A Beginner’s Guide to Public Relations

Public relations has always been important for small and large businesses alike – without a solid ground game through which you can cultivate a positive attitude about your company or brand, you risk letting your competitors define you. In an increasingly mobile and technology-filled world, having a public relations campaign for your website and online presence is just as important as it is having one for a brick and mortar institution. For those seeking to improve their online public relations, continue reading to find out what the process entails and how you can form a successful campaign with minimal resistance.

What Is PR?

While many web enthusiasts think of ‘PR’ as being PageRank, PR also means public relations, and affects every aspect of your marketing, traffic and sales. Many utilize PR as a way to increase free exposure for their company through other outlets, such as newspaper, radio, blogs and television. The goal of PR is to enhance the level of exposure your business receives while also framing it in a positive light. By pinging a website or business’ best characteristics to the rest of the world, you can slowly but surely develop a PR campaign that relies on viral content, word of mouth and first impressions.

Public Relations for SEO

A detail oriented public relations campaign can do remarkable things for your organic search engine rankings on Google and other search engines. Studies have shown that well thought-out press releases and announcements that are search engine optimized can bring a load of benefits for your site in the short, medium and long-term. This gives you not just an opportunity to plug your business or website and showcase its positive attributes, but can also give you an extra opportunity to improve your search rankings by pinging a website’s basic information, keywords and new offerings all in one press release. Syndication of such press releases by other sources only add more clout to your SEO and PR strategy.

Contacting News Outlets

Most local news affiliates and newspapers love to offer publicity to businesses that have an interesting angle to cover. If you are the founder or current CEO of a company, it is vital that you make the initial contact, as reporters and editors are far more likely to be receptive to an angle pitched by the company’s chief than by a social media developer or contracted firm. In any email or personal conversation, you will want to showcase why the outlet in question should cover your business and be sure to include a general press release covering the event or promotion for which you are attempting to gain attention.

Conclusion

By developing a strong writing technique with which you can distribute effective press releases, combining the approach with elements of search engine optimization, reaching out to interested parties through social media and also contacting traditional news sources for potential coverage, you can begin to put into place the foundational blocks of a strong public relations campaign. While it will certainly take dedication and time to achieve the best results, following this advice will help steer you in the right direction.