By Although there’s a good chance you haven’t used them, I’m sure you’ve heard of the concept of press releases. They used to be very popular in the SEO community. But are they relevant for SEO in 2019? Is it worth the time to create them?
A short answer is yes. Press releases are still relevant and will probably be relevant not only for search engine optimization, but also for website redesign
in general for a long time to come. However, many webmasters do not really understand the concept and often do things that eventually harm their websites.
What are press releases?
It is a way of distributing and announcing events in the press. Google defines them as “an official statement from newspapers containing information on a specific issue.
They usually come in writing, but they can also be in audio or video format. Once someone has an event and wants it to become more popular, the best way to do so is to attract media attention quickly and effectively.
But how can they do that? The answer is press releases. You write some content that will then be distributed to news publishers who may be interested.
The fact is, however, that it is quite difficult to attract the attention of the media. It is even harder for editors who are constantly bombarding news stories from all sides. They should filter and curate them to publish only the best, most interesting news.
This is how press release platforms such as HARO (we have Pressfeed) have been created. Instead of sending a press release to news publishers, you publish it on one of these popular distribution platforms, where journalists and news publishers hang out to find interesting topics.
The problem is that these platforms often become a spam dump for spammers. But before we discuss the possibility of harming your site with these platforms, let’s see how they can help your site.
How do press releases help SEO?
In most cases, these are backlinks. If news publishers start talking about you, you can not only get backlinks from the news sites themselves, which contain a very high trust, but you can also get a lot of backlinks from other webmasters who will read the news.
We all know that creating backlinks is one of the most difficult tasks for SEO. Creating high quality backlinks is even harder. And don’t even make me start with how hard it is to do it all naturally without buying them or using risky tricks like PBNs.
Well, the press releases combine all 3 points above, which makes it probably the best way to build links.
Why?
Well, this method helps you to create links quite quickly, the links are of high quality, and they are all completely natural and will not lead to any penalties.
If everything is done correctly, of course. If not, it is a waste of time, and it can lead to sanctions.
About press releases and filters
Spam
Instead of focusing on creating interesting news, people distribute as many “press releases” as possible on as many platforms as possible.
Some platforms are free and earn money from advertising, so they have no problem with people who go there and publish their “news”.
But even paid are full of inappropriate “news” articles. With webmasters asking hundreds of dollars for a link or guest posts, press releases cheap way to get links
.
These messages are too long for a press release (because Google likes longer content) and full of keywords with anchor links, which naturally attract fines.
Thus, the quality of press release sites is beginning to decline. Very few companies and websites (one of them is Pressfeed) still manage to remain relevant. Why? Well, because it does not index its materials. They are only available to registered users.
So, instead of publishing a press release just for the sake of a backlink, focus on the publication that will really get the reporter’s attention.
Using nofollow links
You may wonder, “Won’t nofollow links be useless?”
First, no. I’ve already written about how nofollow backlinks can help your site promote it.
Second, nofollow links will only be used on press release websites, given that these websites index their content on Google. Any other links you receive as a result of a successful press release will be a combination of nofollow and dofollow links, depending on the internal policies of the sites that link to you.
But why use nofollow links? The reason is that nofollow links reduce the risk of sanctions. Google says you should not build or buy backlinks. Because links to PRs are either manually created or paid for, Google’s recommendations require that they be nofollow.
