Before You Distribute: A Press Release Checklist for IR and Communications Teams
The final review of a press release is often the last opportunity to catch a problem before an announcement becomes public.
A date copied from an earlier release. A number that changed during the approval process. A quote attributed to the wrong title. A link that no longer works. These details can be easy to overlook when several people have reviewed multiple versions of the same document.
For investor relations and communications teams, a final check should go beyond spelling and grammar. It should confirm that there is a clear newsworthy announcement, that the important facts are accurate and consistent, and that the release is ready for distribution.
Before submitting your next press release, use this press release checklist to work through five essential checks.
1. Start With the Announcement
Before checking individual details, read the release once for the bigger picture.
Ask a simple question: Is there a clear, newsworthy development from the company?
A press release should communicate an announcement or development rather than read like an advertisement, general article or blog post. The headline and opening should make the purpose of the release clear without requiring readers to search for the news.
Check the headline and opening
□ Does the headline clearly identify the announcement?
□ Is there a clear, newsworthy development from the company?
□ Does the opening paragraph explain the most important information?
□ Is the company making the announcement clearly identified?
□ Does the release provide enough context to understand the development?
Check the story as a whole
Read the headline, opening paragraph and rest of the release together. They should tell a consistent story.
If the headline announces growth but the body describes a decline, or the opening describes a transaction differently from later paragraphs, reconcile the information before distribution.
2. Verify the Facts That Are Easy to Get Wrong
A word does not have to be misspelled to be incorrect. Dates, numbers, names and stock tickers can all look perfectly normal on the page while containing the wrong information.
Verify these details against the source
□ Company name and spelling
□ Executive names and current titles
□ Announcement date and relevant transaction or event dates
□ Stock exchange and ticker symbol
□ Financial figures and percentages
□ Share counts, financing amounts and transaction values
□ Locations, property names and project names
□ Contact names, email addresses and phone numbers
If a number appears more than once, check every occurrence. Correcting one version of a figure does not automatically correct it everywhere else in the release.
THE 60 SECOND FACT CHECK
3. Remove Anything Left From the Drafting Process
Some of the easiest mistakes to miss are remnants of earlier drafts.
This deserves particular attention when AI or templates have been used to prepare a release. TMX Newsfile's News Leads have encountered placeholders, repeated information and even conversational instructions from AI tools left in submitted releases.
Search the final document for:
□ Placeholder names such as Jane Doe or John Smith
□ XX, TBD, TK or other temporary markers
□ Blank dates, statistics or quote attributions
□ Internal comments or drafting instructions
□ AI prompts or conversational responses
□ Duplicate paragraphs or repeated sections
□ Information carried over from an earlier release
A quick document search for terms such as TBD, XX and placeholder can help uncover remnants that are easy to miss during a normal read.
4. Check the Supporting Elements
A release can be accurate on the page and still contain problems with the elements that accompany it.
Quotes
Confirm that each quotation is attributed to the correct person and that the person's name and title match references elsewhere in the release.
If a quote changed during the approval process, make sure the release contains the final approved version.
Links
Do not assume a hyperlink works because it looks correct. Open it.
□ Does the link work?
□ Does it lead to the intended page?
□ Is the page publicly accessible?
Images, Tables and Charts
Supporting material also needs to be ready for distribution.
□ Are images clear and high quality?
□ Do captions correspond with the correct images?
□ Are graphics provided as finished files rather than separate elements assembled in a document?
□ Are tables provided in an appropriate format?
These details can be easy to overlook when a release looks correct in the document used to prepare it.
5. Confirm the Release Is Ready to Go Public
Once the detailed review is complete, step away from individual words and look at the release as the document that will actually be distributed.
Ask:
“Are we comfortable with this exact version becoming public?”
Before submitting, confirm:
□ You are submitting the correct final version
□ Required internal, legal and regulatory approvals are complete
□ Quotes are final and correctly attributed
□ Supporting files are ready
□ The appropriate language and distribution selections have been made
□ No comments, placeholders or drafting notes remain
One Last Read
Read the release once as someone seeing the announcement for the first time.
Does anything seem inconsistent? Is anything confusing? Does something appear to be missing?
That last question is worth asking. A final review is not only about finding incorrect information. Sometimes the important issue is information that should be there but isn't.
Before a press release is distributed, a final review should confirm that the announcement is clear and newsworthy, the facts are accurate, drafting remnants have been removed and the release is ready to move through its intended distribution channels.
A few minutes spent checking the final version can prevent a small oversight from becoming part of the public announcement.
