Online press release distribution basics.

Over the years I've used many online press release sites on behalf of my customers, and for my own business, to get out the word on new product announcements, events, company announcements and more.

Online press release distribution is key in your total PR campaign to let the pet business media, customers, prospects, and other key publics learn about your business, and what's new with your business.

Press release distribution can also be a terrific tool to help you garner higher Google, and other search engine, placement for key words that are important to your company and your product.

Free vs Paid

What are the differences between free and paid sites? A quick review...

Generally speaking, most paid sites will provide you with not only the ability to gain Google, and other search engine placements, but they will also provide you with statistics and metrics to see who and how many have viewed your press release.

In addition, many pet business medias utilize some of these key paid sites as a way to search for pet business news and information from pet business companies to share with their audiences. Paid sites like PRNewswire and Marketwire are very popular online news media outlets and can have their advantages over free paid sites.

Free online sites can be just as effective as paid sites in my opinion, but it does depend on your goal. While in some cases you may not be able to track how many people and who have viewed your press releases, they can get very good Google, and other search engine placements; many times getting the front page of Google for key search terms related to your announcement.

In addition, I see more and more pet business medias utilizing Google (and other search engine) searches, as well as press release sites, in gaining information, and new product and company announcements, just as much as searching some of the paid press release sites.

Free press release sites do have some limitations that paid sites can provide, like adding images, or multiple hyperlinks to your press releases. In many cases you can add those elements, but there is an additional cost on free sites. Most importantly, there is usually a delay in when the free press release will be pushed out online (sometimes 2-3 days). So if you have very timely news, paid press release sites are definitely the way to go.

What I recommend

In most all cases, I recommend my clients utilize several free press release sites to distribute their press release online, unless they have an extremely timely topic that would require getting the word out immediately. I also do the same when getting out announcements about my business.

I have found that it is a bit more time consuming and sometimes challenging to the 'computer novice' to submit your press release to these free sites. Like anything else that's new to you, there is a learning curve. The more you do it, the easier it becomes.

Also I have found that when utilizing free or paid sites, there isn't really any difference in how my press release for my business or my clients gets results. Free or paid, I see the same results in Google (and other search engine) placement, contacts and more.

Again, it depends on your goal before making a final decision on free vs paid.

A quick listing of my favorite press release sites

Free

Pitch Engine - Pitch Engine is by far my favorite free press release distribution site.The only draw back is that now they only keep your press release up for free for 30 days. But the interface is very attractive and can make your business really stand out. And the social media sharing aspect is spot on with there system. You can purchase services from Pitch Engine to keep your press release up for a longer period.

PR.com - One of my primary recommendations for free press release distribution.

24-7 - I have had good luck in getting front page Google placement for key word searches with 24-7.

PRlog - Another one of my top free sites, allows links in free press releases.

PetPress.net - This site is free with approval of your press release. And specific to the pet business trade.

Paid

Pitch Engine - Even though I've listed Pitch Engine as one of my favorite free sites, they are also one of my favorite paid sites. Great interface, ease of use, and more.

Marketwire - One of the top three most visited online paid press release sites by journalists and medias.
Businesswire - Another top paid online press release site for distribution.

PRNewswire - One of the top three most visited online paid press release sites.

PRWeb - I see a lot of pet businesses utilizing this paid service and getting good results.

Online press distribution is only one part of your PR plan

Remember, online press distribution is only one part of your PR plan, albeit an important one. Other PR elements also play a very important part in your plan, from fashioning and scripting the writing of your press release to differentiate your business and your product or event, to distribution to pet business media and more.


Photo credits:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/meaganjean/ / CC BY 2.0

http://www.flickr.com/photos/deerwooduk/ / CC BY 2.0

Why it's important for you to own your pet business relationships.

After spending many years in the corporate environment and in the pet business world, there are a lot of important things I have learned...but none more important that the need for business owners to own their business relationships and not farm them out to a wide variety of agencies.

Whether those relationships are with your pet business vendors, retailers, suppliers, media or bloggers, building and maintaining those personal connections yourself can be incredibly valuable to your pet business.

Let's say for a moment that you hire or work through a public relations agency to connect with consumer pet magazines on your behalf. They put together a great press release, send it out to the all the appropriate consumer pet magazines in their database, then follow up to see if that media is interested in covering your new pet product or service. 

Sure, you may get some press out of that contact. But what happens when that public relations agency pitch person no longer works for that PR company, or that PR company no longer works for you? And what happens when the media has specific questions that your agency's pitch person can't answer effectively?

