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“Unriddled” is HubSpot’s mid-week digest of the tech headlines you need to know. Each week, we highlight the top stories in a quick, scannable way and break it all down. It’s tech news: explained.

Unriddled: The Tech News You Need

1. News From Google

The Latest in Location Tracking

Last week, a report from the Associated Press (AP) emerged revealing that Google has been tracking the location of Android and iOS device users — even those who had Location History turned off. (Here’s what happened when I looked at what Google was tracking on me.)

And while Google hasn’t stopped this tracking per se, it has revised its Location History settings management support page, according to a subsequent AP report — noting that “This setting does not affect other location services on your device [and] some location data may be saved as part of your activity on other services, like Search and Maps.”

But that hasn’t exactly stopped the fallout — and a complaint was filed last Friday accusing Google of false claims that users won’t be tracked with “Location History” turned off. Jonathan Stempel of Reuters has more. Read full story >>

The Political Ad Archive

Back in May, Facebook unveiled its political ad archive: a searchable database of any ads of political nature, both active and inactive, published after May 7, 2018.

Now, Google has appeared to follow suit with the launch of its own political ad archive last week, which will include any advertisement for a candidate — including incumbents — running for a federal elected office.

The database includes such ads that ran on Search and YouTube, as well as other Google platforms, but does not include issue-based ads that often spark debate during elections. David McCabe of Axios has more. Read full story >>

The Display-Enabled Smart Speaker Cometh

I’ve written my fair share on smart speakers. I’ve quoted our experts on how to optimize for voice search, I’ve tried using three smart speakers at once, and I’ve waxed philosophical on the future of voice shopping.

Now, Google is throwing its hat into the ring of smart speakers that are also equipped with visual displays. It began, some might say, with the Amazon Echo Show, which was released slightly over a year ago and boasts capabilities like hands-free video calling and a touchscreen. (How that sets it apart to similarly-equipped mobile devices or Smart TVs, well — that’s a conversation for another day.)

According to Cheng Ting-Fang and Lauly Li of Nikkei Asian Review, Google’s version will come equipped with the company’s Assistant, as well as the ability to use voice commands to play YouTube videos, check schedules, and look at maps. The smart speaker is rumored to be making its official debut in time for the holiday season, as many new tech products do following fall press events. Read full story >>

2. A Sneak Peek at Rumored New Apple Products

Speaking of potential fall product announcements: Apple is rumored to be unveiling a new, low-cost MacBook this year — most likely in October, write Mark Gurman and Debby Wu of Bloomberg.

The move is said to be one of Apple’s attempts to breathe new life into its MacBook sales, which the company says hit its lowest point since 2010. Along with the potentially low-cost MacBook, Apple might also debut a “pro” version of its Mac mini desktop.

These product announcements are expected to come alongside new iPhone releases (three of them, no less), Apple Watches, and iPad Pros. Read full story >>

3. Amazon Goes to the Movies

Amazon might be a top contender for the acquisition of Landmark Theaters: a chain of brick-and-mortar movie theaters that specialize in screening independent films.

When looking at Amazon’s historical foray into independent production — typically in the form of exclusive shows available to its Prime members — the potential acquisition makes sense. The company has also produced its own independent films, and ownership of such a theater chain could create greater distribution opportunities for Amazon as well.

In addition, Amazon is said to be developing a DVR-like advice that would record live television, save it to Fire TV boxes, and stream what’s been recorded to users’ smartphones. Read full story >>

4. Facebook’s Continued Content Moderation Problem

Reuters published a special report last week on Facebook’s ongoing struggle to curb violence-inciting hate speech on its platform in Myanmar. 

Previous reports — including one from The New York Times in April — indicated that Facebook was being used to incite violence against the Rohingya, a Muslim minority group in Myanmar.

A United Nations investigator confirmed this — and months later (after Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg claimed the company was hiring more Burmese-speaking content reviewers to help tackle the problem), Reuters discovered more than 1,000 posts, comments, and images on Facebook targeting the Rohingya, as well as other Muslim communities. 

