Who cares whether a person uses one space or two between two sentences or if “gray” is spelled “grey”?*

I do.

So does the Associated Press. The AP Stylebook has long been deemed “The Journalist’s Bible,” standardizing everything from punctuation and numerals to commonly used proper nouns in newspapers and within the news industry. And though “knowledge of AP style” is listed in many-a public relations job description, PR professionals are often quite lenient about their use of AP style.

Why AP Style Makes Sense

One of the core goals of a PR practitioner is to make reporters’ jobs easier – providing them with timely information, interview sources, data, high-quality images, etc. Ideally, in turn, the grateful reporter will cover the PR practitioner’s client, assuming a good angle exists.

By consistently using AP style in PR materials and correspondence, members of the media can simply copy and paste verbiage directly into articles. And what PR person doesn’t want flattering client-approved wording printed verbatim? Even for those journalists who would never print something verbatim, a PR document in AP style will best help them envision writing their own article with the same information. 

So, inline with this “make it easy for the media” decree, press releases, pitches, media advisories – EVERYTHING – should be in AP style.

But I Don’t Want To

Just like using proper grammar and spelling, AP style should be inherent to good PR writing.

It is also just easier to stick with one style. Otherwise, depending on who is writing various parts of a PR document, there might be periods outside of quotation marks in some sections, but not others or Arabic numerals next to spelled out numbers.**

Practice Makes …

The best way to learn AP style is to practice it. Check the AP Stylebook, iPhone app, Twitter, etc. to verify proper usage.

Also, keep this cheat sheet in mind to remedy common errors found in PR materials:   

• Cities – In press releases and article datelines, major cities are NOT followed by state abbreviations. (e.g. CORRECT: “SAN DIEGO – January 27, 2010 –.”)
• Serial commas – There is NO comma before “and” in a series. (e.g. CORRECT: “I bought apples, bananas, bread and milk at the store.”) 
• Title capitalization – I know it looks more important to capitalize all titles, but a person’s title should NOT be capitalized unless it is listed right before the name. (e.g. CORRECT: “Vice President Alan Smith” or “Alan Smith, vice president.”)

I may be in the minority – frequently stopping myself from editing everything I read to conform to AP style and wincing at the most minor infractions – but I am not ashamed to be an AP style stickler. I do not claim to be the ultimate expert, but I know that consistency in the written word can make a huge difference.

Anything that trips up a reader (including members of the media) takes away from a document’s message. And for those sticklers like me (of which reporters are a large percentage), the smallest error can lead materials to be disregarded or discredited entirely. Why risk it?

Sandy Young is a public relations consultant and freelance writer who resides in Alpine, Calif. She has been a member of three of San Diego’s top public relations agencies and has worked with high-profile clients in a wide variety of industries nationwide. Her specialties include media relations, social media marketing and new product/service launches, as well as copywriting and editing, including AP style. Young can be reached at sandrafyoung@gmail.com and @san_dyego.

 In case you were wondering:
*The first choice on each example, respectively, is the proper usage in AP style.
**Periods and commas always go within quotation marks. Question marks, exclamation points, semicolons and dashes go within quotation marks only if they apply to the quoted material. Numbers one through nine are written out. Use Arabic numerals for any number 10 and above.

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