THIS IS YOUR HEADLINE AND SHOULD GRAB PEOPLE’S ATTENTION

This summary paragraph is an elaboration of the headline in no more than four sentences. Now you’ve gotpeople’s attention you need to let them know very quickly what this is actually about before they go readingsome stuff that they’re not interested in.

City, State (FRONTEND) Date - This lead paragraph contains the most important information in no more than 25 words.Quite simply, state the news you want to tell people. This needs to be able to stand on its own in case the reader skippeddown to the start of the article. Include all your most important words here and in the previous bits. Do yourself a favourand add your web address here too http://frontend.gwonder.com so people can immediately give your release some con- text.Keep sentences short and to the point. In the first few paragraphs you want to answer all the questions - who, what, why,where, when, how. If you break it down like this it is easier for interested parties to cut and paste ideas from your releaseto create their own articles and stories. You could well be quoted word for word from this release, so make sure you writestuff you wouldn’t mind being repeated!Check your spelling and make your release is around 300 to 800 words before you submit it anywhere. There’s nothingthat makes you look more rubbish than having really stupid spelling mistakes in your releases.The best length for a headline is around 80 characters. Any more than that and you’ve probably not got the snappiesttitle. Be sure you include the most important news elements in the body of the release. It can be a good idea to write theheadline and summary last to make sure you haven’t said too much at the start. Only the headline should be in capitals.If you’re not going to use capitals, you should capitalize every word except for prepositions and articles of three charac-ters or less.All these other paragraphs are the filling out of the story. Quotes from band members, fans or anyone related to the story.You should fill in the details about the news you have to tell, and by using quotes you can bring your story to life. ‘It wasamazing’ said Julian Moore of Georgia Wonder’sFrontend blog, ‘Once I’d learned to write press releases the whole world was at my feet’. You can visit his site at: http://frontend.gwonder.com- and you should put links to your website just like this too.Typical topics include announcements of a new website, special offer, winning an award, being first at something, gettingon radio or tv, releasing some music on a format no one has invented yet, or a gig in a strange place like the wreck of theTitanic. You are not writing hype though - this is not a commercial. The people reading this are not your target audience -you are giving them the tools to create their own articles. If you are using I, WE and YOU too much then you are indanger of sounding too much like an advert. It’s OK when people are being quoted, but not that great in the body of yourrelease.DO NOT put an email address in the body of your release as it may screw things up with the spam bots, which could endup with your release not being delivered.Traditionally it has been normal for the last paragraph to be the least important. However, it’s become common practicelately to summarize the key points like so:For additional information about this amazing press release (or for a press pack or CD), contact Julian Moore or visitwww.gwonder.com.You could also put some other important details here like who looks after gig bookings, publishing etcAbout MY AMAZING BAND:Include a short “boilerplate” about the band. This could be your UPS (Unique Selling Point) or some other quick para-graph that sums your band up. If you don’t have one you really should make one up, and stick with it.Contact:Julian Moore, head of PR