E-mail PR Tip #1 : Simple is good. Complex is bad, very bad.

I don't keep formal track of the number of press releases I see on a daily basis, but I know when I add press releases on top of correspondence with editors and multiple it by the hype of a major event, I get A LOT of press releases.

Many firms with in-house PR have mastered the art of concise when sending out press releases, using either text or HTML-style E-mail to send out their messages.

Text is good, HTML-text is almost as good. It is easily read/scanned, easily copied (you don't REALLY want me recopying all the technical details, do you?), and easily sorted through and processed. It also takes up less disk space and bandwidth.

"Less disk space and bandwidth? What kind of Luddite are you?"

Some people ASSume that the recipient will always have access to a broadband connection and the time/leisure to download everything and read it.  It's not a bad assumption, except I might be using--

1) A CrackBerry or PDA-like device
2) A laptop with limited/inhibited bandwidth, such as an oversatured hotel connection.
3) Webmail, because I didn't want to schelp around a laptop on my shoulder all day at a trade show.

In any of those examples, text is best. Come on. Say it with me. "Text is best."

But, NOOOOOO, not everyone likes SIMPLE. They send along Microsoft Word .DOC files or Adobe Acrobat .PDF files to ship out press announcements, sometimes 5 to 6 MB wonders with high-res JPEG pictures of new products that take minutes to download on shaky wireless connections or less-than-optimal hotel broadband connections.

Assuming I do download everything successfully onto the laptop. Now I've got to read it, and the simple, unfettered messages go zippy-zippy zippy, easily scanned.

Not so for Word and Acrobat files. It takes a couple of seconds for the appropriate program to fire up, seconds that I think "Damn it, what was so important that they had to use a .PDF file? I didn't need to see their letterhead/logo." Multiple that out by oh, a dozen press releases and it ends up to be a big time sink.

A number of very large and very successful companies use simple text for their press releases, both in e-mail and on their websites. Even Adobe Systems (www.adobe.com), the makers of Acrobat and the aforementioned .PDF files, publish press releases on their website in HTML format, allowing readers the OPTION to download a .PDF file.

Now, if Adobe is using HTML as the primary mechanism for press releases on their website, why shouldn't you/your client/your company?

Similarly, Microsoft, the creator of Microsoft Word, posts press releases in HTML on their website. (Cynics will say that Microsoft wouldn't be caught dead using .PDF; that's fine, but they don't post releases in .DOC format either).

IBM? HTML on the website.

Still, there are any number of, shall we say, smaller companies, that have been brainwashed by the in-house webmaster to do some sort of fancy JAVA pop-up window.  Go ask the webmaster how Google and other search engines can "discover" and index these fancy JAVA pop-up windows. Maybe you don't want to have your press releases indexed in Google so people can find them. But then, why would you go to the trouble of sending out a press release?

SUMMARY

E-mailed press releases

Text or HTML-text is good.
Microsoft .DOC Adobe Acrobat . PDF files attachments for sending out a press releases - BAD

Posting press releases on a website

HTML web page is good.
Microsoft .DOC, Adobe Acrobat PDF as only format for press releases on websites - BAD
Any fancy popup window - BAD, will likely be ignored by Google and other search engines.