Not only have you lost that contact and have to start all over building that wonderful relationship, but the ease and speed of communication is lost. In the fast paced world of communications, this could be a detriment to your business and you may loose out on the great opportunity at hand.

Here's a much better scenario. You hire a PR or marketing agency, they write a wonderful press release about your product/service with just the right pitch, then provide you with a great intro email and a list of the pet business media who would find your information interesting to their readers, visitors, listeners, or viewers.

Then you send the email.

This method creates a means for you to build a wonderful and productive relationship with that pet business media representative or blogger; and allows you the ability to answer any media questions, quickly, easily, efficiently and very effectively.

When I was a VP of marketing at an Internet banking technology company, and on the other 'side of the fence,' I fought tooth and nail to bring the public relations marketing activity in-house and under my guidance after utilizing a public relations firm for a year or so; much to the doubt of the president of the company . Why? So we, as a company, could build and cultivate those great relationships with the tech media ourselves, without outside interference and hindrances; and it paid off in spades. 

Because I had formed these great relationships with the media through email communications, press junkets, catching up at trade shows and conferences, and staying in contact with those writers and reporters throughout the year, not only would they almost always cover our new developments, but many times when they were working on a story that related to a product line or subject matter that we were an expert in, we were one of the first sources they would call for a quote for the article; allowing us even more exposure within our field.

And this happens frequently with my own pet business marketing consultancy. When the pet business trade magazines are in the process of writing articles related to pet business marketing, they frequently turn to me for tips, ideas and quotes that they can share with their readers. This allows me to share some great tips to help pet businesses be more successful, and provides my business with just the type of visibility I want with my target audience.

So the next time you are thinking about outsourcing the important communications and relationships for your pet business, think again...or at least think about how you can work with your agency or agencies to own your own relationships for the long term health of your business.

Media email contact list for your pet business news, information and announcements.

If you're a pet business and you aren't doing public and media relations, you should be!

Public relations is defined as the practice of managing the flow of information between an individual or an organization and the public.

One way to practice public and media relations for your pet business is by providing individuals that manage a wide variety of pet related publications and media with information about your product, service or retail outlet through press announcements relating to your business - whether it be launching a new product, providing a new service, announcing a new partnership and much more.

The most difficult part of this process is knowing who to send your pet business news and information to so that the right person will receive your information and potentially feature it in an upcoming article or segment.

But now it's easy with the Pet Business Press/Media Email Contact List. Our Pet Business Press/Media Email List consists of nearly 200 contact emails for:

- Pet Business Consumer Publications
- Pet Business Trade Publications
- Major Women's Lifestyle Magazines
- Top 15 Newspapers through the US
- Top Influential Pet Bloggers
- Pet Related Radio Programs
- Most Popular Pet Lifestylists
- And more!

The list includes such notable publications and media contacts for Modern Dog, Dog Fancy, Martha Stewart Living, LA Times, Good Housekeeping, USA Today, Parade Magazine, Chicago Tribune, individual pet lifestylists who highlight pet products on the major morning shows, and much more.

When you purchase this list you will receive an email that includes and outlines nearly 200 contacts with the press/media category; publication, radio station, newspaper name; appropriate contact name and their title (if applicable); along with the appropriate contact email address.

While most PR firms charge anywhere from $200 to $500.00 to send out just one press announcement on your behalf, and up to a $3000 per month retainer to handle your PR, now you can do it yourself for only the cost of the list - $125.00 USD. And the best part is that you can keep the list to continue to communicate important information about your pet business on a regular basis.

Once your payment is completed, you will be sent the press/media list to the email address you provide via your preferred payment method via PayPal. (Please allow up to 12-24 hours for your email list to be received in your inbox; and please don't forget to check your spam box, just in case.).

For your security, we process payments via PayPal, which takes major credit cards for your convenience.

In addition, if you are unsure about how to present and provide information about your pet business, new products, services and more to this audience of media and press, and would like Pawsible Marketing to help you in formulating your press release and/or message, feel free to contact us for more information!

When purchasing the Pet Business Press/Media Email Contact List you agree to abide by these terms and conditions. Please read these terms and conditions careful as they explicitly state: You may not republish the content provided on any Internet, Intranet or Extranet site or incorporate the content in any database, compilation, archive or cache. You may not distribute any of the content to others, whether or not for payment or other consideration, and you may not modify, copy, frame, reproduce, sell, publish, transmit, display or otherwise use any portion of the content. 

Buy Now via PayPal

Successful media pitching for pet businesses.

