SEO and PR
-
In the home improvement industry (windows, doors and conservatories) what is the best approach with regard to PR in order to build quality links.
It's a lot easier if you are selling a computer, mirror, widget etc as you have an actual product that you can send magazines,bloggers, journalists to review/feature for inclusion in their publications.
It's a lot more difficult if you are a builder, double glazing installer etc to get this PR coverage as you have nothing to send them to review, feature etc.
What approach do the experts on the forum think that would work best in the double glazing industry to secure coverage across publications both online and offline?
-
So, here's a few ideas, focused on press opportunities specifically, but with some other link ideas tossed in as well.
1 - HARO
We've had a lot of success with HARO for clients. They won't have many opportunities specifically for window improvements, so you'll have to think broader - general construction, green/energy improvements, and general business ownership queries are all going to be relevant, especially if the business owner is fairly personable and willing to get involved. For our clients, we monitor the requests and forward the ones we feel are a good fit. If the client is willing to read 3 emails a day, they'll see a number of responses on their own that might be good as well.
2 - Case Studies
This is a longer term project. Have the contractor ask their clients for energy bills a year before and the year after a project. You might have to incentivize this somehow to get participation. It's tricky to draw too many conclusions, but year-over-year energy savings on average across a wide range of clients would make a good study. There's a number of variables that might be hard to account for - weather and personal energy use being the primary ones - so there might be some kinks to work out in this concept, but I think those could be mitigated somehow.
Anyways, in regards to PR, a study like this could produce at least a handful of links, particularly from energy conservation and window-industry publications. Might not be a ton of results, but enough relevant industry publications could be a major boost for a contractor in a boring niche.
3 - Events
I've seen some other "boring" companies that put on local events with a charitable focus and managed to get a decent handful of links, including a few news organizations. At the risk of tooting my own horn, there's quite a few opportunities out there to build links with local events, and it's a very natural topic to get covered by local press if the event is interesting enough.
4 - Image Marketing with Conservatories, Window Boxes, etc.
While I'm sure many of their projects are pretty straightforward, I'm sure they also have some more elaborate designs and projects. Conservatories and bey windows are great examples of really attractive projects that people like to look at. Even if they're not the business's primary focus, you've got plenty of opportunities for visual marketing on social networks like Houzz, Pinterest, Facebook, and Flickr. It's a long shot that these will generate press, but they can certainly generate links and traffic, especially if you've got a really nice gallery/portfolio on the client's website.
Hope that gets you started!
-
Might be a challenge! I suppose you could identify any interesting/unique newsworthy attributes of your company / windows and send the information out to relevant media outlets. Do your windows have any stand-out energy efficiency / cleanability / design features which will be of interest to the media. Do you offer discounts to the elderly or sponsor any causes, is your fitting fleet running on biodiesel?
There may be sites doing 2X glazing price/quality comparisons as well, and of course partners / suppliers may offer you opps for links / case studies.
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
-
Recommendations on SEO Tools, Strategies and References
Hello all, I have been doing SEO/SEM work on some sites I own for a few years but now I am in a position where I need to handle these tasks for a significant numbers of clients on a freelance basis. Obviously, this requires much more work and organization as well as some additional tools to help. I was wondering if the experts on here could help me with the following: Does anyone know of any online step-by-step guides or checklists that highlight a comprehensive SEO and digital marketing strategy? This could be helpful while trying to juggle multiple projects at once and provide a blueprint that I can follow and alter as I go. What free project management tools do you recommend? I was thinking of using Wunderlist, Trello or Evernote to keep track of projects, but there may be other suggestions I am not aware of. I have it in my budget to spend about $200/month worth of paid tools. Which tools are best for keyword research, backlink analysis, search rankings etc.? I am currently testing out Moz and SEM Rush, but would like a wide variety of information that helps me efficiently execute a plan but without too much white noise. What are the best paid (or free) tools to accomplish this? What are the best references for Q&As and reference materials on strategies, etc. for when I need to deep dive and do some learning on the fly? Besides this website of course. Thanks for any help!!
