The research team of Shel Holtz (Holtz Communication), Dr. Mihaela Vorvoreanu (Clemson University), and Jiyan Wei (Vocus) presented findings of a research study of how, why, and what types of people are using online news releases.

Three indicators of success for online press releases - which is the best?

• 32% increase in unique web site visitors
• Over $100,000 in new sales over a quarter
• Article placed on Boston Globe web site

There are direct returns and indirect returns. The first could be direct, the second could be indirect as a result of web traffic.

Marketing Sherpa put out a series of releases and correlated traffic from each release. They found that traffic generated by press releases was 21.24% less. There is a demonstrable ROI which can be compared to pay-per-click.

Results Highlights

The online survey had 423 respondents for data collection, mostly marketing and PR professionals with a few small business owners. The questions were developed by interviews with PR professionals who use online news releases.

Goals

The goals of online news releases were ranked - the top being increasing visibility, increasing visibility and credibility, and announcing news. The last three are directly reaching customers and consumers, creating readily available online content, and SEO.

Audience

Interestingly enough, traditional media was the top audience people wanted to reach, with bloggers and new media outlets following a close second.

PR professionals were most interested in reaching traditional media, while marketing professionals were the least interested. As for B2B consumers/customers and prospects, the same statistics came through. PR professionals were the least interested in reaching B2C consumers/customers and prospects. As Mihaela said, that is SAD.

Tactics

The primary tactics for online news releases were close together in importance: good headline/subhead with keywords, interesting and newsworthy content, keywords, and links to corporate websites.

Measurement

In terms of measurement to determine ROI, the first was whether or not the release is republished on websites, the number of online views, whether or not they got an article based on the release, any media interview requests, or traffic to the organization’s site.

Most want to be on news aggregators (Yahoo! News), then news websites (Reuters), then blogs.

Advantages

Opportunity for SEO and ability to reach both consumers and media.

Challenges

Cutting through the clutter, targeting and distribution, and measurement.

People are more likely to use online press releases based on affordability and the ability to get detailed and accurate metrics.

Age Factor

The age of respondents of the survey was pretty evenly split, with those under age 30 actually making up the smallest segment.

Goals and audiences was more important to those over age 50 while SEO optimization was more important to those under age 30.

User Groups

PR, Marketing, and Small Business owners all used online news releases. However, they used them for different ways with significant differences in goals, although all wanted to increase visibility and gain credibility.

• PR - announcing news, enhancing thought leadership
• Marketing - SEO optimization for website, reaching customers/consumers
• Small business - using the release as a sales tool, reaching customers/consumers

The overall satisfaction levels with online news releases were high. However, the relationship between the goals leave some discrepancies that should be addressed.