Facebook provided its own update on the situation — acknowledging that it had been “too slow” to sustainably resolve the problem — and created a “dedicated team across product, engineering and policy to work on issues specific to Myanmar earlier this year.” The post went on to list the successes the company has experienced in this area, including its alleged proactive identification of 52% of Myanmar-related content removed for hate speech in Q2 2018.

The European Commission, meanwhile, is currently looking into imposing fines on social media networks that allow extremist or terrorist comment to remain on their sites for over one hour.

Despite its efforts to add greater transparency and authenticity to its advertising products and practices, Facebook seems to be experiencing more and more scrutiny for all of the content — paid or not — appearing on its site.

According to The New York Times, the company is under fire for its microtargeting ads, and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has filed a complaint against Facebook for allowing discrimination in targeted ads related to housing.

Meanwhile, Facebook yesterday announced its discovery of another coordinated election interference campaign on its network, and the removal of 652 Pages, groups and accounts related to it. We’ll be reporting on that campaign in more detail this week. Read full Reuters report >>

That’s all for today. Until next week, feel free to weigh in on Twitter to ask us your tech news questions, or to let us know what kind of events and topics you’d like us to cover.

I’ve heard multiple people declare Adobe Fireworks the “Swiss Army knife” of design software, and after doing my research, I’ve come to believe it.

A Swiss Army knife is capable of meeting most of your demands, but its simplicity makes it less of a burden than carrying around the tools individually.

Adobe Fireworks is much like that — it provides versatile features to create website mockups, vector art, and interactive prototypes, but its simple interface makes it quicker and easier than other design software like Adobe Illustrator.

Many users assume Adobe Fireworks is simply a starting point for creative projects, but that isn’t necessarily the case. Here, we’ll explore the six great ways designers can use this software as a fully fledged design tool all its own.

Adobe Fireworks CS6

Adobe Fireworks CS6 provides tools for web designers to create mockups or graphics for web pages. Once you’ve created a design or prototype in Fireworks, you can export it as single-page or multi-page PNG file. Additionally, you can further edit Fireworks code in Dreamweaver, Coda, or another code editor. Fireworks also offers a variety of extensions.

A Fireworks file can be exported to JPG, GIF, PNG8, PNG24, PNG32, TIFF, and other graphic formats, making it more versatile than Photoshop for exporting options. You can also compress a file for iPad or iPhone.

Basic features of Adobe Fireworks include:

• The tools to create and edit bitmap and vector images or objects
• The ability to create web effects on a web page prototype, including rollovers and pop-up menus
• The option to animate your graphics
• Pre-built custom templates for website mobile, desktop, or web frames to get started with your next design project
• The ability to create an animated GIF

For a comprehensive list of everything you can do in Adobe Fireworks, check out Adobe Fireworks CS6 PDF manual.

Why You Should Use Adobe Fireworks

Now that we’ve explored basic features of Adobe Fireworks, let’s consider six great ways you can use the software for your own design purposes.

1. Design Realistic and Interactive Website Mockups

If you need to show a client how their website will look in-action, Fireworks provides all the necessary tools. You can create buttons, navigation bars, master and sub pages, and add text, symbols, and images. If your design team works in Illustrator or Photoshop, you can import designs from those applications into Fireworks. Your web pages will be editable in both vector and bitmap modes. Plus, you can create interactive prototypes to simulate how the design will interact with a user. When you’re ready to show a client, simply export your Fireworks design as a PDF.

If you typically use Dreamweaver to create web pages, it’s easy to use Fireworks in conjunction. Dreamweaver has a command for importing Fireworks HTML, so you can move back and forth between the two to create your ideal web pages or graphics.

2. Create Vector Art

Fireworks offers a comprehensive collection of vector-based objects and shapes, such as polygons and flow charts, to provide everything you need for most vector editing tasks. You can easily modify a vector object, and you might find Fireworks an easier user interface than Illustrator for vector creation.

If you’re considering a logo redesign for your own company or a client’s, Fireworks makes it easy to experiment with different vector graphics to create an icon that suits your needs.

