The Internet has revolutionized PR. Gone are the days of text-only press releases. As New PR demonstrates, you need to be innovative and relevant, using technology to its full potential. Public relations is more public than ever before, thanks to social networking, blogs, and online news releases. Thanks to the Web, you can now communicate directly with prospects and buyers in a highly personal, intimate way.

In the past, the media, as gatekeepers, deemed who received exposure and who didn’t. Now Online PR offers many viable and immediate ways to reach prospects, buyers and key influencers directly. And yet with so many choices available, it’s easy to over emphasize technology and tools while core activities like strategy development receive short shrift.

For that reason, I present “The 4 Pillars of the New PR.” (Complete with handy mnemonic device for easy reference: each pillar begins with the letter “S.”)

New PR Pillar #1: Strategy
Strategy is “the what” and tactics are “the how.” The “what” could be anything from your brand personality to key business objectives and outcomes you expect from your marketing. Your strategy should also include successful positioning compared to the competition.

For example, what values does you product, service or company represent? Do those values permeate your marketing – and if not – why not? One of my most important values is humor. Humor helps me engage my audience whether live or remote, as well as overcome the dry subject matter of search engine marketing.

New PR Pillar #2: Story
The most glaring mistake I see again and again is announcement-driven messaging rather than story-driven content. Announcement style press releases work if you are Apple announcing a new iPod. But with 5,000 press releases published daily, an announcement driven approach won’t effectively breakthrough the press release clutter.

To overcome that challenge, consider developing a “Persona” and weave that through ALL of your marketing, not just your articles and online press releases.

A Persona is a role or character you create for yourself. For example, I have several customers that use a Persona of “The Underdog.” I’ve seen real estate and investment pros establish the Persona of “The Contrarian” to combat the recent doom and gloom of today’s investment market.

I’ve identified 23 distinct Personas that are effective for publicity and Online PR purposes. (Note: my “Power Personas” report is not for sale, but is included as a bonus via my Online PR Made Easy program.)

Of course, there are many other ways to enhance your story, like finding the right angle. Try piggybacking on current events. That way your message is relevant and you ride a wave of interest already created on that topic.

New PR Pillar #3: Search
Perhaps the biggest benefit of Online PR is its staying power. Old PR was often transactional and temporary. With New PR, optimize your content correctly, and your articles, stories, releases and other content can be found online for weeks, months even years – by journalists and buyers alike.

Where can your content be found? The news search engines (Google News, Yahoo! News, etc.), the regular search engines, news aggregators like Daylife and Topix, as well as on hundreds of sites that add fresh news content via RSS feeds.

4 best practices for optimizing your Online PR for search:

1. Put your keyword phrase in the headline and 3-4 times in the body copy.
2. Include your keyword phrase is in the first paragraph and the last.
3. Use a paid online press release site (PRWeb, Webwire, PitchEngine) over free sites. (Paid sites have greater reach and credibility.)
4. Go beyond just optimizing text: include images, audio, video and caption those elements with your keyword phrases.

New PR Pillar #4: Social
The widespread social media impact of the New PR is just beginning. In “Putting the Public Back in Public Relations” authors Brian Solis and Deirdre Breakenridge shared, “By driving New PR from a social-centric position, companies can identify the right groups of people, determine their needs, uncover their channels of influence and use the tools and words that will reach and compel them.”

They further add that New PR is about “communicating with, not to” and that there is a shift from away from spin and towards relevance. They identify another critical shift: from a broadcast machine (one-to-many) to community participation (many-to-many.)

When it comes to the New Online PR, community is king. Social networking allows you to communicate with a broad audience who can, in turn, spread your message to other audiences. Online press release sites have become both a distribution and sharing resource, thanks to tools that link them with social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

Online PR is an effective, engaging way for companies to connect with buyers and opinion leaders. By following the four pillars, you can add new energy to your marketing campaigns, increasing the impact of your online press releases.

Author Bio: Got PR 2.0? Visit http://www.30minutepr.com for the latest Online PR tips, trends, tools and techniques – on a time budget. Marc Harty is an Online PR expert, professional speaker, Internet marketing strategist and CEO of MainTopic Media, Inc.

Category: Marketing
Keywords: marketing,online pr,web pr,internet pr,publicity,branding,public relations,pr