If you’re on any social media platform, there’s no doubt that you’ve seen or heard of a multitude of topics where someone somewhere was offended. Not counting obvious religious, political or other volatile topics - there are many that seem, well, baffling. Take for example, the University of Ottawa’s decision to cancel its yoga class over concerns that cultural issues could offend students. Another recent example involved Starbucks decision to remove Holiday words and symbols from its traditional red cup which quickly went viral with detractors claiming that Starbucks hated Christmas. Target got into a mess recently with a Christmas sweater they sell that has the words “Obsessive Christmas Disorder” on it. People called them insensitive to those with mental health conditions. There are far too many examples of this recent phenomenon of unintentionally causing offense infiltrating and dominating social media conversations.

It’s a given that you can’t make everyone happy. But no business wants to find itself on the wrong end of public perception. So what is a business to do? In our age of political correctness, marketing is not quite so simple a proposition. Businesses have to rethink what messages they put out to ensure they don’t step on any toes. Simple things like wishing customers “Merry Christmas” can be perceived as insensitive. That being said, from a public relations perspective, the opinion that matters most is not the world’s… it’s that of your audiences. Business owners know how their patrons think and feel. They interact with them daily. As long as content and/or messages don’t cross a line, if your business feels like wishing customers a Merry Christmas, there’s no reason for you not to. Could someone come along and criticize you for being insensitive or politically incorrect? Certainly. If they’re not your customer (or potential customer) does it really matter? Do you think yoga instructors around the world are going to become unemployed because a university decided that their physical activity might offend students? I highly doubt it. What about Target and their OCD sweatshirt? They’re continuing to sell it despite the commotion. And we all know that Starbucks didn’t change its cups back.

The bottom line is that if you operate your business from a standpoint of high ethics and professionalism, genuinely care about your customers and show them that by treating them well, chances are that if you do find yourself in a position where someone criticizes a message as being insensitive, you probably won’t have to worry about how that could affect your customer’s perception of you. Starbucks and Target know their customers and made the decision to move on with their choices. They believe that they are socially responsible and give back to their communities and the world, and that they treat their customers and employees well. So, they stuck by their guns when they received pushback.

There’s no reason for you to operate your marketing as if you are treading on thin ice out of fear that you may say or do something that will offend someone. Just be a human being. Treat people how you want to be treated and everything should be just fine.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving holiday. Eat turkey. Watch football. Take a nap. Or whatever it is that you like to do. You’ve worked hard and deserve it.

If you’re on any social media platform, there’s no doubt that you’ve seen or heard of a multitude of topics where someone somewhere was offended. Not counting obvious religious, political or other volatile topics - there are many that seem, well, baffling. Take for example, the University of Ottawa’s decision to cancel its yoga class over concerns that cultural issues could offend students. Another recent example involved Starbucks decision to remove Holiday words and symbols from its traditional red cup which quickly went viral with detractors claiming that Starbucks hated Christmas. Target got into a mess recently with a Christmas sweater they sell that has the words “Obsessive Christmas Disorder” on it. People called them insensitive to those with mental health conditions. There are far too many examples of this recent phenomenon of unintentionally causing offense infiltrating and dominating social media conversations.

It’s a given that you can’t make everyone happy. But no business wants to find itself on the wrong end of public perception. So what is a business to do? In our age of political correctness, marketing is not quite so simple a proposition. Businesses have to rethink what messages they put out to ensure they don’t step on any toes. Simple things like wishing customers “Merry Christmas” can be perceived as insensitive. That being said, from a public relations perspective, the opinion that matters most is not the world’s… it’s that of your audiences. Business owners know how their patrons think and feel. They interact with them daily. As long as content and/or messages don’t cross a line, if your business feels like wishing customers a Merry Christmas, there’s no reason for you not to. Could someone come along and criticize you for being insensitive or politically incorrect? Certainly. If they’re not your customer (or potential customer) does it really matter? Do you think yoga instructors around the world are going to become unemployed because a university decided that their physical activity might offend students? I highly doubt it. What about Target and their OCD sweatshirt? They’re continuing to sell it despite the commotion. And we all know that Starbucks didn’t change its cups back.

