Tag Archives: blow your own horn

How To Blow Your Own Horn Via Online PR

: Image via Wikipedia

Ok. This post is about press releases. It may be too wonkish for you and, if it is, move on. But, before you go, you might at least want to look at these 2 links:

1. Releases are well written: This link, several layers deep, tells you how to write something really of value to the user, so it gets her or his attention. Doesn’t necessarily have to be a press release. Can also be a “white paper” on your site outlining the advantages or benefits it offers. I’m planning to use this as a guide myself.

2. Integrated Twitter Option. Power user tip: PRWeb is releasing a “Tweet It” option for your press releases that will tweet your press release for you the second it goes live. Be sure to take advantage of this brand new feature. Twitter is awesome at spreading news in a viral fashion.

Now on to the meat of the matter. We’ve been stressing for a long time the importance of developing your own brand. Brand You. And, short of dragging your mother to all your networking events, or having a blazer made out of testimonials for you…. I’m kidding…you are the only one you have to shout out your story.

So what’s one excellent way to do it. I say this with the recognition that every now and then one has to pay for something to get it executed most effectively. If you think you will never pay for a press release, under any circumstances, well then, there is always twitter. And also some free pr services, but you may not be exactly sure what you’ll get from those. For now, let’s turn to Sugarrae aka Rae Hoffman in her PRWeb Review

“I’m often asked when I mention doing press releases for website promotion, branding and visibility what online press release distribution services I recommend, if any. The truth is that I’m a longtime user of PRWeb, have spent thousands of dollars running press releases with them and am pretty pleased with their services.

When I first started doing serious press releases several years back, I signed up with PRWeb – partially because they were very visible at industry conferences like PubCon and partially because they offered (and still do offer) a series of free webinars that explained how to use the service.

I was making the leap from being a small site affiliate to creating true affiliate brands and knew press releases had to be a part of my marketing strategy. With the roles of traffic and branding playing a larger and larger part in top search engine rankings, utilizing every opportunity you have to get publicity, including press releases, is becoming more of a necessity.

The PRWeb offerings

PRWeb has tried to simplify their offerings over the years to give you a choice between four main press release packages:

Standard Visibility aka the $80 level
Social Media Visibility aka the $140 level
SEO Visibility aka the $200 level
Media Visibility aka the $360 level

While the site touts tons of features for each, the main (read, important) differences aren’t that difficult to spot.

Standard Visibility ($80)

The cheapest of all the available options, standard visibility gets your release listed on the PRWeb network (which gets about 2-3 million unique visitors per month), in Google News and Yahoo News. Additionally, you’ll also get access to basic statistics about how “well” your release did such as headline impressions (cumulative, by week and by day), full page reads (cumulative, by week and by day) and the ability to compare the statistics of one (or more) press releases to another (useful in identifying the best days of the week to send out releases and which features help make your release more appealing).

Social Media Visibility ($140)

This option gets you everything included in the Standard Visibility package with a little increased distribution. Specifically, your release will be sent to an additional list of about 35,000 opt-in journalists, a “media digest” list (a list of about 4-500 regional reporters or 150-300 vertical reporters – your choice) and will also be distributed on the Pheedo network (which means your release will receive exposure on the relevant high profile sites in Pheedo’s network).

SEO Visibility ($200)

The “SEO Visibility” package, in my experience, is often the most misunderstood. PRWeb, along with every other known press release site, has long been treated differently by Google. The links from within your press release, with or without anchor text are not going to give you much (if any) “inbound link value” in the eyes of Google. Then why bother with the SEO Visibility package? A few reasons.

The SEO Visibility option comes with everything included in the Standard and Social Media Visibility options as well as distribution to an additional regional or vertical media digest list (for a total of two), inclusion with relevant premium vertical publishers (like Entrepreneur.com) and the ability to embed an image within your release.

In addition to that increased distribution, you can also specify anchor text for your links, keywords to include in the url of your release when published on PRWeb. If the links don’t “count” then why does either of these options matter? To begin with, at first glance, a press release looks much neater and more professional with “anchor text” vs. www.mydomain.com/the-long-ass-url-to-the-feature-were-announcing.html as the links to the features, people or products being announced.

Additionally, PRWeb has numerous distribution channels and should someone from those channels decide to publish your release on their own site, you’ll likely find more value in that re-published release linking to you with anchor text rather than long and ugly url strings.

Specifying keywords to use in the url of the release hosted on PRWeb will increase (however slightly) the chances that your release will rank well in the search engines based on the domain age, trust, branding and traffic of PRWeb.

