I have used press releases a few times with very good results, 2 out 4 were picked up by television news media. I don't mean I just sent out 4 releases, I have written releases for 4 of my business ventures and 2 of them were picked up. You have to send out as many as you possibly can to every newspaper, radio station, TV news dept. etc... there is software that supposedly does this for you but its pretty spendy. I just surf google and email it to any all different media places I can find.
Its best to have the relase in the body of the email and not just as an attachment, but also as an attachment. It takes me about an entire day possibly two to get a press release out to say 100-200 media outlets. I wrote a release for my first website
www.findanymanual.com and it was picked up 3 different TV news stations and I have to say the traffic sky rocketed each time they mentioned it on TV. It was truly amazing.
There is a certain format that the release needs to be written in for them to take it seriously and it should be written in the third person. Not "I" or "we" but 'They' You should also quote yourself like your being interviewed by someone else, like the person writing the release for example, (which is you but they don't need to know that) Things, like... Mr. Smith, chairman of the board, said "We are very excitied about our upcoming launch and look forward to a very successful campaign." He went on to say "What makes us different is..." You get the idea.
Also the headline is very important, it has to catch their attention immediately, news people see hundreds of press releaeses everyday from people trying to promote their business or new website. The head line should be daring and use words like "Revolutionary" "Exciting" "Amazing" and "New". Something like:
BlahBlah.com Revolutionizes The Home Mortage Industry With Exciting New Incentives
Or: BlahBlah.com Announces New Incentives That Will Revolutionize the Highly Competetive Motgage Industry
Something like that
There really is an art to writing a good press release and you might consider hiring a professional, you can find excellent writers on
www.elance.com that will do it failry cheap like $100 bucks or so, but a poorly written press release can have a negative impact on your venture as well so it something to consider, it would probably money well spent.
The format is very important I can send you a copy of a press release I wrote that was picked up by the media and you can see the format and just change the info to suit your specific venture. PM with your email address and I'll send it to you, or anyone else interested in writing a press release.
Hope this helps.
