You can promote your content on social media sharing, SEO, digital adverts, website, social media pages, email etc. but in most cases, content marketers forget that you can also use press releases to promote your content.
Don’t get me wrong, the above mentioned are all great places to promote your content but it doesn’t suffice. Since you are looking for more subscribers, followers or audience; you need to keep strategizing on the next step to attract more audience to read your content.
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Therefore, another silent but very effective means to promoting and acquiring new leads or audience is through the use of press releases. This is ultimately to boost lead acquisition and build a lasting relationship with industry influencers and journalists.
One thing that is sure for every content marketer before promoting their content, there is always a goal for a particular move. They give you a way to deliver a continuous stream of useful, newsworthy content that positions you as an authority, and brings people to your site.
Once people are on your site, you can promote your products as the solution to whatever problems they face. Content promotion is a constantly changing game of trial and error. Although there are some best practices that work for the majority of marketers but there is no cure-all formula.
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This means you have to look beyond your existing audience and experiment with promotional strategies such as press releases. This as I said earlier will help you reach new segments and build relationships with influencers.
But before you set out to distribute your content press release, you have to understand and strategize. Let’s look into certain necessary strategies.
Have a clear cut of your goal
Who goes to war without analyzing the cost and number of army to send for battle?
Honestly, it would be folly not to estimate and strategize. It’s the same with promoting content using press releases. You have to evaluate what your goals are – what do you wish to achieve by promoting that press release.
What information do you want to give your audience?
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Am sure you know you can promote nothing right! Your first step is to decide what success looks like for your press release plan. To do this, you need to go back to the goals of your content marketing strategy.
If your primary goal is driving traffic to your blog, then your press release strategy should include regularly issuing releases with quality links back to blog posts.
If your focus is more on lead generation, make sure the releases you send are written with the target buyers’ preferences in mind. You should put your goals first then every other thing can follow afterwards. Be sure to set a measurable goal.
Decide on the format you intend to use
There is no one-size-fits-all formula for writing a press release. Personnel announcements are written differently than trade show news and trade show news is written differently from financial earnings announcements.
Preferably, you should experiment with a number of different formats for your press releases to see which works best in helping you reach your content marketing goals.
When writing a press release promoting your content, you have a number of options to choose from in reference to the format. Here are some you can try your hands on:
Short promotional content press release:
This is a particularly common approach, and a good way to drive traffic to the original content. By briefly summarizing the post and linking to your blog, you pique the interest of your audience and encourage them to click on, download or subscribe to your content.
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It usually is focused on providing a teaser of the content with a couple of paragraphs that includes key takeaways in a bold and bullet-style format depending on what you think will attract more attention.
A short promo highlights a few passages from your post and gives the reader some key points that will stimulate or encourage them to visit your site to learn more.
Multiple Content press release or (Content round-ups):
Take the content teaser one step further by promoting multiple blog posts or pieces of content in a press release. This works well if you have a content series connected together by a central theme. It basically highlights several content pieces linked by a similar theme.
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However, a possible downside with this format is that including multiple links or calls-to-action may dilute your audience’s response. So be strategic in how many and which links you include.
Full content press release:
If your primary goal is getting your content seen by as many people as possible, consider syndication of your full blog post.
Republishing a blog post in this way will probably drive less traffic to your original content, but could help raise brand awareness or establish you or your brand as a thought leader.
Be sure to include a quality link back to your blog, as the biggest risk with this type of press release is in diverting traffic from the blog – if readers choose to stay on the syndicate sites.
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If you want your content read in full, consider publishing a full blog post in a press release. Be sure to include back links to your website so that readers have the opportunity to learn more about your company.
So, why do you really need a press release for your content anyways?
Here are some indispensable reasons why you need to get working on creating press release to promote your content.
Increases visibility on search results
Most buyers often use search engines for search queries. Simply put, that by reinventing your content into a relevant, interesting, and engaging message and sharing it intelligently across multiple channels through a content distribution network, you increase the potential for your message to be discovered.
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Therefore, press releases take you to a whole new dimension especially when you have taken out time to create one to promote your content.
Usually, when leads type in a query using certain keywords that are relevant to you; automatically your content pops up as part of the search results. This is not to say that you won’t do some assignments to get yourself above the fold.
Press releases can rank well in major search engines, providing a great entry point for a new niche blog.
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Sometimes just one highly optimized press release is all it takes to get on the first page of a search engine for a competitive term, drive consistent organic traffic, and creating increased awareness about your blog.
