Take a look at the diagram above. Say you have a press release and you have two options. You can send it to the Oprah show and pray every day that they choose you to be on the show OR you can distribute your search engine optimized press release using a distribution service, knowing it will definitely reach a wide variety of channels online, including Yahoo!, Google, RSS feeds, blogs, journalists and others who may want to interview you further or write about your release on their websites.

Now, each of those channels has anywhere from dozens to thousands of readers who will see your press release. Many will click on the link to your website to see what you’re all about. Some of those will even buy from you.

So rather than putting all your eggs in one basket with the Oprah show (or major media channel of your choice), you do better to diversify and let larger numbers of people in smaller, under served niches find you.

As David Meerman Scott says in his book The New Rules of Marketing & PR, the market for press release is changing:

• Marketers must shift their thinking from mainstream marketing to the masses to a strategy of reaching vast numbers of under served audiences via the Web. 

• PR is not about your boss seeing your company on TV. It’s about your buyers seeing your company on the Web.

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Today, we have email, Internet, and SEO to throw into the mix. Press releases use all these elements, and are no longer  held captive by a few key editors. Now bloggers and consumers are the targets of releases.

In his book, The New Rules of Marketing and PR , David Meerman Scott explains the “new rules of press releases:”

• Don’t just send news releases when “big news” is happening; find good reasons to send them all the time
• Instead of just targeting a handful of journalists, create news releases that appeal directly to your buyers.
• Write releases that are replete with keyword-rich copy.
• Include offers that compel consumers to respond to your release in some way.
• Place links in releases to deliver potential customers to landing pages on your Web site.
• Optimize news release delivery for searching and browsing.
• Add social media tags for Technorati, DIGG, and del.icio.us so your release will be found.
• Drive people into the sales process with news releases.

How are you using press releases? Are you still stuck in the “old days,” or have you evolved along with the process?

Click here to view the embedded video.

Mike will be a part of a top-notch group of presenters at the upcoming Inbound Marketing Summit on September 8th in Cambridge, MA.  As of the last time I checked in with Mike, there were only about 20 tickets left so get over to their site and sign-up.  Let me know if you’re going to be attending as I’ll be there as well.

To accomplish this, Newsforce purchases ad spots on the major news media sites and then displays their clients’ press releases within that advertisement space.  When a visitor clicks on the PR it brings them to a hosted article page which can include videos, photos, links, etc.  The Newsforce team then sends you weekly reports showing you how the PR is doing and allows you to tweak your headline or content whenever you want.  Each PR runs for 30 days at which time it can be renewed or you can submit a new press release.  Their pricing structure is based on the number of headline impressions you are targeting for your campaign.

Newsforce has already partnered with several media sites such as: Los Angeles Times, USA Today, Washington Post, Boston Herald, and a bunch more.  They also continue to add more partners each week.

So, below are a few tips that will help you when developing your next internet press release:

1. First and foremost, read The New Rules of Marketing and PR by David Meerman Scott.  While waiting for the book to arrive, start by reading the New Rules ebook.  These two resources will provide you with the fundamentals needed to dive into internet PR.
2. Optimize your press release with relevant keywords that your target audience will use when they are searching for what they’re looking for.
3. Use links in your press release to drive your potential customers to your website or to other relevant pages such as a recently published positive-related article, whitepaper or ebook which is referenced in the release.
4. Include your contact information including phone number and website so that potential customers have a way to contact you directly from the press release.
5. Submit your press release within approximately 7 days of when you want to begin creating buzz.  We typically see that our customers receive the most headline impressions and pageviews during the first 7-28 days that the press release is distributed.  However, a benefit of web-based press releases is that they will continue to live on the internet instead of a traditional print press release which is only beneficial during the immediate time after release.
6. Use a distribution service who will distribute your release to a wide network of media outlets including opt-in journalists, bloggers, television, radio, newspapers, and broad range of other resources.
7. Utilize social networks such as Twitter, Plurk, Facebook, Digg, Reddit and StumbleUpon to gain even more traction especially among those already interested in your blog, website or company.
8. Post your press release on the media/press section of your website.  By posting the press release to the media/press section of your website, you create more linking between your keywords and your website as the search engines crawl your site and index this information.
9. Submit press releases often and about any newsworthy event that involves your company, your products or your people.  As I have mentioned in a previous post, you should use internet-based PR like you use Twitter.
10. Optimize the landing page that you direct your potential customers to within the release.  On this landing page you could have an interesting and informative video, a field to capture opt-ins to a newsletter, an RSS link to your blog, and/or any other information which will take that visitor and turn them into a potential customer.  An example of an excellent landing page is the home page of personal branding expert, Dan Schawbel.

While I could go into greater depth about each of these tips (and will in future posts), this will help you to start developing a successful internet-based PR campaign.

To learn more about why it’s beneficial to distribute a search-engine-optimized press release through the internet as opposed to traditional print channels, take a look at this video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Also, here are some more resources on internet-based press releases:

• Brian Solis of FutureWorks wrote a guide on how to write social media press releases.
• Todd Defren of Shift Communications developed a social media press release template to help guide you during the development/writing process.