Working with small businesses and nonprofits, I am often asked for advice on writing a press release that is sure to get picked up by worthy media outlets. For those new to writing press releases, here are 10 quick tips to ensure your success:

Tip #1 “Your press release must be newsworthy. You can't write a press release to say how great your company is without having a reason for saying so. OK, that's not entirely true. You can write a press release saying "ABC Company is the BEST widget maker in the world." However, news outlets won't listen. However, if you say "ABC Company was recently awarded a million dollar contract by the U.S. Government to make widgets", the media is much more likely to pick up your story.

Tip #2 “The first paragraph of your press release should summarize your news factually and succinctly. Leave out the modifiers like biggest, best, most sought after, etc. Keep it short and to the point. Details can be added in subsequent paragraphs.

Tip #3 “Dress up your press release with a pertinent quote from a company official or an industry expert. This not only adds credibility to the press release, but it is more interesting to read. It also provides media outlets with an additional contact name for further information.

You may want to know a bit of my advertising experience, I have been in the world of advertising for 6 years from cub copywriter to creative director. And I was privileged to attend a workshop conducted by Neil French, a well known advertising guru, I asked Neil to define advertising to me in one simple sentence and he in his flamboyant style answered me in one word: "Life!"

I agree with him totally because if you don't understand life it is very hard to be successful in advertising because advertising is about communicating well with people on your products and services to the extend that they just can't wait to get their hands on your products or use your services!

I love using acronyms to communicate my message and it makes it easy for you to remember the key factors or points. What Advertising means to you can be subjective too depending on what you were taught, experienced or have read about it. You can write a book on it, but I am only going to cover a little on the basic points. Let's agree on the fundamentals:

Most TV commercials you see, radio commercials you hear, training films, and more use the voice of a professional announcer. In the media industry, these much sought after voice pros are called Voice Over Talent.

A fine voice over talent can give you a warm, friendly read that not only entices prospects to take an interest in you, but effectively urges them to buy. A good voice can accentuate just the right words, stress the right phrases, and literally create an emotion in the listener.

In the past, many producers both large and small avoided working with top voice over talents because (1) they were hard to contact, (2) took weeks to finish the job, and (3) were very expensive.

The usual method was to contact an advertising or talent agency who set up a session with the voice over talent. Not only could this take days, weeks, or even months for some top talents -- the fee could range from several hundred to thousands of dollars and more.

What I'm about to reveal are myths that most people think are 'true.' They seem set in stone yet they are deadly to the advertiser.

I'm certain you'll be surprised. Certainly you may even doubt what I reveal to you. But I've discovered that these myths must *NEVER* be followed - unless of course you like throwing your hard earned money down the drain!

There are essentially five common 'Newspaper And Magazine Advertising Myths'

Before I go any further I have a proviso to what I'm about to reveal to you about advertising. Here it is:

PPC or pay per click forms the crux of an e commerce website. It is absolutely necessary to have well managed pay per click campaign right from the onset of the online marketing campaign.

Through a pay per click campaign, you are permitted to place your campaign's advertisements on the search engine and bid for your keyword accordingly. You do need to set up an ad words account in order to operate and run your PPC campaign on the search engine.

The AdWords you use in your PPC Campaign are keywords of your website. Using these keywords you have to make PPC advertisement which are then visible on the search engine pages. Most vital at this juncture is to use good quality keywords and advertisements which are highly relevant. It is through these key words your PPC campaign will enjoy increase traffic and sales.

I've had lots of good results from my advertising lately - well, I say advertising but what I really mean is, I've had lots of good results from my ARTICLES.

Writing so called 'press releases' is much more exciting than designing an advert. The results are better too, by far.

All I do is make it sound newsworthy and it seems to get used by the magazine(s) that I've sent the article to.

The thing is, most people think that their article would never be used - why would a publication be interested in me?. Well, they ARE interested in you, or rather, your story. You'd be surprised at how magazines and, especially, local newspapers are crying out for stories. A new business launch or a sudden improvement can well be newsworthy.

Even if it's not super exciting, it may well fill a space that the editor has and will be glad to see your article fill it. It will be of interest to somebody anyway.

If you're a typical small business, you've probably been approached by at least several different radio station sales representatives. In most cases, he or she comes armed with all the latest rating information demonstrating, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that his or her station is number one among just the kind of people who would buy your products or services. She or he will also probably stress how inexpensive radio advertising is vs. TV or even newspaper ads.

Yes, radio spots are cheaper that TV ads and often even cheaper than newspaper ads. But there area few things you need to think about before you sign that radio advertising contract. First, is yours the kind of business that can really profit from radio advertising? Radio commercials are very ethereal. Once the 30 or 60 second spot is over, there is nothing physical for your customers to hang on to. You have to depend on their ability to remember your message long enough to take some action, i.e., either call you or come to your place of business. This means you have to have a very strong and compelling advertising message. This could be a special, and I do mean special, sales event, or some other special promotion.

Many people cannot believe that I will not endorse yellow page advertising, however over my 27 years in business I have found yellow page advertising to be the most expensive and the least effective. Many small businesses just starting out will advertise in the Yellow Pages because they believe this will help their business and bring in new customers.

Sure, it will bring in some new customers but generally not the kind the customers you are looking for and not the customers, which are in a 10-mile radius of your business.

Those customers within a 10-mile radius will become your regular customers because you are close to their residence.

If you are in a metro area there will be other competition in the area and chances are your customers who call you from the Yellow Pages and stop in and will eventually find them and no longer use your business as it is too far away from them to partake in your products or services.