SEO Outreach vs Digital PR: Which One Is Best?

One of the best ways to give your business a boost in search engine rankings is to get other websites to link to you.

This shows search engines like Google that your website is trusted and reliable, and will provide visitors with the information they need.

When you work with a digital marketing agency (like Bubblegum Search!), they may suggest a few different tactics to get those all-important backlinks to your site. Two commonly used methods of link building are SEO outreach and digital PR.

What Is SEO Outreach?

SEO outreach, often referred to as ‘outreach link building for SEO,’ is the science of pitching for, and acquiring, links from other websites. There are lots of different outreach specialities. For example, local SEO outreach focuses on getting backlinks from websites in the same area and region as your business.

Outreach specialists typically come from a digital marketing background. This means they can utilise SEO outreach tools and SEO outreach software to identify opportunities and find the right people to target.

One of the ways that an outreach specialist might get links is by searching for mentions of your brand on other websites. If a site mentions your company, products or trademarks by name, the specialist will contact the site manager and ask them to provide a link to your website.

Another well-used strategy is to find broken external links on other websites. The outreach expert will send an email alerting the site manager to the broken link and recommend an alternative piece of content on your site they can link to. They get a heads-up about an SEO-damaging broken link, and you get a shiny new backlink in exchange. Win-win!

What Is Digital PR?

Digital PR is a specific subset of SEO outreach. All digital PR is SEO outreach, while not all SEO outreach is digital PR!

This link-building strategy is about getting featured in online publications, like newspapers and magazines. Digital PR experts generally come from a journalistic background, meaning they understand what publications like to see and may even have a network of contacts they can call on.

For example, a digital PR specialist could write a press release about your company and send it out to relevant journalists. If these journalists publish the story online, you get a link to your website.

One tactic that digital PR experts use is to identify trade magazines that publish editorials. Many create ‘forward feature’ documents that specify what theme each edition of the magazine will be about. The digital PR expert can then pitch a relevant article, and if the trade magazine agrees to it, it’s all systems go!

As an added bonus, many newspapers and magazines may even publish your content physically, amplifying your reach even further.

SEO Outreach or Digital PR: Which One Should I Use?

Now that we’ve looked at both types of link-building strategies, which is the best one to use?

SEO outreach and digital PR use very similar strategies to get links. It’s all about networking and building relationships with the right people, creating content that adds value, and being persistent in chasing up leads.

The key distinction is that the targets are different. Digital PR focuses on press publications, while SEO outreach is much broader. The specialists you use may have slightly different skill sets too, although there is a lot of overlap between the two. For example, both SEO outreach and digital PR specialists need to know how to write persuasively and identify high-quality sites.

While getting a backlink from a great site is well worth the effort, it can be hard. You typically get a lot of ‘nos’ before you get a ‘yes,’ you have to spend lots of time chasing up contacts, and outreach that gets the best response rates has to be bespoke to each publication and done manually. Although there are SEO outreach tools and software to help facilitate the process.

Over 40% of SEO specialists consider outreach and link building the hardest parts of their job.

This means that any relevant, high-authority link you can get, regardless of whether it’s a blog, news site, or website in your industry’s niche, is worth its weight in gold!

In conclusion, it’s always good to focus on both digital and outreach SEO and keep your options as open as possible. A great digital marketing agency will identify the right target sites, send across the perfect pitch and write content that gets those backlinks rolling in!

Remember, if you need support creating an SEO outreach strategy that gets you high-quality, relevant backlinks, Bubblegum Search can help. We’re experts in both digital PR and SEO outreach, meaning your business gets the best of both worlds when you work with us!

Contact us today for your free marketing plan, and we’ll show you how you can use outreach, PR and link-building to drive your business forward.