Many of the lower-end press release distribution services are now allowing you to specify a release time. The main wire service providers have always allowed you to specify the release time and time zone.  Your PR or marketing agency should be able to advise you on the best time for a release; but if you don’t have one here is some guidance ?

Unless you are trying to stem a crisis or doing a timed product release that’s linked to an event, we have found 7:30am-8:00am in your “target timezone” to be the most effective.It is early enough in the morning to meet most journalist’s deadlines and late enough to catch them after their coffee. Releasing early in the morning will allow get you to the top of Inbox’s if you are pitching via email. It also gives your public relations agency the entire day to line up interviews with company executives, if requested.

Note your “target timezone” may be different than the location of your business. For instance, if your business is in San Francisco, but you mostly sell products or services on the East Coats, a 7:30am release time would be best. Early AM release submissions have given us the best media pickup. Remember though, you always have to option of sending reporters releases “under embargo” which means you can send them ahead of time and, by ethics, the receiver agreees not to publish until your specified date and time.  {However, we find sending releases “under embargo” is not as effective as a timed morning distribution}. Many editors and journalists now frown upon embargoes releases or the release slips their minds because it was sent days before actual distribution.

For a press release distribution service consider Marketwire.com.Marketwire’s state-only distribution channels are excellent bargains if you only sell locally.And their SEO-enhanced options at $200 is highly-recommended as anchor-text links remain intact even in online news sites such as Google News and Yahoo! News. If you can’t afford Marketwire for a nationwide release, then use PRWeb at $80 if you’re really budget-limited, or the $200 PRWeb SEO-enhanced package with anchor text backlinks. But be aware that at the PRWeb package, you will not be able to specify the {time of distribution- the $80 option releases only at midnight}.