As the practice of public relations evolves, so does its tools.

I remember major national PR campaigns (years ago) during which I would spend an entire day posted at the fax machine to send a pitch and press release to sports desks across the nation. When I tell this story, our current junior executives and interns look at me, dazed with confusion. “A fax machine,” they say. “But why didn’t you just tweet them?”

I suppose I shared similar looks when my seniors would tell me stories about heading to the nearest university library to do that they called “reading the papers.” Imagine that, actually dedicating time each day to read a physical paper. This time before Vocus, Google  and twitter lists required a public relations practitioner to visit the largest source of printed daily and weekly regional, national and international papers. Often that was found at the university. “Ewwwww,” I would say. “Imagine how black the ink would make your hands.”

As my job continues to move online, I am curious what shape the conventional press release will take. As an agency, we push our clients towards social media press releases, yet many of our clients lack the information and resources to provide all the necessary pieces for a complete social media release. It’s an evolution of thinking and prioritization that will continue over the next months and years.

And I’m not fully convinced that it is the future of the press release.

As public relations moves further into community-based initiatives, it becomes more about interacting with information and making it as accessible as possible. It’s about sharing all the information up front and embarking on conversations about the topic. When a reporter asks me, “Can you send me more information on that?” I am not sure she is looking for a press release, but an information source.

The press release is old, like yesterday’s paper.

Here are a few of my predictions for the future of the press release:

1. Pretty quotes from the CEO will disappear. Please! While I love reading my ridiculously crafted quote for the CEO, reporters and bloggers don’t want it. It’s so fake, it’s appalling.
2. Your 15 minutes of fame will come on your blog. Or better yet vlog. If a client absolutely insists that a CEO have her name and quote in the announcement of the news, it should come in her blog. A post she writes specifically to share her insists on the matter. Even better if she gives those thoughts in a video blog post.
3. News will be announced on the company blog. When the reporter asks, “Can you email that info to me?” It will come in the form of a link–to a blog post with the news.
4. For more information, please contact Jamie at 619-295-8232 x106. Gone. Who has time for a phone call, when you can DM me at @jamieortiz, text me on my cell, comment on the news post, ichat me and more.
5. Catchy headlines don’t hook a reporter–SEO does. Reporters are inundated with pitches. Those they like get “filed away” in a folder. And when they want to recover that information they use the search function in their email. Did you write a headline that will make your information easy to find?
6. What’s a press release? If you want more information on that, why don’t you visit my the online community where you’ll find data, video, customer forums, links and blog posts. A press release won’t be needed in the onset of community news sites.

How else will the press release change?