Strategies for Optimizing Press Releases

Press Releases are intended to highlight a specific event, announcement, or special information to be sent to the media in hopes that they will cover your story. It seems pretty simple; just write and release, but there have to be tactics to ensure that your press release is getting recognized.

Since press releases are not only being read by news reporters, but also another audience being the end-users utilizing search engines, it is especially important to make sure that these possible consumers are finding your press release. By putting links in your press release, it helps end-users to be led somewhere helpful if they want more information about your business. To target your other audience of reporters and journalists, it is crucial to decide on a distributions channel that will be most beneficial to getting your press release out there in the media and to come up in search engines. There are many news services that do this including: PR Web, PR Newswire, Business Wire, Marketwire, etc.

Another very important strategy that will help optimize your press release for online search is researching and defining the right keywords to help reach your target audience. It is a great idea to place these keywords in the headline and/or subhead of the release as well as in the lead paragraph of the release since these are the most important parts of the press release. Also, to intrigue readers, try to create a creative hook that will grab attention and encourage your target audience to further inquire about your release. Another strategy in addition to keywords is adding an image to your press release because this will set it apart from other press releases as well as increase its visibility in search engines as image searches are becoming more popular.

One more thing: do not forget to track the effectiveness of your press release by measuring results. Through Search Engine Optimization reporting, you can find out how much traffic was driven to your website from the press release as well as how many people are reading the press release itself!

What’s all the Buzz about Social Media?

With the way the Public Relations industry is headed, social media is sure to be a key player. As new technological advances are being made constantly, it is not surprising that individuals look to the internet for a quick and easy way to access information. Although social media is not exclusively an online outlet to spread information through messages, it is becoming increasingly popular. Social media may only be one form of PR; however, it is most definitely a trend that shows a great deal of impact on how individuals gather and learn about messages.

Simply put, social media is also known as user generated content that is usually found online or through some form of an electronic source. As opposed to traditional broadcast media in which messages are distributed directly to an audience from one source, social media allows for messages to be passed to and from many individuals, allowing anyone to utilize it without requiring any special skills. A perk of social media compared to industrial or broadcast media is that there is usually little or no cost associated with it. Social media is also very efficient in that it is usually available just as soon as, or in most cases sooner than traditional media, and it can generate responses almost instantaneously. Social media is also very flexible in that it can be altered by being edited or added to, and it is great for allowing other individuals to comment or respond as a way to increase the buzz on a certain issue or topic of interest.

It is evident that social media is expanding PR in this new wave of increased reliance and confidence in technology, and is an excellent way to create buzz or generate popularity on any subject matter. As traditional media is being put on the back burner, social media is a trend that does not appear to be going out of style any time soon! Could it be that social media is more of a revolution rather than a trend after all?