The bottom line is that if you operate your business from a standpoint of high ethics and professionalism, genuinely care about your customers and show them that by treating them well, chances are that if you do find yourself in a position where someone criticizes a message as being insensitive, you probably won’t have to worry about how that could affect your customer’s perception of you. Starbucks and Target know their customers and made the decision to move on with their choices. They believe that they are socially responsible and give back to their communities and the world, and that they treat their customers and employees well. So, they stuck by their guns when they received pushback.

There’s no reason for you to operate your marketing as if you are treading on thin ice out of fear that you may say or do something that will offend someone. Just be a human being. Treat people how you want to be treated and everything should be just fine.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving holiday. Eat turkey. Watch football. Take a nap. Or whatever it is that you like to do. You’ve worked hard and deserve it.

In B2B marketing, there’s no scarcity of brand messages from vendors to dealers. Increasingly, those messages now tend to market how the vendor’s products and services help dealers create a better customer experience, rather than focus on the products or services themselves. But is that a good thing? Certainly dealers now recognize that customer experience is the battleground of today and will increasingly become more important. But, at the end of the day, the features that ultimately sell dealers aren’t how your solution helps their customers, but rather, how it helps them.

Let me explain:

Dealerships are businesses and the idea that customer experience will be the differentiator is accurate and important. However, what ultimately matters is the bottom line. Some dealers are content to invest in a service knowing that the financial benefits from that service could take some time to materialize – such as customer loyalty and retention. Others, however, simply cannot afford to shell out money on a monthly basis without seeing an immediate return on their investment. Dealers don’t buy leads because they think they’ll sell a car to someone in 3 months. They buy leads because they want to sell those customers cars NOW. They invest in products and services that solve THEIR problems, not necessarily their customer’s problems.

While there are certainly products and services that overlap that area between solving a dealership’s problem as well as a customer’s, typically the products and services aren’t designed to work that way. The typical solution is designed to solve a dealership’s problem and, as a side effect, enhance the customer experience. Yet, many vendors focus solely on how their service will enhance the experience for the customer.

In the past, it was the exact opposite. Marketing focused on ROI and solving problems. The foundation of closing any sale with a dealer was based on the correct answer to the question, “will your service help me sell more cars?” If you could do that satisfactorily, chances are good the dealer would sign up with you.

Nothing in sales today has changed. Dealers still want the answer to that question. Sure, if the sole purpose of your product or service is to enhance the customer experience, then by all means create a compelling message designed to convince a dealer that by doing so they will sell (or service) more cars. Ultimately, however, dealers still care how it will help increase revenue for their dealership. Bombarding dealers with a single message can result in your message being ignored.

It’s OK to brag. There is nothing wrong with telling the world how great you are. Include marketing messages that show dealers how your product or service will sell more cars or increase service business. Customer loyalty and retention are extremely important. But, it is important to be able to first and foremost illustrate to dealers how your service is going to help them NOW, in order to win that business. We all know that the auto industry is a business of immediacy. No dealer in the universe is going to tell a customer to go home and think about it before doing everything in their power to earn that sale at that moment.

Take a page from sales 101 and include messages of solutions for pain points and ROI in addition to your messages of customer experience. You may well find that dealers will be more receptive to your message and, perhaps, easier to close.

In B2B marketing, there’s no scarcity of brand messages from vendors to dealers. Increasingly, those messages now tend to market how the vendor’s products and services help dealers create a better customer experience, rather than focus on the products or services themselves. But is that a good thing? Certainly dealers now recognize that customer experience is the battleground of today and will increasingly become more important. But, at the end of the day, the features that ultimately sell dealers aren’t how your solution helps their customers, but rather, how it helps them.

