With the ease of sharing information online on both local and international scales, it is easy to forget about some of the tried and true promotional methods that predate the internet and are still around. Press release marketing is one promotional tool that has been around for a long time and continues to help get news out to the masses. If you are doing creative work and want to increase your exposure, you can easily employ the use of press releases to help you gain a wider audience for your events.
When you have news about an upcoming art show, art auction, premier performance, book release, or other arts-related event, it is highly favorable to have a press release to submit to online newswire services. Newspapers and editorial programs often scour these sites in order to find leads for newsworthy stories about local events. Your event news item will be easily found by people using search engines once it has been distributed online. In this way a press release can lead to being discovered and highlighted by more than just visitors to the news site alone, it can also result in receiving a call or email from a newspaper editor for a special interest article or interview.
Having decided that a press release will help promote an upcoming art event there are many things to consider. Not only should it be concise, the content should both inform and intrigue. A reader should come away from your release knowing who you are, what, when and where Art of the Event event is and how it benefits them. Perhaps there will be a charity auction or a chance to win door prizes, maybe it is a free event that they could enjoy at their leisure by adding it to their calendars. Letting them know of the event is the first step, but enticing them by telling about how it will stand apart from other similar events is an important message to get across in a press release. Keep in mind that you do not want to make the content sound like a straight commercial; the idea is to passively advertise as a "for your information" type of short news article or blurb. If you are not able to create a press release yourself try finding someone you can hire to write and distribute it for you.
If you are a visual artist you should try to include a photo image of your work, or at the very least a link to your site with a gallery of images for people to view. This would give a preview or sample of what to expect. This also goes for writers, musicians and performance artists - an audio file, a few chapters of an ebook or a performance video can go a long way in making an impact on those reached by your press release. Be aware that there is an additional cost to have media included or linked on a newswire site as opposed to just the words, however, it could be well worth the money.
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