One of the most frequent requests I receive from pet businesses is assistance in writing a press release with the goal of having their product or service appear in a variety of publications or media.

What many don't realize is to have your product or service written up in a publication or appear in the media isn't as easy as writing a press release, posting it online and then sitting back and waiting to magically appear in the media.

There is much more involved in getting out a story of your business, your product or your service. Much more.

Consider this...

• Journalists and editors receive 100's of emails a day from companies looking to have them write about their product, business or service. Even my dog who has a blog receives well over 25 mails a day from pet companies looking for him to write about their information.
• People are busy. Journalists are busy. Editors are busy.
• Editors and journalists are working on stories every day. Some publish daily, some weekly, some monthly. And they have ideas of what these stories will be ahead of their deadlines.
• Each journalist generally focuses on certain specialties within their respective niche. 

Now that you understand and consider the above points, what do you do? Here are a few tips in helping your product, service or company get more notice and attention from the media:

Pitch a story, not a product or service

Sorry folks....your product or service isn't usually big news. What is news is the story behind the product or service, how it benefits pets or people with pets, how people have used it for success, how your product/service fits within the broader perspective of life, etc. Put yourself in the shoes of the journalist and think about the story behind your product/service and what may be of interest to their readers.

Target the right people and get to the point

Find out the journalists that cover the subject you are pitching. Not all journalists cover all stories, many specialize in specific areas. Those that match your pitch are the ones you want to target.

Get to the point! Remember these journalists are very busy. Don't just send them a press release; instead, why not suggest a few story ideas that will fit within the realm of your targeted journalists beat? And, getting to the point quickly, simply and succinctly will increase your chances of getting noticed within the sea of emails they receive daily.

Don't expect overnight success (yep, I said it)

Despite the fact that you may have the best story, product or service on the market, it's not a guarantee that journalists will write about you right away. Think of public and media relations as a journey. One press release does not a PR program make.

What you need to do is build a relationships with the media for long term success of your public relations and media relations program. By building a relationship with journalists you are showing that you are a reliable source who understands their needs and are there to help them when they need you.

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If you are looking for assistance in starting or improving your public or media relations program, feel free to contact Pawsible Marketing via email to schedule a time to discuss your needs.

Measuring your pet business social media program

You blog, you post, you comment, you tweet, you stumble, you Facebook...you've been using it.

The real question is....is it working?

"How do I measure my social media investment?," is one of the most asked questions from my clients...as it should be! Social media may not be as expensive as other forms of marketing, but it does take time and time is money.

I've been measuring marketing programs for over 20 years; everything from advertising, direct mail, pr, to trade shows, events and more. It's a must for any marketer to determine a marketing activities' value and worth in increasing the bottom line of their company.

So how do you measure your social media program? We've put together a presentation to help you understand the elements of determining the goals of your social media program, how and what to track, and how to trend, evaluate and analyze your program in relation to your goals and objectives.

Measuring your pet business social media program on Prezi

The most difficult part of social media measurement is interpreting and evaluating the data. Once you have gathered all the data, input it into a bar chart or graph and correlate it to your objective. For instance, if you want to track increased sales, determine your quantitative markers, i.e., fans, followers, traffic, comments, interactions, etc., in relation to your sales.

Do you see trends? If so, you will be able to tell in some relation what brought upon that up-tick in sales...was it Facebook? Twitter? Blogging? Then by taking this information you can best

revise and refine your social media program accordingly to increase it's effectiveness.

This is the key to measuring ROI (return on investment) and ROE (return

on engagement).

Successes and disappointments in conducting a social media program may not be immediately visible when measuring your social media. You need to evaluate both quantitative and qualitative data (see presentation) and evaluate it based on the present, to help you act on the future.

If you're not seeing the results you expect, evaluate and be sure to ask yourself:

Are you targeting the right people?

Are your messages speaking to them?

Are you engaging your audience?

The companies with the most successful social media programs are those that answer yes to these questions and act accordingly and with vigor.

Visit these sites to learn more about measuring your social media program:

Marketing Analysis tools for download

Social media measuring article repository

A Wiki of Social Media Monitoring Solutions

The 10 Social Media Metrics Your Company Should Monitor

PR: Pawsible Marketing listed as one of the Top 50 Blogs for Startups to Watch in 2008!

Pawsible Marketing was recently listed on Evan Carmichael's Top 50 Blogs For Startups to Watch in 2008, along with Donald Trump's The Trump Blog, Dosh Dosh, The Blog of Author Tim Ferriss, and many other remarkable blogs.