3. Use it for Online Designs

Matthew Inman, an illustrator and designer, prefers to use Fireworks over Illustrator or Photoshop when designing The Oatmeal’s online comics. If you need to create illustrations or designs for your website, you might consider checking out Fireworks rather than Photoshop, especially since Fireworks is a cheaper and sometimes easier alternative.

4. Create Print Materials or Organize Your Print Layout

As long as you modify your artwork’s resolution in Fireworks, you can print your designs for posters, flyers, business cards, etc. It might be a good idea to use Fireworks as your design tool for print promotional materials, particularly if you want to A/B test your products and need a cheap and easy method to do so.

If you need your print materials to be higher quality than Fireworks offers, you can still create an initial layout in Fireworks to organize your text and images on the page and experiment with different designs before creating the final version elsewhere.

5. Design Animated GIFS

While Fireworks isn’t inherently an animation software, it can meet your basic needs for creating an animated gif. You can either use the gif as a website graphic, or export the gif into a Flash player.

Creating an original animated gif might be a creative way to attract an audience to your social media accounts, as well. Check out Total Training’s tutorial if you’re interested in creating an animated gif in Fireworks.

6. Collect Design Objects

One of the easiest ways to avoid tedious repetition when it comes to your design is to use Fireworks’ Symbols panel to collect your most popular design objects and store them. For instance, you might save a company logo in the Symbols panel to use across multiple web pages, or save a vector image you often use. When you’re ready, simply click, drag, and drop your saved design anywhere on your Fireworks page.

Even though they’re over 25 years old, PDFs are still one of the main types of documents on the internet. Whether you’re trying to access your W-2, a contract, or an eBook, it’ll probably be in the form of a PDF. But to view these important documents, you need to download a PDF reader on your computer.

There are hundreds of PDF readers and some can cost you almost a thousand dollars per year, so we sifted through the internet to find the best free PDF readers that you can download online.

Below, we created a list of 15 of the best free PDF readers whose capabilities range from only viewing PDFs to creating, editing, and securing them.

The 15 Best Free PDF Readers

The 5 Best Free PDF Readers for Windows and Mac

1. Foxit Reader

Image Credit: Foxit Reader

Foxit Reader is like the Google Docs of PDF readers. You can create, share, and secure your PDFs all on the cloud. To create PDFs, you can upload scans, convert Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, and Excel sheets, and even combine multiple PDFs into a new file.

If you want to collaborate with someone on a PDF, you can grant and revoke document access, track who opens your document and view their activity, edit, comment, and also notify readers about new updates to your PDF.

Foxit reader also provides multiple security options to keep your PDFs safe and private, like passwords, digital signatures, and encryption. If you create PDFs regularly for your job and need a way to collaborate on the same file, Foxit would be a good option.

2. Adobe Acrobat Reader DC

Image Credit: Top Best Alternatives

Adobe’s free PDF reader, Adobe Acrobat Reader DC, connects to the Adobe Document cloud and other cloud storage systems like Box, Dropbox, and Microsoft OneDrive, letting you open, view, share, and comment on PDFs from anywhere and on any device you want.

Acrobat Reader DC coolest feature is that it can read text out loud, guiding you along any document that’s challenging to read. Adobe’s free PDF reader is great for any busy professional who needs to annotate PDFs on the go or on their commute.

3. Javelin PDF Reader

Picture Credit: Drumline Security

Javelin PDF Reader is a straightforward PDF reader that lets you launch and print standard and encrypted PDFs, annotate them, and bookmark them. Since its download size is two MB and it doesn’t have extra features like editing, the PDF reader is fast with a simple and clean user interface. If you want to read and take notes on PDFs quickly, Javelin is probably the PDF reader for you.

4. Google Drive

Google Drive is the most accessible PDF converter and PDF storage system. On the platform, you can convert any of your documents, presentations, and sheets into PDF files and upload any PDFs to it for your own viewing purposes. If your only use for PDFs is viewing them or converting files into them, Google Drive is the best option for you.

5. Your Web Browser

Web browsers like Google Chrome, Firefox, and Safari all have integrated PDF readers. To view a PDF on your browser, all you have to do is click on the PDF link. You can also open PDF files that are already stored on your computer by dragging them to an open tab in your browser.

