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After a railway accident in 1906, ad agency pioneer Ivy Lee decided not to wait for journalists to write the story. Instead, he proactively wrote the story and sent it to several newspapers from the perspective of his client, the Pennsylvania Railroad. The New York Times printed the news without a single edit.
According to Cision’s 2024 State of the Media Report, news releases remain the No. 1 type of content journalists want. Original research ranked second, followed by exclusive stories, access to events and expert interviews.
Times may have changed, but news releases, adapted for a digital-first world, are a key part of building your brand. Sent to local, regional and niche media directly or through distribution partners (Pioneer works with PR Newswire), news releases develop your brand’s online presence in a lasting way. They make your story easy for people, search engines and—as artificial intelligence grows in use–AI bots to find.
Where You Share News Impacts Your Reach
X, formerly Twitter, Facebook and other social channels might be helpful outlets for sharing news, but they should not be the only way you tell your story. Social media posts rely on algorithms to reach followers.
Imagine you’re at a big party. Social media is a noisy, crowded room where everyone’s talking at once. It can be hard to hear a person speaking to you. Algorithms are the DJ at the party. The DJ picks which songs (posts) to play based on what they think people will like. Sometimes, the DJ won’t play your song because it doesn’t fit the night’s theme.
AI is the party planner. It looks at everything, far beyond what’s happening in the noisy room. AI-powered bots scan quiet corners, read flyers on the wall and even look at old party photos. When you only post news on social media channels, you run the risk of AI missing your news.
Context is the core difference between yesterday’s web crawlers and modern AI indexing. Traditional web crawlers follow set rules to decide what to look at and what’s important. AI-powered crawlers can determine what content means, not just what words are there.
Keep these AI traits in mind:
- High intelligence: AI is getting smarter and learning to understand companies better, not only by what’s popular but by what is meaningful. AI does more than follow set rules. Bots learn patterns then improve. Regular algorithms are stuck with the same rules.
- Long memory: Unlike social media posts that people forget, AI remembers things for a long time.
- Wide reach: AI can help people find us even if they’re not at the social media party, and it looks at all information, not only what’s trending.
- Predictive ability: AI predicts which webpages have value before looking at them.
- Complex: AI understands complex websites, easily sifting through different languages and determines when a website tries to trick them.
Regular search algorithms are like following a map. AI crawlers are explorers. They learn the landscape as they go. They’re constantly getting more intelligent and efficient at finding and understanding information. This means AI can find more useful and relevant information than traditional crawlers, and it can do it faster and better.
News releases offer a great way to get AI’s attention. Try these eight share-worthy storytelling moments:
1. Share Wins
Our cooperative does awesome things, like helping people in the community or reaching big goals. We can tell everyone about it. It’s like giving our whole team a high-five in public!
2. Introduce Programs
Got a new product or service? A news release is a great way to say, “Hey, world, check this out!” It’s like throwing a party for a new idea.
3. Tell Your Story
Use releases to share why your utility or broadband service is special. Write about how the utility began or what sets the utility apart. Tell your company’s life story.
4. Showcase Experts
Share your knowledge and opinions on trending topics if something big happens in the community or industry.
5. Spotlight Team Changes
When someone new joins your leadership team or the utility creates a new position, let people know. It’s like introducing a new friend to the group.
6. Celebrate Milestones
Have you been in business for 75 years? Helped your 5,000th subscriber? Saved 1,000 MW of energy through the life of an efficiency program? Awarded $25,000 worth of scholarships over the years? Diverted 10,000 plastic water bottles from the landfill based on the water bottle filling station in the breakroom? That’s news release-worthy! Throw yourself a party. Having a big promotion or event? A news release sends a bunch of invitations all at once.
7. Announce Partnerships
We team up with cool companies or groups. This lets us spread the word. It’s like telling everyone about our new best friend.
8. Correct Mistakes
If there’s wrong information about your utility or broadband network in the community, set the record straight.
Need more ideas? Consider these out-of-the-box options:
- “A Day in the Life” stories
- Testimonials
- Community impact reports
- Employee spotlight series
- Behind the scenes of a project
- Future vision pieces
Remember, every time you share news, you’re helping your brand story grow. News releases help a wider network of people learn about you and what you do. And that’s good for everyone at your utility or broadband provider!