Keyword Optimization for Press Releases - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #116
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008Keyword optimization on your website has become standard operating procedure for most marketers. But are you optimizing your press releases with keywords? Here are a few reasons why you should:
- If you are posting your press releases to your website (and you should be), it is probably the freshest content. Google gives precedence to new content (that is why blogs rank so highly in search engine results).
- Press releases and news articles rank very highly on Google. The more keyword rich your press releases are, the better they will rank in Google.
- Press releases are not just for the press. Make it easy for prospects/bloggers/analysts/media to find you wherever they are searching.
Don’t know where to start to find the right keywords? Check out these tips from MarketingProfs: Four Steps to Writing Search-Engine-Optimized Press Releases (I highly recommend the entire article) by Kim Cornwall Malseed:
- Find out what keywords successful competitors are using
- Read articles written by target journalists
- Survey your PR and Marketing department personnel
- Survey your Web site development team
- Survey product development personnel and executive management,
- Many press release distribution services (PRNewswire, MarketWire, etc.) have SEO features. Use them a few times (the companies usually permit you to do a free trial) and track results to get an idea of which keywords are most popular.
Also, be sure to avoid gobbledygook, those over-used industry words like “flexible,” “scalable” and “market-leading” so aptly named gobbledygook by David Meerman Scott.
After you have written your press release and think you have optimized all necessary keywords, put it to the test. HubSpot recently announced Press Release Grader, a free online tool to rate your press release. “Press Release Grader rates a press release based on a checklist of criteria – from content and structure, to search optimization and link analysis. The free tool is designed to optimize a press release so it can be found more easily by media, bloggers, customers and prospects. Press Release Grader provides an analysis and recommendations that will help you improve the way your press release is structured.”
As it is for most marketing tactics, in the end it is all about testing and re-testing to find what works best for your audience. I am sure I am missing a lot here. Anyone have any more tips?
Event Marketing Leading Questions
Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008We have discussed event marketing quite a bit on The B2b Lead. With tightening budgets I was curious what other marketers are doing to draw attention and make the most out of those leads gathered. I interviewed a variety of marketers at MarketingProfs B2B Forum in June. Check out this video to see what marketers from Marketo, HubSpot, Manticore, Enspire Learning and IDC have to say. See how they answered the following questions:
- What is the craziest thing you have seen at a trade show?
- What is your lead management process for leads gathered at trade shows?
Leverage Exclusive Events to Increase Trade Show Traffic - B2B Marketing and Sales Tip #115
Tuesday, July 1st, 2008Ever notice how people will go way out of their way and wait in the longest lines to be part of an exclusive group or the first to experience something new, then word spreads and a frenzy ensues? Witness the iPhone phenomenon. Here are a few techniques for stimulating your own frenzy of trade show traffic.
In my last position, I wanted to call out all of the stops at one major industry event to take our booth traffic to new levels and stimulate huge buzz to raise brand awareness. I decided to leverage word of mouth techniques to accomplish this goal. So, my team produced an exclusive, invitation-only after hours party at a swank club in Las Vegas immediately following the close of the show floor.
We gave a small number of invitations to our customers and partners who were attending the event and they helped us generate so much buzz for the event that we had attendees lining up at the booth for a chance to get an invite to the party. Once inside the party, we lavished our guests with food, drinks, attention and gifts—one of which was a killer t-shirt that many wore to the show the next day which led others to visit the booth.
The event has now become an annual affair for NetQoS which more than 500 attending the last party in Anaheim. The event is no longer exclusive, but it does have a widespread reputation as the must-attend event at Networkers.
So, take a tip from New York club promoters and offer exclusives to get people excited about you and stimulate WOM. Invite your customers and partners and encourage them to spread the word for you.
Oh, and here’s another related tip for driving booth traffic: sponsor a keynote drop. What’s a keynote drop? Some trade shows enable marketers to produce cards or flyers that are placed on the seats at the Keynote presentation. It’s more targeted than a hotel drop and instantly actionable. If the trade show does not offering a keynote drop, that’s even better. Contact the show organizers and offer to sponsor it exclusively! They will be happy to have the additional dollars and you’ll be the only game in town.
The Discipline of Market Leaders - ReachForce Book Club
Tuesday, July 1st, 2008In this chapter, authors Treacy and Wiersema discuss the different kinds of value customers want, offer guidance for companies trying to find the one they should excel in and provide lots of examples of market leading companies that have found success through knowing what their customers want and providing that value. In the beginning of the chapter, three kinds of value customers want are defined.
“For one category of customers, the most important value of a product is its performance. There’s a limit to how much they will pay, of course, but price is not the most important consideration.
For a second category of customers, the most important value is personalized service and advice. Once again, price is a consideration (no one wants to overpay), but it’s not the driving force behind their choice of product or service. They prefer to pay a little more to receive better attention.
For a third category of customers, the cost of a product is the primary consideration. Total cost begins with price but doesn’t end there. Customers don’t want to pay a very low price initially only to have the product cost them in the long run because of constant repairs. the total cost refers to how much the customers will pay for the entire time that they own the product. Thus, dependability is as much a component of low cost as is initial price.”
The authors go on to say that for a company to be successful, they cannot solely focus on one value and ignore the others. Also, companies that try to excel in all areas and be everything to everyone are rarely successful. So that got me thinking. I think there are lots of successful companies that do more than one of these well, they just know the right value to advertise. Knowing what your customers/prospects value and then letting them know that you fulfill that value is key. I think I might do some testing to see what value really resonates with my prospects.
How do you communicate to your prospects that your product or service fulfills the value they are looking for?
