Targeting Your Publicity Release

How to use the Internet wisely

Writing a press release today is not the same as it was several years ago. The Internet has changed how we treat these releases and the words we use. Public Relations firms and pr clients have been quickly learning how to make a press release meet the demand of the new technology.

Just as your web site needs to be optimized, it is just as important that each press release you distribute be optimized when submitting to the online news media. The use of keywords and how they are placed within the text body is critical. Using too many keywords, or phrases will destroy your objective.

The purpose to optimizing press releases and story’s that you are pitching is to help your web site gain higher ranking and position with the search engines.  In addition to using the keywords, you need to include your company’s web address. That may seem logical, and most pr firms and clients do include that information.  Want to make your release more worthy? Then don’t only list the URL of the web site, but have a link be directed to a specific page that discusses the product or service of that press release.

This will help reporters, or other media people collect more information quickly than searching for it on your home page.

When you combine the technology of today, using search engines, and traditional writing for press releases, you can increase your company’s visibility and traffic. It is best to work with a company that knows how to optimize a press release than trying to learn by trial and error.

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EMail Marketing

Improve your image with better emails


The old saying that "Timing is Everything" is true in advertising, publicity and now email marketing.

How do you get better responses to your emails? This is a question we are asked many times by our pr clients and advertising clients. The answer is to make sure your emails are timely. This sounds like common sense, and it is. But think about how many emails you receive daily from customers, clients, and friends, and which ones you open first to read. Even junk emails campaigns use this technique to get you to respond.

An article by Robert Bly gives illustrative examples about this same topic. He mentions that some financial companies use this technique wisely. Another interesting point is to use news embedded into the copy. Make your email or publicity release (the one that goes to clients and potential customers) be somewhat newsworthy by including a current item that relates to your email.

An example was when a financial publisher used a photo of Martha Stewart and the "subject" was "Stay one step ahead of the stock market, just like Martha Stewart…but without her legal liability."

This is clever thinking and good use of publicity in email marketing.

Another good tip by Mr. Bly is to give something away in your email. Not necessarily a product, but information. Provide a tip, or something useful in the market you are in.

Why? Because people expect to receive free stuff on the internet. Knowing this, offer them something of value, and the potential client may read further and contact you for more information about your service or product.

Try these simple tips and then read Mr. Bly’s article for a third tip.

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Use All The Internet Tools

Publicity is everywhere


It’s time to continue the discussion about publicity being everywhere. The most active and productive place is the Internet.

Before we dive into this, keep in mind that traditional pr, such as publications (both newspaper, magazines), and broadcast media should be an on-going mix with your overall pr activities.

Clients tend to either keep the traditional methods and don’t explore the new media, or they drop all the reporters and publishers and only concentrate on the Internet news for press release distribution.

As I began saying earlier, you need to work within the powerful media of the Internet. One good suggestion is the RSS with a blog site.

I’ve mentioned this before, but pr clients tend to not fully appreciate the advantage of this new media. Because we use the Internet as a means of gathering information "quickly", clients feel that their blogsite should have "instant" success.

Remember that Kevin Costner movie…well, just because you build a blog site, not everyone will read it.

You need to market the site. When done correctly and with the right company, professional bloggers (yes they do exist) can make the site become highly ranked. And the company doing the work for you, if they are into RSS and Blogging can get your main web site listed high with the popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN and Alta Vista.

There are lessons to be learned when building a blogsite. More importantly you need to have daily blogs. I cannot go into all the needed essentials to building a good business blogsite in this short blog lesson. So keep in mind to be successful in any industry, use all the marketing tools that exist. That may even mean a direct mail program if that’s what is needed to gain favorable publicity. When was the last time you had an open discussion with your pr director, or met with the publicity firm to review a plan? If it’s been over three months, then it’s time to call a meeting.

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