Let me explain:

Dealerships are businesses and the idea that customer experience will be the differentiator is accurate and important. However, what ultimately matters is the bottom line. Some dealers are content to invest in a service knowing that the financial benefits from that service could take some time to materialize – such as customer loyalty and retention. Others, however, simply cannot afford to shell out money on a monthly basis without seeing an immediate return on their investment. Dealers don’t buy leads because they think they’ll sell a car to someone in 3 months. They buy leads because they want to sell those customers cars NOW. They invest in products and services that solve THEIR problems, not necessarily their customer’s problems.

While there are certainly products and services that overlap that area between solving a dealership’s problem as well as a customer’s, typically the products and services aren’t designed to work that way. The typical solution is designed to solve a dealership’s problem and, as a side effect, enhance the customer experience. Yet, many vendors focus solely on how their service will enhance the experience for the customer.

In the past, it was the exact opposite. Marketing focused on ROI and solving problems. The foundation of closing any sale with a dealer was based on the correct answer to the question, “will your service help me sell more cars?” If you could do that satisfactorily, chances are good the dealer would sign up with you.

Nothing in sales today has changed. Dealers still want the answer to that question. Sure, if the sole purpose of your product or service is to enhance the customer experience, then by all means create a compelling message designed to convince a dealer that by doing so they will sell (or service) more cars. Ultimately, however, dealers still care how it will help increase revenue for their dealership. Bombarding dealers with a single message can result in your message being ignored.

It’s OK to brag. There is nothing wrong with telling the world how great you are. Include marketing messages that show dealers how your product or service will sell more cars or increase service business. Customer loyalty and retention are extremely important. But, it is important to be able to first and foremost illustrate to dealers how your service is going to help them NOW, in order to win that business. We all know that the auto industry is a business of immediacy. No dealer in the universe is going to tell a customer to go home and think about it before doing everything in their power to earn that sale at that moment.

Take a page from sales 101 and include messages of solutions for pain points and ROI in addition to your messages of customer experience. You may well find that dealers will be more receptive to your message and, perhaps, easier to close.

As far as content marketing goes, the most popular types of content educate and help your audience make informed decisions. It’s not enough, however, to simply write a blog article and slap it on your company’s website. All content (great or otherwise) needs syndication of some sort. This could be through newsletters, via social media, or other avenues.

What some people miss, however, is the power inherent in publishing content written by company executives traveling to conferences educating attendees. There is a huge additional audience that may be unable to attend these conferences. In fact, some within the automotive industry estimate that just 5 percent of auto dealers have conference expenses in their budgets. If 95 percent of your audience isn’t attending the conference you are presenting at, how then are you planning on reaching them?

As social media reach continues to decrease and becomes more of a pay-to-play model, there is still one platform that is free - and actually increasing in popularity - LinkedIn. In the B2B world, there has never been a better platform for exposure and connections. Since LinkedIn has adopted a Facebook-style newsfeed and opened up its publishing platform to everyone, rather than just its top members, it has exploded for content marketers.

Daniel Roth, the Executive Editor at LinkedIn, shared in a recent article that LinkedIn now has over 1 million unique writers publishing more than 130,000 posts a week. In addition, he stated that about 45% of readers are in the upper ranks of their industries and the average post now reaches professionals in 21 industries and 9 countries.

Many companies have LinkedIn company pages. These pages are great for sharing relevant product announcements, press releases and other general news. The problem is that the reach is limited to how many followers your company has. Many start-ups, and even larger companies, don’t have significant follower bases. And, even when they do, not many are paying attention.

However, what DOES get attention is articles published under a company executive’s personal LinkedIn account. These aren’t filtered. These are shared. All of that executive’s contacts are notified that they published an article. I’d be willing to bet that most company executives have quite a few personal (or business) connections on LinkedIn. While that post on your company page may go unseen, the articles published by a company executive has a much better chance of being viewed - and not only by their connections. LinkedIn offers the ability to “tag” articles with up to three relevant categories. Think of this as LinkedIn’s version of a hashtag. This allows people to search out content relevant to their industries and provides increased reach. In addition, the way the articles are set up invites readers to comment and can be a catalyst for great discussions and interactions.

