Home Interviews & Features Music Repartee With Alex: How Press Release Can Ruin An Artiste

Music Repartee With Alex: How Press Release Can Ruin An Artiste

April 13, 2016

A press release is the means by which an artiste communicate the newsworthiness of the material being released. It is one of the 3 most important content of an electronic press kit. The way a press release is tailored can affect the way an artiste is being perceived, therefore, the press release is an important part of branding.

The reason many artiste do not have an identity is not far from the quality – rather than the quantity of information in their press releases. Many artistes and their publicists do not know this but the press release that follows a video, music, album, news release is as important as the music, album, video that is being released. While the press release may not affect the music – especially if it is a good one – that is being released, it definitely affects the brand of the artiste in question.

Many are also of the opinion that a long press release shows the quality of the material and the persona of the artiste. This also is a wrong perception as some of the features of a good press release include deliberateness, conciseness, target and more. So, you can use a few paragraphs and still hit the nail on the head as long as all the features are in place.

An artiste can make or mar his brand by the kind of press release synonymous with him. Not paying attention to details or leaving out important information of the press release such as title, contact, description and profile can ruin the way an artiste is being perceived. Typographical errors, blunders, wrong spelling and the likes, will have the same negative effect.

While it is all too common to see a press release with lack of detailed information, another great killer of brand is a press release where too much information is packed into one. What happens in this situation is that the main information is watered down in our subconscious and the focal point is compromised, hence, the receiver may discard the whole body of information or may not hold it for long because the essence has been forfeited or pick the more salient information and discard the most important.

I refer to this as information hoarding. This is a situation where the artiste does not want to let go of some information for the greater good of the focal point so that he packs a body of various information into one presskit thereby forfeiting the focal point of such release.

Information hoarding affects the two kinds of receiver, the media and the masses. It affects the media in the sense that they do not know what to do with all the information provided so they discard some and hold on to the most important – in their view. The problem is the most important to the receiver may not be the focal of the sender therefore the mission is not accomplished. The masses are left with no other choice than to free themselves of the mental stress caused by information hoarding on the part of the artiste so as soon as the masses received the information, the lifespan of such information begins to count — really fast if I may add.

Take for instance, an artiste releases a new video, and together with the presskit for the video, he also attaches behind-the-scene photos of the video, he also attaches the audio version and the artwork for the release. Aside the title, the press release does not tell us anything about the song, only about the artistes background, childhood, awards and achievement. He then adds codes of caller tune to this song and other songs to the release. The first contact with the presskit is the blogger who will most likely separate the video and the artwork and publish a music release. He will probably create his press release too (if he has the time). If the artiste is lucky enough, he will include the audio. He will save the behind-the-scene photos for a later time, a separate post or he will discard it.

Paradventure he posted the picture, alongside the press release, artwork and behind-the-scenes photos, a reader who comes across such information is left with the choice of either mentally separating the information or ease himself of the mental stress and discard the information altogether. So you see why it is important to focus on the one thing — like Apostle Paul puts it. When the artiste make the mistake of putting too much information in his press release, he creates problem for himself and his receivers.

While it is better to completely avoid hoarding information and keep the focus in focus, some people have actually devised a means (consciously or subconsciously) of putting similar information together thereby creating a synergy of information. The result is great but one has to be careful when applying this, so one does not fall into the trap of information hoarding

About Alex Amos

Alex Amos is a Creative Writer and Team Head at Lexyville Entertainment, publishers of SelahAfrik. He is a publicist to Christian personalities including Wole Oni, Wilson Joel, Glowreeyah Braimah, Ada, Chris Shalom and more. Alex is an assistant pastor, serving in Heaven on Earth Ministries.