Additionally, you also get access to additional statistics called “Search Engine Hits” (which is a bit misleading since it is actually search engine visits, not “hits” as traditional SEO folk would identify “hits”). You’ll get to see the percentage of total search engine traffic each of the major engines sent to your release (Google News, Google, Yahoo, MSN and “other”) as well as the top 20 keywords that drove that traffic. Unfortunately, while they show you the % of traffic each engine sent, they don’t show an aggregate number of “total search engine visits”, which PRWeb says they’re working on providing.

Media Visibility ($360)

This package includes everything in the three previous packages, but with some additional “heavy artillery” distribution via the Associated Press and by having your release sent to a distribution list that includes the top newspaper in 100 designated marketing areas (DMA). It also includes the ability to include video with your release, access to additional geographical statistics (which is essentially a Google maps mashup showing you the location of people who have read your release) and the ability to export all of your statistics (you can find an example export here).

What to watch out for

PRWeb makes it incredibly easy to get your release in front of the right people (your release will need to do the rest) but it does have a few caveats you should be aware of.

Linking limitations

Links, even with the SEO Visibility package are limited to 1 per 100 words. PRWeb’s reasoning is that Google News seems to prefer this ratio and anything above it risks the release not being included in Google News. Since press releases traditionally are supposed to be short and to the point, you might find you quickly run out of links and are then editing your release to bulk it up to get another link or two in. However, note that if you contact PRWeb and explain you’ll take the risk of not being included in Google news, they will allow your release to go through providing the number of links isn’t excessive (aka obvious spam).

RSS groupings

PRWeb has the ability to group your releases, which is especially useful for those submitting releases on behalf of clients. However, note that underneath each release published is a section called “Other releases by the member” where other releases in the same grouping appear. So if you don’t want sites connected publicly, be sure not to connect them in your account by putting them in the same RSS grouping.

Editorial Scores

PRWeb doesn’t give much information about how it doles out editorial scores, only that each release receives a score of 1-5 (with 5 being the best) and that an editorial score of 4 or higher is required for your release to be distributed to Topix, Yahoo News and eMediaWire. If you get a score below a 4, you’ll want to edit and improve your release and submit it for another review to ensure maximum exposure. That said, I’ve never really had a problem getting an editorial score of four or above.

Three power user tips

PRWeb is releasing a “Tweet It” option for your press releases that will tweet your press release for you the second it goes live. Be sure to take advantage of this brand new feature. Twitter is awesome at spreading news in a viral fashion.
Press releases are listed on PRWeb based on who paid the most. You can buy additional “stars” above the four packages listed to show higher than other folks if you’d like. Whatever package you buy, you might want to consider paying a few dollars above the package price. So, if you buy the 200 dollar package, pay 203 dollars. This will bump you above all other press releases who only paid the 200 dollar base price without you having to buy another entire star for 40 dollars.
If you’re interested in trying out PRWeb, I’d suggest signing up for an account and then attending their free daily webinars as soon as possible before spending any actual money submitting a release.

My experience

As I mentioned, I’ve been using PRWeb with success for a few years now. Our releases are well written (we do them in house) and always submitted at the 200 dollar (SEO Visibility level) though I admit I didn’t realize everything that came with the Media Visibility package until I did this review and will likely use that level for our next “big” announcement.

The statistics of our last five releases published are as follows with the most recently released press release listed first:

(impressions/reads/email forwards/prints/pdf)

116561/1990/0/17/0

146304/2229/0/17/40

107428/1542/0/14/40

128481/1824/0/15/26

98241/2122/0/9/27

Our releases all have gotten us several links a piece and we also have three business deals that have been very good for our sites that came from releases we’ve issued putting us on that company’s radar in the first place. Press releases, and PRWeb as a distribution method, have earned their spot in our marketing budget.”

For more great stuff, go to Sugarrae online marketing blog, home to online marketing consultant Rae Hoffman.

Do you have marketing and pr tips of your own? Let us know. We’d love to hear from you.

Blow Your Own Horn: Increase Your Visibility Using LinkedIn

Image representing LinkedIn as depicted in Cru...

Image via CrunchBase

Even if you have demonstrable skills and great results, what good will it do you if too few people know what a valuable asset you are to any company or any client? Zero, or close to it, is the correct answer. Remember that question: “If a tree falls in a forest and no one’s there to hear it does it make a sound?” Answer: no, it makes sound waves; someone has to hear the sound waves for them to be perceived as sound. And someone has to hear about your successes, achievements and accomplishments for you to be perceived as effective and successful. There is real currency in perception. And it is up to you to shape those perceptions.

