Here are 5 easy steps that any small business can use for PR and lead generation by John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing.  Another article that you might find helpful is “Generate Buzz And Exposure Quickly For Your Site With Press Releases“.  These are practical articles for any size organization.

We use PR Log for our online news releases – you can see all of our releases have been aggregated here in our newsroom.  Admittedly, there are about a dozen news releases that should be in our newsroom already, but we are busy like you are!  The best way to do this is to systematically write at least one news release per month.  The benefit is for the purposes of search engine optimization and to create a consistent flow of news from your brand.  Not every news release is going to get picked up by the NYTimes, but there are times when, after a consistent flow of good stories come from you to a particular news outlet, your story will have context and resonate with the writers of that publication.  They can also see that you are not just pitching them a product to promote, but helping them do their job by providing a consistent flow of news.

MARKETING IDEA WORTH TRYING:  Encourage others in your Chamber or networking group to do the same thing and then forward each other’s news releases to the local media.   When it comes from someone else, the media won’t likely view it like self-promotion.  Creating a PR co-op is a cool idea that will enable a group of businesses to capture the attention of the local media outside the typical self-promoting public relations strategies.