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May, 2006 – Carrie Hill’s April 24th press release, “Influence the Public with a Press Release”, discusses examples of how press releases have helped some of our clients in the hospitality industry recently. Here’s some more information about how to handle press releases.

Press releases are a great marketing tool to distribute information about your travel or tourism business across the web. They can provide the media with newsworthy content about your industry, location or company. There are many free and fee-based sources that you can submit your press release information to online.

One of our favorite sources is PRWeb, a media site that distributes press releases both for free and for a fee, depending on how aggressive you’d like them to be in promoting your news. They specialize in the distribution of information for small and medium sized companies – this will work for you whether you are marketing a small bed and breakfast or medium-sized inn or hotel. After creating a PR Web user account, you can manage multiple press releases at one time, providing you with viewer statistics about each release. They also allow you to upload pictures and files, create RSS feed groups, and include hypertext links for each release. PRWeb distributes releases daily to media contacts, syndicated news feeds, search engines, and on their own site.

When writing a press release, there are several important factors to consider. These factors include:

• Do not write your press release as an ad piece. Most sources will not consider content newsworthy if it’s simply trying to sell a product or service. Rather, make it interesting and informative.
• The headline is very important! This is what will (or will not) grab a reader’s attention.
• Make sure that you follow the guidelines that each resource gives you. They will instruct you with what information to include in your release and what will disqualify your release.
• Submit your release to many sources. The purpose is to get your news distributed to many places.
• Include your press releases and other company information on your own website. A media blog is a great way to add content to your site and to distribute information online. Information from blogs does get picked up by media sources.

UPDATE 3-17-09:

We’ve updated our SEO For WordPress Blogs whitepaper – You can find a new copy at SEO for WordPress Blogs – a Non-Techie’s Guide

Blizzard Internet Marketing has released a new white paper by SEO’s Carrie Hill and Mary Bowling. The free internet marketing mini-manual is entitled SEO for WordPress Blogs and is available for download on our website.

If you are a regular reader of our newsletter, you already know we are huge fans of the WordPress blogging platform. It’s easy to learn and use and offers a multitude of Search Engine Optimization benefits.

The 14 page, illustrated marketing white paper covers the following topics:

• Why a WordPress Blog?
• Setting Up WordPress for SEO Success
• Start Blogging
• Promote your Blog
• WordPress SEO Plug-Ins

Blogging is here to stay and WordPress is the way to do it. In the world of internet marketing, if you’re not blogging, you’re apt to be left behind. And if you are blogging, make certain you’re taking advantage of all the SEO benefits it can give you.

Get started today by downloading SEO for WordPress Blogs by Mary Bowling and Carrie Hill.

UPDATE:
Here are some great suggestions from our readers for more WordPress Tips and Tricks.
Thanks everyone for your suggestions and support!

From Ed at BestRankingSites.com

I read the SEO for WordPress Blogs and it’s a good beginners guide. I wrote a more advanced WordPress SEO guide if your readers are interested.

One simple thing I thought could be added is that h2 tags added to the sidebar could be changed to make the blog more SEO friendly (since the sidebar titles have little relevancy).

Open up your stylesheet by going to your admin dashboard–>presentation–>stylesheet.
Add ,menu wherever you see h2.

* If you’re using widgets

Open up wp-includes/widgets.php and search for:

‘before_title’ => ‘<h2 class=”widgettitle”>’, ‘after_title’ => ‘</h2>’,

Change this to

‘before_title’ => ‘<menu>’,
‘after_title’ => ‘</menu>’,

You may need to add a <br /> or two after </h2> if the spacing is off.

* Without widgets

Using the old school sidebar actually makes this easier. Just search for h2 in sidebar.php and replace it with menu

***************************************

Jonathan at GInside.com sent us these tips:

I have a few SEO tips that your readers might like,

http://www.ginside.com/2006/383/seo-tips-image-naming/
http://www.ginside.com/2007/993/seo-tips-image-naming-round-2/
http://www.ginside.com/2007/637/seo-tips-enforcing-www/
http://www.ginside.com/2007/677/seo-tips-communicate-with-the-blogsphere/

Hope some of those tips help your readers out.

sincerely,
Jonathan

****************************************

From Emon Hassan @ Emonome.com

Good morning,
Very good Whitepaper. I particularly didn’t know the usefulness of ‘Optional Excerpts’ option. If I may recommend two plugins very useful for permalink structure and two personal preferences.