Additional features included in most browsers’ PDF readers are rotate, download, print, and adjust text size. If you don’t need to convert files into PDFs and you only need to view PDFs, you don’t need to download a PDF reader. You can just use your web browser.

The 5 Best Free PDF Readers for Windows

1. Nitro Reader

Picture Credit: Techworld

Nitro Reader has a reputation for striking a good balance between usability and advanced features. The platform has an intuitive and slick interface, but you also have access to a wide variety of tools to create, review, secure, and share PDF files. To create new PDFs, all you have to do is drag and drop your documents into the reader. Then, you can design your PDF draft with custom colors, font embedding, and orientation.

When you want to review a document, the PDF reader’s review pane helps you edit, comment, and address feedback. To secure your PDF files, Nitro Reader uses QuickSign to password-protect and sign your documents. Sharing documents is also simple and secure — you can share documents with anyone since the PDFs you create in Nitro Reader are compatible with almost every other PDF reader. If you’re a PDF power user, Nitro Reader could be your best option.

2. PDF-XChange Editor

Picture Credit: Tracker Software

PDF-XChange Editor is one of the more robust free PDF readers out there. You can create, view, add notes, record and attach audio, highlight text, attach files, strikethrough words, and add signatures. But the PDF reader’s coolest feature is its Optical Character Recognition tool — it can scan printed documents and convert the text into a searchable document. If you need to create, edit, and share PDFs at work a lot, PDF-XChange Editor could be the PDF reader for you.

3. MuPDF

Picture Credit: Stack Overflow

MuPDF is a standard PDF reader for viewing and editing PDF files. You can fill out text forms, annotate documents, and use it to convert PDF files into other file types like HTML, SVG, and CBZ. You can also write scripts in Javascript to alter your documents. If you want a low-memory PDF reader that you can easily edit and view files on, MuPDF is your best option.

4. SumatraPDF

Picture Credit: Sumatra PDF

Even though SumatraPDF lacks some advanced features like annotation, document signing, and form-filling, Sumatra PDF provides an intuitive and fast reading experience — it has multiple viewing modes like single page, book, and presentation and shortcuts that help you navigate any PDF file. If you just need to read PDFs for work, consider using SumatraPDF.

5. Slim PDF

Picture Credit: Softpedia

Slim PDF says its the smallest PDF reader in the world, taking up just 1.43 MB of space on your computer, so it loads documents almost instantly. But since it’s so tiny, its core functionality is very basic — the PDF reader’s most advanced features are search, print, and rotate. If the only thing you do with PDFs is view them, Slim PDF could be a good choice.

The 5 Best Free PDF Readers for Mac

1. PDF Reader Premium

Picture Credit: App Advice

With over 50 million downloads, PDF Reader Premium is one of the most popular PDF readers for Apple Devices. It has powerful functionality that lets you view your PDF in multiple tabs, annotate your document with images and sticky notes, organize your files with tags, sign signatures and fill out forms on your PDF, and store and transfer PDFs through a variety of cloud services. Anyone who frequently uses PDFs for work should consider downloading PDF Reader Premium.

2. Preview

Picture Credit: iMore

Even though Preview is the pre-installed PDF reader on every Mac, it’s more powerful than you think. On Preview, you can view and annotate your documents, combine documents, fill out and sign forms, edit images, share files, and even export a password protected PDF, if there’s sensitive information on your document. Preview is the best choice for someone who wants to use one PDF reader for personal and professional matters.

3. Skim

Picture Credit: Organizing Creativity

Skim is PDF reader that was originally designed to help academics read and annotate scientific papers in PDF format, but they’ve now improved their functionality to let anyone view any type of PDF file on the reader. On Skim, you can highlight text, take notes, take snapshots, export notes as text, and integrate with third party apps like BibDesk, a bibliography manager.

