How To Write An SEO Press Release

A press release announces news about a company to the media to generate interest and attention. When you write a press release, you'll want to have certain goals in mind: to bring attention to new news and events within your company, to drive visitors to your site, and to build backlinks to your site as part of your search engine optimization strategy. In order to have the desired results, however, the PR needs to utilize a specific language, style, and format.

The Difference Between A Regular Press Release And An SEO Press Release

A traditional press release is typically written and distributed with journalists in mind -- whether in a local market or on a national scale. Marketing agencies circulate traditional press releases using a specialized email list of journalists or a newswire service. An SEO press release, however, is usually distributed online via a PR submission service. Press releases distributed online aren't at the mercy of only the traditional news media's discretion. Online press releases can be seen by your target audience, be displayed in search engine news feeds, and picked up by the new army of desktop journalists - bloggers and website publishers.

This has increased the number of 'journalists' exponentially. Website publishers and bloggers have become a new definition of media journalists. While this new stream may be young, the collective influence can be astounding. These journalists pick up on a hot topic and they republish it, open discussions, give viewpoints, and spread the news through social media sites generating buzz that was almost unheard of previously. To take full advantage of this excitement, press releases that would otherwise be distributed the traditional way can be formatted and distributed as an SEO press release as well.

Writing An SEO Press Release

An SEO press release contains certain words, formatting, and links to grab the attention of search engines and readers while creating valuable links for a company's website. Everything from the title to the contact information at the bottom has a particular purpose.

Writing Your Press Release Title

The title, which often becomes the title tag for the piece, needs to grab the attention of the target audience and convince them to click through to read the rest of the piece. It also needs to contain a selected keyword phrase in order to take a high position in search engine results and appear relevant to customer searches.

Press Release Topics and Writing Style

Even though companies publish SEO press releases as a part of their overall marketing plan, the body of an SEO press release needs to have a news angle rather than a promotional one. In fact, many distribution sites will not accept a press release if they feel it is overly promotional. The writing should also follow AP style and not include the word 'you.'

Linking Within an SEO Press Release

To generate links and give the reader directions to the company website, news items need to contain anchor text and URLs. URLs are the actual web address beginning with http so that they become clickable once they go live. When certain phrases have addresses embedded right into the text, they are called anchor text. These have far more SEO value than URL links.

When search engines like Google crawl the news item, they pick up the anchor text phrase and associate it with the link destinations. When composing an SEO press release, make sure that your keyword phrases become the anchor text to get the most value. Keyword anchor text also helps direct readers who scan a piece to a particular website or page.

Using Quotes Within Press Releases

Quotes give an SEO press release two important benefits. Most importantly, the quotable becomes the only promotional part of the entire piece. The idea is to explain to potential customers reasons why your company over shadows its competitors, and is therefore, the better choice. It could explain that a particular service costs less, or that your company has superior customer service. Quotes also provide a news item with a human element to make it more interesting and more relevant to the reader. Make sure to include one or two of these in the PR.

When written correctly, an SEO press release can generate more interest in a company than most marketing outlets. The search engine optimization collects attention from the big search engines such as Google and associates the chosen keywords with the author company. Releases build relevance, links, and interest without having to depend on traditional journalism -- making it easier and appropriate for companies of all sizes and in any industry.

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