Keep in mind, however, that if the content being published strays too much into promotion, there is always a chance that the author gets tuned out. By maintaining some great strategies of content marketing and writing and publishing content that is industry relevant, educational and topical, LinkedIn has now proven to be a very viable platform on which to reach your audience.

As far as content marketing goes, the most popular types of content educate and help your audience make informed decisions. It’s not enough, however, to simply write a blog article and slap it on your company’s website. All content (great or otherwise) needs syndication of some sort. This could be through newsletters, via social media, or other avenues.

What some people miss, however, is the power inherent in publishing content written by company executives traveling to conferences educating attendees. There is a huge additional audience that may be unable to attend these conferences. In fact, some within the automotive industry estimate that just 5 percent of auto dealers have conference expenses in their budgets. If 95 percent of your audience isn’t attending the conference you are presenting at, how then are you planning on reaching them?

As social media reach continues to decrease and becomes more of a pay-to-play model, there is still one platform that is free - and actually increasing in popularity - LinkedIn. In the B2B world, there has never been a better platform for exposure and connections. Since LinkedIn has adopted a Facebook-style newsfeed and opened up its publishing platform to everyone, rather than just its top members, it has exploded for content marketers.

Daniel Roth, the Executive Editor at LinkedIn, shared in a recent article that LinkedIn now has over 1 million unique writers publishing more than 130,000 posts a week. In addition, he stated that about 45% of readers are in the upper ranks of their industries and the average post now reaches professionals in 21 industries and 9 countries.

Many companies have LinkedIn company pages. These pages are great for sharing relevant product announcements, press releases and other general news. The problem is that the reach is limited to how many followers your company has. Many start-ups, and even larger companies, don’t have significant follower bases. And, even when they do, not many are paying attention.

However, what DOES get attention is articles published under a company executive’s personal LinkedIn account. These aren’t filtered. These are shared. All of that executive’s contacts are notified that they published an article. I’d be willing to bet that most company executives have quite a few personal (or business) connections on LinkedIn. While that post on your company page may go unseen, the articles published by a company executive has a much better chance of being viewed - and not only by their connections. LinkedIn offers the ability to “tag” articles with up to three relevant categories. Think of this as LinkedIn’s version of a hashtag. This allows people to search out content relevant to their industries and provides increased reach. In addition, the way the articles are set up invites readers to comment and can be a catalyst for great discussions and interactions.

Keep in mind, however, that if the content being published strays too much into promotion, there is always a chance that the author gets tuned out. By maintaining some great strategies of content marketing and writing and publishing content that is industry relevant, educational and topical, LinkedIn has now proven to be a very viable platform on which to reach your audience.

According to a recent article in The Atlantic, soon reporters at two of the country’s leading newspapers will have access to the most basic type of digital analytics: They will be able to see web-traffic data for their own stories. That is, they will at least know how many people clicked on them, where they came from, and how long they lingered.
 

The Washington Post—in a concession to its reporters’ union—told journalists they would soon have access to this data, which they had long demanded. It also recently emerged that The New York Times would follow suit.

The crux of the argument was that the inability to view data on pieces they had previously written, prevented journalists from tailoring future content based on empirical data about the types of content their audience wanted. In addition, some suspected that the performance of their pieces could contribute to their compensation, future promotions and other job advancement opportunities.

Knowing your audience is key when making content decisions. Data is available on just about every content publishing platform. Google Analytics will tell you how many people read it. Facebook can tell you how many people interacted with it. LinkedIn can also tell you what content is popular. Each type of content will perform differently on different platforms. Some blog articles may see better performance as a published article on LinkedIn, rather than on your website. Facebook is also opening up its platform to publishers. I suspect that they will follow LinkedIn’s lead and allow content providers to publish directly on Facebook, similar to its recent push to get video content published natively to Facebook, rather than on competing video platforms.

Businesses frequently make the mistake of pushing content to their audience that they want their audience to see -- rather than content that their audience wants to see. The data and performance of your content will provide valuable evidence on the actual content your readership wants. You may not like the answer. However, the alternative is to keep pushing the content you want them to read – you could then end up with nobody reading it. The whole idea behind content marketing is to gain an audience and keep their attention through engaging and educational content. Making mistakes such as blatant self-promotion and egocentric articles will probably hurt you more than it will help.

