Amazon Press Release Template

A Template for Inspiration: The Amazon Press Release

Here at Press Release Jet, you will find numerous how-to articles, samples, and templates to help you create an effective press release for your business or event. There is a fair amount of strategy that goes into press release writing if you want to be sure it will be noticed and read by reporters and journalists.

But there is somewhere else where you will find a press release template that can help you with your goals. Ian McAllister (general manager at Amazon) responded to a question on Quora ^[1] about product development by describing the “working backwards” model, in which developers write an internal press release about their initiative, announcing the finished product to customers. These Amazon press releases need to be customer-centered and show how the product will “blow away” existing solutions. Their reasoning is that if it’s not possible to make this product sound exciting to consumers, perhaps it shouldn’t be built.

Helpfully, McAllister offers an example template to guide developers in the crafting and formatting of an Amazon press release.

• Heading - Name the product in a way the reader (i.e. your target customers) will understand.
• Sub-Heading - Describe who the market for the product is and what benefit they get. One sentence only underneath the title.
• Summary - Give a summary of the product and the benefit. Assume the reader will not read anything else so make this paragraph good.
• Problem - Describe the problem your product solves.
• Solution - Describe how your product elegantly solves the problem.
• Quote from You - A quote from a spokesperson in your company.
• How to Get Started - Describe how easy it is to get started.
• Customer Quote - Provide a quote from a hypothetical customer that describes how they experienced the benefit.
• Closing and Call to Action - Wrap it up and give pointers where the reader should go next.

This format is helpful not just for an Amazon press release, but makes sense for many other types of press release as well. For more guidance, feel free to check out all the tips on our “Resources” page.