Search Engine Optimization Eblog

- Getting Your Press Release on Page 1 of the Search Engines Within 2 Days -

Includes links to the press release distribution services used and the actual press release copy submitted.

Over my copywriting career I've been commissioned to write many press releases. In fact, writing a press release to announce myself as a new hire was my first ever assignment as a new ad agency copywriter in Florida.

Now that I work exclusively with the company SEO Advantage, Inc., I'm very excited about using online press releases to help our clients gain additional exposure in the search engines while promoting their announcements online.

I've outlined below the steps I took to get search engine exposure for our latest press release announcement, so you can see that immediate results can be yours by only investing in a copywriter that understands SEO and finding a few key distribution outlets.

1. Writing the Press Release
First, you have to choose a topic. And it has to be at least somewhat newsworthy.

I wanted to write about our recent participation in a direct response copywriting conference. I felt that this topic supported our unique range of online copywriting services, since I don't know of any other SEO companies that offer direct response copywriting. (See SEO Advantage's latest direct response website created for a client in the men's hair regrowth treatment industry.)

Once I had the topic, I wrote a standard 1-page press release.

I was aware of some of our keywords that produce good conversions for our SEO business, as well as those related to copywriting that I wanted to target. As I wrote the press release, I paid attention to opportunities to use these keywords naturally. For example, in the headline, you'll see I began with "SEO Company" rather than the actual name of our company. (Conventional PR best practices say that you should use your company name in the headline to gain credibility for your press release - but our company is probably not well known enough at this point to capitalize on immediate brand recognition, and I knew the generic term would gain a lot more visibility.)

2. Distributing the Press Release
There are many online press release distribution services, ranging from no charge to $300 and much higher.

I wanted to see if some of the free services I hadn't used before could pull through in the natural search engine rankings, before shelling out big bucks.

So I picked 6 distribution outlets and posted it. I decided to contribute $10 to 2 of the online press release distribution services, since I had used their free options before but hadn't seen any search engine results. I just tested the free distribution options for the remaining 4 services.

3. Checking Search Engine Results
It was just 2 days ago that I posted the press release. When I checked in the search engines on a couple of the keywords today, there it was, right at the top!

Below are some of the keywords and the corresponding position on Google's page 1.

SEO Direct Response Copywriting - page 1, #1 position was achieved with Webwire, #2 with Pressbox.

Direct Response Copywriting - #4 with Webwire, #6 with Pressbox. (This is an great achievement, since it is a much broader category of copywriting without the term "SEO". Marketers are realizing it can be extremely powerful when paired with proper SEO.)

SEO Company Copywriting - #2 with Webwire, #3 with Pressbox.

SEO Company Copywriters - #1 with Webwire, #3 with Pressbox.

... you get the idea...

Lessons to Take Away
It seems the $10 investment with Webwire did its job. Click to see how our SEO company press release looked.

Pressbox, amazingly was free! I didn't have high hopes for it, as it was based in the UK and also the first time I used it. I noticed that my headline was automatically cut off in an awkward spot, though, whereas other services notify you if you exceed character limits. Here's how our press release on SEO direct response copywriting looked.

The other services I used were:
PRWeb (paid $10) - Although I did not see the press release in the search engines, the small contribution allowed me to view their tracking results, which indicated that it had been picked up by 49 outlets and viewed 159 times (estimated).

PRFree - This service was easy to use, although with the free option there is no way to judge its performance beyond searching online. And I haven't seen it anywhere yet.

Free Press Release - This site didn't even require you to sign in - you just post it right off. You can contribute $3 upfront for premium services and to create an account but the benefits didn't seem very compelling. Plus, the spelling mistakes are a sure sign that they may not be very diligent in their services. I don't think I'll even use the free service next time.

i-Newswire - Also easy to use. Paid service is just $25, and the benefits include distribution to more outlets, although I just tried the free service this time. No search engine results have shown yet for the press release.

While a press release optimized for search engines can gain placement right away, it can also stick around for a long time. Online press release distribution outlets let you link to your company website, too, adding more quality inbound links. Check back for more news on how this press release performs over the long term.