How To

Search engine optimised press releases ?

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Paul from the UK came today with a question : Does anyone have any experience of writing search engine optimised releases?
So far, I push my press release among my selected and beloved journalists, but his question is definitely becoming more and more important.

I’m not really a SEO wizard, but here are a few ideas.

[entering in Geek mode]

there is several way to answer the question.

1/ the content of the press release

  • I would first recommend you to include tags that could be easily identified by Search engines at the bottom of your release (such as – Tag: Mobile, RFID, Distribution, Payment, etc, etc)
  • Second, I would recommend you to have the shortest title possible, with the name of the company / product in it.
  • I would finally recommend you to link your press release to social news site (Digg this, Add this to del.icio.us, Stumble Upon this, etc, etc. – dozens of services exists on the web as a widget to include on your pages). The more you spread it, the highest ranking you’ll have on the Search Engines.

2/ the format of the HTML support

  • Your press release will probably be hosted on the company website, somewhere on the press room. To be well identified, the meta tag of the HTML page has to be clear and well formatted, as well as page title, etc, etc…

[/geek mode suspended]

I know that some of my client are experimenting, with a lot of precautious to implement link to social news site (look at IBM corp press release).

Does anybody has ever created a press release optimised for search engine ?
Shouldn’t we try to think about it when writing the press release to our clients ?
Maybe should we create a toolkit for these questions to our client (when I’ll have 5 mn, I promise I’ll draft something – hell ! I don’t have 5 mn so far :/ I’ve to find them).

Pierre from Paris.

Reading

Virtual Paris 2007

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Second Life, camembert style
Hello, just a few words to underline that Text100 Paris will participate to a one day event dedicated to companies investigating virtual worlds. The conference will not focus specifically on SL, but wants to be as large as possible about opportunities for Metaverses (= virtual worlds).

Of course, SL being one of the most advanced one, it will be hard to avoid speaking
about SL. Builders, designers, and marketing companies will also speak during this day.

Text100 will be the only one agency this day speaking about PR in SL.

Philippe Beteille (GM Paris) and myself will speak about PR in SL (more precisely how these universes changes the deal of traditional PR by targeting small and identified communities or even individuals).


A French pool of virtual world expertise

The idea behind this conference is to create an entry point for French company who wants to investigate virtual worlds, and get all required competencies.
More information : http://www.virtualparis2007.com/

Do we already have somewhere a list of text100 partners in SL ?

We’ll keep you updated with the info on this event.

Pierre from Paris

blogs, Web/Tech

Enterprise 2.0 – an overview

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A good article on this topic – in English
Following the introduction of blueKiwi I made recently, I would like to share with you a fantastic article written with one of the most influential blogger in france. The guy is involved in web2-stuff questions and he is one of the leading specialist for Second Life.
Once again, these concepts of "2.0" remain unclear and are often criticized. However, there is something happening and, yes, as it is difficult to find the adapted vocabulary, Enterprise 2.0 will be fine for the moment.
He wrote a remarkable article in French dedicated to the Enterprise 2.0 topic.
Then he decided to translate it in English.
Extract :

If “Web 2.0” was 2006’s buzzword, we begin to hear much of Enterprise 2.0. To make a long story short, it means using inside an enterprise the successful tools of web 2.0.
Please, do not sum-up this to internal blogs or wikis, this notion
gather much richer fields and above all implies deep mutations which go
farther than rolling-out new tools.
Before going through my overview map (which can confuse you), I’d like first to introduce the subject.

More : http://www.fredcavazza.net/2007/07/27/what-is-enterprise-20/

Pierre from Paris.

Virtual Worlds

Critics over SL – end of the hype or beginning of a crisis ?

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Several articles has been published recently following the publication of a forrester study showing that several company are leaving Second Life as their audience is not what was initially expected …
An exemple : http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/chi-mon_second_lifejul23,0,7924397.story

In the meantime, the september european SL conference of Berlin has just been canceled. The message posted on the frontpage confirms that the event had not enough financial support http://www.slconference.eu/

All these bad signals will probably worry future and existing clients investing in SL … At least for the moment, they worry the press in France 🙂
Is it really the sign of the beginning of the end for Second Life ?

