Tips for Successful 'Extra' Entries
» (above) Sample of an effective 'Extra' entry
The Headline
Make it punchy, but remember this is a serious professional audience. Headlines must be no more than 65 characters to ensure they don't break into two lines, but shorter ones often work best.
Main Text
We recommend about 40 to 70 words. Experience has shown us that this is the length of text that gets the best results. If it is too long people won't wait to read it all. Don't try to give them too much information - use the links for this - just get their interest.
The Link - or Links - at the end
Bear in mind that most people reading your entry are very busy; they want a quick and straightforward way of finding out what they need to know.
You can use more than one link, but providing a selection of links won't necessarily increase the response - just keep it simple and choose the link, or links, that suit your needs.
The link that you choose will depend upon two main questions:
Do you want to receive name and address sales leads?
Do you need to quantify how many people responded to your advertisement?
If you want both of these, then choose this option:
Option 1 - Pro-Talk's Sales Enquiry Service
Readers clicking on the link are sent to a form where they can fill in their details, and these are sent to you instantly. The simplest and most effective option. You are able to quantify how many people responded to the advertisement, and you can specify which countries you want leads from, if that's a useful facility. To use this option you must already have a press release on the same topic on our site. If you really want them to read the full press release, use Option 2 as well.
Option 2 - a link to the press release in question.
Choose this if you think that your 40 to 70 words aren't enough to interest readers in the news, and you'd really prefer them to read your full press release, already on our site. You can combine this with Option 1, but remember, minimising choices is recommended!
Do you want people to visit your website or a special page on your website, rather than have name and address details?
If you need to be able to count how many people clicked through to your website, then use either of these:
Option 3 - a link to your website through your own counting mechanism
Option 4 - a link to your website through a counting mechanism set up by us: just ask!
If you don't need to know how many people clicked through to your website, then use this:
Option 5 - a basic link to your web site
Do you want people to email you, but you don't want the Sales Enquiry Service?
Option 6 - a dedicated or identifiable email address
If you need to be able to count the emails from the Extra entry, you will need to set up a dedicated email address or ask them to put certain words in the text or subject line.
Option 7 - a normal email address
If you don't need to know how many people emailed you because of the Extra entry then just use any normal email address
Do you want people to telephone you?
Option 8 - your telephone number
We can include your telephone number, but you will only know how many people phoned because of the Extra entry if you ask them when they call!
What to do when, and the importance of press releases
We will write to you about three weeks before the date of publication, suggesting a date or reminding you of a date that you have already requested. We need your entry 7 days before the date of publication. We make up the Extra Newsletter 4 days before publication. By receiving your entry 7 days before, we have a few days' grace in case of queries.
If you wish to use our Sales Enquiry Service, you will need a press release on our web site at least 4 days before publication of the Extra, so that we can set up the service. If you allow two days for the Editor to receive, edit and upload (overnight) the press release you can see that ideally you need to also send in the press release 7 days before publication of the Extra. Publication is free, so it makes sense to do this.
Please remember, press releases should be sent directly to the Editors using our news@... email addresses. Only the editors can publish press releases. Please send the text in the body of an email, not as an attachment.
The text for Extra entries should be sent to sue.nutting@pro-talk.com and can be sent in the email or as an attachment.
When to use your Extra entry
You may have requested a specific date for your entry in which case we will have booked it for that date. We will then write to you about three weeks beforehand asking for your text.
If you have one of our advertising packages, you will have been given one or more Extra entries as part of this package. Unless you have requested specific dates, we will have randomly booked these at regular intervals over the period of your advertising campaign. We will then write to you about three weeks before each date and offer you the entry. You do not have to take the date that is offered if you have a preferred alternative - for instance because of a product launch or an exhibition. But please give us as much notice as possible so that we can reserve you a place in that edition.