How to Prepare a Press Kit

Have you ever considered putting together a company press kit? A press kit is a (presumably) easy way to share a comprehensive look at your business. Over time, press kits have morphed from cumbersome folders and packets into small, easy-to-handle digital bytes. (Think flash drive). This has made it easier than ever for reporters and PR teams to handle and access your company’s info, as well as made it cheaper for companies to produce and distribute. Remember, you want to make it easy for reporters to write about you. Some PR professionals claim that having a good press kit is just as important as having a good website. But where do you start? Focus on these six elements to prepare an attractive and informative press kit:

Company Overview. What do you do? When were you founded? What’s unique about your company that would spark someone’s interest? This is where you sum up your business so that people who have never heard of it will understand what you’re all about. You can also include a company fact sheet or company timeline.

Biographies. Talk about your founders, investors or anyone else you feel has a story to tell! It’s your opportunity put a “face” on the company. A company’s executives are the soul of that company. This is your opportunity to give people insight into how your team thinks and what they see as far as the future of the company goes. But keep it short and don’t tell everyone’s life story or you will lose interest fast. No bio ever needs to more than three paragraphs.

FAQs. Differentiate from your competitors with a Frequently Asked Questions section. Talk with your customer service team about which questions come up the most frequently. Do your customers have trouble navigating your homepage? Try creating a homepage navigation video. (Here’s a link to our old one to see what we mean). Your answers will help to position your company in the marketplace. You can even including customer testimonials or product/service reviews.

News Coverage. If you’ve had press releases done (click here for an example), include the most recent ones. Also, include copies of any media coverage your company has received including magazine stories, video clips, or screenshots from online publications. If you don’t have any coverage you may want to consider hiring a professional videographer to create a demo video. Show off your employees as poised and articulate! Note that getting the rights for copies of news coverage can be costly, so you may want to consider just linking to it instead.

Art. Provide some photos or footage of your company that is easy to use. For example: product photos, employee headshots, a demo video or an interactive map of your location. Make it clear that your content is allowed to be published as long as it is properly credited. Above all, make sure to include a high-resolution version of your company logo! (Remember, according to our August infographic, your company’s logo will do most of the talking). If your company doesn’t have professional photos, try setting up a page on an image hosting site such as flickr and link to it throughout the kit. Image hosting sites are easy to use and are a quick way to post and share photos.

Contact Info. Even though this seems like an obvious element, some people often overlook including a section informing people whom to contact for more information. List phone numbers and e-mail addresses for whoever handles media requests for your company. You can go through all the work of preparing a press kit, but if you forget to include contact info, it’s useless.

Have you ever put together a press kit? Are you inspired to put one together now? Let us know by leaving a comment below, leaving a comment on Facebook or tweeting us @123Print.