4. Soda PDF

Picture Credit: Soda PDF

Soda PDF is one of the best PDF readers for reading visual documents like digital catalogues, magazines, and comic books — you can even view files in 3D. The app also lets you create and edit PDFs from scratch. Soda PDF sells an online PDF platform too, so they drive demand for it by offering free PDF tools on their website like convert to PDF, convert from PDF, merge, split, & compress, sign & secure, and insert elements like watermarks and page numbering. You can use these online tools as a proxy for a downloadable PDF reader if you want to save space on your computer.

5. Haihaisoft Reader

Picture Credit: TopAppsLike

Haihaisoft Reader is a fast, low memory PDF reader. It’s only three MB, so it has basic functionality like rotate, full screen, presentation mode, search, and zoom. Even though it’s small, it still supports over 40 languages and has high security — it only connects to the internet with the user’s permission. Haihaisoft is best for casual PDF users.

When it comes to content, sometimes old school can be a good thing (namely, when it comes to old-school rap or Throwback Thursday on Instagram). But when it comes to your company’s public relations strategy, being old school isn’t advantageous for your business or your brand.

Ten years ago, people still relied on morning papers for news. Today, the vast majority of your company’s customers and prospects scan headlines on Twitter or see what’s trending in their Facebook feed.

People now have control over where, when, and how they consume information. As a result, public relations is no longer about feeding into a traditional news cycle; it’s about providing relevant content when, where, and how your prospects, influencers, and customers will consume it.

Sounds pretty hopeless, right? Wrong. While relationship-building still helps you get into popular publications, we now have the opportunity to quit playing the waiting game and generate our own buzz. By turning your PR strategy into an inbound one, you create opportunities that weren’t there before and carve out a place for your company, building meaningful mindshare with your target audiences in the process.

One of the most crucial updates to make to your PR strategy is to think of press releases as an opportunity to connect to the audiences you care about — including, but not limited to, reporters.

What Is a Press Release / News Release?

A regular cadence of meaningful news can help a company stand out and build mindshare with journalists over time. That’s where the press release (or news announcement) comes in.

A press release is an official announcement (written or recorded) that an organization issues to the news media and beyond. Whether we call it a “press release,” a “press statement,” a “news release,” or a “media release,” we’re always talking about the same basic thing.

While the heading should contain action verbs, the first paragraph should answer the “who,” “what,” “why,” and “where.” The press release should also contain understandable language and a quote.

Most press releases are succinct at just a page long — two pages, tops. Ultimately, companies want to provide enough information so that news outlets have sufficient material for publishing their own stories about whatever the company is announcing in the release.

And while it may be tempting to craft a press release that embellishes your company’s accomplishments or twists the facts to make a story sound more intriguing to the media, remember: Press releases live in the public domain, which means your customers and prospective customers can see them. So instead of thinking of a press release solely as a ticket to earning news coverage, you should also think of it as a valuable piece of marketing content.

You’ve got your announcement in mind, and now it’s time to get it down in words to share with your community, industry, and followers.

Take Catbrella Inc., a fictitious ad agency, which just gained its 10th Twitter follower after two years of paid social media efforts. To announce its achievement, Catbrella could issue a press release like the one we’ve broken down for you below.*

Sample Press Release Format

Rule 1: Make your headline irresistible.

Just like writing the perfect blog post title, setting up your press release for success starts with your headline. You only have one line to work with, which can seem scary, but consider diction carefully to make your headline captivating.

Use action verbs, clear, understandable language, and keep your headline simple and short — fortune (and search engines) reward the brief, so keep your title to one line to clearly focus people’s attention on your topline message.

Most importantly, make it interesting: Keep in mind that reporters get dozens, if not hundreds, of releases each day, so invest the time to write a compelling headline. It’s worth the time and effort on your part.

Rule 2: Convey the news’s value to the press.

For reporters, analysts, influencers, or followers to be inclined to share your announcement, you have to tell them upfront why they should care.

The first paragraph of your release should cover the who, what, why, where, and how of your new launch, update, or development. Reporters don’t have a ton of time to sift through details and fluffy background information — they just need the facts that’ll help them tell your story to someone else from a position of authority.

There shouldn’t be any new, crucial information covered after this section that the reader could potentially miss.

Rule 3: Offer a tempting quotable.

