Covering how PRs can support SEO performance, whether brand mentions, nofollow links and social shares have an impact on rankings and case studies for how to earn good links.

1. PRMOMENT
Why PR agencies
should be better at SEO
than SEO agencies
L A U R A C R I M M O N S
@lauracrimmons

2. *Clarification

3. PR Agencies
should be
better at one
key element
of SEO.

4. Technical Content Authority
Three Pillars of SEO

5. Earning
links.

6. Let’s go back to
basics.

7. There is no link included – often
referred to as a brand mention or
coverage
<a href=“https://example.com”
rel=“nofollow”>
Google shouldn’t crawl this link and it
doesn’t transfer PageRank
<a href="https://example.com">
Google can crawl this link and the link
*should* pass PageRank
‘Follow’ link
Nofollow link
No link
3 linking
possibilities

8. What’s
PageRank?

9. “PageRank works by counting the number and
quality of links to a page to determine a rough
estimate of how important the website is. The
underlying assumption is that more important
websites are likely to receive more links from
other websites.”
G O O G L E

10. PageRank is one
of many
algorithms Google
uses to rank sites.

11. Many SEOs

13. https://www.semrush.com/ranking-factors/

14. *Correlation
not causation

15. http://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations
This is also correlation…

16. However…

17. Ammon Johns (SEO): Would it be beneficial for us to know
what the first two are (first two ranking signals are). Would
webmasters build better sites...?”
Andrey Lipattsev (Search Quality Senior Strategist at Google):
“I can tell you what they are. It is content and links pointing to
your site.”
Ammon: “In that order or the other order?"
Andrey: “There is no order."
http://webpromo.expert/google-qa-march/
Google top 3 rankings factors

18. *Note he doesn’t
say follow links
pointing to your
site…

19. Do I always have
to get a link for it
to help SEO?

22. Perhaps not.

23. https://moz.com/blog/rankings-correlation-study-domain-authority-vs-branded-search-volume#results

24. https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-seo-experiment/

25. https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-seo-experiment/

26. https://blog.hootsuite.com/social-media-seo-experiment/

27. *Again,
correlation not
causation

28. Either way
building brand
engagement
doesn’t hurt.

29. So, links are
preferred but
mentions may
still be good.

30. How do we try to
ensure we get
links not just
mentions?

31. Give the
journalist a
reason to link.

33. More information
than the journalist
can include in an
article.

35. Something
their readers
can explore.

37. Useful tool for
readers.

38. Include the link in
your email/ release
Use terminology like
‘source’ or ‘credit’
Outline value of a
link to the audience
More
tips

39. But, if we can’t
get a follow link
how do we show
value?

40. Traffic.

41. A nofollow link on a
big publication can
drive 000’s of visits.

42. *Free traffic

43. Retargeting.

44. Ensure cookies are on the
campaign page and all
visitors can be retargeted.

45. Conversions
(direct and
assisted).

46. Track conversions from
people that have seen
your campaign.

47. SERP real
estate.

48. This is a
featured
snippet
(or position 0)

49. Our
campaigns
can deliver
them.

50. Brand
Awareness.

51. https://moz.com/blog/rankings-correlation-study-domain-authority-vs-branded-search-volume#results

53. Increase in
search interest
of 38%
Avg. search interest score 33 in 12 months pre-campaign
Avg. search interest score 46 in 12 months post-campaign

54. In summary…

55. Do social signals
impact SEO?

56. Is there a
correlation between
brand mentions and
rankings?

57. Nobody knows
for sure…

58. But they’re
certainly not
going to hurt you.

59. So just take what
you can get
through natural
PR.

60. *But if you’re going
to pay for anything
or give something
away for free…

61. Remember that
should be
nofollow.

62. And why should
PRs be better at
SEO than SEOs?

63. SEOs mainly
think about how
to please
Google…

64. PRs mainly think
about how to
please their
audience…

65. Google cares
about how to
please their
audience too.

66. So don’t worry
so much about
links…

67. And just keep
focussing on
engaging your
audience…

68. Since you share the
same objective as
Google, anything you
do should naturally
help with SEO.

69. SILVERTHORNAGENCY
Thank you.
E-MAIL:
laura@silverthornagency.com
@lauracrimmons / @SilverthornCo