1. On page 4 you’d recommended renaming the permalink structure to category and post title before one begins blogging as it is tricky to switch after you’ve blogged for a while and some of your posts have already been indexed on Google. After I’d switched to the category/post title structure a few weeks ago, I’d noticed my posts on Google, with the numeric structure, wouldn’t redirect. I thought I was stuck with that structure for good. That’s when I cold emailed Stephan Spencer, of Netconcepts, asking for suggestion. One of the plugins he recommended solved was exactly what I needed. After activation, this plugin redirects all existing permalink structure to your new preferred one without having to do anything. Awesome!

http://www.deanlee.cn/wordpress/permalinks-migration-plugin/

2. I highly recommend the FeedSmith plugin to re-direct all existing/original feeds from your blog to the FeedBurner feed. A lot of folks will subscribe to a blog by clicking the orange icon on the browser which is not the FeedBurner feed. FeedSmith will automatically re-direct original feed to FeedBurner even if you click the source Feed.

http://www.feedburner.com

3. This is a personal preference. Chances are, a lot of your readers won’t visit your blog but will read all your posts via their preferred Feed reader. They’re likely to browse through all the feeds they’ve subscribed to and don’t have the time to visit each site. In that case, you may want to consider making the full feed available on your FeedBurner settings. If people like your post, they will click the link to your page to leave comment or find the trackback link to post on theirs. I have readers who can’t get to my new posts every day but they check them out when they get a chance because they’re all waiting for them in their Readers. Sure you can argue that that would make you write compelling titles so people will click on to your site and read the posts but chances are, if you’re new at this, it won’t work for you and even if it did, readers just might not have that extra click in them to divert their attention to your site.

4. Most bloggers often make the mistake – I had as well – of requiring registration to leave comment on their blogs. It is, frankly, annoying for most readers. After a few people let me know of the annoyance, I realized I had unknowingly chose the option thinking it was a better way to block spam. Well, Akismet does an excellent job of blocking spam. Random visitors are likely to drop by your blog and want to leave comments and if you ask them to register and require them be logged in, they won’t and you lose a comment and, maybe, a subscriber. On the Options>General page, I have the ‘Membership’ options unchecked. I then went to Options>Discussion and required commenters fill out name and email; I hold all comments for moderation and put ‘1′ in the ‘Comment Moderation’ option. Again, a personal preference.
**************************************************

Our Conversion-Ready Template Designs are Built with You, Your Visitors and Search Engines in Mind.

The low-cost, user-friendly designs include a content management system (CMS) that will allow you to make basic changes to the website, such as re-sizing and swapping out photos, changing text and specials, add new pages, etc.  Furthermore, our designs typically rank higher in search engines than an average HTML design, as well as have a higher return-on-investment (ROI) due to increased conversions.

All Template Designs Start at $3,825 and Include:

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• Number of Pages – Pricing already includes the design of 30 pages.  Fewer pages can be designed if requested, as well as additional pages (in blocks of five).
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• CMS Training - 1.5 hours of training your staff on the basic back-end use of WordPress CMS.

Recommended Design Best-Practices Features for an Additional $630+ :

• HTML and XML Site Maps
• 301 Re-Directs
• Google Analytics Installation
• 404 Pages
• Google Webmaster Tools Integration

Looking for an economic way to get your business online? Let us help you today:

Trent Blizzard

Trent is the President and co-founder of Blizzard Internet Marketing. Trent began optimizing tourism websites in 1997 and has maintained a keen interest in Search Engine Marketing ever since. He considers his main expertise to be SEO with a specialized focus toward Social Media Optimization, Google Vertical Search, Blogging, and Analytics.

Before launching his Internet marketing company, Trent taught math and history at Mary Help of Christians Academy in Patterson, NJ, where he also claims the honor of being one of the most unsuccessful coaches in the school’s history – in 3 sports, no less! Thankfully, his record as an SEM coach reflects a much higher aptitude for getting positive results from his teams. Trent is a member of the National Speakers Association and has been one of the more prolific presenters in the industry.

