I work for Marketwire and do my best to take on a consultative role and educate clients on the value of SEO’ing their press releases. Too often, when I mention to clients that we can SEO a press release, they see it as the answer to their prayers. Unfortunately what ends up happening is they live-link every other word and choose HTML META keywords that will never give them a chance at any Google juice whatsoever!

While I agree spamming can be a negative drawback to the values of SEO, there is real value to live-linking keywords in your release – especially because many downstream partners like Yahoo!, MSN, AOL, etc. are now able to receive and re-post these live keywords. Driving traffic back to your site is never a bad thing, particularly when you have the power to select the words you want to use to drive potential customers, media, stakeholders, and others to specific pages on your site.

Marketwire’s platform is based on both ASCII text and HTML, allowing us to feed news-aggregating websites with the proper HTML coding to maintain those live-linked words. We can also help clients place their keywords in the HTML coding of their news release in the Meta tags. But as you mentioned, it certainly can be abused. Used properly, this can be a very responsible and effective SEO strategy.

Ultimately, content is king. Keeping your releases relevant and consistent is key. We do our best not to simply “sell” SEO, but consult (http://www.marketwire.com/mkt/PDF/SEO%20Tips.pdf) on best practices when utilizing what can ultimately be a very valuable PR tool. For example, matching your Meta tag keywords from your own website with the same keywords in your news release can be extremely effective. Choose relevant keywords that should and would be associated with your company, services or products.

Thanks for including me in the conversation.

David

1) The tool box addicts - these are technicians - before you’ve finished telling them what you think you need, they’re already pulling out brochure templates and talking font size and colour. They’re easy to recognize because, despite billing themselves as PR specialists, they don’t follow the news and couldn’t discuss the day’s big event to save their lives.

2) Strategists - those of this ilk actually stop a client who says ‘I need a press conference’ or ‘I want a blog’ and dare ask the question : Why? They look to gain a clear understanding of business (or other) objectives before launching into a campaign.

I believe that the ones you fear are the technicians.

Strategists will understand how and when to use any tool - including SEO tactics - appropriately.

Hopefully the strategists will win out and will be the saviours of us all. Would I put money on it? Hmmm … not sure ..

Am I bitter? Have I lost faith? No .. not really. Just not always particularly impressed.

As with anything, we learn new things everyday on how to best mix SEO and PR. Some work, some don’t. But my hard and fast rule is that I will NOT hurt the overall writing simply to optimize a news release or blog post.

/kff

I agree – to be properly optimized content has to read naturally and be authentic. (Copy that is stuffed with keyword phrases is absolutely horrid: It does nothing for the people who have the unpleasant experience of reading it and can damage a company’s brand.) Sure, sometimes people who try to cheat the system rank well, but do they convert well? I’d say no.

It’s one thing to place in the Top 10, but it is quite another to have an enjoyable visitor experience.

Optimization is a means through which companies can ensure their websites (and press releases) are search-engine friendly through on- and off-page factors but it should also include “people optimization” – great content, intuitive navigation, everything geared to the visitor.

As Ed points out, keyword research is invaluable, because it can reveal keyword permutations and frequency. But it can also offer insights into what is really important to your audience….what they are interested in. That can be the ultimate act of listening to your market.

The challenge (and my worry) is going about it the right way and not destroying the quality of your written product at the same time.

Second, make it to the point and as useful to reporters/stakeholders as possible …

Load it with useful info/links and don’t make it message-heavy …

If people have to use a search engine to find you … you’re already behind anyways …

thank you again.

quite simply, stuffing your content with key words that none of your customers use is a waste of time and effort. one of the first things we do when approaching an SEO programme is to try and bridge the gap between the key words the client gives us and the key words that its audience actually uses.

and, funnily enough, we’ve found that the audience almost never uses the same internal jargon that the client does. i know, i was shocked too.

so while you can SEO your releases for your keywords up the wazoo, you need to step back and make sure you’re SEOing for the right terms.

Ed

Search isn’t going away, it’s going to become more valued as vertical and mobile offerings emerge. Therefore, SEO techniques have to be mastered by the PR industry, but must remain balanced against the human desire to read informative, well written copy.