Press Release SEO Strategies

Drafting Press Releasesthat Maximize SEONew ways to promote any business on the Internet using press releases created for search marketing.
Brian Pasch, CEO
Pasch Consulting Group

Terms of Use
The contents of the document are not to be copied, mailed, transmitted via email or altered digitally for any purpose other than to facilitate this seminar. All seminar attendees have permission to print or keep an electronic copy of this presentation in downloadable PDF format for their personal use and reference.
Anyone or company interested in reproducing any part of these materials must first contact the author for permission. The logos, screen shots and graphics used in this presentation are the property of the registered companies and permission to use those items must be obtained directly by the rights holder.
Date of original publication: 6/15/2009. The screen shots presented in this webinar were taken before June 6, 2009. Changes made to individual websites after 6/6/2009 will not be reflected in this presentation.
© Copyright 2009 – Pasch Consulting Group
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SEO Fundamentals Testing & Measuring : Determining the ROI of your online marketing How does Google, Yahoo and Bing Really Work Dow to Reverse Engineer search listingsEffective Marketing with Press Releases Good writing skills are critical for Internet marketing Traditional press releases writing falls short on the Internet Writer have to research what consumers type into the search engines Press Release Writing For the Internet Titles & Teasers Content & Links & Keywords Formatting Measuring the Effectiveness of PR Portals How to choose a PR publishing website? Determining the cost/benefit of PR fees. Are free PR websites effective? Tracking views and clicks on your press releases (Budurl) Press Release Marketing Strategies How to target your competitors How to supercharge your press releases How to leverage PR content on blogs
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Seminar Outline

Fundamentals: SEO vs. SEM
This seminar will focus on the “green” area of a search results page
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Internet Marketing Opportunities
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Internet Press Releases
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Think like a CFO
Without measurement tools in place, your hard work will be not be appreciated and funding may be pulled.
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Put on Your SEO Hat
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SEO Fundamentals

Unique Phone#
Unique Web Phone Numbers
Who’s Calling
Unique Lead Form Subject Tags
Unique Email Addresses
In Press Release
On Blog Posts
Inside Content Writing
Create Specific Landing Pages
Google Analytics
Webmaster Tools
Proprietary Tracking
Example: www.BudURL.com
Unique Lead Tag
Testing & Measurement
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How Do The Search Engines Really Work?
Google SEO Starter Guide
What Matters For Rankings?
Domain Name
Domain Age
Site & Page Architecture
Page Content
Links Pointing to Website
Traffic to Website
Frequency of new content being added
Press Release Websites win on many of these items.
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Reverse Engineering Search Engines
Type in a Phrase you want to optimize
Look who is on page one
Examine:
Page Titles
Meta Description
URL
Inbound Links
PageRank Score
Once you start de-coding the search engines you can become a powerful Internet press release writer.
Google example: www.google.com
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SEO Diagnostic– Page Titles
Play Doctor with the Site Command
Format: site:www.website.com
Example: site:www.wow-toyota.com
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Quick Diagnostic:
Duplicate Page Titles
Duplicate META descriptions
META descriptions could be stronger

Effective Marketing with Press Releases
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Google & Press Releases
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Press releases and press release icons are getting a good amount of attention in Google SERP

Website Content - PR Challenges
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Most web platforms don’t have a blogging module installed.
Creating additional content pages often requires assistance from your platform vendor
The more content you add to your primary website, the wider your search visibility will be.
However, all marketing budgets are being cut and good Internet trained writers are hard to find.
New content is often the first thing on the chopping block and the LAST thing that should be cut from Internet Marketing.
Professionals who can DEMONSTRATE that their writing skills drive traffic to a company website will be funded.

Press Releases to The Rescue
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Press release solve the limited content capabilities of most websites.
Where traditional press release fall short, Internet press release can provided instant feedback.
Press releases can get on Google Page One in hours.
Internet press releases give clients measurable results.
Press Release costs are scalable to the NET effect you want to accomplish.
Press Releases can stay in Google search results for a very long time.

How To Research Keywords
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There are many free and paid tools on the market and for most people the free tools are fine.
Google Yahoo and MSN all offer free tools for keyword research.
Link to Google’s Keyword Research Tool
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
Keywords should be prioritized and a checklist created to mark where phrases have been targeted with press releases.

Press Release Writing for the Internet
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Publicist Training 101
Internet Press Releases are different than traditional press releases.
A special focus needs to be on Press Release Titles, Teasers and keyword targets.
Don’t overstress on creating content, you can often repurpose information that has already been written.
300-500 words is an ideal target for press releases and always include links back to your website, and not just the home page!
Develop your Press Release in Word with multiple Titles and Teasers.
Good Press Releases = Traffic and Links
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Sample Working Document
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Create multiple version of your titles
Create multiple teasers to go along with the titles
Your body should open with your strongest keywords
Include 1-2 live links in the body, if allowed, and hyperlink key phrase to go to a good landing page.
Use this document to make it easier to post on multiple sites.
keep track on where you posted with a note on the bottom of your worksheet.

