Publicity and Public Relations

All too often, publicity and public relations are all lumped into the same category
of advertising. From where I sit, publicity and public relations are two
different things. Publicity is free, and it includes coverage from other media
sources, including newsletters, newspapers, radio stations, television, or
whoever else may pick up word of what you’re doing.
On the Web, publicity usually takes the form of word-of-mouth type publicity.
Someone sees your Web site and then tells someone else who happens to
have a blog, so that person writes a blog post about it, which is then picked
up by other bloggers, and it then catches the eye of some radio host or newspaper
journalist who then runs a brief article or makes mention of your site
to their audience.
You get the picture — and that’s really a best-case scenario.
Did you know that you can influence publicity, too? You can — by getting the
name of your Web site in front of as many people as possible. One way to do
that is to write articles that are complete and ready to run, and then distribute
them to news outlets, newsletter owners, other Web site owners, or
anyone else who has a publication and might be interested in your site. The
catch is that to run the article you provide (for free), the publication must
also run a short blurb about you, including your Web site address.
That takes care of publicity. Public relations, on the other hand, deals with
how you handle people, especially in a public setting. You can put that to
work for your Web site, too. Public relations can be the donations that you
make (in the name of your Web site) to charity organizations, or it can be you
taking the time to teach about your topic within your community. Guess
what? Just putting your knowledge to use by answering questions posed by
folks in search of answers can count as public relations.
Creating a relationship with the public is what public relations is all about.
When you use public relations — along with publicity — to get your Web site
in front of people, you’re building your traffic levels (which in turn helps
build your AdSense revenues). Creating public relations and publicity is a
time-consuming process, though, so don’t make the mistake of thinking that
you can spend ten minutes here and there and immediately see results.
Professionals set aside several hours each week to devote to public relations
and publicity efforts. You should do the same if you’re truly serious about
creating a real brand with your Web site that people will think of and recognize
when they consider topics related to your site and products. (Creating a
brand simply means making your Web site or blog immediately recognizable,
just like other products [Pepsi, Kleenex, Saran Wrap] are immediately recognizable.
The goal is to be the first site or blog that comes to mind when your
topic or product is considered.)