How Dutch organisations answer a press question on deadline
A journalist is on the line and the deadline is theirs, not yours. This site shows what to say first, who should speak, and what a press desk costs.
Go straight to a section
Eight sections, each about one part of a press question: the first reply, the deadline, who speaks, what you may say, a bad day, your type of organisation, the desk itself, and the bill.
A good press reply and a bad one, side by side
Both are honest. Only one of them gives the reporter something to print that you chose yourself.
“No comment at this time.”
It is not neutral. It reads as a decision to hold something back, and it leaves the newsroom with one line and no facts, on deadline.
“We can confirm the inspection took place on Tuesday. The findings sit with the board until Thursday, and I will call you the moment they are released.”
The same position, said out loud in two halves: one fact you can point at, one thing you do not have yet, and a time. That is the whole method.
How to read the marked-up examples on this site
A desk editor works with a marker and two pencils. So does this site, and each mark carries one meaning only, everywhere.
Yellow: a line you can say to a journalist
What you say. A line you can hand over exactly as it stands, because there is a time or a page behind it.
Red: a line to hold back for now
What you do not say yet. Often not even wrong, but not yours to say at this minute, and it will be quoted as if it were.
Blue: a date, amount or source you can check
Structure and reference: a date, an amount, a source, the way back to where a figure came from.
“Not yet” is an answer. “No comment” is a headline.
The line the eight moments below are built on
Why no comment is the worst reply to a Dutch journalist
Most Dutch organisations do not get into trouble because they said something wrong. They get into trouble because they said nothing, slowly, and somebody else had to write the sentence for them. What is not in the inbox by the hour of the deadline is described in one line that you did not choose.
So the useful question is never whether to speak. It is which half of your answer is already solid. Almost every press question splits into a part you can confirm from a document today and a part that is genuinely not settled, and both halves go into the same email, with a time on the second one.
That is why everything here is marked in two colours. The marker is the part you can stand behind, because it is written down somewhere and dated. The red pencil is the part that may well be true but is not yours to release yet. Both belong in the reply. Only one of them belongs in quotation marks.
It also settles the order of your day. The organisations that come out of this well are not the fastest writers. They are the ones who already know who speaks, who approves, and where last year’s figures live. The eight moments below are that preparation, written out in the order a question actually arrives.
Silence is read as an answer too. It is just not the one you meant.
The eight steps of a press question, from the first call to the morning after
Find the moment you are standing in. Each one holds a single decision: the line under the marker is what you say, the line struck through in red is the one that is easiest to get wrong under time pressure. This is how a press question runs, not something we measured, so there is no source under these eight.
Step 1: the journalist calls, write down the question and the deadline
Take the outlet, the reporter’s name, the question in their own words and the hour they file, in that order, before you say anything about the substance.
Not yetDo not answer the substance while you are still on the phone.
Step 2: log the press question so the whole team can see it
Put it where every colleague can see it: who asked, about what, by when, and who owns it now. One list, one owner, one deadline per question.
Not yetDo not forward it to the person the question is about.
That is how a second, unprepared answer leaves the building.Step 3: choose one spokesperson and one approver
Name one spokesperson and one approver for this question and say it out loud to both. A quarter of an hour in, the organisation has exactly one voice on this subject.
Not yetNo second voice, and no personal account replying in parallel.
Step 4: check what your organisation has already published
Annual figures, an earlier statement, a policy page: check what your organisation has already published on this. Answering from documents survives being quoted, answering from memory does not.
Not yetDo not confirm a number you cannot point at on a page.
“I will confirm that in writing within the hour” is a complete answer.Step 5: send the reply in writing before the deadline
Answer before the deadline, in writing, in the language the reporter works in. Say what you can confirm, say plainly what you cannot say yet, and give the time at which you will know more.
Two halves in one email is not hedging. It is the only shape of an answer that survives being quoted, because the reporter can print both halves and neither one is a surprise to you the next morning.
Not yetDo not ask to read the whole article before it runs.
Checking your own quotes for factual accuracy is normal. Editorial control is not.Step 6: expect a follow-up call to verify quotes
Expect one more call: a quote to verify, a second question, a request for a name and a photograph. Keep the same spokesperson on it and keep the log up to date.
Not yetDo not renegotiate what you already sent.
Step 7: read the published article and file it with the inquiry
Read what was published, note which of your lines were used, and file the piece against the inquiry in the same list.
