Optimizing Press Releases for Google

The Internet has revolutionized the way companies market themselves to the business world. Traditional PR efforts are still important, but when press releases posted on a company's Web site, they are able to reach a much larger audience, thanks to the advent of sophisticated search engines like Google.

But getting those search engines to pick up and distribute your message requires strategy. The reality is that writing for search engines is slightly different than writing for human editors. That's because search engines use algorithms to determine press-release relevance and ranking. Knowing some of the capabilities and limitations of Google will give you a leg up in getting your press elease indexed by Google and read by your audience.

Below are some standard best practices for how to optimize press release for Google

1. Google displays only the first 65 characters (including spaces) of the headline. Anything after that, Google puts an ellipsis. Get the point across up front. Don't bury it at the end of the headline, because Google won't show it.
2. Google refreshes its PR database every 30 days. Therefore, to stay top-of-mind, you should do a release every month.
3. It's important to pepper the release with the search phrase or phrases under which you want to indexed. This will increase the relevance of your release to the search query. Make sure to include the search phrase in both the headline (first 65 characters) and also in the first sentence of the body. Google displays up to 160 characters (including spaces) of the first sentence, so make sure to put it there.
4. Adding the keywords in the headline and in first sentence has the added benefit of bolding the keywords in the release, which subsequently will elicit a higher click-through rate, or CTR. This best practice is similar to Google's AdWords advertising program, in which ad copy that includes the keyword will drive more click-throughs than those without the keyword.
5. Add links that point back to your Web site. This not only drives traffic, but has the added benefit of helping increase your site's organic ranking. In ranking sites, Google takes into account how many inbound links there are pointing to a site-the more the better.

And while I'm at it, let me take a moment to discuss Google's ranking method. Google's ranking algorithm is complex, and only Google knows the recipe of its closely guarded secret sauce. However, inbound links (what Google calls Page Rank) is a large measure that determines the ranking in organic results.