How to Write A Press Release: 10 Tips To Drive More Traffic

By Tatyana Gann

Nashville TN

How many times have you thought of writing a press release for your business but then decided to turn to something you considered more effective? You considered it old fashioned method and looked for something more fancy!   How many times have you gone online to do research and found newstories about your product that someone has written that got a lot of reviews and applause.. You thought, “Oh well, next time ”

Now you are ready to write a press release to promote your business but stuck where to go?

Writing a press release is a very creative way to add more online exposure.. While back ago I did a training on  and articles, and I wanted to discuss with you the importance of press release in your personal branding and as one of the best attraction marketing methods that is forgotten and not used by many owners. I shared my story of generating few million views to my press release in 8 months. Of course not every press release I wrote got so many hits but press releases are still my favorite method. I have used press releases to promote my previous business. My current clients love press release method as their promotional approach. It gives them stability, credibility, instant traffic, long term traffic and solid buyers who share their story with their inner circle.

When you are ready to write a press release you have to be prepared. You must get your kit together of information ..Top press release submission firms charge up to 1000 dollars just to write and submit one press release.

Press releases marketing is considered one of the most forgotten marketing methods.  The online marketers are looking for more sophisticated methods (ppc, seo methods) or trendy marketing such as youtube, twitter and facebook. It is all good but not enough in my opinion.  Press releases can be a good addition to what an online marketer does on a daily basis. The excuse I hear so often, “Tatyana, I do not know how to write”.  Well, it is a pretty lame excuse.  Everyone can write. WHY? Because every day we share news, announcements or even gossips with our friends, family, church members and our business collegues.  We forget how natural it is for us to share the news or events that occured in the past few days or months.  Google loves rich content that is natural and has good flow and it will crawl its content with its powerful spiders.

How can we write a press release that are not only good content rich editorials but also bring quality traffic and buyers for our product or a business?

First of all, you need to understand that press release is about 4 words: Where, Why, Who and What. Once you understand that press release is not about selling but it is more of announcement of event, news, sharing   testimonials and real stories. Press release is about presenting solutions to a reader and grabbing their attention in the headline and then two paragraphs.. Remember stories sell not facts.

Here are few little tips to help you to write simple and quite effective press release.

1. Voice of your company: Determine what you are going to write about.  It could be event with your company, your personal achievements, announcement of the partnership with a particular company and etc.

Better way- bring solutions to the clients with your company services, products. Do not focus on your company and products. People do not care. they care if you can deliver solutions!

2. Keyword research: Research keywords you want to target. Make sure they are buying keywords not some generic keywords. You want to use keywords that a customer or a business seeker would be looking for on google or other search engine. I recommend to use services such WebCeo.com. I think it is the best keyword research software.  I love to use Spyfu.com

3.  The length of press release: Make sure you write a  press release is about 5-6 paragraphs with 4-5 sentences each to make it easier for you than counting words.

4.  Only 2 keywords and 72 characters in headline: Use important two keywords in the title or headline then summary of your press release. Repeat headline sentence in the summary then in the first paragraph.

5. SEO: distribute keywords you plan to use to the left of each paragraph and if you have an option to hyperlink that keyword to your personal site or a blog then do it. That will help with optimization. Do not overuse your keywords.  Create natural flow of keywords without too much repetition and relevant to what you say. 2-3 main keywords max per each release that you want to focus on..

6. Include your website address in round brackets in the beginning of the first paragraph to help with SEO and make sure include information with your link in the end of the press release.

Make sure you include free report, free ebook, free resources, free training video series and link them to your sites. It is a great way to build your list.

7.  Where to submit? After you write your press release, you need to submit your press release to online press release distribution sites such as PRWEB and Pitchengine.

Some are free and some will cost you money. I do not recommend free press release sites and I will explain why later in my next newsletter

We have put together special PRWeb and media press release writing and submission services packages for our clients and they really love

8. Social bookmarking– submit to social bookmarking sites such as digg, technorati, stumbleupon and more. I recommend to use services called “Social Marker”

9. Sharing is caring. Ask and it will be given. Bring value. Share with your friends, collegues via twitter, facebook or forums.  Ask them to repost it for you and leave comments on the press release. Remember comments are very important for search engines to crawl your press release and get more exposure! The press release that got a lot of traffic had many comments that turned into heated debates and it was actually fun because it allowed me to post my answers and create more interest among my viewers. I was receiving calls about my business every day just from my press releases that they saw online.

Use social media such as Facebook to spread news!

10. One press release a week can keep bad reputation a way: Write at least one press release a week if your time allows you. Just imagine you will collect over 50 press releaeses in one year. Talk about online presence!

The last tip: Take your press release and distribute offline.  Find local companies that can include your editorials in their local news papers or magazines.  You can even find good national publications that will accept your articles as contribution to their community.  Do your own research and discover targeted publications. If you write about real estate crisis, find popular real estate publications. If you want to promote your business, find magazines like “Who is Who In Nashville” as good example and it will give an option to submit article about you and what you do.

Tatyana Gann is the founder of Smokin’ Hot PR  Ezine, and SmokinHotPR Boutique, providing publicity, online PR services and even private VIP coaching. Tatyana is a published writer, a mompreneur, a lover of international cuisine and red wine! Grab her free publicity and promotion tips via her newsletter at http://www.smokinhotpr.com/

(c) Copyright 2009 Tatyana Gann. All Rights Reserved.