1.His technorati search was related to a release that was issued via PR Web almost a full year ago, so it has had a lot of time to accumulate all sorts of responses. The button on PR Newswire releases links directly into Technorati and tracks the url of the original story. It won't track blogs by keyword.

2.Makes sense, Dave. Thanks. I still wonder about the need for a partnership vs. simply creating a Technorati link, though. Also, wasn't McInnis' post directly related to the PR Newswire release? Shouldn't it have shown up in the related Technorati search?

3.Nope. He linked to Beaulaurier.net, the PR Web marketing director's blog. If he referenced the original story though, it would have.

This is the inherent hurdle with the feature. Hopefully the functionality drives people to link to the official releases.

Thanks again and, as always, great stuff.

4.Shel,

Let me help clarify this a bit. The new Technorati button on press releases posted on http://www.prnewswire.com provides a direct link to blog posts about the specific news release. When someone clicks on the Technorati button, the unique press release url is searched by Technorati and results that specifically include the url are retrieved. If a blog posting does not include the url of the press release then it won?t appear. That?s what happened with McInnis? blog post ? he linked to another blog post, but did not actually include the press release link in his own post.

More importantly, the reason this differs so vastly from what PRWeb is doing is because it tracks specific conversations about the press release itself. When you include Technorati tags on a press release like PRWeb does, the search will bring back thousands of blog postings that reference that tag, not just those that are specific to the press release. For example, a ?marketing? tag embedded in a press release will bring back 259,681 posts ? most, if not all, of which will be completely irrelevant to the press release itself.

While McInnis? pointed out how to create a tracking url for a news release, we entered this partnership with Technorati so that each of the nearly 1,000 news releases we distribute each day would automatically generate a unique tracking url to make it easier for our customers and press releases readers to track conversations that relate directly to that press release, without having to go through the steps of doing it themselves. We are not charging for this service, but we do think it adds great value to the press release for both issuers and consumers of news.

Looking forward to seeing you at SNCR in March. Hearing you and Neville promo the event on FIR prompted me to book.

- Dave

5.Hi Shel, David and Dave,

Dave A's explanation about why David (how many Dave/David's can we get into this space?) McInnis' post didn't show up in the release's Technorati page is spot on. If there's no link to the release, it's not going to show up.

Dave A also accurately points out that the PRWeb Technorati links are used for an entirely different purpose. We don't use Technorati to track conversations about the release but rather to provide the media with related resources on the topic.

We implemented our Trackback solution directly on the release page almost a year ago using our patent-pending Trackback mechanism. This enables the online conversation information to appear on the press release page and it is screened to eliminate trackback spam. The company issuing the release receive a notification of new trackback links and can control which one's appear on their release page and which don't. It's a pretty robust implementation.

Hope this clarifies the discussion for all.

- Joe B

6.The explanation of the partnership from Dave A. certainly helped, but I still have an issue with this. If someone writes a post about the release but does not include the URL -- opting instead to simply mention it or link to the Yahoo! page on which it appears -- the tracking effort won't pick that up. It still strikes me as an incomplete view of the conversation about the release. On the other hand, I understand why it's configured the way it is -- there is likely no good method for limiting a seach to just conversation about the release other than referencing the URL.

7.Shel,

I am not sure readers are going to get a complete view of the conversation directly on the press release.

PRWeb's "patent-pending Trackback" solution, which exists on all major blog platforms, allows customers to filter out negative trackbacks.

PR Newswire's link to the Technorati Link Cosmos on each press release provides a more balanced view of the conversation. Issuers of press releases do not have control over negative reactions showing up in Technorati's index.

-Merrick

8.Merrick is absolutely correct. PRWeb customer are enables with the ability to enable, disable or selectively display trackbacks to their releases. Our medical industry clients need to disable trackbacks to comply with their industry's requirements. But for most it's a simple desire to control the content on their paid space (their release page). I can't blame anyone for wanting that. Anyone who'd argue against would probably against painting over negative graffiti on someone's storefront.

And, as always, anyone who wants to get the complete trackback picture (including spam) can search for inlinks to the page on a search engine or use Technorati's great capabilities.