Are Press Releases Still Relevant? 8 Reasons Why.

Really? Of course I provided counsel around the numerous benefits of issuing news, particularly in the absence of other integrated marketing campaigns.

Yes, the B2B tech world lives on LinkedIn and often in digital communities. And yes, a brand can easily pen a blog that conveys the message of an announcement, but each medium serves different purposes, and the press release actually bookends a campaign. In fact, social media posts achieve high engagement when they amplify a brand's educational content and news.

Press releases, while drafted to map to a format for media, serve myriad purposes in communicating with ALL of your audiences: prospects, customers, press, analysts, influencers, employees, candidates, and investors.

Here are 8 reasons why press releases remain an essential part of Marketing strategy for private enterprise technology companies:

1) Product Launch Consensus

Executive leadership, product, and product marketing must arrive on the same page before a key announcement. A product announcement requires solidifying your ideal customer profile, solution benefits, competitive differentiation, and a date stamp that lives in perpetuity online, so it's important to circulate a draft weeks in advance.

These internal reviews solicit input and build consensus for external messaging – even when there is a solid internal brief in place. Likewise, it's important to engage legal and any quoted third parties early in the process to course correct if needed.

2) Just the Facts

Following a format that includes the who, what, when, where, and why, forces simplicity and limits the hype and jargon. When written well, news is digestible for an array of target audiences, including your ideal customer profile (ICP), who may just be learning about the space and your value proposition. Including third-party validation from a customer, analyst, or even prestigious industry award, further boost credibility as well.

A PR Newswire media survey found that 77% of journalists prefer receiving organizational news through official press releases, rather than other channels, as press releases "ensure accuracy and provide comprehensive information."

3) Forcing Function for Media

Journalists are inundated with news pitches, but will minimally review advance or embargoed announcements when pre-pitched. Beat writers can't risk missing out on covering important, market-moving, or industry-first news scheduled to be shared broadly on a particular date.

Pre-pitching of newsworthy announcements is essential for smaller brands to secure media coverage in a noisy world. It's important to understand, however, that once you have secured exclusive contact, have committed, however, that release wire date must be etched in stone. This also means any accompanying website landing page, blog, video, or other part of the integrated campaign must all be live and hyperlinked in the press release just before it goes over PR Newswire, Businesswire, or a self-service tier II newswire such as EIN Presswire.

Even if the writers your PR team pitches decide not to cover the news right then, they have read your announcement draft and the press release has served a purpose as one of a series of "media touches" that help explain your technology, build brand awareness, and pave the way for thought leadership or other traction with that outlet.

4) Online Syndication

Press releases issued over a newswire typically receive 120 to 200 online postings, from Yahoo! News, to trade or local media. Wire services claim 40 percent greater pickup when there is an image or video (multimedia) add-on included.

Additionally, private companies have the luxury of what I call "liberties with the lead," which I have seen drive additional syndication. That is, while a public company is mandated to begin a press release with their tagline and ticker symbol, a private company can write a press release more like an article, which boosts posting appeal amid a resource-constrained media landscape. As long as the announcement has the issuing company name in the headline and lead paragraph, meeting wire service requirements, a brand can begin the release with a data point and trend that lead up to your news hook.

For example: BOSTON, MA — A new study reveals consumer banks are not meeting the personalization expectations of customers, with 45% of consumers surveyed saying they would consider switching banks for one that delivers more personalized digital experiences. Conducted by Researchscape and commissioned by AI company X, the online survey…

5) Historical Date Stamp

Every company has a timeline in its evolution. The easiest way for someone learning about the company to learn about the company's history and milestones is to skim the headlines of press releases on a company's website. For this reason, even private companies opt to keep press releases distinct from news coverage on their website Resources section. Additionally, that date stamp can be used as a point of reference as proof points for industry-first innovations as competitors roll out similar functionality.

6) Hype Club Fuel

Announcements that detail industry-first innovations, customer wins or case results, award wins, IP like patents, company growth milestones and key hires, partnerships, events and speaking appearances, are essential to boosting morale with employees. People teams are cheerleaders for the troops internally, but the hype of external validation vis a vis news and resulting media hits, is equally exciting — much like Ad Value Equivalency (dated) formula that found people viewed "an article as three times more credible than an ad."

Press releases also showcase market leadership and an enduring brand for customers, prospects, and investors.

7) Sales Enablement Tool

Enterprise sales teams benefit from an arsenal of materials that they can share with prospects as value-add touchpoints for brand and product education throughout stages of the full sales funnel (ToFu, MoFu, and even BoFu). A relevant press release — whether about a customer, analyst report inclusion, or innovation — can serve as an impetus for a value-added touchpoint with a prospect to keep your brand and solution top of mind or prompt a call to learn more. News releases are also great fodder for customer newsletters.

8) News Release SEO and AIO Value

The single-most-important reason to issue a press release over the newswire today is for driving qualified traffic to your website over time. When a press release is wired, it lives across the internet in perpetuity, is a search return for "news.google" and becomes an artifact for organic search results on your website, as well as AI search returns.

In the era of zero-click marketing, over 60% of Google searches (including by prospective customers) now end without a click because the user gets answers instantly from AI overviews, featured snippets, or knowledge panels. In turn, marketers are shifting toward brand visibility and striving to have owned and earned content cited directly within the search provider's native answers rather than chasing traditional traffic.

Marketers are coming to terms with website traffic being 30-70 percent lower than in prior years, and that the source of that traffic is harder to measure. Instead, they must stress internally that the traffic that does arrive at a company's website is higher quality because it stemmed from an AI bot link and filtering to the user's intended finding: your content.

I recommend these three resources, among others, to begin to dig into understanding not only what AI search means today, but how to balance the art plus science of best practices.

• How AI, AEO, and GEO Are Transforming Public Relations (PR Newswire)
• AI Search Trends for 2026 and How You can Adapt to Them (SEMRUSH)
• AI Search & LLMs: A Guide for LLM SEO Best Practices (B2B marketing agency, Flow)

Can you guess which source types surface frequently in the list of (unpaid) organic and AI search results? That is my next blog.