Arizona town
6-8-09 Universal Insurance Holdings of North America To Purchase ICAT Specialty Insurance Company
6-1-09 The Nackard Companies Celebrate 75 Years by Giving to the Museum of Northern Arizona’s Endowment
- Photo | Caption

What is a press release?

The press release is the standard device for conveying the basic who, what, where, why, and when of your story to the outside world via the news media. If your release is clear, straightforward, and free of unnecessary words and details, it may be printed verbatim by a small, short-staffed local newspaper. In most cases, however, an interesting press release will serve as a point of departure for the journalist. It arouses curiosity and furnishes the basic information for a good story. So that a reporter can call you for a quote or other help in writing the story, be sure to put your name and phone number at the top of the page "for further information."

It?s equally important to know when you should not issue a press release. Think twice when someone in your organization, in a rush of enthusiasm or in the heat of panic, announces that "we need to get out a press release on that!" Before you race to your word processor to share some allegedly earthshaking news with the rest of the world, stop in your tracks, take a deep breath, and ask these kinds of questions:

What do we hope to accomplish by getting out a press release? Who, outside our organization, really cares? Is it truly newsworthy? Will the resulting press coverage (if any) help us? Can we accomplish our purpose better in another way?

The problem with sending out a humdrum press release, and most of them fall in this category (and into the wastebasket unread), is that you are not only wasting your own time, paper, and postage. You are also wasting the time of the person on the receiving end who opens and scans such mail. In so doing, you deflate your organization?s currency with the news media. If you cry News! too many times when you have no real news to report, you may not get the attention you deserve when you do have something significant to say.

Definition courtesy of the Mississippi Press Association.

General press release guidelines

  1. Keep it simple, clear, and direct. That?s a lot easier said than done, but it can be done if you put yourself in the place of your reader.
  2. Try to engage your reader from the start with a catchy lead paragraph.
  3. Get to the point and then elaborate on it, with increasingly less important details in the paragraphs that follow.
  4. Be sure of your facts. A reporter, columnist, or editorial writer must be able to depend on you for accurate information.
  5. If you can do so legitimately, convey a sense of urgency without being histrionic, perhaps through a quote from the head of your organization.
  6. Go easy on quotes, however, and if you use them, be sure they sound like something a real person would say. (Most quotes in press releases are preachy and stilted.)
  7. Avoid jargon of any kind, especially legal and computer jargon.
  8. Leave no important question unanswered. Assume that your reader has never heard of your organization or cause and has little or no familiarity with your subject.
  9. Favor short sentences over long ones. When you do use a long sentence, try to follow it with a short declarative one.
  10. Stick to the essential details. Don?t try to be all-inclusive.
  11. Be sparing in the use of acronyms. When you do use one for the first time, be sure it appears parenthetically after the full name of whatever it represents.
  12. Limit your release to one or two pages, preferably double spaced for easy reading and editing.
  13. Include visual aids when you can. A photocopied map, photograph, or other illustration can add interest to your release.
  14. Have a friend, preferably one not involved in your organization, read the release to be sure it is interesting, understandable, and free of typographical errors and misspellings.

Be neatly professional (not sloppily amateurish) by producing a clean, clearly printed, easy-to-read press release.

Guidelines courtesy of the Mississippi Press Association.