When you’re writing press releases and other materials for the media every day, there aren’t many things that are more annoying than having to write those dry, formulaic “About Company” parts from scratch every time. You know the ones—the ones that repeat your company’s goal statement, overview, and most important facts.
Well, now you can say goodbye to those days of, boring work. This guide shows you how to write a great press release form that you can use over and over again. We’re talking about an exciting “About” part that makes your brand more human while still giving all the important, dry information.
I will, however, share many valuable tips and tricks that I have learned over the years. Everything from the best way to format and number of words for a template to tone rules and examples that will really inspire you.
Key Takeaways
- A boilerplate should include the name of your business, the year it was founded, and its location. It should also give a brief overview of your background and place of residence.
- To maintain readability and clarity, try to keep it brief, usually between 100 and 150 words.
- Your vision statement should outline your long-term objectives and aspirations, giving a glimpse into your business’s future course.
- In your unique selling proposition, stress how your products and services give your customers particular advantages.
- To strengthen brand identification, use consistent messaging in all news releases and other communication materials.
What Does a Press Release Boilerplate Mean?
A press release boilerplate is a condensed, uniform, and reliable “About Us” statement used in public relations that provides journalists and your target audiences with a high-level synopsis of your business.
The press release boilerplate is a one-paragraph synopsis of your firm that emphasizes the most important details. It appears near the conclusion of a news release. A PR boilerplate aims to provide important information about your business’s work. A boilerplate in a press release gives the piece more authority and provides room for you to include a link to your website and a call to action (CTA).
Tips on Crafting a Strong Boilerplate for the Press Release of Your Company
In recent times, the classic press release effectively announces news about honors and rankings, mergers, new offices or practice areas, and lateral recruits. It is a terrific idea to use press releases to distribute content on social media and through the newsroom on your website.
Writing an effective press release requires adhering to its prescribed format and tone, which includes the boilerplate wording at the bottom of the release. Many businesses overlook updating their boilerplates, and some don’t have any at all. Some find it difficult to write them in the first place. As a public relations specialist for professional services companies, I believe it is worthwhile to review the boilerplate to comprehend its significance and offer guidance on how to write this crucial element.
The main point is that your firm should be succinctly and concisely described in the boilerplate content. Here are four boilerplate writing strategies that you may put to use right now.
#1. Adhere to the Details
Being “the greatest,” “the only,” or “the best” is not something that should be expressed in a press release. The text must be factual instead. If you use boastful, flowery wording in your release, you risk losing trust with the media because reporters are trained to spot such stuff. You must be ready to measure the veracity of your claims if you genuinely believe that you are “the first,” “the largest,” or “one of a kind.” Give the figure to support your claim, for instance, if you want to say that your company is the biggest in the state, but be aware that you might need to change it to account for new information.
#2. Understand the Use and Worth of Boilerplate
Boilerplate writing has been compared to an elevator pitch and the “About Us” section of a website. They’re all effective marketing instruments. Since the text on the “About Us” page is intended to be a call to action, encouraging a prospect to browse your site and establish a connection, it is an inbound marketing tool with a genuine and friendly tone. Conversely, an elevator pitch aims to quickly convey to a potential client what you do and how you can help with their specific business issue. A Boilerplate is used to summarise a company professionally after a press release or pitch to a journalist. It highlights the company’s salient features so that the reader can rapidly understand the firm’s mission and scope and where further information may be obtained. Its worth is found in how well this one sentence or paragraph sums up your company.
#3. Keep It Concise
I advise limiting boilerplate text to one paragraph, or roughly five sentences. Condensing information into a single paragraph is difficult, especially if you are starting with the “About Us” section. I still clearly recall English professors back then telling us that if we were to rewrite any piece of writing, the first draft should have half as many words as the second. They were accurate! You really can say a lot in one paragraph. The boilerplate aims to emphasize the firm’s history, locations, practice areas, competencies, accolades, and values concisely.
#4. Establish the Point of View and Tone First
A press release is organized to provide media and other stakeholders with accurate information. You can manage your messaging by using the well-known blocks of headlines, paragraphs, and quotes to position your company and its employees using officially sanctioned terminology.
Companies may provide a list of acceptable terms and phrases to employ in addition to the suggested tone, which can vary from informal to extremely official. I advise using the third person and erring on the side of formality.
Press Release Boilerplate Components
The following should be included in a news release’s boilerplate:
#1. Goals and Objectives
Put your company’s mission statement in your PR boilerplate. Make sure to keep it as simple as you can. Assume you are presenting your business to a person who has never heard of it before. The individual ought to grasp your company’s goals and vision right away. For this reason, in order for your aims and objectives to be effective, make sure they are simple to understand.
#2. Important Information in Graphs
Impressive analytics enhance the quality of a PR boilerplate, much like awards and other recognitions do. Make it apparent in your PR if you are a startup approaching your one-year anniversary in operation and have achieved a milestone that exceeds your target clientele. If you are an established company in the field, it would be a pleasure to have thousands of workers, and use your PR boilerplate to communicate this. This is, after all, the section of your PR where you get to highlight your company’s accomplishments using hard data.
#3. History of the Company
In the boilerplate copy, you can discuss your company’s founding date and the reasons for its founding. If your company has been around for a while, this aspect can demonstrate longevity and credibility.
#4. The Tagline and Logo of the Company
Your logo and catchphrase are among the most important components of your brand personality. These are your brand’s distinguishing features; stop searching and reading now. They ought to appear on your boilerplate for the press release.