If you’re a content producer, take time to analyze the performance of your published pieces. Which articles are your readers responding to? Which content are they ignoring? If your goal is to increase your businesses’ exposure and connect with your audience, all of your content questions will be answered with such a content analysis. Don’t discount it, trust it. It’s telling you what types of content you should be writing. And you should be listening to it.

Yes, there’s a place for articles and announcements about your company’s products, services, new features or other company related news… but that place is not on your blog. Separate blog articles from news articles into their own dedicated areas on your website. People that come to your website to see what’s new with your company will naturally gravitate towards that area. If your news is buried amongst a bunch of blog articles, however, they may never read it. The opposite also holds true. Readers who are coming to find tips, topical or educational articles, won’t necessarily want to see news articles.
 

Use analytical data to tailor content to your audience and you will find that it is better received, that it produces better results and that it gets more exposure with your desired audience.

According to a recent article in The Atlantic, soon reporters at two of the country’s leading newspapers will have access to the most basic type of digital analytics: They will be able to see web-traffic data for their own stories. That is, they will at least know how many people clicked on them, where they came from, and how long they lingered.
 

The Washington Post—in a concession to its reporters’ union—told journalists they would soon have access to this data, which they had long demanded. It also recently emerged that The New York Times would follow suit.

The crux of the argument was that the inability to view data on pieces they had previously written, prevented journalists from tailoring future content based on empirical data about the types of content their audience wanted. In addition, some suspected that the performance of their pieces could contribute to their compensation, future promotions and other job advancement opportunities.

Knowing your audience is key when making content decisions. Data is available on just about every content publishing platform. Google Analytics will tell you how many people read it. Facebook can tell you how many people interacted with it. LinkedIn can also tell you what content is popular. Each type of content will perform differently on different platforms. Some blog articles may see better performance as a published article on LinkedIn, rather than on your website. Facebook is also opening up its platform to publishers. I suspect that they will follow LinkedIn’s lead and allow content providers to publish directly on Facebook, similar to its recent push to get video content published natively to Facebook, rather than on competing video platforms.

Businesses frequently make the mistake of pushing content to their audience that they want their audience to see -- rather than content that their audience wants to see. The data and performance of your content will provide valuable evidence on the actual content your readership wants. You may not like the answer. However, the alternative is to keep pushing the content you want them to read – you could then end up with nobody reading it. The whole idea behind content marketing is to gain an audience and keep their attention through engaging and educational content. Making mistakes such as blatant self-promotion and egocentric articles will probably hurt you more than it will help.

If you’re a content producer, take time to analyze the performance of your published pieces. Which articles are your readers responding to? Which content are they ignoring? If your goal is to increase your businesses’ exposure and connect with your audience, all of your content questions will be answered with such a content analysis. Don’t discount it, trust it. It’s telling you what types of content you should be writing. And you should be listening to it.

Yes, there’s a place for articles and announcements about your company’s products, services, new features or other company related news… but that place is not on your blog. Separate blog articles from news articles into their own dedicated areas on your website. People that come to your website to see what’s new with your company will naturally gravitate towards that area. If your news is buried amongst a bunch of blog articles, however, they may never read it. The opposite also holds true. Readers who are coming to find tips, topical or educational articles, won’t necessarily want to see news articles.
 

Use analytical data to tailor content to your audience and you will find that it is better received, that it produces better results and that it gets more exposure with your desired audience.

The quick answer to the question is not so much anymore. These days press releases are branding, validation, and credibility tools for companies, not SEO tools.  Quite simply it means PR firms are shifting the focus of how they utilize press releases for their clients.

Companies have been utilizing press releases for over 100 years.  Initially a press release was a way to get information to the news media.  They were rarely seen by the public and were not created to be an advertisement. The point was to get the media’s attention about a story or news worthy event gets them to write about it. To accomplish this, organizations had to write a release that had real news value.

