Blast to everywhere and nowhere. Why wire services shouldn’t be your sole B2B PR distribution strategy.

You’ve just written your latest B2B press release, guided it through the C-suite and legal, and you’re ready to distribute. Wire services promise a massive network of media outlets, they can meet SEC requirements for financial releases, and provide a quick (but short-lived) search engine result that may generate some backlink traffic to your content. Seems like an easy decision. Hit send and you’re done, right?

Not so fast. While wire services do have the capability to blast your release to thousands of outlets, there’s no guarantee that the editors will even read it, much less run it. Additionally, much of the “coverage” generated by wire service distribution is the result of automated postings to thousands of local papers, big and small, as soon as the release is received. The result is that your release will appear on the “Punxsutawney Spirit” (an actual newspaper) website, with little to no chance that one of your target audience will actually read it. These appearances are recorded as “coverage,” but do not reach your customers in any meaningful way.

Distribution does not equal coverage.

Whether it’s distributed from a wire service, PR firm, or a corporate email account a press release is considered owned media. This is content you created and are sharing with the world. Wire distribution is fine for financial statements and new hires, but the true goal of a press release is to generate earned media—where a third party validates your content by running it on their outlet, or, even better, using it to source an article that promotes the release topic. Earned media tells prospects that your message is real and newsworthy.

Turning owned media into earned media. Experience matters.

Media outlets receive hundreds to thousands of releases a day via general inboxes. Editorial staff has been drastically reduced at these outlets, so the chances of your release being read are slim.

This is where the services of a PR firm like BTB Integrated Marketing become valuable. A skilled PR team builds and maintains relationships with the editors at targeted media outlets. We know editors are over-worked, and we don’t waste their time. By only sending releases that fulfill the information needs of their audience, we build trust and credibility. They come to rely on us as a source of timely, well-written information that makes their job easier—and that turns owned media into earned media.

And lastly, never one and done.

A release should not be “send it and forget it.” A good PR person will continue to promote the release by looking for opportunities in the editorial calendar—your February product announcement may be a great fit for the article coming up in May. Let’s leverage that release into a featured quote. Or let’s home in on an element of the initial release that is now supported by user data and spin off a second release.

Don’t get us wrong, PR wire services have their place and can generate press or satisfy SEC requirements, but when you’re really looking to boost that earned media KPI, it takes a human touch.