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How to get the media to use your press release photos
Is it easy to get a picture published in the media?
This is a question I am often asked by companies with
a news item they wish to send out as a press release.
The quick answer is no it isn't.
However, that isn't to say it is impossible. We have
pictures published in the national and regional media
as well as the trade press on a regular basis and your
chances dramatically increase if you follow a simple
set of instructions. As a general rule of thumb, the
nationals are the hardest in which to have a photo
published while the regional dailies, weeklies and
trade press offer a far easier target.
The first and foremost thing to consider is whether
your 'news' is in fact newsworthy. The fact that you
have a new director or a new product is probably very
important to you, but will it be of interest to the
readers of all the publications you send it to?
Look very carefully at the audience you think will be
interested and the publications they are likely to
read. Having established this, take a look at those
publications and analyse the style of articles and
pictures they use. The closer you can match their
style, the increased likelihood of your article being
used. Is is often worthwhile using the services of a
professional copywriter to do this for you.
Break the mould
When analysing the style and type of pictures used,
especially in trade publications, be aware they are
only too often sent a boring head and shoulders shot
and a bog standard product picture. Because that is
all they are sent, that is what they end up having to
use. If you can offer them a picture that breaks this
mould and still meets their house style, they will
probably be only too happy to receive it from you.
Now you know what type of picture you need, choose a
photographer to shoot it for you. Just because you
have always used a particular photographer to shoot
your product shots for you, that does not mean he is
necessarily the right photographer to take this
picture for you. If he has a proven track record in
having pictures published in the media, that's great.
But if he hasn't, maybe it is time to look for someone
who does media work on a regular basis. If he doesn't
know what an IPTC field is then you should be looking
elsewhere.
Technical spec
On the subject of IPTC fields, they are simply hidden
fields embedded in an image which hold amongst other
things, caption and image title information. Recent
research has shown that 75% of images submitted to the
media fail to have completed IPTC fields and are
regularly rejected because they lack them.
These fields are easily completed using PhotoShop. The
File/File information menu will take you to the
required fields. If you do not have a copy of
PhotoShop, simply ask your photographer to fill the
fields for you.
The format of the photo is equally as important as the
content of the photo itself. Send it in the incorrect
format and it will rejected out of hand, or bounced by
the server. (This probably doesn't need saying, but do
not send prints or transparencies by snail mail.)
The 'print size' or dimensions of your photo should be
large enough to allow the publication to use it at a
decent size, but not so large it causes the file to
crash the journalist's mailbox. (This guarantees your
article will not be used!) I recommend the longest
side of the image should be 8 inches at 300dpi or 2400
pixels.
Save your image in RGB JPEG format. This is a whole
other topic which I will try to cover succinctly. The
JPEG format is a lossy format. This means it discards
image information to decrease the file size using a
complicated algorithm. You do not want to throw away
so much information, the image quality is degraded to
such a degree it cannot be used. But if you leave it
on the highest setting the file will probably be too
large for the email address of the publication to
accept. So you need to find a compromise. I recommend
a high quality/low compression setting of 10 or 11.
As you can see there is more to preparing an image to
send to the media than you might have originally
thought. If you are briefing a photographer, say you
want your 'final high res images to be 8" longest side
x pro at 300dpi, RGB JPEGS saved at JPEG 11
compression with completed IPTC fields'.
Talk it up
You should always telephone the publications in which
you want your article to appear before you email the
release and photo. Give them the bare bones of your
story and ask if they want more information. Tell them
you have a photo/photos available. Ask what email
address you should send it to. The address for the
photos will usually be different for national
newspapers, so it is especially important those IPTC
fields are filled in! Without them your photo and copy
will never meet again.
Given that your photo meets all the right technical
criteria, all you have to worry about now is how
important your story is compared to the others
competing for the space on the day, in the view of the
editorial staff. If your 'news' is not rated highly
enough then no matter how good your photo is, it has
little chance of being used.
Supposing your news angle is good enough and they want
to use your copy, they will then look at the picture.
It needs to run a separate gauntlet against all the
other photos the publication has available for that
page. They are extremely unlikely to run a photo for
every story so you really want your photo to beat the
competition in the creative photography stakes.
This is where all the aspects of the photo have to
come together. The publication will probably be
looking for a main photo for the page and then one or
more smaller supplementary ones for other stories. The
lead story nearly always goes 'above the fold' or at
the top of the page and that's where you want to be.
It is entirely possible your story may qualify as the
lead, but if the photo is lacking, your story will be
knocked back to a lower, less desirable position or
not make the page at all.
In conclusion, if your 'news' is good enough to be
published you should always send an imaginative photo
with the article which meets all the technical
specifications.
Good luck!
Written by Simon Apps, ex-press photographer and
founder of Professional Images. Professional
Images are specialist
PR
photographers providing PR and editorial photography and a full
photographic service to the business sector.
This article may be used freely provided a live URL
link is provided to
http://www.professional-images.com.
Used without the link, you will be breaching
copyright.
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