Do Press Releases help ranking?
-
Sorry to bring up this question again. I have done a ton of reading on it and most of it shows me that it is not a good idea:
https://www.seroundtable.com/google-press-release-links-16136.html
http://authoritylabs.com/blog/press-releases-seo-strategy/
http://www.theclinegroup.com/2014/07/09/google-killing-seo-press-releases/But then there are a few articles showing some semblance of it having an affect.
Here are some from my company that were done by our last marketer. We're trying to determine if we should continue doing these. Probably launched close to 200 of these.
http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/chicago-business-lawyers-weigh-if-motorolas-gift-to-city-violates-antitrust-laws-579439.htm
http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/new-york-attorneys-will-be-in-high-demand-if-data-security-law-passes-579440.htm
http://www.abnewswire.com/pressreleases/chicago-business-lawyers-weigh-if-motorolas-gift-to-city-violates-antitrust-laws_23357.html
http://www.abnewswire.com/pressreleases/new-york-attorneys-will-be-in-high-demand-if-data-security-law-passes_23358.html
http://www.releasewire.com/press-releases/california-intellectual-property-lawyers-battle-to-protect-clients-ip-579154.htmWhat's your take?
-
Excellent. Glad I could help Mase. It sounds like you have the right perspective on this as well. Cheers!
-
Thanks Ryan.
I fully agree on the approach of trying to put out a press release with the intention that it will get "picked up" and covered by some other news / media outlet where we get an original and unique article discussing the topic, rather than just reposting the same exact press release.
We have been doing this under one effort - as we expand. And then there are the releases I pasted in my question where we were doing it for the sake of SEO and I didn't like that once I figured out why / how we were approaching it.
-
Thank you everyone! You have confirmed my thoughts on the matter in every way. I think as we try to understand why SEO is doing well (yay!), we want to do our best to figure out which things had the most impact. It seems nearly impossible to answer that well, and so we end up questioning things and want to try to get to the bottom of efforts like this.
-
You have some good answers from Ryan and Hutch there. Press releases should be used as part of a larger overall strategy and not be the only thing you're doing to build links and/or drive traffic.
As Hutch said, by all means, if you have something useful to say, why not do a press release? If you're just doing it for the sake of it, you'd need to consider what the benefit is.
Ryan said it better than I could but definitely steer clear of spun press releases as this all this will do will give a short cut to getting yourself a penalty.
I'd look to invest in a more complete content strategy if you haven't already. If you're still looking for more traffic and have the budget, have you considered using a content distribution network such as Outbrain or Taboola? This can be a great way to get more eyeballs on your content and also build links. Here's a great post on using content distribution networks written after a test carried out by Seer Interactive. Rand also did a Whiteboard Friday a few weeks back on how paid media can have SEO benefits. This is something I've done in the past with really good results.
-
Look at your press releases how you look at content, if your press release is worth while and either ads value or answers a question then it can be useful as it will be picked up by relevant sites and used properly. If you are just putting out press releases across sites which are spammy, then as Ryan said, they will not be helpful, or even have a negative effect.
-
Hi Mase. The type of press release that gets the best benefit regarding rankings is when it's sourced via the press side. In situations like that, you have news based sites that are receiving large numbers of visits sending referrals to your site along with the associated links. The release from your side of it may be a new product, service, personal interest story, local news, business profile, etc. You'll be wanting to pitch various aspects of your site to the press for them to do the write up and publish to their network. Those are still, and will remain, really great sources of links / referrals.
The commoditized form of spun press releases across a network of press release sites is a bad route to go. Google has taken on several algorithmic changes to discount these. Cheers!
-
I am getting ready to test this myself using PRWEB and would love to hear feedback from other folks too. It looks like the links from PR Web are no follow, but I am not sure if the News Sites they distribute to add nofollow.
Anthony
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Is there a benefit SEO and ranking-wise in putting a free SEO audit tool on your homepage?
Hi everyone, I work for a digital marketing agency in Australia. Our team noticed some businesses similar to ours use a free SEO Audit tool on their homepages. We are considering having one as well but, but want to know how it would benefit us. Will adding this tool on our home page help us rank better in Google? If yes, can you please tell us how? Thank you.
Local SEO | | nhhernandez0 -
Keywords not ranking at google.COM, only at google.com.br
I have a website registered with .com.br. And I have noticed that some (not all of them, some are ranking the same way at both "Googles") of its keywords are ranking only when I search at google.com.br, but if I search the same term at google.COM, those pages aren't ranking. What could I do to rank not just at google.com.br, but also at google.com. My chrome, for example, redirects searches automatically for google.com. If this happens with a large number of people, the impact in my website's visits would be very harmful. Please, help me.