Once you’ve set the scene, it’s time to bring your details to life with a quote that reporters can use for context around your announcement and help paint a picture of how your news affects the given industry, customer base, and landscape.

Ideally, quotes will be from key stakeholders in your company including your executive team, project leads, or those directly impacted by your announcement. Quoting key figures and authorities underlines the importance of your development. The chosen quote should shape your narrative and emphasize the core of the announcement. Don’t ask everyone in your office for a comment or feel compelled to quote all 25 people included in the acquisition — pick one or two critical spokespeople and focus the quotes around their unique perspective.

Rule 4: Provide valuable background information on the subject.

In this last paragraph, keep in mind that the reader already has all of the vital details and information they need to file a story or spread the word.

It can be tempting to provide superfluous facts and tidbits about your company or the development of your announcement — we sometimes think a piece of writing is lacking if it isn’t drawn-out and just shy of being a novella. However, a press release needs to be helpful and concise.

Offer details here that strengthen your narrative, like creative or noteworthy ways your company developed the project or announcement at hand. Or, when applicable, comment on future implications of your announcement.

Rule 5: Summarize the “who” and the “what” in a boilerplate.

Twitter is chock-full of reporters lamenting press releases or pitches that don’t clearly explain what the company does or what the announcement is actually about, so instead of being the butt of a joke, make your release incredibly easy to reference.

Describe what your company does in clear, plain English, include a link to your company’s homepage early on, and make your boilerplate succinct and straightforward. If you cite data, include a reference link for the data source, and make sure every name in the release has an associated title and company as well.

To keep yourself honest on this front, ask a friend or colleague to read the release without context and ask if they can easily and readily explain why the announcement matters, what your company does, and why the executives included are quoted. If the answer to any of those questions is no, get back to the drawing board.

The key to keeping your PR strategy new school is forgetting preconceived notions of what public relations is and instead focusing on creating highly remarkable content. Traditional press releases can still be really valuable when executed well, so instead of ditching releases as a tactic, give them a modern makeover to make them more useful for your marketing.

Think about how you’ve used inbound methods to transform your marketing strategies to be more personalized, approachable, and build relationships. Those same principles apply to your PR strategy: Create content to craft your own story and use tactful outreach to get reporters and analysts familiar with your brand.

Press Release Examples

Many people think press releases have to be chock full of buzzwords and branded terms. “Big data,” anyone? Five-syllable words you have to look up on Thesaurus.com? Quotes from every executive on the planet that go on for pages? We’ve seen it all. Unfortunately, so have reporters — and they are not fans.

Instead of stuffing your next release with industry jargon, take a page out of our book (okay fine, ebook), The Newsworthy Guide to Inbound Public Relations, and brainstorm some creative approaches for your next announcement. Can you include new data? A remarkable graphic or video? A shareable SlideShare? If so, a creative angle can help carry your content and increase the likelihood of social sharing.

Types of Press Releases

While there’s no cut-and-dried formula for what a press release should include, here are a few types of occasions to help you carve out a focus for your press release and determine what content would help you broadcast your news in the best way:

• New product launches
• Mergers and acquisitions
• Updates to existing products
• Hosting or attending an event
• Opening a new office
• Introducing a new partnership
• Rebranding
• Promoting/hiring a new executive
• Receiving an award

Now, to get you thinking on the right track, take a look at some creative press release examples below, the type of news each one is reporting on, and what makes the release unique:

ŠKODA at the World Rally Championship

Type of press release: Event

Škoda, a car manufacturer based in the Czech Republic, recently showed off its sponsored racing team in two big places: at the 2017 World Rally Championship, and in a sleek, image-based press release reporting on the event.

The news release, shown above, doesn’t have any trouble aligning the look and feel of the Škoda brand with the press release itself — which is a crucial aspect of any company’s press content. The release opens with a large feature image of one of its vehicles in the same vibrant green that covers the business’s website. The press release also begins with three helpful bullet points summarizing the news for readers, and ends the release with a couple of captioned actions shots to give reporters more context around the event.