Sample Press Release
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Example of Publicist Power
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Measuring the Effectiveness of PR Portals

PR on a Modest Budget
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* Some of these services are free and some have small fees associated with publishing a press release that can range from $1.00 - $25.00

PR Campaigns With a Large Budget
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budurl allows you to track how many people visit your web pages.
Instead of recommending your normal web page (url) in a web post, you will recommend a budurl.
You can measure which “posts” have the best net traffic patterns to your web pages.
The advantage over Google Analytics is that you can tag each budurl with a comment to describe the post so its easy to see what is working.
Analogy: Color coded tickets to an event can show who sold them.
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BudUrl Example
Ford Dealer Example
For example, if you write a press release announcing your car service specials, the page link you would normally post would be something like this:
http://www.prestonford.com/coupons.asp?keywords=specials
If you wanted to track visitors, you would replace this URL with a budurl that would look like this:
http://budurl.com/forddealercoupons
If you click on both URL’s you will see that they take you to the same webpage.
The trick is that you can now log into your budurl account and see how many people clicked on your link. Each budurl can have a description – CRS help.
Application #1: This is also a great way to test interest in cars on Craigslist
Application #2: Test Outlook Email campaigns that are small and outside of your normal CRM based email blasts.
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Let’s Post a Press Release
www.prlog.org
www.free-press-release.com
www.webwire.com
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Repurpose Press ReleasesUse Free Blogging Platforms
Content Delivery Platforms
Merchant Circle Example
Fast Company Example
Wordpress Example
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Press Release Marketing Strategies
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Internet Press Releases Topics
Talk About Your Reviews
Talk About New Promotions, Sales or Special Events
Talk About Industry Tradeshow Participation
Detail Specific Products
Detail New Services
Announce new Clients
Publish Opinions on News
Try to piggy-back on things that are hot!
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What About Your Reviews?
Popular Review Websites
http://www.dealerrater.com
http://www.insiderpages.com
http://www.judysbook.com
http://www.yelp.com
http://www.merchantcircle.com
http://local.yahoo.com
http://www.citysearch.com
http://www.superpages.com
http://www.local.com
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Have you setup an IRM process?

Wordpress software is free.
It allows anyone to create content for the web with tools as easy as Microsoft Word.
The costs can vary but you want to place the site on a good URL, which you may already own.
Hosting will run < $100 a year.
When setup properly, Google loves to index Wordpress blog pages.
Leveraging PR on Wordpress Blogs
http://www.infinitig37nj.com
Visibility for G37 cars
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Press Releases Help Visibility
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Google Search For:
Montclair Volvo
3/8/2009
PCG Blog
2 Press Releases
Dealer Website
MerchantCircle
Yellowbot

Google Search For:
BMW Peabody
3/8/2009
Map with Web Link
Company Website
Spoke Directory
PCG Blog Post
Yelp Directory
Used Car Microsite
Press Release
Merchant Circle
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Google Search For:
Infiniti G37 Arizona
3/8/2009
Press Release
Vox Blog
Dealer Websites
Press Release
PCG Blog
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Link Building Strategies
Automated Paid Services
Manual Paid Services
Actively engaging:
Industry Forums
Press Releases **
Blogging
Video/Photo Galleries
Selects sites that will give you the best ROI.
Don’t build all your links to the home page.
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Free Internet Links
The goal of using these free directories is to:
Build quality inbound links
Create visibility for top search phrases
Leverage their content tools
Leverage their review tools
Push competitors off SERP’s
Always signup for the free basic listings. I don’t recommend paid listings on the “yellow” websites for car dealers; it may work some other businesses.
Make sure all of these websites have correct information and live web links.
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Play Detective with the Link
Format: link:www.website.com
Example: link:www.actontoyota.com
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Yahoo Link Command
The Yahoo link command works better for public sites than the Google link command.

Free Marketing Tools
Bonus Discussion
Create Sitemaps and RSS Feeds
http://www.sitemapdoc.com
Get Snapshots of web pages
http://www.shrinktheweb.com
Automated Pings
http://www.pingler.com
Google SEO Starter Guide
Download PDF Booklet
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Post Webinar Questions
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Brian Pasch, CEO
Pasch Consulting Group
PO Box 159
Rumson, NJ 07760
brian@paschconsulting.com
732-450-8200 office
732-672-2356 cell
www.paschconsulting.com

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Press Release SEO Strategies

by Brian Pasch on Aug 31, 2009

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Press Release SEO Strategies — Presentation Transcript