A few elements to keep in mind :

1/ Our involvement in Second Life is mainly an invitation to explore virtual universe. If Second Life vanishes one day, the 3D social environment will probably modify for a long time use and habits on the web.

And so for our client : being involved with Second Life allows them having a deeper experience with their ecosystem.

Audience in SL is for sure a problem – but it is not a massive market – it’s a long tail market where communities and individuals can be reach.

2/ Business models inside second life are discussed a lot these days. But we care first about delivering the best experience between our clients and communities by creating a conversation : SL probably remains a good communication plateform / a bad marketing plateform.

3/ Several companies have massively invested inside SL. A lot of money circulates around SL. Companies rarely leave their investment behind them …

What is your opinion regarding these critics ? Is it the same ‘business as usual’ critics or a deeper sign of a crisis ?

Pierre from Paris.

PR

Anticipation – future of IT 2.0

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I’ve noticed this video today on techrunch France. You’ve probably already seen this video which is really well designed and also has pretty good ideas (especially regarding Second Life).

It reminds me a video seen almost two years ago that was really impressive about the future of the IT industry with the arrival of new players.

Museum of Media History : http://epic.lightover.com/ols-master.html – really to be seen.

Epicmuseummediahistory

video

The advertiser / consumer divorce

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I just found this small video during the lunch which I found quite relevant if you observe it on a peer media perspective. This video could be a good and funny explanation of why peer media are becoming so important today – because consumer wants to talk, and to be listened.

The Break-Up’ – soon available on www.bringtheloveback.com
– is about the relationship between an advertiser and a consumer.
They’ve agreed to meet in a restaurant. The man’s feeling perfectly
happy, until the woman makes a painful announcement: she wants a
divorce. In the course of their conversation she makes it clear to him
why she is leaving him. And he makes it very clear that he doesn’t have
an empathic bone in his body. At the end of the movie the woman walks
away disappointed but determined. The advertiser stays behind alone.

It’s a Microsoft video however              >_<

The Break Up
envoyé par geertdesager

Pierre from Paris

Virtual Worlds

Lewis PR promotes their SL activity

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Brand_republic160507You’ve probably already noticed it, but I’ve seen it today on Techcrunch (the US version, not the French one) – Lewis PR have set a banner on the site to promote their SL activity (linking on their website)

Of course, this is only an advertisement, but this is the first time I see a PR company branding and marketing its SL activity and showing it in a large Media such as Techrunch.

Have you ever noticed other PR company doing this ?

How do you react over such a campaign ?

By clicking on this link, you’ll see a screenshot of what I’ve seen today.

Pierre from Paris

Virtual Worlds

Is SL bad for environment ?

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I know, this could sound a bit strange to ask such a question.
After all, since its beginning, SL has been recognized for its capacity to connect people, and thus to potentially replace real meetings with virtual features (and reduce energy dedicated to transportations, etc) …

However,  an interesting article has been published in les echos this week. Les Echos is the no1 french business daily newspaper (our national FT). The article discusses about the latest Gartner report saying that the Data Center consumes a lot of energy and could be very bad for environmnent.
So far, no big news. But the journalist reported in his article the calculation of Nick Carrs about Linden Lab’s 4000 data centers consumption – these 4000 data centers prequire 1.752 kWh of electricity to work, which represents 1.17 tons of carbon equivalent …

If you divide this consumption by the overall SL population, each avatar produces more carbon that a brazilian citizen, according to this calculation …

o_O  Impressive …

What do you think  about these figures ? Have you already seen them somewhere ?

Sources :
The orginal article (translated over google)
Click here
The source for this article : Nicholas Carr’s blog
http://www.roughtype.com/archives/2006/12/avatars_consume.php

Pierre from Paris.