ScribbleLive Acquires New Company

Type of press release: Acquisition

Yes, a video press release! This news item from ScribbleLive gave reporters nearly everything they’d need to republish this story, all in a thorough two-minute video about the company’s latest acquisition.

ScribbleLive opens the video press release above with the company’s logo and a clear header stating the news. This allowed the company’s CEO to jump right into his commentary on the acquisition, giving reporters plenty of quotable material on the state of the industry and why this merger was so important to them.

The press release also segments the video the same way a written press release would, breaking up the CEO’s commentary by the question he’s answering. This makes it easy for viewers to jump through the video and find the information they’re most interested in hearing about.

And, being on YouTube, a press release in this format allows reporters to embed the news content directly on their site, making ScribbleLive’s news that much easier to share.

Peapod’s New Headquarters

Type of press release: Opening a new office

When you open a new headquarters, it can be hard to figure out what to say. People just want to get a look at the new digs! In the above press release by Peadpod, an online grocery service, the company puts photos of its new office right at the top, immediately showing readers what makes this news so significant for Peadpod.

The release even singles out a quote by the Mayor of Chicago just below the headline, hinting to reporters who are writing about Peadpod’s new HQ that this is the remark Peapod is most interested in sharing with readers.

Check out the boilerplate text at the bottom of the above press release. “About [company]” text can blend too easily with the actual news text, making the piece seem longer than it really is. By isolating this copy in a dark gray box, Peapod provides a smoother reading experience and ensures the story itself doesn’t get lost in an intimidatingly long wall of text.

HubSpot’s New Product Announcements

Type of press release: New product launches

When you’re launching products or services, the information is often best expressed in written form. But when all you’re doing is writing about your new offering’s price and features, it can be difficult for others to refer to and report on it later. We at HubSpot know the challenge well.

The graphic above helped us to supplement our own product announcement — written by our fantastic Communications Manager, Ellie Botelho — with details that needed a visual aid. Using a combination of colors and shapes, this graphic allowed us to reveal important relationships between products, as well as their respective prices and when they’ll be available. (Interested one of our products? Take note! ^)

We’ve also crafted this comprehensive, easy-to-follow press release template complete with a promotional plan and considerations for your next announcement. We use these same guidelines when writing and formatting our releases here at HubSpot, and created a faux, sample release to illustrate what content goes where and why.

Tips for Publishing Press Releases

Writing a press release is really only half the battle. Once you’re finished with production, it’ll be time to focus on distribution.

Of course, we’re all familiar with the traditional distribution levers we can pull, which include publishing the press release on our website/blog, as well as sharing the press release with our followers/subscribers via social media and email. But for ensuring a press release gets the maximum amount of distribution possible, here are some tips you can follow.

1. Reach out to specific journalists.

Instead of blasting a press release out to every journalist you can find an email address for, focus on a few journalists who have experience covering your industry (and company, hopefully) and send them personalized messages. Connect the dots. Show why what you wrote connects to what they write.

2. Don’t be afraid to go offline.

Most journalists have mountains of emails (and press releases) to sort through. Try sending your release through snail mail or another offline channel to differentiate yourself.

3. Send the release to top journalists the day before.

Give journalists some time to craft a story around your press release by sending it to them — under embargo — the day before it officially goes live. (FYI “under embargo” just means they aren’t allowed to share the information in the press release until the time you specify.)

4. To avoid competition, don’t publish your release on the hour.

If you’re publishing your press release on a distribution service like PR Newswire or Business Wire, avoid publishing it on the hour (e.g., 1 p.m., or 3 p.m., or 5 p.m.). The reason? Most companies schedule their releases to go out on the hour, which means if your release goes out on the hour too, it’s more likely to get lost in the shuffle. Instead, try going with a more distinct time (e.g., 1:12 p.m., or 3:18 p.m., or 5:22 p.m.).

5. Share your media coverage.

If all goes according to plan, and your press release gets picked up by the media, your job still isn’t finished. To keep the buzz going, you can release a “second wave” of distribution by sharing the specific stories that news outlets write based on your press release.

What other best practices do you follow when writing press releases? Share your thoughts with us below, and don’t forget to download our free press release template here.