#5. Specialty Product Offering
You can explain to your readers what sets your brand apart from the competition using boilerplate in press releases. Provide a succinct and truthful description of what makes your company unique compared to other companies that provide comparable goods or services.
6 Easy Steps to Writing a Press Release BolierPlate
Press releases arrive on journalists’ desks in large quantities daily. Fifty to fifty proposals a week are received by 43% of top-tier publishers, while the remaining 57% receive fifty to five hundred pitches a week. Whether or not they see you is largely dependent on your press release boilerplates.
Publishers and journalists should be able to recognize PR boilerplates due to their consistency. Your press release’s boilerplate plays a crucial role in determining whether or not its receivers will notice it.
The objectives of a top-notch press release boilerplate are as follows:
#1. Communicating the Company’s Vision
Presenting your company’s objectives will help you become more well-known in your field. This will showcase your company culture, your efforts to benefit customers in the marketplace, and your dedication to providing top-notch service. Similar to how people respond to your accomplishments, journalists, publishers, investors, and prospective customers will respond favourably to your demonstration of commitment.
Checklist on the Boilerplate Press Release.pdf
#2. Motivating Readers to Take Initiative
If your PR’s boilerplate section contains a compelling call to action, it can affect customers’ next actions. It can convince clients to finish an endeavour in a number of ways. For example, they can accept the invitation to subscribe to your newsletter so they never miss an update. Other possible consumer behaviours include making a donation, calling to inquire, and purchasing your goods or using your services.
#3. Returnability
Copywriters at your firm will benefit from a reusable boilerplate in addition to having consistency in every press release. When necessary, they can easily make minor alterations and revisions to the boilerplate wording used in press releases.
#4. Conserving Money and Time
Having definitive and easily retrieved boilerplate text for each press release allows you to concentrate your time, energy, and resources on the tailored content of the PR and your marketing campaigns. You won’t need to continuously rewrite a boilerplate for every release.
#5. Name Recognition
An efficient PR boilerplate aids in the development of brand recall and recognition as your business grows within its sector and reaches a wider audience. Press releases with a regular “About Us” part will help your brand become more well-known among your target customers and expand its reach.
#6. Attracting Customers
Because it allows potential clients to quickly review the services and products your business provides, a well-written boilerplate can help draw in new business and keep hold of current ones. They can rapidly assess your firm and decide whether it will be worthwhile for them to interact with your company based on the concise but reliable information in your PR boilerplate.
Examples of Successful Press Release Boilerplates
A well-crafted boilerplate for a press release should be succinct and simple to read, enabling journalists to grasp the scope of your business rapidly. It should have an assured tone and use strong language that appropriately represents your business. It should also be current to provide journalists with the most accurate information about your organization.
Here are four powerful boilerplate samples from press releases that have been released, along with an explanation of their effectiveness:
#1. Zentist: Press Release Boilerplate Example Based on Solutions
To attract the attention of its target audience, the Zentist boilerplate mentions a major issue facing the sector and outlines the advantages and potential remedies it can offer. This is an excellent illustration of a product-focused viewpoint that can raise brand recognition and produce leads and sales.
#2. Giant Food: Boilerplate Example of a Unique Selling Proposition
Boilerplates typically allow more promotional language than the body of your press release. Giant Food provides a good illustration of this. Using their boilerplate, they explain to readers what sets their items apart from competitors in the market. They conclude by restating their company’s objective and including a call to action to visit their website.
#3. Boilerplate Example of Industry Leadership: Darling Ingredients, Inc.
Darling’s boilerplate press release sample does a lot of things well. It identifies leaders in the field and highlights subjects that can promote brand affinity. It also establishes credibility by outlining the brand’s reach. They ask readers to visit their website and follow them on social media, offer contact details for interested investors and members of the media, and include a link to multimedia.
#4. Marquette Bank: Boilerplate Example of Local Appeal
An invitation to visit the bank’s website and a media contact are included in this boilerplate example. They use local keywords to assist the news get found online and appeal to readers and journalists in the larger Chicago area by naming their locations. Lastly, they provide a description of their services and bolster customer confidence by stating the asset values of the bank.
What is the purpose of a boilerplate?
Boilerplates are an essential component of a brand’s messaging and overall marketing strategy. They provide a consistent picture of the company in marketing terms. Boilerplates function essentially as elevator pitches, outlining a business’s goals and activities.
How do you write a boilerplate?
- Ensure that the boilerplate reflects the brand of your employer.
- Write a compelling business paragraph.
- Urge viewers to communicate with the company.
- Provide business-to-business correspondence
How long is a boilerplate?
Boilerplates, which typically consist of one paragraph and five sentences, are brief summaries of companies used at the end of press releases. They should contain the most important information, such as the company’s services, mission, and contact data, and should not exceed 100 words. Long boilerplates can be costly, so journalists and publishers who are unfamiliar with the brand might choose to ignore them.
Why is it called boilerplate?
Boilerplates were steel plates used as templates to build steam boilers in the 1800s. Manufacturers affix the plate to their products as a trademark, designating the boiler’s maker and place of manufacture.
What to include in a press release boilerplate?
- What do you do, and who are you? …
- Why do others need you? What is your purpose? …
- Keep it brief.
- Concentrate on your industry or niche.
- Emphasize honors and accolades.
Conclusion
A press release boilerplate should succinctly provide journalists with the most salient and interesting information about your company. In just one paragraph, readers should have a clear understanding of what your company does. The boilerplate should also include a call to action, a link to your website or landing page, and contact information for more information that supports your brand and objectives. To create a compelling boilerplate for your press release, adhere to the guidelines and boilerplate samples provided above.
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