Not yetDo not answer in the comments, and do not brief the board on the headline alone.
Step 8: ask for a correction only when a fact is wrong
If a fact is wrong, ask the editor for a correction in writing, with the right fact and the page it is printed on. If it is a matter of framing rather than fact, note it and move on.
Not yetDo not demand a rectification for a story you simply dislike.
Guides on press questions, deadlines, spokespersons, rules and costs
8 sections, 200 guides in all, each written for a working day with Dutch and Flemish media.
How Dutch organisations answer a press questionWhat a Dutch organisation does between the phone call and the first written line.25 guides
Deadlines and response times in Dutch mediaWhat a Dutch newsroom means by a deadline, how much time you really have, and what silence costs you.25 guides
Who speaks for the organisation, and how they prepareWho may speak for the organisation, who approves the words, and how both prepare before anything happens.25 guides
What Dutch rules let a spokesperson sayWhat Dutch rules, contracts and privacy law let a spokesperson confirm, and where the line runs.25 guides
Speaking to the press when something goes wrongThe first day after something has gone wrong: order, tone, and who hears it when.25 guides
What press work looks like per type of Dutch organisationA hospital, a municipality, a listed company and a startup get the same call and answer it differently.25 guides
Systems and routines a Dutch press desk runs onThe list, the routine and the log that turn one answered question into a desk that gets better.25 guides
What a press desk costs in the NetherlandsWhat a press desk costs in the Netherlands, with every amount read on the supplier's own page.25 guides
What PR software costs in the Netherlands in 2026: from € 2,650 to € 20,000
A press desk is a person and a routine before it is a licence, but the licence is the part with a number on it. These are the yearly amounts suppliers print on their own pages, on one axis, read between 31 Aug 2026 and 1 Sep 2026. PR-Dashboard prints a figure for a press inquiry desk, which is why it is the first row.
- PR-DashboardDe Perslijst€ 2,650
a year · read on 31 Aug 2026 at pr-dashboard.nl - ANP ConnectDatabase only€ 2,990
a year · read on 31 Aug 2026 at anpconnect.nl - PresspageBusiness essentialsfrom € 20,000
a year · read on 31 Aug 2026 at presspage.com
Read as plain HTML, without JavaScript, on the dates shown. Amounts appear as the supplier prints them; where a supplier writes “from”, so do we. Suppliers who publish no readable yearly price are left out of this list, because a guess does not belong next to a measured figure.
What a spokesperson can look up on a supplier’s own page
One row per question a press desk asks before it buys anything, one column per supplier, read as plain HTML between 31 Aug 2026 and 1 Sep 2026. An empty cell means we did not find it on the pages we read.
| Criterion | PR-Dashboard | Prezly | Presspage | pr.co | Presscloud | Prowly | Mynewsdesk | Cision |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Size of the journalist database | stated in thousands; 10,000+ and about 12,000 both appear | not documented | not documented | not documented | 79,000+ | not documented | not documented | not documented |
| Digital accessibility | described as a feature | not documented | not documented | not documented | not documented | not documented | not documented | a legal accessibility statement |
| Press-question module | yes | not documented | yes | not documented | not documented | not documented | not documented | not documented |
| Dutch-language pages | 31 | 0 | 0 | 373 | 744 | not documented | not documented | 0 |
Wide table. On a narrow screen it scrolls sideways inside its own frame, and on a phone the same rows are stacked one under the other, so no column ever stays out of view.
4 criteria across 8 vendors is 32 cells. We found 12 documented and 20 not documented on the pages we measured (31 Aug and 1 Sep 2026). An empty cell means we did not find it stated, not that the product lacks it: two of these vendors render their pages with JavaScript.
What a spokesperson can look up in public, on its own page with the sources
How this site is researched and written
The eight steps are editorial guidance, not a measurement
They describe how a press question runs in a Dutch organisation. They carry no source and no reading date, because there is nothing there to measure.
Every amount is read on the supplier’s own page, never estimated
Prices come from the supplier’s own page, fetched as plain HTML, with the day we read it printed next to the figure.
If a supplier publishes no price, we say so
Where a supplier documents nothing, we write that we did not find it on the pages we measured, not that it does not exist.
Thijs BakkerHow Dutch organisations answer a press question: who speaks, how fast, what the rules allow, and what a press desk costs.