Does PR belong in Search Marketing?
With search driving higher than 75% of online brand awareness in several verticals, brands are becoming more and more used to the idea that, whether they like it or not, their search page is really the front page of their Web site.
Since search is a communications channel where consumers voluntarily come for information, I think this falls distinctly into the realm of PR, as opposed to advertising’s monopoly on interruptive and paid media (including paid inclusion search marketing). Not only is the channel itself, by its nature, important to PR practitioners but it is also the single most vital channel in regards to their traditional role in media relations. Put simply, if you’re generating coverage that isn’t indexing well with search, you’re not really generating high profile coverage.
Kevin Dugan explored the subject in his recent post “PR Opportunity in SEO is Short-Sighted.” He stresses how a well-crafted message is search-friendly by nature and that brands can’t forget to engage in all forms of social media, including microblogging and commenting in the blogosphere, since most also index high in search.
The problem with the industry’s approach to search is that they’re trying to find the easiest way to deal with the channel while changing the way their system works as little as possible. If you look at the various social media press releases floating around, they are generally trimmed down for bloggers to cut and paste and then loaded up with social media bookmarks and embeddable press assets. That’s all well and good but when was the last time you actually saw a social media press release in the first page of your search or on a Digg page?
So, to build on Kevin’s point, search is a big piece of the pie and brands need to see how everything they do online is being amplified, or buried, in the single most important channel for building awareness. Sure, there are plenty of ways to affect search rankings, most of which are outside the ethics of good PR, but, if you’re not participating in social media on a regular basis, you’re missing a great opportunity to tell the world your story.