The Internet, along with media channels, blogs and social networks, has changed the press release landscape.  Company branding, pushing content, infographics and press releases became a tool in the SEO arsenal. This shift led to a glut of releases that were no longer “real news,” but promotional content stuffed with keywords and hyperlinks to affiliated sites and networks designed to ‘game the system’ and put the content on page one of the search engines.

Google, the appointed keeper and indexer of web content had enough, and listed press releases as a link scheme, stating that a release is basically an advertisement.

As a PR specialist, it’s my job to keep up with the latest advice and best practices in order to optimize the value I can offer. While I’m certainly no SEO expert myself, I have assembled some best practices from SEO experts that I thought would be useful.

Here are a few tips that should help increase the effective reach and value of your press releases:

1. Use reputable press release distribution sites – When Google rolled out Panda, press release sites took a hit -- and none were hit harder than the many free press release sites in existence. The simple fact that they are free lead many companies to distribute press releases as an SEO strategy. The practice was to fill these releases with tons of backlinks to their websites, hoping for increased traffic. In the past this worked, but not anymore. While the new algorithm also hit reputable sites such as PR Newswire, they weren’t hit as hard. These sites also immediately worked with Google and revised site policies to prevent further damage. While free press release sites are tempting, I’d advise not to use them for distribution. Google has labeled many of them as spam. If you have a good news release that is worth getting out, spend the money and distribute it through a reputable site such as BusinessWire, PRNewswire or Marketwire.
    
2. Don’t rely solely on a newswire -- build your contact list – Public relations is by its very nature a relations business. There is so much news out there that if you just send it out on a newswire, unless it is very big news, the chances of it actually appearing in your target publications are really quite small.I was recently at a press conference at NADA with literally no one in attendance. A very green new PR person had spent about $1,200 to send out the press conference announcement on PR Newswire. But she had no one turn up at the press conference – why? At a very hot news time such as NADA, it can be very hard to get eyeballs on a newswire release, especially if it is not from a company that is known to the editors and reporters. It is therefore important to establish contacts with the editors of the key publications in your industry. Talk to them.Stay in regular contact with them so you know the type of news they are looking for. Send them your press releases with a personal note. And, if appropriate, follow up with a phone call. Also, editors can frequently change at publications, so make sure your list is up to date.
    
3. How many links can you put in a press release before triggering the “link police?”  One of the primary reasons that press release sites were penalized was that people were using them inappropriately. The general rule of thumb is that you shouldn’t include more than 2-3 links for every 500 words of text.
   
   Google does not give credit for links created by press release authors. Their algorithm is based on third-party endorsement links, what they call editorial links. Earned media had always been regarded as more valuable than owned or paid, precisely because it is third-party endorsement from a source that has no vested interest.
   
   Google only penalizes links that are there for the express purpose of juicing up the SEO values.  Write press releases with links that lead naturally to other content, making it beneficial to the reader– be it the public or the media.  Work with your IT team and learn what a “no-follow” link is.  Make all links in your releases no-follow to avoid being penalized by Google. PRNewswire already automatically tags all links in press releases with these tags. So, if you’re unclear on how to do this, you might consider using them. These links should be different and relevant. If you’re going to include multiple links, it’s acceptable to include one to your home page. But, if you are going to include more, make sure they are to relevant pages within your site, rather than to your home page. Ensure that any anchor text contains the keywords you are targeting in your release. And that the primary keyword target in your anchor text is the first link, as it carries the most weight.
   
   According to Google, “The best way to get other sites to create high-quality, relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can naturally gain popularity in the Internet community. Creating good content pays off: Links are usually editorial votes given by choice, and the more useful content you have, the greater the chances someone else will find that content valuable to their readers and link to it.”
    
4. Be newsworthy – Too many press releases are self-promotional and aren’t really newsworthy. Don’t use press releases simply to say “something,” if what you are saying has no value and would be of no interest to your audience. And please, please, please don’t send out your sales and marketing materials as a press release. By avoiding flooding the Internet with irrelevant press releases, chances are your target audience will pay more attention when they see your release. Post too many that are not newsworthy and you may cause a journalist or industry site to ignore future releases under the assumption they are simply self-promotional pieces.
    
