Press Release – is an official statement from an organization or an individual released to media for publication and distribution. Well, that’s the definition of Press Release! In this article we are analyzing how press releases are used for digital marketing. Let’s first analyze how press releases work!
As we already told, press releases are an official communication (written or recorded) by an organization or an individual. In the print media, press releases are usually announced by calling an official press meeting; in the presence of media editors & journalists. The press release will then be submitted to all media contacts for publication. The journalists and editors who find the press release newsworthy will publish them and others usually ignore the release.
In the digital world too, press releases works in same fashion. Instead of calling a press meeting, press releases are usually emailed to the personal/official mail of online media journalists. Those journalists who find the press release useful to his readers will publish them. The difference between print media press release and online media press release is that we get a chance to embed our website’s link in online media press releases (as the content we distribute is in HTML format). When our press release gets published in hundreds of online media news websites, we get hundreds of genuine backlinks to our website (never mind they are do follow or no follow) through the link we embed in our press release content. In addition, we get lots of referral traffic to our website from the news websites who publish our press release. The net result is we invite attention to our website,business and our products using good press releases.
Let’s dig what we can achieve with a good press release:
- Eyeballs – a lot of people will read about your company name, your product/service and your website.
- Traffic – Not everyone will be interested in your company and its product/services. A few interested ones will click on your website link to know more about your business. These are prospects who might get converted as customers.
- SEO Advantage-1 – Outgoing links from most of the news websites will be having a “no follow” tag. But a few of them might have “do follow” tag as well. This will give your website back link value. Net result is that your website is going to get a boost in search engines.
- SEO Advantage-2 – Even if the link rel tag is “no follow”, most of the search engines are going to count references to your website from other websites. This number of references from different news websites are surely going to add value to your websites domain authority. This is definitely a positive signal for search engines.
- SEO Advantage-3 – is through social shares! Number of social shares and traffic from social media websites like Facebook, Twitter, G+, LinkedIn etc are definitely a metric counted by search engines. Good press releases will get shared in social media. Since you have a link reference to your website in the press release content, a small percentage of these social traffic (traffic originating from social sources) will get directed to your website as well. This will result as a positive signal for search engines to boost your websites overall value in search engines.
- Social Traffic – Good press releases will get lots of social shares through Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, G+ and other social medias. Thus more people will see your products and services. In addition, social shares brings trust and authority to your products and services.
When to use Press Release for Digital Marketing ?
There are usually 2 instances in which press releases are used – 1) is for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) 2) is for increasing visibility and get audience to your website
1) SEO Activities – Press Releases are good for Search Engine Optimization activities. The first one being the articles/news releases will get ranked in search engines as most of the news websites are well established and hold high authority in search engines. These articles will rank high in search results and traffic will come to your website as a referral from the news websites through search engines. The second one being back links obtained from the news websites adding value to your websites link profile and your website getting boosted in search results.
You have to take caution while doing Press Release for SEO activities:
- Don’t do Press Releases often – when you do for SEO purpose, release news only in a limited frequency. You can do a PR during the initial launch of a website, during a new product/service launch and during such relevant occasions.
- Don’t embed keyword stuffed anchor texts – You have to keep in mind that Google tracks and punishes link building activities that attempts to take advantage of their ranking algorithm. Google takes manual actions against website which violates its link building policies. For Example:- We are a new Chicago Real Estate Agency, which focus on premium apartments and condos. We also focus on Rentals in Chicago for premium villas. Embedding links like in the above statement can get you punished. Instead, embed links only 1 or 2 times in a press release. An ideal case is adding first link within the first 100 or 200 words and second link towards the end of release. Instead of using keyword stuffed anchor text, use natural word combinations. For example:- We are a new real estate agency based in Chicago known as RoseVil, and we focus on premium apartments and condos.
2) Increasing Visibility – when you do Press Release for increasing visibility and getting audience to your website, you can do it often. But make sure you add “no follow” tag to every link you embed in the press release.
