The thinning line between SEO and PR
In recent times, it seems that the boundaries between search engine optimisation and public relations are becoming increasingly thin. I say this because SEO is becomingly increasingly dependent on link building and the best, most authoritative links are often obtained by a link builder or marketer interacting with an online community the way a PR officer might interact with the public. By this, I don't mean manipulating the target audience, but maintaining a company's image or reputation within the relevant sector (be it online or offline).
Bearing this in mind, I thought it might be beneficial to cover some of the similarities between these two industries in a bit more detail. It might even be worth discussing the differences as well because there are several important contrasts.
What is PR?
Firstly, it would be prudent to establish a definition of 'PR' or 'Public Relations'. PR is concerned with managing the reputation of a business with the objective of earning support and influencing the opinion of the public, particularly those that might be specifically interested in the service or conduct of an individual business.
Well, how is the comparable to SEO, I hear you say. To achieve a higher online visibility, SEO strategists must determine the best channels of communication to distribute businesses content to an online community. The content that the SEO copywriters create also has to be written in a very precise form that will appeal and interest that community, get shared through social media outlets and forums and win authoritative links.
In many ways the mind-set is very similar between the two professions, but because traditional PR is largely an offline practice and SEO is online, there are some differences. I think the main variance is that search engine optimisation is ultimately about getting traffic to visit a website directly. PR can more frequently be about simply making the public aware of a brand without implying explicitly that they should use that brand next time they are searching for a particular service.
Can I apply PR strategies to my SEO work?
There is one tactic that is employed lots by both PR and SEO professionals – that is to use press releases. Press releases provide a great way to distribute information quickly and reliably through many reputable news channels that will be deemed as authoritative hubs of information by the online community. They can be used to discuss new services, client acquisitions and research – anything that could be considered newsworthy by the online community. The main difference between online and offline press releases that online ones are reliant on links and keywords to achieve maximum SEO value. When press releases are being written by SEO agencies, they are written with increasing search engine visibility in mind.
It is also important to regularly publish and post other forms of content that are more distanced from advertising than press releases. This can be the blog or articles that are published on a website and distributing them through Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn etc. Regularly producing content that is suitable and interesting for the online community will help a business establish a solid foundation on which to build other facets of an SEO campaign such as link building and reputation management.
Another idea that has the same principles for both search marketing and PR company's is to host a competition. By hosting a competition you will be directly interacting with you clients, all the while building trust and establishing a positive brand association. Online competitions are generally quite simple to organise and host. For example, you can say raise awareness of a social media presence by offering a free sample of a service when your Twitter accounts reaches 500 followers, for example.
To conclude I would say that there are some striking similarities between SEO and PR, and often the skills from one profession are easily transferrable to the other. Understanding how to interact with the community in order to transfer a brand message between a business and the public is a crucial practice in search engine optimisation and public relations. Often the best SEO campaigns can strike a blend between the two, so if you have any questions about SEO or any of our other services please don't hesitate to get in touch.