5. Format your releases correctly – According to PRNewsOnline, press releases should have catchy headlines that are under 22 characters and should contain 2-3 of your targeted keywords in the headline, subhead and first paragraph. They should be no more than about 750 words long. It is also a good practice to include your company’s logo in every release, as well as rich media such as pictures and video.
    
6. Don’t post them on your website – This one was a surprise to me but it is good to keep in mind and makes sense -- SEO authority Kissmetrics advises that businesses not post their press releases on their own websites. They explain that this action “denigrate(s) your content authenticity and page-score ranking with Google and other search engines.” They do, however, offer a solution and advise that businesses “write a unique teaser paragraph or two, then link out to the release on the host site that distributed it or one of the major media outlets that picked it up.”

Is there such a thing as a well optimized press release? Yes, but proceed with caution. An optimized release needs to be relevant, speak in a natural voice and avoid the keyword stuffing that triggers the Google red flags.   Maintain editorial integrity, keep content newsworthy, craft a headline with your targeted audience in mind, and put key phrases in the first paragraph, so they will be indexed properly. 

Press releases are still a very valuable way for businesses to gain brand exposure and share relevant company information with their target audiences. However, due to the changes in search engine algorithms, you should no longer think of press releases as a form of SEO, but rather as a means of sharing company news. When press releases are picked up by industry news sites and publications, those mentions, re-publications, links and citations do help your website and company through increased exposure.

While there are certainly more intricacies involved when it comes to the SEO value of press releases, I hope that abiding by these 6 tips helps you accomplish the main goal of all press releases – namely getting your message out to the people that need to hear it.

The quick answer to the question is not so much anymore. These days press releases are branding, validation, and credibility tools for companies, not SEO tools.  Quite simply it means PR firms are shifting the focus of how they utilize press releases for their clients.

Companies have been utilizing press releases for over 100 years.  Initially a press release was a way to get information to the news media.  They were rarely seen by the public and were not created to be an advertisement. The point was to get the media’s attention about a story or news worthy event gets them to write about it. To accomplish this, organizations had to write a release that had real news value.

The Internet, along with media channels, blogs and social networks, has changed the press release landscape.  Company branding, pushing content, infographics and press releases became a tool in the SEO arsenal. This shift led to a glut of releases that were no longer “real news,” but promotional content stuffed with keywords and hyperlinks to affiliated sites and networks designed to ‘game the system’ and put the content on page one of the search engines.

Google, the appointed keeper and indexer of web content had enough, and listed press releases as a link scheme, stating that a release is basically an advertisement.

As a PR specialist, it’s my job to keep up with the latest advice and best practices in order to optimize the value I can offer. While I’m certainly no SEO expert myself, I have assembled some best practices from SEO experts that I thought would be useful.

Here are a few tips that should help increase the effective reach and value of your press releases:

1. Use reputable press release distribution sites – When Google rolled out Panda, press release sites took a hit -- and none were hit harder than the many free press release sites in existence. The simple fact that they are free lead many companies to distribute press releases as an SEO strategy. The practice was to fill these releases with tons of backlinks to their websites, hoping for increased traffic. In the past this worked, but not anymore. While the new algorithm also hit reputable sites such as PR Newswire, they weren’t hit as hard. These sites also immediately worked with Google and revised site policies to prevent further damage. While free press release sites are tempting, I’d advise not to use them for distribution. Google has labeled many of them as spam. If you have a good news release that is worth getting out, spend the money and distribute it through a reputable site such as BusinessWire, PRNewswire or Marketwire.
    
