PR Wall of Shame-- another big peeve of editors-- sending the release as a PDF #pauto #fail

March 10, 2010

This isn't tied to any specific release. But if you've done this, you know who you are.

I regularly get press releases from PR firms and from vendors directly, which are in PDF.

Now, Adobe Acrobat is a very nice program, and it looks nice.

But friends, this adds a step to my ability to post or print your release. I have to get it out of PDF and into Word or InCopy or our CMS.

This isn't tied to any specific release. But if you've done this, you know who you are.

I regularly get press releases from PR firms and from vendors directly, which are in PDF.

Now, Adobe Acrobat is a very nice program, and it looks nice.

But friends, this adds a step to my ability to post or print your release. I have to get it out of PDF and into Word or InCopy or our CMS.

Usually, this involves copying the text, putting it into notepad to get rid of wierd characters that Acrobat sticks in, and then copying it back to Word, etc. so we can use it. We are just delighted to do all this extra work, especially when we get about 300 releases a week. Not.

Sometimes, the PDF is sent encrypted so you can't copy it. Sheesh!

Look, we are NOT going to re-type your release. We don't even take printed releases anymore, haven't for about four years now.

Make it easy. I have even said how we want releases to come to us in our Editorial Guidelines.