3 (More!) Tricks for Writing Knife-sharp Press Releases

2. Your "Fluff Quotes" Need Substance. Badly.
"Fluff quotes," those silly little blurbs from a company's CEO that usually live at the bottom-middle of press releases, are often a painfully missed opportunity. It's not that they're unnecessary, it's that they always seem to say exactly nothing.

"This new technology platform is going to be the best technology platform because I say so." "I'm thrilled we hired Steve Blorp because he's going to bring that personal Blorp touch to our company." "Our new products are great because they're new and great and also, did I mention, new and great?"

Every line of your press release should add some value to the reader. Quotes from your CEO can add some nice weight and shine to your release, but if they don't say anything of meaning, they'll just come off as hollow-sounding fluff. And since fluff is only good for sleeping on, you want to rip every single atom of it out of your writing. Choose hard, shiny quotes that will stick out and add something, either to the message of your release or to the marketing of your company as a whole. Some examples:

Example 1: "Our new technology platform cuts our users' order-time down by 75%," said Alexander Awesome, CEO of Awesome Co. "It gives us by far the fastest storefront in the promotional products industry, as an absolute fact. I know because I've personally tried and timed the speed of each of our competitors' sites, with a stopwatch in hand," he said. "It was boring, tedious, and I bought a lot of second-rate products I don't want, but at least now I can definitely back up what our web engineers have been saying for months: We have, without question, the fastest website in the industry."

Why it has value: Includes numbers (see first point), shows the CEO's dedication to truth and his business overall, shows a (slight) sense of humor and personality.