Track Press ReleasesYou can track press releases. That is to say, you can track the leads from press releases. And you can do it easily and inexpensively. This is a useful evaluative technique. How You Do ItIf my memory serves me well, I first heard advice about tracking press releases from Greg Jarboe in the mid-1980s. At that time, he was in charge of PR at Lotus Development Corporation. He advocated the idea that PR departments should reserve special toll-free numbers to be used only by PR.For example, a PR department could use one 800 number for all releases, or, better yet, a unique 800 number for each release. Whenever a trade publication or other publication included an 800 number in its coverage, PR could “get credit for” leads and sales that result from calls to that number. Greg Jarboe was and is a pioneer in PR measurement. He is president and co-founder of SEO-PR, a search engine optimization firm. Today, thanks to the web, PR people can also use landing pages. They can easily track the traffic via web analytics. And many people other than the press are now searching for and reading “press” releases online. Releases are usually are stored indefinitely and remain accessible via keyword search. When a prospect makes an inquiry or a purchase, even if it is months or years after the release date, PR can still "get the credit" for having brought in that lead or sale. So, press releases are more easily tracked than in past decades. They also attract more readers and therefore potentially more traffic to track.
Return from Track Press Releases to Measuring What They Did
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