PR Squared: Belkin Adopts Social Media News Release Format

Belkin is one of those companies making a small fortune (to the tune of $1B+) making accessories for computing gear and MP3 players like the iPod. You see their gadgets all over the place at consumer electronics stores like BestBuy. Last week we received an excited note from Belkin's PR execs:

"We're now using SHIFT Communication's Social Media News Release template as our standard press release format. We just implemented it last week, and we're quite proud of the final product. We really love your new take on the press release -- evolving it from the antiquated all-text style to something more useful to both editors and end-users and more reflective of the current social media landscape. So, thanks! Keep up the good Web 2.0 work!"

This was pretty exciting news. Yet another billion-dollar corporation jumps into the Social Media waters!

We asked the Belkin reps if they'd experienced any feedback (positive or negative) from the media and/or bloggers. It was also important for us to get a sense for Belkin's distribution method. And, perhaps most importantly, we wanted to know about the internal reaction to the new press release format: after all, in most big companies it only takes one old-school VP to put the kibosh on anything newfangled!

"We put the release out over BusinessWire. We used a new service they're offering called XHTML, so, although it doesn't translate exactly, the final press release looks pretty close to our version (no RSS, digg, or del.icio.us links though).

"[Re: press response]: Our PR person had approached her contacts for their feedback, and ... it's largely positive. Internally, our folks have loved it too-- namely, the multimedia elements, the RSS, digg, and del.icio.us links."

Here (and here) are some examples of Belkin's new Social Media News Releases. They look pretty sweet to me. After you take a gander at those new releases, be sure to check out the last of Belkin's "traditional" releases. See a difference?

Whether you are a blogger, a journalist or just an interested consumer, which version of a news release would you rather read??

Tags: belkin, social+media, social+media+news+release, hrelease, public+relations, pr2.0, marketing

Comments

Woah. I think that looks great. Much better than the traditional news release. It's the first time I've seen the SMNR in action and am very impressed.

The pdf template is great but when you see it in all its glory like now you just know it's the future.

Nice work Belkin... and of course, Todd.

Posted by: Stephen Davies | October 21, 2006 12:23 PM

Thanks for the good words! We thank SHIFT Communications for sort of "revolutionizing" the press release.

Posted by: Melody Chalaban | October 24, 2006 01:55 AM

A couple of our clients have also been using a version of a new media release to great success. I'm excited to see that companies are embracing this move instead of fighting it. Of course, this new release format isn't going to work for everyone, but it's great to see those companies it will benefit most actually making use of it. Great feedback from Belkin too!

Posted by: Becky Caudill | October 25, 2006 01:39 PM

Great news, Becky. I'd love to hear more about your clients' experiences (were they resistant at first? did they embrace it right away? were their expectations higher than normal? which wire service did you use?) - thanks!

Posted by: Todd Defren | October 25, 2006 01:44 PM