SEO for blogs

Date: 02nd June 2008

Blog posts often appear in news search engine results, though some search engines (such as Yahoo News and Moreover) separate news and blog content. "A lot of the blog content we were pushing was not just showing up in news search, but RSS search and regular search as well," said Nan Dawkins, Partner at Redboots Consulting. "Blogs are a great way to reach journalists because firms need combined impact in various places." Dawkins offered the following tips for optimizing blogs and press releases for news search: * Establish a blog outreach program. "This does not mean blanketing your press release to bloggers," Dawkins explained. "It means going out and doing some research on which bloggers might be interested in your company, product or service; establish a relationship with those bloggers, which means reading their stuff, providing them with material; and commenting on their own material from time to time so that they know who you are." * Make contact with the journalist. "You don't have to make that much of a distinction between the conventional journalist and the citizen journalist, especially from a marketing perspective," she said. * Send your press release to trusted bloggers. "Never blanket bloggers with press releases," said Dawkins. "Establish relationship with them, talk to them on a regular basis, let them know when you have news coming up. When they ask for the press release, try and send it to them the day before or two days before it goes to the wire service, but make sure its clear they know not to post it in advance of the wire service. A lot of times, they will take your exact release and put it online, sometimes posting their own commentary - so you want to make sure you time it correctly." * Use images whenever possible. Sometimes press releases get picked up because of their professional images. "Many blogs may carry an image you send out with a press release, if it fits the style of the blog," said Dawkins.