Increasingly in the show jumping community and other “niche market” groups, I see the same documents being used simultaneously as news releases and internal communications. In the show jumping community, these internal stakeholders might be horse owners, riders, members of the national federation, sponsors, or other interested parties. This approach makes it nearly impossible to satisfy the needs of all recipients.
I frequently see newsletter-style documents, complete with an invitation to subscribe, being used as news releases. Without question, the stakeholders and other interested parties in any sport want to hear promptly of anything that is newsworthy. But their needs are not the same as that of the media. It is hard to make a single document fill both needs.
A news release should be written in the language of sport, not in the lingo of a particular sport. It should contain only the essential information needed by a journalist, and not a lot of extraneous detail that will deter them from reading further. That extraneous detail, however, may be of great interest to those who understand the intricacies and want to know exactly how the news unfolded.
Maintaining an appropriate e-mailing list is one of the biggest tasks facing anyone who generates news releases. But that list should be targeted based on your publicity goals. Any interested party with an e-mail address is not good criteria for establishing your target market.
