From time to time memories pop up, and when they do, we start the entire journey of reminiscence.
For some of us, we take it step by step. We move forward and backward in our memories as if we were replaying a VHS tape and watching the scenes take place backwards. For some of us, we operate our memories as we would a DVD player where we choose the section that we wish to see and jump straight to it. And there are those of us who factor our memories as online streaming where the past and present are merged into an ongoing download with no buffering but we leap to the very second that we wish to see.
Today I'm suddenly remembering my very first press release.
I didn't know how to write one. I didn't know the right way. Thank goodness there were lovely colleagues who guided me on the essentials and straightaway I plunged into writing out a single paragraph. (It's usually a page but the boss said a paragraph would do)
Now, I knew it wasn't good. It was, like, sub-par of the sub-par. In other words, I had no frigging' idea what the frak I was writing. No style, no composure whatsoever, but still, there was this wee little bit of hope that there would be at least one thing right, wouldn't it?
Ha!
It came back to me cancelled from top to bottom. Line by line by line, the boss had rewritten and restructured. She had given it a new voice. She had inserted new vocabulary. She had turned the grammar inside out. She had shifted it from a passive voice to an active one. There were additions, subtractions, replacements, words of engagement, words of action, words of description, words of the present, words that would make a very busy person stop and do a double-take.
Ten lines, every single one of them crossed out neatly, and I can see the black lines of the pen she used.
But I learnt what it meant to have a seller's voice from her.
Because that's what a press release really is. More than the product or service that our clients are offering- they can well do that with marketing, no- we're selling an angle, a story, a perspective.
One that with Media and what the potential is, we'll get that perspective going somewhere.
For some of us, we take it step by step. We move forward and backward in our memories as if we were replaying a VHS tape and watching the scenes take place backwards. For some of us, we operate our memories as we would a DVD player where we choose the section that we wish to see and jump straight to it. And there are those of us who factor our memories as online streaming where the past and present are merged into an ongoing download with no buffering but we leap to the very second that we wish to see.
Today I'm suddenly remembering my very first press release.
I didn't know how to write one. I didn't know the right way. Thank goodness there were lovely colleagues who guided me on the essentials and straightaway I plunged into writing out a single paragraph. (It's usually a page but the boss said a paragraph would do)
Now, I knew it wasn't good. It was, like, sub-par of the sub-par. In other words, I had no frigging' idea what the frak I was writing. No style, no composure whatsoever, but still, there was this wee little bit of hope that there would be at least one thing right, wouldn't it?
Ha!
It came back to me cancelled from top to bottom. Line by line by line, the boss had rewritten and restructured. She had given it a new voice. She had inserted new vocabulary. She had turned the grammar inside out. She had shifted it from a passive voice to an active one. There were additions, subtractions, replacements, words of engagement, words of action, words of description, words of the present, words that would make a very busy person stop and do a double-take.
Ten lines, every single one of them crossed out neatly, and I can see the black lines of the pen she used.
But I learnt what it meant to have a seller's voice from her.
Because that's what a press release really is. More than the product or service that our clients are offering- they can well do that with marketing, no- we're selling an angle, a story, a perspective.
One that with Media and what the potential is, we'll get that perspective going somewhere.