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Press release platform development

For PR agencies, newswire operators and in-house communications teams who need a distribution platform built around verified senders, embargo times, journalist preferences and delivery evidence rather than a mass-mailing tool with a press list attached.

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The problem

What goes wrong today

Where it usually starts

A distribution operation run on a mailing tool and a spreadsheet breaks in predictable places.

  • The journalist list has been built up over years by several account managers, so the same correspondent appears three times under two spellings and still receives property releases after moving to the health desk.
  • Releases go out as attachments from individual inboxes, so when a client asks who received the embargoed version and when, nobody can answer with confidence.
  • One account manager sends a release an hour early because the embargo was in the subject line and not enforced anywhere.

Where it gets harder

New senders are accepted on the strength of an email, and a release with a defamatory line goes out under the operator's name before anyone reads it.

  • Journalists who have asked to stop receiving a sector keep receiving it because the opt-out lives in one person's notes.
  • Media kits are sent as oversized attachments that bounce.
  • The sender wants to know whether the release was opened and the images downloaded; the operator has an open rate for the whole send and nothing per journalist.
  • The operation has relationships and reach, and a toolset that cannot prove either.

Scope of the service

What the build covers

A custom distribution platform build normally covers both sides of the wire. Sender organisations are onboarded with a verification step, and a moderation queue holds releases from first-time senders until a moderator has read them. The release composer carries an embargo time that the platform enforces, a boilerplate per sender, and a media kit of images and documents served from the platform rather than attached. Distribution lists are built by sector, region and outlet type from a journalist database the operator owns, with each journalist holding their own account, topic subscriptions and opt-outs that apply across every sender.

Distribution is scheduled against the embargo and delivery is tracked per recipient as sent, opened and downloaded, so a sender can see what happened to their release and the operator can show it. Senders buy credit packs or subscription plans through the orders engine, and each sender has a public newsroom page that archives their releases. The operator's dashboard shows moderation load, delivery health and sender activity.

Deliberately out of scope

  • The email delivery infrastructure itself, which comes from a transactional email provider connected to the platform
  • Media monitoring and coverage tracking, which stay with specialist services
  • The writing of the releases

When the scope grows

Scoping scenario

A newswire with an imported database of several thousand journalists, three sender tiers, mandatory moderation for the first five releases from any new sender and a requirement to show each sender a per-journalist delivery record for its own releases only. The tiered moderation and the strict separation of what each sender can see are what make it a custom build, and the scope document says so.

Deliverables

What you receive

  • Discovery notes from mapping how releases currently move from sender to journalist
  • A written scope document naming the onboarding, moderation, distribution and tracking stages and what is left out
  • Designs of the release composer, the moderation queue, the sender dashboard and the journalist preferences page
  • The build, connected to your email delivery provider, deployed to your hosting or ours
  • Import and de-duplication of the journalist database with opt-outs preserved
  • Training for the operator team, moderators and a sender onboarding guide
  • Handover material and full ownership of the source code, the database and the archive

Process

How a project runs

Each stage maps onto the project view in your client panel. Durations are set in your proposal, never on this page.

  1. Onboarding

    Access to the current mailing tool, the journalist spreadsheets, the sender list and any existing newsroom archive.

    Project stage: Onboarding

  2. Planning

    Discovery with the operator and a senior account manager; verification, moderation rules, list structure and payment model go into the scope document.

    Project stage: Planning

  3. Design

    Composer, moderation queue, sender dashboard and journalist preferences page designed for desktop work with phone access for approvals.

    Project stage: Design

  4. Development

    Built in layers: senders and verification, then composer and lists, then scheduled distribution and tracking, then credits and newsrooms.

    Project stage: Development

  5. Client review

    The operator runs a fortnight of real releases to a test list alongside the current tool and reports what does not match the way the desk works.

    Project stage: Client review

  6. Revisions

    Changes from the review are made and re-checked against the scope document and the embargo rules.

    Project stage: Revisions

  7. Ready for launch

    Journalist database imported and de-duplicated, opt-outs verified, email provider authenticated, launch checklist signed off.

    Project stage: Ready for launch

  8. Delivered

    Releases go out through the new platform; hosting and maintenance continue under their own agreement if taken.

    Project stage: Delivered

Integrations

Commonly integrated

Systems this kind of business usually asks us to connect. Each integration is confirmed during discovery; none is assumed.

  • Transactional email providers with delivery and open tracking
  • Payment providers for credit packs and subscriptions
  • Media monitoring and coverage tracking services
  • CRM systems holding sender and journalist relationships
  • Image and document storage for media kits
  • Accounting software for sender invoicing
  • Analytics and consent management platforms

How we would approach it

Worked example

Concept demo

A newswire with tiered moderation and sender-scoped reporting

In this scoping scenario, a newswire operator with a journalist database built up over a decade wants three sender tiers, moderation of the first five releases from every new sender, embargoes enforced by the platform, and a delivery record each sender can see for its own releases and nobody else's. The scope we would propose: a verification and moderation workflow with a counter per sender that lifts moderation after the agreed number of approved releases, an embargo field that blocks distribution until the time passes, lists built from a de-duplicated journalist database with opt-outs applied globally, and sender dashboards scoped so a sender sees per-journalist delivery events for its releases only.

The custom route is needed because the moderation rules change with sender history and because sender-level data isolation has to be enforced on every query, not just hidden in the interface.

Concept demo: a scoping scenario written to show how we would approach the work. It is not a delivered client project.

Pricing

What affects the price

Every proposal is priced on scope. These are the factors that move it most for this kind of build.

  • Size and condition of the journalist database to import and de-duplicate
  • Sender verification steps and moderation rules
  • Number of sender tiers and the payment model for each
  • Delivery tracking detail required per journalist and per release
  • Public newsroom pages per sender and their customisation
  • The email delivery provider and sending volume per month
  • Reporting for the operator, senders and account managers
  • Hosting choice: your own hosting or ours

Start from a package

Press release distribution package

Sender onboarding, an embargoed release composer, journalist lists with preferences, scheduled distribution with delivery tracking, credits and public newsrooms for newswire operators.

Custom build
View the package

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

When is the package the better option?

If you need verified senders, an embargoed composer, lists by sector and region, delivery tracking and credit packs with standard moderation, the press release distribution package usually fits through configuration. Moderation that varies with sender history, several sender tiers with different rights or an unusually messy database import point to the custom route.

Can you import our existing journalist lists?

Yes. We import from your spreadsheets and mailing tool, de-duplicate on email and name, preserve every opt-out we can find and give the result a structure by sector, region and outlet type. The scope document states what the source data allows once we have seen it.

Is the embargo actually enforced?

Yes. A release with an embargo time cannot be distributed before it by anyone, including the operator. Journalists on an embargo list receive it in advance only where you configure that, with the embargo marked.

Do journalists have to create an account?

They can receive releases without one, but an account lets them set topics, regions and opt-outs that apply across every sender. The platform honours opt-outs whether or not an account exists.

Who owns the platform and the database?

You do. Source code, the journalist database, sender records and the newsroom archive are handed over at delivery. Hosting and maintenance are optional and separately agreed.

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