Evan is an entrepreneur and international speaker. At the age of 19, he became an owner and Chief Operating Officer in Redasoft, a biotechnology software company. The company quickly grew to over 300 organizations as clients, including NASA and Johnson & Johnson, in 30 countries.

He started Evan Carmichael Communications Group and created www.EvanCarmichael.com with the goal to give entrepreneurs the motivation to follow their passion and the strategies they need to succeed. Evan has also delivered over 100 keynote presentations to entrepreneurs in North America, Europe, and Asia; and has been quoted in the New York Times, The Dallas Morning News and other notable publications and television programs.

PR: Pawsible Marketing president provides marketing advice in recent issue of Pet Age!

Check out the current issue of Pet Age Magazine. Leslie May, President and CEO of Pawsible Marketing, is quoted frequently in the magazine's article "CounterIntelligence: Making Words Pack a Punch", written by Patricia Frank.

The article discusses a variety of ways that pet businesses can bring their marketing messages to the highest, most effective, level possible.

Read the article here!

PR: Pawsible Marketing featured on Working With Pets!

Leslie May, owner of Pawsible Marketing is featured in an interview with Working With Pets on March 5, 2008.

May talks about her business and how she helps pet businesses with their marketing needs. She also discusses what types of marketing Pawsible Marketing offers, why she started her company, how marketing is unique and key to every business, and provides other key advice to pet business owners.

Be sure and check out the article and pick up some good tips to help market your pet business!

Getting media coverage.

Every week one of my clients asks me, "how can I get my business in a national consumer pet magazine?"

Well, that's a pretty big question. But it's not an impossible task...not if you have a great product or service, think outside of the box, be creative and have a unique take on what and how you provide to your customers and potential customers, have something people want, and let people know about it.

Over the years I have met with many editors of many national, local and regional consumer and trade magazines. Editors know their audience, they know what the next 'big' thing is, they keep up on trends in their industry, and they know what types of sources can help them with their articles. And they are open to new ideas.

It's the job of your marketing/pr person to get to know your media, understand their needs and make sure your business, your product, or your service is presented to the media in a way that helps them accomplish their goals. Thus, putting you in the right place at the right time.

Here's a good example:

This month Dog World Magazine includes a feature article entitled "It's Easy Going Green." A great article discussing the many ways you can reduce your dog's carbon paw print on the environment, and reap the benefits of a healthier and happier dog.

Lucky for me, I am one of the main sources of the article. But is it really luck?

Now really. It's a culmination of lots of social media promotion, lots of research, and lots of hard work. Rewarding and wonderful work, I might add!

I began my Raise A Green Dog blog about a year and a half ago, when I started getting many, many questions about the safety of dog food, toys and a dog's environment. I grew up 'green.' And, I've been as green as possible all of my life. So living green is second nature to me and writing about it was came easily.

The blog launched in October 2007 and very quickly began increasing in traffic. Why? Because the information contained in the blog was something people were hungry for. They needed information, they needed resources, and they needed help. And I was happy to help through Raise A Green Dog.

So how did I end up talking about a dog's carbon pawprint in Dog World?

When the writer was looking for resources for her article, she Googled 'green dog,' and up popped my blog on the front page of Google. I was in the right place at the right time because I had done the things I mentioned earlier - have a great product or service, think outside of the box, be creative and have a unique take on what and how you provide to your customers, have something people want, and let people know about it.

But the best part to me is...I'm hopefully helping lots of dog lovers have a healthier, happier pup and environment.

PR: Pawsible Marketing mentioned in Pet Product News International!

Pawsible Marketing, and it's parent company, May Marketing. Inc., was mentioned in Pet Product News International's March 2008 issue.

The article highlighted the recent opening of Pawsible Marketing and its plans to help any type of business aimed at the pet industry with their marketing needs. Pawsible Marketing will focus on implementing marketing and marketing planning for any type of pet business, including start-ups, services and retailers.

PR: ShortTakes wishes they'd thought of us!

From the ShortTakes blog...

WISH WE'D THOUGHT OF THIS

"We here at Short Takes are known for our predilection for finding offbeat animal marketing reports, so this one shouldn’t have surprised us, but it did anyway. Pawsible Marketing is now up and running in Carmel, Ind., consulting with, and implementing, “marketing plans and projects for any type of business related to pets.” Considering that Americans spent upwards of $40 billion on their pets in 2007, this may well be one of the breakout agencies of 2008. See how they do it at MarketingMyPetBusiness.com."