Public Relations is a great small business marketing tool. It's an inexpensive way to generate free editorial coverage about your business, products or services.
My marketing plan includes issuing at least one press release per month. But I've been so busy developing new products and services over the past few months, I haven't gotten around to issuing any press releases. And quite frankly, I didn't have anything "new" to announce.
Even though the guidelines about what is newsworthy has relaxed a bit with the advent of online press release distribution, I still believe that what you announce needs to have a strong news hook. So I opt not to distribute my monthly press releases if I don't have anything to announce.
And this past weekend, it was time to play catch up! I suddenly realized I had three newsworthy announcements to make. So I spent a few hours on Sunday drafting three press releases and posting them on my favorite online press release website, PRWeb. They are scheduled to release one per week over the next three weeks. And, you can be sure I'll be announcing this news right here on my blog, too!
I'll also have my virtual assistant post these press releases to a variety of other free press release websites over the coming weeks. By doing so, I'll be creating lots of links back to my website, and hopefully driving traffic and improving my search engine rankings.
I increase my chances of this by making sure my press releases feature important keywords related to the subject matter. And, by using a free, Live Keyword Analysis Tool that's available online.
This is just an example of the kind of resources I use and that are included in my Small Business Marketing Resource Center.
I'll be curious to see what affect posting three press releases in one month has on my website traffic. And, to see where my news shows up. To date, my biggest press release hit was the coverage of my Extreme Marketing Makeover Program in Entrepreneur Magazine.