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As small business owners on a budget, we are always trying to find free and/or low cost ways to market our businesses. Although we know that it takes money to make money, the Internet does offer numerous opportunities to market yourself and your business that are free. One way of doing this is to use Press Releases. To clarify, a press release is a short report on a news worthy event having to do with yourbusiness. It could be a launch of a new line of products or one new product, new fragrances, a change of venue if you're a bricks and mortar business or a new service that you are going to offer.Whatever the event, take advantage of the change to issue a press release.

A press release has a strict format - any deviance from this format may cause seasoned press release readers to overlook your press release because it is too wordy or cluttered. The format of a press release is as follows:

When and Where: Most press releases begin with a line that names the date and the location of the news that is takingplace.

Headline: the headline of the press release is one line that will be the hook for your press release. Try to write atitle that is attention grabbing so that the reader is pulled into reading theentire press release. If you want your press release to be picked up bynewspapers or other websites, your title has to stand out.

Summary: The summary of a press release is a short synopsis of what the rest of the press release is all about. Itshould summarize the content of the press release in one sentence.

Body of the Press Release: This is where the "meat" of your story lies. Keep your sentences short and to the point.It is also helpful to use quotations from people involved in the news story.These quotations tend to personalize the news and get people interested.

Boiler Plate/Contact Information: In this area of the press release, include your contact information and an "aboutcompany" profile. This is called a boiler plate because you can cut andpaste it for every press release you write.

Free places to submit your press releases:

http://www.pr9.net
http://www.prlog.org
http://www.prweb.com
http://www.pr.com/promote-your-business
http://www.express-press-release.com
http://www.theopenpress.com

More information on Press Releases:

http://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Press-Release
http://www.prweb.com/pressreleasetips.php
http://www.ereleases.com/howtowrite.htm