How to Create an Effective Goal for Your Social Media Press Release
A press release is a marketing tactic. It’s a tool, like many other forms of content that contributes to the success and marketing of your business. As with any marketing tactic it’s important to identify a goal. It’s the only way you’ll know if your efforts were successful. As you probably already know, there are good goals and there are goals that don’t really provide you with much information or return on investment. Let’s take a look at how to create good goals for your social media press releases.
#1 What Are Your Business Goals?
Ideally any goal that you have for your marketing efforts should support your business goals. These goals should be outlined in your marketing strategy. If they’re not, pull out the business plan and review your goals. Also review your current social media goals and the results that you’re getting from your social media marketing. What’s working? What isn’t? Where does a press release fit into the marketing mix and how can you create press release goals that compliment your social media, marketing, and business goals? For example, are you using social media to build buzz about a new product? You can tie a social media press release about your product launch into that goal.
#2 Make it Measurable and Timely
You may very well be familiar with the concept of SMART goals. Your social media press release goals also need to fit this category. They need to be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and timely. We’ve already discussed relevant goals in the first step. Now take a look at your goals and make sure they’re quantitative and time bound. With a press release this is fairly simple as they have a short shelf life. The activity you get from a press release is generally measured over a period of days.
#3 Keep It Simple
Generally, press releases are one component of a larger marketing strategy. Keep the goals for your press release simple. They’ll be easier to implement and simpler to evaluate. The return on investment for a press release can be huge when it’s tied to a larger marketing initiative. For example, a press release issued as part of the marketing strategy for a product launch. If the goals are complicated then it detracts from the overall strategy and it makes it more complicated to measure success.
Finally, be sure to actually test, track, and evaluate your social media press release goals. You can use the information to fine tune your press release and apply the knowledge to future releases.
