Posts Tagged ‘search engine optimization’
Using publicity as an SEO tool
When we write and pitch press releases for our clients we always have a targeted list of journalists that we are trying to reach. Every now and then we have a story newsworthy enough to send via newswire. I wanted to share some recent successes we’ve had with improving search engine rankings through newswire submitted press releases.
Just before Thanksgiving we sent out a press release for Pitt County Development Commission about a new industrial park that they were announcing in partnership with Martin County. You can read the release for the industrial park here.
About a month later I was researching some of their keyword rankings and noticed that the Landseast news release page on their site shows up on page 1 in Google for the following search terms: “nc industrial park” and “nc industrial parks”. Since North Carolina is consistently ranked as one of the best states for business, these search terms are a high priority for the client.
Why does this happen?
1) The more websites that are linking to you the more relevant Google thinks your site is.
2) Google liked that the news release was being linked to from high traffic websites like Marketwire.com, MSNBC, Google News, Yahoo Finance, etc…
3) Keywords were not only in the body of the press release, but also in the headline: “Martin & Pitt Counties Unveil “First-of-its-Kind” NC Industrial Park
Tips on implementing publicity into your Internet Marketing Plan:
1) Use an respectable newswire service. Our favorite is www.marketingwire.com. For $150 you can send your release to almost every paper and TV station in your state, plus they send the release to news websites all across the World Wide Web.
2) Come up with a plan to send 4, 6 or 10 press releases for the year and develop your story ideas ahead of time.
3) Be sure to include relevant keywords in your release and try to work them into your headline.
4) Most newswire services will give you one or two free hypertext links. Try linking one set of keywords in your release to a related page on your website.
5) Measure your results. Earlier this month, we sent a press release via newswire about two ADDY awards that our productions company Inspire Productions won. Before we sent it out we ranked #16 for the term “nc production company”. Within a couple of days we bumped up to #13 and we’ve maintained that position since.
