Go Direct With PR - Write Your Own Coverage - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #98
Monday, May 12th, 2008TechCrunch published an excellent mini-tutorial on how to develop and distribute press releases in a Web 2.0 world. Why should you care? After all, who reads press releases? Well, according to the Tech Crunch article, a recent Outsell study highlighted that over 51% of IT professionals reported that they get their news from press releases in Yahoo and Google news over trade journals!
Tech Crunch advises, and BreakingPoint just witnessed (with our May 9th announcement) that “the trick for this new breed of press releases is to write it as the article you want to read.” Because, if you’ve done a good job, very often that is exactly what will be published.
Here’s another gem: “When implemented with calls and links to action, and if they read in a way that’s compelling to people aka customers, you’ll find that they’re usually compelled to act.”
The TechCrunch post is a must-read. And, here are a few other tips on getting better press release pickup in last week’s blog post, Using Press Releases to Drive Web Traffic and Leads.
Using Press Releases to Drive Web Traffic and Leads - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #97
Friday, May 9th, 2008If you’re like me, you pour a lot of time and effort into wordsmithing press releases. It’s important to get the message just right. Then you go back and forth with executives and/or partners to make sure all parties are happy with the messages. It can take days or weeks and become frustrating.
Sadly, if you’re not taking advantage of new ways to publish your own content online, chances are nobody’s reading the results of all of that hard work. Or, so says David Meerman Scott. In his recent post entitled Top 10 PR tips, Scott’s #1 piece of advice is “The old ways to get noticed were to buy expensive advertising and beg the media to write about you and your products. The best way to get noticed today is to publish great content online.”
At BreakingPoint, we just completed a major agreement with a strategic partner. Of course, we wanted to get the broadest possible coverage for the news. And, we didn’t want to count on just the traditional methods for getting the word out. So, Kyle (www.engageinpr.com) and I sat down to brainstorm all of the ways we could get the word out about the news and build nice inbound links for SEO. All of the ways beyond traditional media, that is.
Here’s what we came up with. Did we miss anything?
- Distribute the release via a wire service like MarketWire, Business Wire, PRWeb or PRNewswire.
- Include video or audio interviews with the wire service post to get pickup on a wide variety of sites like Odeo.
- Post a supporting video on YouTube.
- Develop a chart or image that supports the release and post to Flickr.
- Blog about it on your own blog and your partner’s blog.
- Reach out to other bloggers to conduct a Q&A about the news.
- Promote via StumbleUpon.
- Create a Google AdWords or Yahoo campaign using the headline of the release – promote using traditional PPC ads and contextual advertising.
- Send out the link to your LinkedIn or Facebook friends to help you spread the word.
- Post your blog post to sites like Reddit, Digg, etc.
- Include it in your RSS feeds – both press release and blog RSS feeds.
- Send out a tweet to your Twitter following.
- Hold a webinar to discuss the reasons behind the news.
- Turn the release into an educational article and post it to www.scribd.com or www.ezinearticles.com.
- Embed the headline and a link in your email signature.
- Include it in your own newsletter or magazine.
- Post it to your customer support site.
- Send the release to relevant user groups or professional organizations.
- Use a free press release posting service such as:
http://www.free-news-release.com/
http://www.freepressreleases.co.uk/
http://www.i-newswire.com/
http://www.prleap.com/
(I’ve never tried these but heard they are good for SEO. Anyone had success with them?)
20. Oh yeah, pitch it to the press.
Extreme Makeover - B2B Style
Monday, January 14th, 2008What do you do when you know that your company’s current logo and branding are no longer a fit? There are many costs and challenges associated with revamping or reinventing a corporate brand but do the benefits outweigh? At ReachForce, we decided the timing was right for an allover makeover for our brand. We launched a new website today! You can check it out at www.reachforce.com.
For us, the timing made sense as we also made a big announcement today of our Series B Financing. With this announcemnt, we are proving that ReachForce is a more established company. We felt like the old look and feel just did not fit our new growth.
Would love to hear your feedback on our new look!
Breaking News - Length of Headlines in Google Shortened
Tuesday, October 16th, 2007This week, Google alerted Business Wire that press release headlines should not exceed 22 words. That’s eight words shorter than what we were told months ago. “An ideal headline should be between two and 22 words,” advises the search engine giant. Read more at BusinessWired.
The B2B Lead Podcast #4 – Adapt or Die – Marketing and PR in the Blogosphere and New Media
Monday, October 15th, 2007As new media has pushed its way into B2B marketing, many marketing departments reacted by hiring a specialist to tackle these new forms of marketing and PR, especially blogs. But as these new media have come to replace many traditional media and really become now media, all marketers need to accept blogging and twitter and YouTube and become educated, so that not just one member of your marketing organization understands these communities. In this podcast, I interview Josh Dilworth to discuss the changing landscape of marketing and PR in new media.
The B2B Lead Podcast #3 – Making a Viral Campaign Successful - Seeding
Monday, October 15th, 2007The thought of undertaking a viral campaign may seem a bit daunting. But say you have created the perfect video, now how do you actually get the right people to view it and pass it on – the whole point of a viral campaign. In this podcast, listen to my interview with Josh Dilworth at Porter Novelli to explore how detailed planning and execution of the seeding component made my viral campaign at NetQoS a major success.
B2B Sales and Marketing Tip #16 – B2B Marketing Campaign Watch – Lessons Learned in B2B Viral Marketing
Thursday, September 6th, 2007B2B Marketing Campaign Watch – ReachForce Customer Shares Lessons Learned in B2B Viral Marketing
ReachForce customer, NetQoS, was recently honored by Marketing Sherpa for an innovative B2B Viral Marketing program that continues to generate a steady stream of B2B leads for the company. Read about it in the Marketing Sherpa Hall of Fame. The campaign involved a blend of new media, traditional public relations, blogger relations, demand generation, and an elaborate seeding campaign. NetQoS placed the video on YouTube and Google Video, as well as on more targeted sites such as Digg, Techmeme, Brightcove, Grouper, Motionbox, DailyMotion, GoFish and Veoh. At that point, the viral effect took over netting 66,000+ views on YouTube, numerous press mentions, pickup by the popular TechCrunch tech blog, and more than 1,800 downloads, some of which have already turned into sales meetings. O’Neal will speak about how the leads from the Viral campaign compared to traditional Marketing Campaign leads and how she is leveraging Deliberate Marketing techniques to increase the value of those leads at the upcoming Marketing Sherpa B-to-B Demand Generation Summit this fall. More details coming soon on The B2B Lead blog.
B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #10 - Integrate Social Media into Your B2B Marketing Mix
Thursday, August 30th, 2007Are you a Marketing Communications professional or a Marketing Conversations professional? Find out by reading this manifesto just published by Brian Solis a Principal of the FutureWorks PR agency. In my opinion, this is an excellent primer on Social Media to help B2B Marketers expand beyond the traditional one-way communications monologue. It provides a nice overview of the tools and techniques B2B Marketers can use to initiate conversations with their target audiences including this tidbit:
“What does the future of communications look like?
First it’s an understanding that social media is about sociology and less about technology. It’s a mashup of new and traditional media that spans across advertising, PR, customer service, marcom, sales, and community relations. In order to succeed now and in the future, is to bridge the gap between early adopters and everyone else.Now, however, it’s about conversations, and the best communicators start as the best listeners.Participation is marketing.”
Check it out at http://www.thinkfreedocs.com/docs/view.php?dsn=819339