Using press releases to reach new audience
Acquiring new audience members is critical to the success of many marketing campaigns, while promoting solely in owned channels is “preaching to the choir” of your existing and engaged audiences.
Press releases can be syndicated to a variety of sites and media outlets, from major media to trade and niche sites, enhancing the chance that potential audience members and new prospects will come across your content as they research topics and issues.
Drive lead generation with press releases
Take your focus on improving search results and reaching new audiences one step closer to conversion by capturing contact info from your release.
Press release best practices emphasize a call-to-action in the message – download a white paper, access a webinar, sign up for a newsletter – that will encourage B2C or B2B readers to provide information that your team can nurture in its programs.
It will enable you drive more traffic to your site
Driving traffic to your owned channels where existing and newly acquired audiences can interact with your content, product offerings, maybe even your experts can also be encouraged by highlighting content with a CTA that takes viewers to your website, blog, or social channels.
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Releases from the major wire services which have large channels of distribution will send your blog fresh, niche-specific traffic.
The larger the site, the more channels and categories of distribution there will be (which is what you receive with the paid wire services vs. the free).
Remember, press releases reach a community of influencers. Journalists and other bloggers from your niche could see your release and send you highly targeted traffic as a result.
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This is also the power of the new direct distribution model—it gives you the ability to create your own audience.
Generate earned media
Press releases continue to be a valued source of information and story ideas by all types of media professionals – online, broadcast, and print – and can increase your chances of media coverage of your original content.
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Getting picked up by media outlets and written about by journalists and bloggers can build attention for your content, and third-party coverage can enhance the credibility of the content and your brand as a “go to” source on the subject.
Press releases are still a format that’s preferred by mainstream media, so promoting your blog through press releases may grab you an inquiry from a mainstream media outlet.
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The media will be looking for something unique, so promote the most eye-catching or attention-getting content on your blog (or even your blog itself).
Even if media don’t write up the story from your release, if that release exposes an influential journalist to your blog and they become a subscriber, they could easily write about you later on.
Make you an authority in your niche
Search, audience growth, earned media coverage – press releases can perform on several fronts to position your brand and thought-leaders as expert resources on the issues, topics, and events that are most important to your customers and to the success of your overall business.
Press releases ensure you quality links
An external link to a website is like a vote of confidence. Imagine how powerful those votes could become with targeted anchor text.
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Press releases with anchor-text links can help increase the authority of your blog in search engines, whether in the release itself, or reused in original content by an influencer.
Not only are you using targeted anchor text, but you also gain domain authority from websites that your blogging competitors who aren’t using press releases may not have.
Remember not to fall into the trap of overdoing your links in press releases. Include too many links, and it’s obvious to the reader and to search engine robots what you’re trying to do.
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The reader will be put off by too many links and feel advertised to, while the search engine robot will recognize that the document contains way too many links and won’t value them highly. The links in press releases can be powerful, but only if they’re used when necessary.
Conclusion
Adding press releases to your promotional mix is a relatively straightforward way to strengthen your overall content marketing strategy and achieve your content marketing goals.
Creating content on a blog is just one aspect of being a productive blogger—you’ve written the content, but now what? How are you going to promote your blog or specific posts within it?
Companies, businesses, and individual blog owners try out many tactics, but few consider using press releases as a promotional tactic for their blog.
It’s an idea many blog owners simply forget about, underestimate, or don’t even know exists. Haven known its relevance, I’ll advice you look towards creating press releases to promote your content.
Note that all press releases should include the following:
- Catchy Headline—you want something attractive to draw readers in to your release.
- The lead—it needs to summarize what the press release is about and provide the most important facts.
- Who, What, When, Where, Why & How—whatever information is not included in the lead, is written in the next several sentences.
- Contact Information—Give them a way to get in touch with you; include your website and social media pages.
When you have written your press release, determine where you want it distributed and you can use the following sites to share your press release: 24-7PressRelease.com, PRLog.org, PRLeap.com, PRNewswire.com, and Newswire.com. You might need to pay for some of the distribution sites to enjoy their services while others are free.
This is where using a service can come in handy. The last step is measuring your results. Take a look back at the goals you had set for the press release and notice what you achieved and where you fell short. Use this information to tweak your next campaign.
You can share with me other reasons why you think promoting your content using press releases is worth it.
The post Astounding reasons to promote your content using press releases appeared first on NATIVEDGE.