I just Googled my name, Gretchen Glasscock and it returned 9,350 results. It’s kind of scary, when you think about it, how much information is out there about you. There’s a profile of me on Amazon.com from when I reviewed a book on the Net for them. One of my Internet providers, of many moons ago, has a profile posted of me with nothing but my name. Which makes it all the more important for you to write your own profile, which is accurate and which you have control over, so that is the first place potential clients and colleagues go when looking for information about you. ( Not the website with you wearing a party hat or your nieces and nephews climbing on your shoulder as your dog is kissing your ear and you are struggling for balance.)

First, let’s focus on Linked In

Guy Kawasaki, the popular VC and entrepreneur has provided us with Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn. I’m going to point out a couple of his tips, but I’d also like to say how much I’ve learned from Guy who is probably one of the most popular personalities on the Net. It’s easy to see why, when you read his linked in profile. He comes through as very engaging and personable. He says of his first degree from Stanford, before he went for his MBA:

“These were some of the happiest days of my life. I loved Stanford. Sometimes I wish I could go back to school there. By the way, I majored in Psychology because it was the easiest major I could find.

I think most of us have a tendency to make these facts too stiff and formal. I know I do. And I’m going to go back and work on mine, to let my hair down a bit, and be more personal, like Guy is. The end result is you, the reader, immediately think of Guy Kawasaki as approachable, someone who’d like to help you, which is, after all, what you want when your goal is for people to seek you out for your service or product,

Some of Guy Kawasaki‘s advice for your Linked In page”

Improve your connectability.

Most new users put only their current company in their profile. By doing so, they severely limit their ability to connect with people. You should fill out your profile like it’s an executive bio, so include past companies, education, affiliations, and activitiesYou can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature. The added benefit is that the link enables people to see all your credentials, which would be awkward if not downright strange, as an attachment.

Improve your Google PageRank.LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. Since LinkedIn profiles receive a fairly high PageRank in Google, this is a good way to influence what people see when they search for you.To do this, create a public profile and select “Full View.” Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profile’s URL to be your actual name. To strengthen the visibility of this page in search engines, use this link in various places on the web> For example, when you comment in a blog, include a link to your profile in your signature.
Enhance your search engine results.In addition to your name, you can also promote your blog or website to search engines like Google and Yahoo! Your LinkedIn profile allows you to publicize websites. There are a few pre-selected categories like “My Website,” “My Company,” etc.If you select “Other” you can modify the name of the link. If you’re linking to your personal blog, include your name or descriptive terms in the link, and voila! instant search-engine optimization for your site. To make this work, be sure your public profile setting is set to “Full View.”

These small changes, which don’t take long to execute can make a huge difference how visible you are on the Net, and that is your first hurdle: Visibility. We will work on the rest as we go along.

To read Guy Kawasaki’s entire post go to Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn

How To: Pitch Yourself to a Magazine Editor

A Communication Toolkit To Grow Your Business | Starting a Business and Growing your Company, Ladies Who Launch.

by Summer Bellessa,
Ladies Who Launch member, Los Angeles

Here are some highlights the author advises adding ” to your communication toolkit.

1. Know the publication.

2. Make it easy.

3. Make it pretty.

4. Make it short.

5. Follow up

6. Repeat.

Summer Bellessa is a member of the Los Angeles Incubator and the founder/editor-in-chief of Eliza magazine.

For the complete post go here: A Communication Toolkit To Grow Your Business |

He Who Owns The Most Brain Cells Wins -SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED

SOME ASSEMBLY REQUIRED.

Thom Singer of Austin, Texas, clearly a guru on the topic says “Take charge your brand and construct a network of cherished professionals with whom you can mutually assist each other in getting your name into the community. In the end, we all need others who will be our evangelists, or all the independent efforts are just wasted. No PR firm can spread the word about you, your company or your services if real people are not on board. Word of mouth marketing is the most powerful tool that you can harness. However, it has to be real, as you can fake “BUZZ”.

If you are not thinking about how to build your “buzz”, remember that you competition is out there looking for how to buy the brain cells of the decision makers in the marketplace. That means occupying the “top of mind” position in your industry. He who owns the most brain cells wins. Never forget that plain but powerful point.”

Keep building your brand, blowing your own horn and projecting your accomplishments. First do it. Then persist

Content Is King Morphs Into Publishing It Marketing

The Trend Junkie – Marketing 2.0: The Content Challenge.

The landscape has changed … In order to maximize the opportunity of amplifying your organizations signal ( or your individual profile) in this shifting media landscape, you must think strategically about how publishing can help you achieve your goals and objectives.

This insight dovetails nicely with the “Blow Your Own Horn – Project Your Achievements” concept. With some planning transforming into the “publishing is marketing” model is achievable for any individual or company.

