Speaker 1: Do you want to increase online mentions, create more backlinks and greatly boost brand awareness? Who doesn't? Digital PR can do just that and one of the often most overlooked digital PR strategies is the creation and distribution of press releases. And before you shout at your screen telling me that they're so 1906, you're wrong. They can be so beneficial for your digital marketing strategy. So I'm going to talk you through why you need press release distribution, the process and how to use it within your SEO strategy. A press release is written text about specific news or an event that's happening within your business or has recently happened. Press releases are a proactive way to provide journalists and media outlets with important information about an organization so they can write their own piece and publish it, more so nowadays online. Look at it like digital storytelling. You want your press release to be interesting and exciting enough to capture the attention of media outlets, blogs and other distributors so they're shared throughout the internet by word of mouth. So can press release distribution help your SEO? The short answer is yes. The long answer is it depends. The goal with press release distribution shouldn't necessarily be to gain a particular number of backlinks to your website but it should be used as a distribution channel to share your brand's content. Because of the nature of press releases, most if not all links contained within the actual press release itself are no follow. Sometimes the release may be picked up by a media outlet that allows follow links but it's rare. The links you really want are those that are created by the journalists who have transcribed your story. They'll likely be high quality, natural, relevant and authoritative backlinks. And as quality backlinks are a very important ranking factor, every website wants these included within their backlink profile. So with press release distribution you should be aiming to provide content that would get journalists and news publications to talk about your business and the information you've provided. They'll write about the press release and put their own natural spin on the story and when they do they'll link back to your website as a reference for their readers. They're most likely to be backlinks to your homepage which makes press releases such a good brand building exercise. And anyway if you've watched our video revealing the truth behind nofollow links you'll know that a good mix of follow and nofollow links is important in ensuring a natural authentic backlink profile. Landing media coverage both online and offline is great for brand exposure and can generate a good range of natural backlinks to your website as well as plenty of referral traffic from users who are reading and sharing the news publication. Now let's take a look at how press release distribution works but before we do make sure to subscribe to our channel and hit the bell icon to get notified for all our future videos. So how press release distribution works. Firstly don't attempt to write a press release if you don't have anything to write about. Do you know what runs on air? Well apparently this but truthfully not much. So you can't expect to get much out of a fluffy airy press release either. Journalists time is limited so is the real estate on their websites so you want to make your press release about a potentially groundbreaking employee initiative or an innovative product you've just launched. Essentially newsworthy. In the same way that you'd write an email you need to grab the attention of the media outlet instantly. You don't want to be mass selected and deleted before they've even had a chance to find out what your press release is about. This applies to the length of the press release too. Get to the point as quickly as possible and if the journalist wants to know more they'll contact you directly. Because of this just sticking to one topic is best. Now that you have your press release it's time to look at how you'll distribute it. To start it depends on whether you're planning to distribute your press release yourself or use a service to write and distribute the press release for you. If you choose to distribute your press release yourself you may find that the conversion rate is super low. However you could choose to use a service like ours where everything will be done for you. Press release writers will craft an engaging press release to get your news across in a professional manner. The benefits of using a service to write your press release is that you don't need to spend the time and resources researching the best way to craft one. You'll have unlimited revisions and it won't be distributed until it's just right. I'm sure you're now asking how you should incorporate press release distribution within your existing strategy. Firstly you need to consider what your press release should be about. More and more brands are adopting a more personalized human approach to their press releases. People are craving the reality now more than ever so true meaningful stories could work best at this time. However it all depends on what it is you have to share. Now let's talk about when to distribute press releases. Research from 2019 showed that the most popular time to issue a press release was on a Tuesday or Friday at 7 and 8 a.m in particular. However bear in mind that an average of over 1,000 press releases are fired into journalists inboxes each day so varying the time of your release could enable yours to stand out and encourage more visibility. For example sharing your release a few minutes before or a few minutes after the usual bombardment. Alternatively if you choose to share your press release on social media you want to time this with the time when your users are most active. The same report showed that the most engaging time for press releases to be shared on social was in the afternoon and over the weekend because this is when people are most active on these platforms and therefore are more likely to discover engage with and share your content. Now if you think this all sounds great and want to plow right in bear in mind that like anything less is often more. Press releases have been abused over time and as you can probably imagine Google is aware of this. Rather than writing press releases in an effort to get a story written by a journalist, marketers in the past have flooded press release platforms with low quality and spammy content purely for the single backlink that comes from posting it to the platform. Press release distribution can be a really beneficial tool for your SEO strategy. Click the screen now to find out more ways you can boost your SEO using backlink strategies and if you'd like to know more about our press release service I've included the links to our website below.