In the past 10 years, Trent has spoken at over 150 hospitality, travel and tourism conferences. His record of repeat engagements speaks to his dynamic style and ability to connect with his audience. You just can’t teach the type of enthusiasm and dedication Trent brings to each and every presentation. His obvious enjoyment in sharing his expertise with others is reflected by the consistently positive feedback he receives from his assemblies.

Trent empowers the members of his audiences by presenting useful material they can easily integrate into their own Internet marketing endeavors.

“Worth the price of the conference. I can’t wait to get back and start using some to the things I learned.”
- By Jeannie of Village Realty

He speaks effectively to individuals with diverse levels of Internet knowledge and experience.

“Great presentation. I think it was a great overview that was appropriate for novices and experts alike.”
- Tom of Creative Internet Systems

He engages the audience using a dynamic and lively style of presentation. The information he covers remains available to audience members via a blog created specifically for them.

“Enormous amount of information, fun, rapid-fire hour, and glad it is online.”
- Suzen of Pismo Beach, CVB

Carrie Hill

Carrie is the Director of Search Strategies at Blizzard and specializes in On-Page Optimization and Online Reputation Management research and problem solving with an emphasis on hospitality industry clients. Keeping Blizzard on the cutting edge of technology and innovation in website promotion requires research and test implementation on a wide spectrum of hospitality websites, and Carrie is regularly involved in this research.

Carrie is a regular columnist for SearchEngineLand where she helps small business owners gain insight into the complex world of online marketing. She is a frequent presenter for the Search Engine Strategies and SearchMarketingExpo conference series where she has presented or moderated panels on Traffic Segmentation, Post Click Marketing, PPC Research Strategies, Online Reputation Management, and Small Business Search Engine Marketing. Her article “Seven Easy Steps to a Well Optimized Blog” was published in the premier issue of Visibility Magazine. She is also a featured contributor to the SearchEngineNews monthly newsletter.

Carrie’s passion is ROI for her clients – and teaching others how to see the value in the big picture and the minutiae of optimization, paid advertising and post-click marketing.

“I think the standout talks were Michael Jensen’s on event tracking in Google Analytics, as well as Carrie Hill’s on the value of Traffic Segmentation, and some advanced techniques she uses.”
- Jeffrey Donenfeld on Carrie’s SMX Search Analytics presentation.

Learn more about us:

• Request More Information about Conference Speakers
• Resume of Speaking Engagements
• Suggested Presentation Topics
• Presentation and Speaking Terms

Do You Need A Website That Outshines Your Competitors?

Our Custom Designs are built with a specific plan and management in place.  We will collaboratively work with you to determine the look-and-feel that best fits your needs, goals, and business.  The end result will be to provide you with a solid web marketing platform that will outperform your competitors in search engine rankings AND convert a higher percentage of website traffic that reach the site.

Blizzard Internet has 15 years experience and a staff of design and usability experts devoted to making highly effective and beautiful website. See for yourself in our website design portfolio.

All Custom Designs Include:

• Project Management and Consultation: These components are the base for understanding your ideas, website needs and coordinating the entire website development process to make it fit the business.
• Content Management System (CMS): Allows you to easily make changes to the site, including text, photos, add new pages and video integration, etc.
• Graphic Mock-Ups: The look and feel of the design to be created needs to visually and functionally match your ideas and our current best practices for a high traffic and high conversion website.  Two (2) mock-ups give you a choice to start the whole website development process.
• Code Build-out: This takes the base WordPress CMS and creates the look and feel from the chosen mock-up.
• Testing & ‘Go Live:’ Tests the website in multiple browsers to ensure it is entirely functional prior to going ‘live’.
• CMS Training: 1.5 hours of training your staff on the basic back-end use of WordPress CMS.

Recommended Design Best-Practices Features for an Additional $630+ :

• HTML and XML Site Maps
• 301 Re-Directs
• Google Analytics Installation
• 404 Pages
• Google Webmaster Tools Integration

Additional Design Features to Incorporate (call for pricing):

Call us right now at 888-840-5893 and we will begin helping you design a new website. You can also either fill out the short form below or email us and we will call you.