Link Building | | ccdispoto2 -
Does embedded content (from my site) help seo
hi i am creating a new accommodation site and will have some great videos on it (fly bys of local beaches and virtual tours of hotels etc). from an seo perspective i have two questions: 1. should i host on my own site or youtube/vimeo - its a new site but in the long run i want my site to get the credit 2. i will be giving the hotels the chance to embed and video content i have on their own sites. does this help my own seo juice and if so is there a particular way it should be done. there will be around 90 well established local hotels in total so figured it should add up.
Link Building | | neilhenderson0 -
Can copyright links to your site have a negative impact on your SEO?
many of the websites we designed have a copyright link in the footer. Like: webdesign by company name then this is made a hyperlink to our company website. Some of these websites have a high PR and other metrics but rarely are about webdesign. What is a clever thing to do? Tom
Link Building | | Onlinq0 -
Does commenting on relevant articles positively impact our seo?
I have read conflicting perspectives on whether or not businesses should partake in relevant conversations on blogs' or articles' comments sections. Does anyone have insight on this?
Link Building | | mbelsito0 -
Root domain or subdomain when submitting to directories, also pr 3 and lower, is it bad to list to these directories?
Hello all, Should I use my root domain or sub domain when adding my site to local directories? I'm very new to this, so I just want to be sure, sub domains start with the www, right? I know all my listings should have the same NAP, and it makes sense to have the same root or sub domain listed as well, but I was wondering if I should try and help one type of domain if it starts to get a bad ratio of follow & no follow links. Also, do directories with a page rank of 3 or lower, or directories with a no follow link, bad for my sites rankings?
Link Building | | allstatetransmission0 -
Wired image releases via Creative Commons for SEO
Wired Magazine has started to publish images under CC licence as reported here: http://www.niemanlab.org/2011/11/wired-releases-images-via-creative-commons-but-reopens-a-debate-on-what-noncommercial-means/ The images are found here http://www.wired.com/rawfile/2011/11/creative-commons/ They allow noncommercial use (though this is not clearly defined) and request to attribute to the original source and "ask for a link back to the original story where the photo first appeared". The latter does not seem to be compulsory, but of course is a great SEO tactic to generate deep links. What's your take on this? Does anyone have experience with providing image material with the request to attribute you as the original source?
Link Building | | zeepartner0 -
Where should I be focusing SEO efforts first?
Hi everyone, I am a digital marketing intern at a small marketing business. They have a really horrible, 1990's ish website which I am currently working with them on a plan to completely redo within a few months. Until then I am fixing some issues on their current site which includes SEOing their current content that will be moved to the new site. They have a ton of issues which include, but are not limited to, missing meta descriptions and title tags, no official keywords incorporated into their content, no analytics or tracking of keywords, a poor use of social media, and duplicate content. My plan was to fix all these issues first, then when the site relaunches really start focusing on the more advanced bits (which include link building). The previous intern spent 99% of his time posting on forums building "backlinks". I've been going through his posts and saw he posted on mainly marketing forums on topics but never included any type of link back to the site in his posts or on his forum profile (his reasoning was he wanted to gain a reputation with the forum first so the admin would not delete his posts or so he'd be able to put a link in his signature). He and the owner of the business say that this is the best and most effective way to help SEO and the owner is questioning whether or not I concentrate on that instead of the other issues. So what do you think? Do you think I should be fixing all these issues first and waiting until the site relaunches to concentrate on forum backlinking? Or do you think it would be more effective to just focus on my energies on forum backlinking? Also - the previous intern also told the owner that Wordtracker was a poor investment and is not useful. I have always thought that was sort of an industry standard. Do you think he's right? If so could you recommend something else? Any thoughts are appreciated. Thanks 🙂
Link Building | | Grow0 -
PR Web or Marketwire which is better
Hi I am currently considering two online PR services, Marketwire and PR web. Just wondering if anyone has a opinion on which one is better in terms of SEO value? Or if anyone has done any experiments on either? Thanks for your help. Cheers Mik
Link Building | | increation1