Press Release Best Practices for AI Search Visibility

Press releases still earn SEO value, and today they can get your brand cited in ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity too. Here’s how to write, distribute and measure them to improve AI search performance.

What’s the best way to structure and distribute our press releases for maximum SEO value?

It’s a common question from agencies consolidating their PR and SEO (or GEO) efforts. Press releases still matter for SEO, and now they also drive brand citations in AI answers. A Semrush study (November 2025) found PR Newswire cited in 4.73% of ChatGPT responses, up 2.5 points in a matter of months. SUSO’s VP of Partner Growth, Cara Corbett, breaks the opportunity into three stages:

Stage 1: Writing the press release

• Choose newsworthy topics: a genuine announcement, never keyword-stuffed sales copy, so real journalists pick it up.
• Follow the standard structure: a strong intro covering the 5 Ws (who, what, where, when, why), then supporting context.
• Add question-style subheadings and original data points (surveys, proprietary research) – the unique value Google and AI models reward.
• Link wisely to useful, non-promotional pages on your own domain, keep the client URL consistent in the boilerplate, and include journalist contact details.
• If you repost to the client’s site, link back to the original and add NewsArticle schema to avoid duplicate-content issues.

Stage 2: Distributing the press release

• Prioritize quality over quantity: a handful of placements on high-authority sites (PR Newswire, Business Wire) beats hundreds on spammy ones.
• For niche or local brands, choose specialist media – lower domain rating, but far stronger topical and geographic relevance.
• If distribution looks too cheap to be true, it probably is.

Stage 3: Measuring the value

• Check the domain authority and relevance of sites that ran the story using Majestic, Ahrefs or Semrush. A genuine journalist pickup is a big E-E-A-T win.
• Track AI citations and LLM visibility with an AI search visibility checker of your choice, checking the individual press-release URLs for citations, not just the client site.
• Watch referral traffic and conversions in Google Analytics.

Used well, a press release is no longer just a news tool. It amplifies visibility across both traditional and AI search.

Video Transcript

0:03 I got another question from one of our partners recently, a common one from agencies that want to consolidate their PR efforts and maximize their SEO or GEO value. They asked: what’s the best way to structure and distribute our press releases to ensure maximum SEO value?

0:20 This is a critical question for any agency working in the PR or AI search space, because press releases still matter for SEO but today they can also help you earn brand citations and mentions in AI responses. Think being referenced in Gemini, ChatGPT, or Perplexity. According to a Semrush study published in November 2025, PR Newswire, a leading press release distributor, is one of the top cited sources in ChatGPT, showing up in 4.73% of responses. That’s up 2.5 points compared to just a few months ago, which is a pretty big increase.

0:57 So how do you tap into this opportunity and get the most out of your client’s press releases? Let’s start with best practices for actually writing them.

1:06 First, choose your topics wisely. Make it a genuinely newsworthy event or a true announcement, not a keyword-stuffed sales pitch. This ensures your story gets picked up by journalists writing for legitimate media. And if it gets shared and quoted by humans, that’s a signal to search engines and LLMs that it’s a great source to cite.

1:26 When writing a press release, follow the standard structure: the intro, the five Ws – who, what, where, when, and why – and provide more context below that. This structure is inherently great not just for human understanding, but also for LLMs, because it immediately signals what the page is about.

1:48 For the same reason, it’s good to add subheadings, especially on a lengthy release – and you can phrase them the way a human would ask a question. It’s also a great idea to add original data points: survey results, user statistics, maybe even proprietary research – the kind of insight that can’t be found anywhere else. This is optional but highly recommended, because it adds unique value, and that’s exactly what Google and other AI models are after.

2:21 While earned media coverage is crucial, you still need to reinforce topical authority with your own content – so link to resources on your own domain from the press release. Because a lot of distribution platforms limit the number of links you can add, choose those resources wisely, and don’t make them overly promotional. Instead, link to pages that add context and value. These links will be no-follow anyway, so use them as an opportunity to become a comprehensive source for both humans and LLMs.

2:54 While those links are optional, the one link that must be in a press release is your client’s website URL in the boilerplate. Ideally, the boilerplate stays consistent across every release you publish for the brand. It’s also important to include contact information so journalists can reach out.

3:23 If a press release is reposted to your client’s own website, we’d recommend adding a link to the original, because it acts as a disclaimer for Google that it’s a repost and helps avoid duplicate-content issues. Also, mark up the release on your client’s website with NewsArticle schema – this sends crawlers and bots a clear signal that the page is a news article.

3:48 So now that your press release is ready, how do you make sure it’s distributed in a way that brings the most SEO value? Many popular PR distribution services offer different packages that help you target domains by authority, reach, topic, and even location. Here, quality over quantity should be the goal. Aim for high-authority media placements from reputable platforms like PR Newswire and Business Wire. A handful of mentions on trusted, high-authority sites is infinitely better than hundreds of placements on low-quality, spammy ones – it minimizes the risk of the low-quality signals Google can pick up on. And if the cost of distribution seems too good to be true, it probably is.

4:33 If you’re targeting a specific location, or your client’s audience is very niche, arrange distribution to media that specialize in that kind of content. The domain rating of these sites might be lower than generic publishers, but this helps LLMs and search engines associate your client’s brand with their location and industry. Targeted distribution is ultimately better for search visibility, because it positions your client’s brand in front of their ideal user.

5:03 Now let’s not forget the final, most important step – because it’s the results that matter. After the press release goes public, how do you measure its true value? Many top PR distribution platforms provide reports on which media picked up your release, but you can also use specialized SEO tools like Majestic, Ahrefs, and Semrush. These help you check the domain authority of the sites that ran the story, and their relevance to your location and industry.

5:33 Did a journalist spin your press release into a story, or did a major news outlet pick it up? That’s a huge win for E-E-A-T. And if your target audience is in Australia, for example, but the site that picked up the story gets most of its traffic from the UK, it might not be the result you want.

5:50 The next metric to monitor is AI citations and visibility. Ahrefs and Semrush can now tell you whether a page has been cited in AI responses such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and so on – and you can check individual press release URLs with these tools. When you monitor your brand’s LLM visibility – either by running manual checks of your target queries in LLMs, or by using specialized tools like Profound or Scrunch – look for the press release URLs and citations too, not just your client’s website.

6:23 And finally, a press release can sometimes lead to more traffic to your website. Maybe a stakeholder wanted to learn more about the proprietary research you just published, or see more about a product you launched. You can track this referral traffic in Google Analytics – and if it leads to conversions and you’ve set things up properly, you can see those too.

6:46 So nowadays, press releases aren’t only a tool for sharing news about your brand – they’re also a way to amplify your visibility in both traditional and AI search engines. If you have any more questions about how to make the most of your press releases – or really any activity around amplifying your client’s AI, organic, or PR performance – I encourage you to join our free Partner Club, where you can use our 24/7 help desk and get answers to all your AI search questions, just like this one.