Online Marketing Blog

When you attend conferences, read blogs or popular search marketing sites you’ll find plenty of subject matter experts in search marketing tactics ranging from search engine optimization to pay per click to local marketing and social media. It’s great to get those specific perspectives, but I get a lot of feedback from businesses that appreciate a more holistic approach to marketing online.

Recently, I was able to do an interview on the online radio show, Online Marketing with RSS Ray talking about an overall  approach to using social media, blogs and online public relations.

Yesterday one of our account managers emailed me about a very nice hit (mention in an article) for a media relations client (way to go Bill!) in a prominent technology publication. This pub has an online version and the topic was pretty provocative.

I did a quick search on Google blog search and noticed a significant number of blogs buzzing about this topic. It would be a great opportunity for the client to participate in those threads of dialogue and present their unique perspective. Doing so with a blog post to link back to offering more details would be a great way to connect with a community that cares deeply about the topic. Except one thing. The client doesn’t have a blog.

This Thursday I’ll be doing an audio conference as part of Bulldog Reporter’s PR University on search engine optimization and public relations. I did one of these in the Spring of 2006 and it went pretty well. I know a lot of practical, hands-on information was given out for the past conference. Attendees ranged from top 10 public relations firms in the U.S. to boutique shops and in-house PR professionals.

The panel this Thursday is very similar as last year and consists of:

• Sally Falkow from Expansion Plus
• Jamie O‚ÄôDonnell, SEO PR
• Lee Odden, TopRank

Note from Lee: Another contributor to Online Marketing Blog, Karen Sams who also writes her own blog at Media Relations Blog, makes her debut in this post about the ongoing challenge to gain original content for clients. Fresh content isn’t only necessary for making web sites attractive to search engines, but it’s also a critical component for marketing efforts in any channel - including Karen’s specialty: Public Relations. Read on to find excellent tips on how to make the most out of limited content.

Spotlight on Search - Interview with Amanda G. Watlington, Ph.D., APR of Searching for Profit

Photo by Jeremy Zawodny

I first bumped into Amanda Watlington via AIM, (Association for Interactive Marketing) and then in person at a WebmasterWorld Pubcon conference several years ago. Further collaboration occurred through involvement with the next iteration of AIM, the Direct Marketing Association’s Search Engine Marketing Council, of which Amanda was a past chair.

Amanda is famous for her in-depth knowledge of blogs, RSS and podcasting and she has one of the first popular books on the subject. However, this long time marketer’s roots are in public relations and she also has an extensive background with search marketing.

Note from Lee: I don’t want to have all the fun blogging here at Online Marketing Blog so 3 of our TopRank and M&O team members will begin offering practical tips related to blogging and public relations each week. Thomas McMahon will offer blogging tips and Karen Sams will be joined by Jolina Pettice in contributing tips on media relations and online PR.

Media interviews that result in published articles are excellent opportunities for companies to reach their target audience. While preparing for the interview, it’s important not to forget the ‘little things’ that can have a big impact on how your company is represented.

The WebProNews video blog posted an interview Mike McDonald did with myself and Stephan Spencer during the Chicago Search Engine Strategies conference where we talk about marketing and public relations issues with blogs and social media.

Congrats to Mike, Chris and Richard on a great job with these videos!

Blogs have been one of the big buzz items in 2006 along with social media. It seems companies are still trying to figure out whether blogging is worthwhile for their business and where social media fits in within overall marketing strategy. The number of “blog consultants” also appears to be growing at a much faster rate than business blog adoption.

For our clients, we use blogs extensively in both our public relations practice as well as for search engine optimization. One of the most productive uses of blog software as a content management system is for an online media room.

Earlier this week Matt McGee of Small Business SEM blog did an interview with me about public relations for small businesses. Matt has had a lot of marketing experience so he asked some great questions that I think businesses small and large will benefit from.

Here are a few sample questions:

Are press releases better for traditional publicity purposes or for SEO purposes — or can the same release do both? How?

Lately I’ve noticed a few mainstream web publications making concerted efforts to solicit user generated content. Enabling consumers to submit news gives media access to millions of potential stories they might otherwise not know about, or not have a scoop on. I know our local (and likely national) public radio station has been soliciting user generated content and news stories for at least a year and so do some TV stations. Also, Topix.net allows users to interact with news stories on their forums which, according to Topix.net founder Rich Skrenta, has enabled a big boost in traffic.

It continues to amaze me how many clueless or sloppy PR pitches we get week in and week out. Just last week it ranged from obvious typos/grammatical errors to claims that a story was exclusive and unreleased when a quick check of Google Blog Search showed nothing less than 10 blogs had already posted on the topic. While these are not necessarily dealbreakers for coverage, the one that will guarantee a visit to the trash bin is blatant spin.

This Friday I will be doing an online radio interview with eMarketing Talkshow about “Push and Pull Online Public Relations”. I’ll be talking with Cindy Turrietta about the market opportunity with online PR, explaining the concept of push and pull with examples of each as well as considerations on measuring results.

With all the buzz about optimizing and marketing with social media as well as the emerging meme in public relations on the social media news release format, there is an opportunity to help marketers better understand how these concepts can be applied in a practical manner.