Are press releases more powerful than advertisments?

Paul McCord writes about the power of press releases in Marketing Profs: Daily Fix blog. As he rightly states that newspapers are full of names of thousands of companies who have issued press releases as they want to let consumers know about a new product, event, earnings report, promotion etc which are reported in the newspapers as "hard news".

The consumer generated advertising revolution also works on a similar premise. Initially, advertisers refered to them as advertisements, but after a lot of outrage from consumers who want to know if what they are reading is sponsored or not, companies are now using press releases that they issue to writers and bloggers, who get paid to write about the company.

Most midsize-to-large companies have long learned the value of the press release, but the vast majority of small companies haven't. The notion seems to be that, to make it into the newspaper, companies must have some momentous news to break.

But, by forfeiting the newspaper coverage to the "big boys," small companies are missing out on possibly the most dynamic form of promotion and lead generation there is—and it's free. And, after all, if it's in the newspaper, it must be important, right?