How to write a press release that Indian journalists actually open

Learning how to write a press release takes twenty minutes. Learning why most of them get deleted takes one sentence: journalists do not owe you coverage, they owe their readers a story. Every rule below follows from that. This guide gives you the exact format, a copy-paste template, the Indian distribution routes that work, and an honest note on what a press release does and does not do for your SEO.

First, is it actually news?

A press release works only when it carries news, and news means it affects people outside your office. These qualify: a product or service people could not buy before, original data or a survey, a first in your city or category, funding, a notable senior hire, a partnership that changes what customers get, a strong local angle on a national story. These do not: a company anniversary, a new website, a motivational statement from the founder.

If you do not have news, make some. Run a small survey of your customers or city and publish the numbers. Original data is the most reliable press magnet available to a small business, and it costs effort rather than money.

The format journalists expect

The structure has not changed in decades because it matches how newsrooms read: top down, in a hurry.

1. Headline. The news in under twelve words, no adjectives. "Bengaluru startup launches gold-rate alert service in Kannada" beats "Revolutionary new platform transforms gold industry".
2. Dateline. City and date: "Bengaluru, 17 October 2026".
3. First paragraph. Who did what, when, where and why it matters, in two or three sentences. A sub-editor should be able to run this paragraph alone as a complete brief.
4. Body. Two or three short paragraphs of supporting detail: the numbers, the context, the how.
5. Quote. One quote from a named person with a designation, saying something a human would actually say. Cut "we are thrilled and delighted".
6. Boilerplate. Two or three sentences about the company: what it does, where, since when.
7. Media contact. Name, phone, email. A release without a reachable phone number in India is a release that does not get follow-up.

Copy-paste template

Writing rules that keep it alive

• 300 to 500 words. One page. Nobody has ever complained a press release was too short.
• Write in third person throughout, except inside the quote.
• Numbers in INR, context in Indian terms. "Rs 2.4 crore" not "$290K".
• No superlatives you cannot prove. "Leading", "revolutionary" and "best-in-class" are deleted on sight, and claims you cannot evidence can also invite trouble under the ASCI code.
• Attach one good photograph, landscape, with faces. Releases with usable images get picked up more because you have done the picture desk's job for them.

Distribution in India: three routes

Route one: direct to reporters. Find the three to ten journalists who cover your beat or your city, read what they wrote recently, and email each one personally with the release pasted into the email body, not only attached. A short note on why this fits their beat doubles your odds. This route is free and outperforms everything else.

Route two: wire and distribution services. PTI and ANI carry serious corporate news; paid services like PRNewswire, Business Wire India and NewsVoir push releases to large lists and guarantee syndicated pickup on news-portal partner pages. Useful for compliance-grade announcements and for volume, weak for genuine editorial coverage.

Route three: your own channels. Publish every release in a newsroom section on your site, then cut it into a LinkedIn post and a WhatsApp update. Your release page becomes a citable source for anyone writing about you later, including AI assistants.

What a press release does for SEO, honestly

Wire-service links are mostly nofollow, so a distribution blast is not a backlink strategy. The SEO value arrives one step later: when a journalist writes a real article from your release, that coverage is an authority mention on a trusted domain. Those mentions move rankings, and they are exactly what AI assistants read when deciding which businesses to cite, which is why PR now sits inside our AI SEO work rather than beside it. The release is the seed; the coverage is the crop. Our SEO service treats earned coverage as one of the few link sources that compounds.

A realistic budget

Doing it yourself costs time: two hours to write, three hours to build a reporter list, an hour to send. Paid wire distribution in India typically runs from about Rs 8,000 to Rs 45,000 per release depending on service and reach. An agency retainer that includes PR writing and media outreach generally starts around Rs 25,000 to Rs 50,000 a month. Start with the free route; pay only when you know what story you are telling and to whom.

Frequently asked questions

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