NewsCactus Blog

We recently conducted a poll of professionals on LinkedIn regarding the practice of posting press releases in some sort of online newsroom.

We were curious to see, in real life and from real business people, how many of them use the Web to display corporate press releases.

Of course we’re biased and believe the practice of publishing press releases online should never be overlooked — it’s just so helpful for search engine marketing.

The results weren’t too surprising, although the spread was.

Our question was: Do you or your company post press releases in an online newsroom?

Participants could answer:

• Yes – 100% of the time
• 75%
• 50%
• 25%
• No

Of the total responses, 56% always, or 75% of the time, posted press releases online (the breakdown was 35% always, and 21% 75% of the time). 42% never did. There was a pretty equal split between those who use the Web to publish their own news and those who don’t.

Not surprisingly, the majority of those who publish press releases online come from enterprise or large companies. Mostly people from small companies don’t publish their press releases online.

However, respondents ranged from industries such as accounting, engineering, human resources, marketing and public relations. Those involved in public relations and marketing made up the percentage of respondents who always or usually published press releases online.

Our takeaway here is those involved in business communication are utilizing the Web to publish press releases as part of their job responsibilities.

Another interesting statistic is that the younger the respondent was, the more likely he or she was to publish press releases online. That finding mirrors Internet usage.

Online press release publishers included business owners and those in management positions. As expected, C-level executives and vice presidents were not the practitioners who published press releases online.

Finally, women respondents were more likely to publish press releases online than men. This finding is in keeping with the distribution of men and women in the public relations and marketing functions.