We believe having any more than five links in the average 500 word press release runs the risk of interfering with readability and may be viewed by search engines as a possible red flag. We believe you should list your url (offset in parantheses) after your first company mention in a press release, as well as in the boiler plate ("About Company" section) of your press release and perhaps in the contact information. You can certainly include links to particular products or services when mentioned as well as any files you may want to highlight.
You can also include anchor text, also known as link label or link text, in which you have a keyword or keyword phrase that links to a webpage. Some of the newswire's partner websites will respect these links, but some won't. Please note that we believe it is best practice to include the actual url, and omit anchored text. Anchored text within press releases can trigger Google's updated Link Schemes Document, which considers anchored text to be unnatural.
We recommend that, in addition to the links mentioned above, if you mention specific products or services where a direct link to an internal page on your website would be advantageous, you include a link to those pages. Anything more runs the risk of appearing unnatural and may alienate journalists and search engines alike.
It’s just a matter of finding the right balance. But to summarize, there is no limit to the number of links you may have in your press release.
Keep in mind that we tag all links, anchored or not, as "no follow" as per Google’s press release requirements. Regardless of the type of link that you choose to include, these links will not be indexed by search engines. We stand behind Google in affirming that press release issuances should not affect SEO.