Local SEO | | Ricardocpereira0 -
Rank not improving despite best practises
Hi there, I have a photobooth hire company in and have been working on getting our site onto the top page for keywords relating to our service and location for almost a year now, but am really struggling to see rank improvement despite my best efforts. After a major penguin update back in mid 2014 I noticed that due to some bad practises from a company that we previously hired, our rank began to plummet. So in the aftermath of that, I found myself having to clean up and disavow a lot of spammy and broken links. This was back towards August last year and despite trying to "clean the slate" and continue to build better backlinks (mostly through reputable directories) I'm still getting little to know rank increases. Is there a possibility that the site is still being black listed by Google in some way and thus all my best practises for the last 6 months haven't really helped at all? Thanks
Local SEO | | 16seo0 -
Content Rewriting and Page ranking
Lets say that a prior writer did a horrible job with more then a few pages on your site and you wanted to rewrite the content for each landing page. A few of these landing pages are actually ranking pretty decently would it be ok to rewrite them as long as you kept the keywords and the density some what equal?
Local SEO | | Spartan222 -
I am ranking for local broad terms, but I am not ranking when geo-modifier is included.
I have noticed that my rankings for broad terms have dramatically improved in the area I service. But, when I put the broad term in my search query with a geo-modifier I notice I am still not ranking even though my domain authority and page authority is higher than the competitor who is ranking. Why might this be? I am not penalized, or have a manual action. I am also featured in more hyperlocal niche directories.
Local SEO | | Ideas-Money-Art0 -
Please help me choose which is the better brand name or domain name?
I am helping a friend and getting involved in looking at launching a taxi service in a major city. Now this is for one of the major cities of world. A big part of the branding of the company or service will be the unique and memorable telephone number this company owns. This company is not expected to be anything huge, just a good small local business. However, we are trying to utilise online marketing which I feel have not been utilised by this cector that much.. The telephone number is something as good as 100 1515, but slightly better. These numbers are hard to get hold of and even when there is one available it's often very expensive. So a big part of the company will be getting that number seen everywhere. As it's a regional business, just for that one city, and for taxi services having a good telephone number that people can easily remember is important. However, most people now use smart phones, and people will often search on their phones or ipads for "birmingham taxi" or "birmingham taxi service" and so on. I have the opportunity, as an example to either go with "getbirminghamtaxi.co.uk" or "getabirminghamtaxi". So the choice is between "Get Birmingham Taxi" or Get a Birmingham Taxi" - the difference being putting the "a" in the middle like a sentence. I also thought of exact match domain "birmingham taxi" or birminghamtaxi.co.uk but the owner wants between £3,000-£12,000 (so between $5,000-$20,000) for it. I feel with a domain purchased for just £3 ($5) I would be able to test the market, and if I found it was successful, we could then consider acquiring a more expensive EMD. I feel that services like private taxi hire firms are small tiny regional businesses, and they don't really do much on search and SEO. I feel if our one did, it would stand out, and I do think quite a few people search online for taxi's, and I know I do. I am also aware that there are now app's like Halo but there is room for a small business to thrive doing a lot online and offline marketing with a great number. This is not for Birmingham. I have just made that up. So I would welcome people's feedback in terms of which domain name would be best, with or without the "a"? If you have an alternative suggestion I would welcome that. Also if anyone has any other comments or feedback about this market, doing business, marketing, or any knowledge that you have that you would like to share with us - then that would be appreciated. Thank you.
Local SEO | | RyanShahed0 -
Is there a tool out there that can help me determine how people in a particular area search for things?
I'm attempting to create geo-specific landing pages for a client. For example if I'm targeting southern Milwaukee very specifically I'd have to target Oak Creek, South Milwaukee, Bay View, etc. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to create landing pages for every one of those. Is there a tool to help with this issue? The tool I use right now is this http://www.5minutesite.com/local_keywords.php I like it for getting the names of every city/village/town in the area. However, it doesn't answer the nagging question ... how do people search for services in those areas?
Local SEO | | tunatraffic1 -
Moz Rank Tracker - Local Rankings?
My question is about local SEO rankings. How does the Moz Rank Tracker track local results, meaning I do not see a place to tell the tool what local market to show results for.If I have a dentist in Denver and I enter the keyword “dentist” into the tracker, is it looking for how my site ranks locally in Denver or how it ranks for “dentist” on a national level.Thanks in advance for the help!
Local SEO | | ifuseurbiz1