Press releases, when used properly, can attract prospects as effectively as advertising. But do you know how to optimize them for the Internet? In this document, Marcia Yudkin describes how you can improve the likelihood that your press releases will reach the audience you’re targeting.
Getting invaluable media coverage is a process I described in my 1994 book, 'Six Steps to Free Publicity.' Although the basics in the process of pursuing publicity remain the same, many of the finer points have changed. If you’ve begun using online publicity distribution services to disseminate your releases to the media, or even if you post press releases on your own Web site, you’ll get a much greater publicity return when you modify releases so that they show up in online searches by your target audience.
The light bulb went off for me when I was searching for specialized software and came upon a press release for such a product, rather than the company’s regular marketing copy, at its Web site. Links in the press release led me to the software manufacturer’s Web site. It occurred to me that in addition to the audience of journalists, editors, and producers who had opted to receive releases in their areas of interest, press releases could address the needs of a second group: individuals who are using search engines to find specialized products, services, and information. I researched techniques that would make a difference in finding press releases through search engines. Here are the steps that I discovered:
- Decide on a keyword phrase that ties in to the product or service you’re promoting and that people might actually search for. You can research this conveniently at http://www.wordtracker.com/.
For example, some authorities claim that 'media release' is preferable to 'press release.' Since more people search for the latter term, it’s the one I use for publicity purposes.
- Use this phrase in your press release headline and repeat it at least three times in the body of the release. Make sure you also write out a properly formed link to your own Web site ('http://www.mydomain.com' rather than 'mydomain.com') in the text of the release.
- Unless the proper name of your product or service is already well known, emphasize its generic description rather than its name. For instance, write 'proposal writing software' rather than 'PropWritePro.'
- Likewise, substitute keyword phrases for pronouns such as 'it' or 'its' to increase their overall frequency in the release.
- If your release runs more than three paragraphs, use a subhead that includes your keyword phrase. If you’d normally finish off with a subhead such as 'About TurboHeadIsland,' where TurboHeadIsland is the name of your company, lengthen the subhead so that it includes your keyword phrase, for example, 'About Proposal Writing Software Maker TurboHeadIsland.'
- Post your release on your own Web site with its own page, linked from your home page, in addition to submitting it to your favorite press release distribution service.
Although these steps might appear easy, they’re not intuitive or natural for anyone with experience in writing traditional press releases. Let’s suppose you were launching a rental boat service in Truro, Massachusetts, which is on Cape Cod. Tourists would be much more likely to use 'Cape Cod' as a search term than 'Truro,' so the former is what you should repeat. And if you’re particularly familiar with Cape Cod, you’d probably use 'Cape Cod' only once and then revert to 'the Cape,' which wouldn’t help enough when people are typing in 'Cape Cod boat rental.'
Assuming that you’ve chosen your keyword phrases wisely, enjoy increased visibility from Internet users finding your press release through search engines for months and even years to come!