2. Don’t rely solely on a newswire -- build your contact list – Public relations is by its very nature a relations business. There is so much news out there that if you just send it out on a newswire, unless it is very big news, the chances of it actually appearing in your target publications are really quite small.I was recently at a press conference at NADA with literally no one in attendance. A very green new PR person had spent about $1,200 to send out the press conference announcement on PR Newswire. But she had no one turn up at the press conference – why? At a very hot news time such as NADA, it can be very hard to get eyeballs on a newswire release, especially if it is not from a company that is known to the editors and reporters. It is therefore important to establish contacts with the editors of the key publications in your industry. Talk to them.Stay in regular contact with them so you know the type of news they are looking for. Send them your press releases with a personal note. And, if appropriate, follow up with a phone call. Also, editors can frequently change at publications, so make sure your list is up to date.
    
3. How many links can you put in a press release before triggering the “link police?”  One of the primary reasons that press release sites were penalized was that people were using them inappropriately. The general rule of thumb is that you shouldn’t include more than 2-3 links for every 500 words of text.
   
   Google does not give credit for links created by press release authors. Their algorithm is based on third-party endorsement links, what they call editorial links. Earned media had always been regarded as more valuable than owned or paid, precisely because it is third-party endorsement from a source that has no vested interest.
   
   Google only penalizes links that are there for the express purpose of juicing up the SEO values.  Write press releases with links that lead naturally to other content, making it beneficial to the reader– be it the public or the media.  Work with your IT team and learn what a “no-follow” link is.  Make all links in your releases no-follow to avoid being penalized by Google. PRNewswire already automatically tags all links in press releases with these tags. So, if you’re unclear on how to do this, you might consider using them. These links should be different and relevant. If you’re going to include multiple links, it’s acceptable to include one to your home page. But, if you are going to include more, make sure they are to relevant pages within your site, rather than to your home page. Ensure that any anchor text contains the keywords you are targeting in your release. And that the primary keyword target in your anchor text is the first link, as it carries the most weight.
   
   According to Google, “The best way to get other sites to create high-quality, relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can naturally gain popularity in the Internet community. Creating good content pays off: Links are usually editorial votes given by choice, and the more useful content you have, the greater the chances someone else will find that content valuable to their readers and link to it.”
    
4. Be newsworthy – Too many press releases are self-promotional and aren’t really newsworthy. Don’t use press releases simply to say “something,” if what you are saying has no value and would be of no interest to your audience. And please, please, please don’t send out your sales and marketing materials as a press release. By avoiding flooding the Internet with irrelevant press releases, chances are your target audience will pay more attention when they see your release. Post too many that are not newsworthy and you may cause a journalist or industry site to ignore future releases under the assumption they are simply self-promotional pieces.
    
5. Format your releases correctly – According to PRNewsOnline, press releases should have catchy headlines that are under 22 characters and should contain 2-3 of your targeted keywords in the headline, subhead and first paragraph. They should be no more than about 750 words long. It is also a good practice to include your company’s logo in every release, as well as rich media such as pictures and video.
    
6. Don’t post them on your website – This one was a surprise to me but it is good to keep in mind and makes sense -- SEO authority Kissmetrics advises that businesses not post their press releases on their own websites. They explain that this action “denigrate(s) your content authenticity and page-score ranking with Google and other search engines.” They do, however, offer a solution and advise that businesses “write a unique teaser paragraph or two, then link out to the release on the host site that distributed it or one of the major media outlets that picked it up.”

Is there such a thing as a well optimized press release? Yes, but proceed with caution. An optimized release needs to be relevant, speak in a natural voice and avoid the keyword stuffing that triggers the Google red flags.   Maintain editorial integrity, keep content newsworthy, craft a headline with your targeted audience in mind, and put key phrases in the first paragraph, so they will be indexed properly. 

Press releases are still a very valuable way for businesses to gain brand exposure and share relevant company information with their target audiences. However, due to the changes in search engine algorithms, you should no longer think of press releases as a form of SEO, but rather as a means of sharing company news. When press releases are picked up by industry news sites and publications, those mentions, re-publications, links and citations do help your website and company through increased exposure.

While there are certainly more intricacies involved when it comes to the SEO value of press releases, I hope that abiding by these 6 tips helps you accomplish the main goal of all press releases – namely getting your message out to the people that need to hear it.