Individuals and marketers have always published content , but its the landscape that has changed, not the concept of publishing. It is the way that the content that we publish is consumed, the way that it moves around the social web, and is globally syndicated that is different. This landscape has also opened up other forms of content for organizations and individual to produce, specifically you can now add audio and video content to the already rich mix of blog posts, articles, white papers, research and surveys, etc.. These are mediums that once had a very large barrier to entry and were commonly associated with heavy production budgets. Not anymore.

The challenge is how to go about it: how to produce a continuous flow of blog posts, white papers, research briefs, surveys, webinars, and audio & video (new media). These are some of the core published products that any individual or organization can take advantage of in the new media landscape. Each one serves a key role to the overall marketing mix, and each can be seamlessly promoted using the tools of the social web.

Hence the question, how do you create a publishing machine that stays not only on schedule but also stays aligned with your marketing or self promotion objectives?

One of the first and foremost considerations is your talent.

Can you write well? Then blog. Can you talk intelligently about your product, service or industry? Then hit the record button and publish a regular podcast. The barriers to entry are just too low not to be taking advantage of these mediums. All that said, content is key.

Just remember, this isn’t a game for being just the sizzle, you have to be the steak at the same time. You may find it challenging at first to organize your content creation processes, but that will become a matter of habit. To complete in a crowded blogosphere and get noticed, and more important, respected for your viewpoint, you must publish on a frequent basis. That’s what the most popular pros do. And with a little focus and determination, you can become one of them

How to Convey Your Strengths During a Job Interview Or With A Potential Client

How to Convey Your Strengths During a Job Interview Or With A Potenial Client

by Jason Kay

Along with “tell me about yourself,” “describe your strengths” is one of the questions that you know you’ll be asked in a job interview. At first blush, it sounds like an easy question. But because it’s such a broad topic, it can actually be quite difficult to answer well. Below are a few guidelines to help you prepare for and deliver a great response.

· Identify your strengths. You should think very carefully about your personal strengths well before you step foot into your interview. It’s not unusual for even the most ambitious professional to be at a loss as to her own strengths. Try viewing resume samples and notice some of the strengths that come across. Do any of those apply to you? Another good source of “strength identification” is to ask your friends and family what they see as your positive attributes. Are you organized? Decisive? Detail-oriented? It’s a good bet that these qualities come through at work as well.

· Limit your strengths. Of course you want to impress the hiring manager with your many and varied strengths, but it’s a good idea to put a lot of thought into just three or four, rather than make a catch-all list to regurgitate. If you try to sell the fact that your strengths cover every single thing that could possibly arise-ever!-two negative things are likely to happen: your interviewer probably won’t believe you, and you won’t have enough time to expound upon anything (and, hence, miss the opportunity to lend credibility to your claims).

· Avoid over-used catch phrases. It’s tempting to say things like, “I’m a people person” because it sounds like it should be the right answer. But it’s far too vague to convey anything other than the fact that you don’t know how to interview well.

· Make sure your strengths are transferable. If you’re interviewing for a similar position as the one you have now-or with your current company-it’ll be fairly easy to describe how your strengths relate to your potential new job. But if you’re changing careers or re-entering the work force after an absence, you’ll need to be more creative. If you’re switching from graphic design to sales, for instance, you can relate how your dedication to on-time delivery and creative customer presentations would be a huge plus in your new job.

· Relate your strengths to the new company or job. It’s no secret that candidates need to research the prospective company, as well as the specific job they’re after if possible. But you may not realize how valuable that information can be when you’re relating your strengths. If you know that the culture of the hiring company is customer-focused, for example, you should make sure to convey that customer service is one of your strengths. The company doesn’t care about your strengths in an abstract sense; they want concrete evidence that you can hit the ground running for them.

· Give concrete examples. Too many job seekers begin well with their “strengths” answer, but then stop short of an impressive response by, well, stopping short. Don’t just say that you’re persistent; back your assertion up with a story about the time you courted a new client for six months to secure a huge deal for your previous firm. Or demonstrate your attention to detail by showing your interviewer a company newsletter that you edited.

· Be prepared for the follow-up. A good interviewer knows that you’ll expect questions about your strengths and weaknesses and that, if you’re smart, you will have prepared a good answer. So to mix things up a bit, some interviewers ask questions that force you to defend your assertion. If you describe one of your strengths as being able to sell ice to an Eskimo, the hiring manager may pick up a stapler and ask you to demonstrate your no-fail sales technique. The best way to prepare for follow-up questions like this is to make sure that you actually possess the strengths you say you do.

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