Do Press Releases Build Real Backlinks for Gambling Brands?

Do press release links actually pass SEO value?

No, not directly. Business Wire's own guidance confirms it adds nofollow tags to every hyperlink inside a distributed release, and PR Newswire and GlobeNewswire follow the same standard. 24-7 Press Release explains the mechanism plainly: the nofollow tag tells search engines not to pass ranking credit through that link, which is now the default across the entire wire distribution industry, not an exception a particular service applies.

This isn't a quirk of the wires — it's a response to how Google classifies the links. Google's spam policies list optimized anchor text in articles, guest posts or press releases distributed on other sites as a textbook link scheme, a position that traces back to a 2013 update explicitly adding press releases to that list. A wire that let commercial anchor text pass link equity at scale would be running exactly the kind of manipulated distribution system Google's guidelines are built to catch.

Why do PR wires nofollow their outbound links?

Google's own explanation for devaluing press release links, reported at the time by Search Engine Journal, is that a link inside a press release isn't "something that an external person is recommending" — it's something the company itself wrote and placed to promote its own site. That's the opposite of the independent editorial endorsement a link is supposed to signal, and it's true whether the release covers a SaaS funding round or a sportsbook's new state launch.

Nofollowing protects the wire services too. A platform that syndicates thousands of company-written releases a month, each with company-chosen anchor text, would be an obvious link-scheme footprint if every link passed equity. Tagging them nofollow keeps the wire itself out of Google's crosshairs while still letting it sell distribution, visibility and journalist reach as the product.

What SEO value does a press release actually deliver?

None of this makes press releases worthless for SEO — it just relocates the value away from the link itself:

• Secondary pickups: a journalist or trade publication reads the release and writes its own independent story, which can carry a genuine dofollow link — this earned mention, not the wire link, is where ranking value actually comes from
• Brand and entity signals: a wave of announcement coverage around a launch or license grant lifts branded search volume and reinforces the entity data Google holds on the company, independent of any single link
• A dated, indexed record: regulators, journalists and partners can point to a specific, timestamped public statement — useful for the trust and disclosure signals that factor into E-E-A-T even though it isn't a ranking link itself
• Distribution cost typically runs $200-$800 for a single release depending on service tier and geographic reach, against $220-$609 for a single guest post placement that does carry a followed, anchor-controlled link

When does a press release make sense for a gambling brand?

Run one when the news is genuinely worth announcing, not when the calendar needs a link: a new license grant or market entry, a sportsbook or platform partnership, a sponsorship deal, a notable executive hire, or an acquisition. Gambling generates more of these moments than most niches, which is exactly why it's tempting to lean on them for link building — but the release itself is the vehicle for getting the story in front of journalists, not the mechanism that earns the link.

Treat the release as the opening move of a pitch, not the deliverable. Send it to the specific trade reporters who cover that market before it goes out on the wire, and give them something concrete to write their own piece around — a number, a quote, a regulatory detail — so the resulting coverage reads as original reporting with its own dofollow link rather than a reprint of the wire copy.

How should press releases fit into a gambling link building program?

Budget press releases as a PR and visibility line, separate from the budget that buys actual links. A release earns brand mentions, journalist relationships and occasional earned coverage; it does not substitute for the guest posts, niche edits and digital PR research pieces that a profile needs to grow its followed-link count month over month.

The agencies that get this right run both in parallel: a release goes out for every genuinely newsworthy event, while a steady guest post and niche edit program keeps delivering the anchor-controlled, followed links a release structurally can't provide. Neither replaces the other — they're solving different problems.