The Importance of Press Release For SEO

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Press releases were commonly and widely used by the SEO community just over a decade ago. However, as the internet and SEO grew in popularity, they became less accessible as an approach in strategy towards building backlinks and internet traffic. This was mainly due to the exponential increase of spam that journalists and news editors had to sift through and refine every day. But just because they are less accessible by no means does this render them redundant – in fact they are still highly effective regarding SEO today and if they’re done right, have the potential to be incredibly beneficial for your website and company.

What exactly are press releases?

Simply put, they are a method of distributing and announcing content regarding an event (in either text, audio or video format). A press release can also announce other kinds of information that would be deemed newsworthy, in the hope of getting media attention from it. The idea is that the release promotes the event or company “news” to the public, increasing its popularity and therefore, its success. This is obviously beneficial for promoting your company brand or event, but now you may be asking: how will it help your website flourish?  

Why are press releases relevant for SEO?

Press releases are probably the best backlink building tool you have at your disposal in that they will boost the amount of incoming traffic to your website through the inherent backlinks it generates. Any webmaster will be aware of how difficult and frustrating it can be to build up an adequate number of backlinks for SEO, and furthermore, it is even harder to accomplish this without having to use private blog networks (which are fairly high risk and can be potentially damaging to your site) or purchase more links.

Having your release published on an online news site will help you to accumulate more backlinks, which are obtained from both the news website itself and other webmasters who access that particular page. Basically, they will:

• Get the attention of the media, which could result in your release being published and broadcasted to the public.


• Generate a large number of backlinks in a relatively short time space.


• Build high quality links.


• Build links in a ‘natural’ way.
• They have indirect value as well – if it is unique and attention grabbing, a smaller blog or other outlet is more likely to share it. This will create awareness and initiate a lot of referral traffic for your page.


• If done right, press releases will not result in any penalties for your website.

Get Your Press Release Seen!

How can you be certain your newsworthyrelease will stand out from the thousands of others that are sent to news websites every day? Here are some fundamental points to keep in mind:

• No one likes spam. Avoid writing releases that have nothing new and exciting to say. If you are constantly sending in content that is uninteresting you may end up being filtered out of an editors’ inbox and lose any further opportunity for when you do have something innovative to promote. Be absolutely certain that your content is something newsworthy and original.


• It would be advised to target a specific reporter or paper that has published content relevant to what you are trying to promote in your press release. Don’t be afraid to reach out to reporters through an email or on their social media outlets instead of a typical news release distribution platform. As soon as one reporter notices you, more will follow.


• Focus on submitting your release to a relevant platform – strive to get it published on a website where it will be appreciated by the target audience.

One well executed press release can have a largely positive impact on your website and do wonders for its searchability. If you focus on getting your website media attention through this marketing tool, it will prove to be extremely useful and worthwhile – apart from the prolific collection of backlinks, your company or brand will also gain mass popularity over social media platforms via likes, comments and shares. Press releases are still the most vitally important tool for SEO – and one that will not go out of fashion in many years to come.