PR isn’t a new form of marketing, it has been around for years and has changed lots since it originated. It’s best to keep up to speed with marketing and how it’s changing so you won’t be left in the dark and wondering how to create a successful marketing plan for the year. If you want to improve your PR marketing tactics and get up to scratch with the new forms of successful PR, we will explain the evolution here…
What are the older more traditional forms of PR?
A press release used to be the most convenient way to convey news and messages, and would focus on creativity and primarily the story or news. Press releases needed to be captivating stories, either shocking, sad, positive or generally something that would provoke a reaction from the reader. In the past, PR was mostly on the phone and journalists would be overwhelmed by the amount of phone calls they would get about featuring press releases, this was only 10 years ago. You will still need an interesting story to get your PR piece published now, but there are some more factors to consider.
You can now use agencies to manage your PR and they will take care of outsourcing your press releases to drive links back to your website. It’s worth researching to find the best digital pr agency for you, so you can up your game if you aren’t doing so well in the PR department currently.
How has PR developed and what is it like now?
PR is now different, and if you haven’t caught on with the new ways it works, it’s about time you did! So, you will still need to write a creative story or some news within a press release for journalists to want to feature your story, of course. However, you will need to aim to get a backlink into the story so your site will rank higher in the SERPs. High-quality backlinks are important, just as important as other SEO methods, such as citations.
Journalists will only publish something about you if there is a need to hear about your topic or company, and this is the only way to get those high-quality backlinks into the media. PR must be paired with SEO to be successful, this is down to Google and its ability to understand online content now.
How is digital PR measured now?
Interestingly, there are a few ways that the success of digital PR is measured. The main ones are the number of backlinks gained, any spikes in your ranking position, the growth of your social media followers, the inbound traffic you’re getting from links, and your domain authority increases. If you have recently invested some money into outsourcing your PR or you have been working on it regularly, use these ways to see if it’s having a positive effect on your company and online presence.
Overall, there have been some very noticeable changes in PR over the past ten years, and if you work in the industry, you will already know this. If you have realised your business is stuck using the more traditional forms of PR, there are always options like digital marketing agencies that can help you turn this around quickly. It’s worth investing in PR now more than ever, as backlinks are so important and you want to be drawing consistent traffic to your website. Good luck on your PR journey!
