In today’s high-tech world, 80-plus percent of the people that do business with your company find you on the internet first. So having control of what is said about you on the internet is important. In fact, it is one of the basic principles we utilize when creating an online presence for you with the media as well as your clients and prospective clientele.
The internet is a huge source of information. What makes you credible to search engines is the value of the information you put out.
Article PR is a tool that has become more common in just the last few years. It is a term that defines the ability to broadcast your knowledge and expertise to your prospective clients via the internet – namely article directories. These article directories or “banks”, as they are sometimes referred to, are depositories of online information that can then be distributed elsewhere… for free. Wouldn’t you like it if people found your articles and felt them useful enough to use them in their own newsletters, magazines, ezines, etc.? You are probably asking yourself why they would do that and what would be the value to them and then to you?
They do it because they are not experts on your subject and in the ongoing effort to provide quality content to their clients, they want experts that have already done the leg work for them. Using your content positions them as being a helpful source of information, which gives their customers more reasons to want to regularly stay in touch with them (and not just get blasted with promotions). The byproduct is that you get “unsolicited” coverage and possibly even clients.
The direct value to you is that your name, your company name and your website are all in tact in the article. Article PR works on the honor system. Anyone is allowed to use your articles as long as they keep the bio of the author and their website link intact. How cool is that?
The value of Article PR invaluable because it can create the perception that you have been around a long time, even if you have not, and that you are an expert in what you do. Article PR is basically a way to get useful content out about your topic of expertise. And as long as you write useful information that actually does help, then you are golden.
There is a right way to get your articles written, communicated and directed to the online directories that matter. What matters? The ones that will get you the best Return On Investment – higher page rankings, more unique visitors, more referring URLs and domains.
What else matters? Critical mass – you can create such an overwhelming amount of useful information on the internet from all sorts of sources, all linking back to your site organically that you become the expert in your industry. It is the foundation for other more targeted PR, like social media, print, radio and TV. Journalists will also start to be one of your fans – and that breeds reputation and credibility…which ties in perfectly with the next piece of the PR puzzle called Reputation Management.
After handling the PR for an Inc 500 company for several years Karla Jo Helms was ready to launch out on her own allowing her to bring her unique take on the world of PR to businesses both large and small. “Public Relations is a powerful tool that can garner wide acceptance and delve into arenas that marketing cannot touch,” says Karla Jo, PR Strategist and Published Author. Helms got her start creating and implementing PR Strategies for entrepreneurs, which helped her develop a keen eye for how to hone in on the best use of PR and technology to increase the Return On Investment of one’s marketing dollars. Her theory on how attaining critical mass by utilizing all areas of PR and Marketing in today's world allows her to put together complete strategies for clients that attain measurable results. A background in sales, business management and media relations has given her the well-rounded understanding of how to harness the power of PR to communicate to diverse groups of people...the end result being a wider sphere of influence and the invaluable commodity of goodwill garnered on a broad basis for her clients.