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We all need to acquire new customers to make our products and businesses work. Whether there are a few users paying big bucks or thousands visiting your platform for free, how you get and retain customers is what is important. But ask yourself: are you really ready for more customers? Is your team set up to handle an influx of users? What’s your promotion strategy – inbound marketing or traditional PR? This extensive guide will walk you through what user acquisition is and how to execute a plan....
There are lots of articles that cover how to create effective calls to action (see below), but the question that really interests me is this: when it comes to content marketing assets such as eBooks, blog posts, articles, social media promotions, and beyond, when do you define your call to action? When do you decide that, yes, this is what I want the visitor to do? Hopefully, you answered, “before I ever lay finger to keyboard and begin to type.” That’s right. A call to action should never be an after-thought. It needs to be defined from the very start....
Content marketing.” The buzzword of 21st century marketing. But what is content marketing exactly? Check out these 11 definitions from around the web, starting with everyone’s favorite dictionary. “Content marketing is any marketing format that involves the creation and sharing of media and publishing content in order to acquire customers.” - Wikipedia...
Online analytics can be fascinating. They can provide insight into the quality of your online content, let you know just how engaged your Twitter followers are or simply provide a timely ego boost. However, in amongst all the good news, bad news and insight, there are certain analytics that rarely change. Wherever you go, from B2B service providers to fashion retailers, the most visited web pages are usually the same. The most visited page on almost every website is the “About” page. No matter what you sell, your website visitors, social media followers and online prospects all want to know about you. More than want to know, they actually expect to get information about you. There are common questions every prospect expects to have answered by your online presence....
The concept of content marketing is constantly evolving and we content marketers will strive to perfect it indefinitely.... Sometimes we are tempted to think we do but when the truth comes home there is always a lot more to learn about content marketing’s role on the social web. The concept is constantly evolving and we content marketers will strive to perfect it indefinitely. But currently, some are promoting false ideas about the concept of content marketing and these are sometimes preventing others from having success. Here is my list of misconceptions you should not fall for – I would be happy if you add yours to it…
Modern marketers have to juggle many disciplines and wear many hats in order to succeed.... ....Psi shaped content marketing roles Psi, the Greek letter Ψ, is the letter that will come to symbolise modern marketers the most. It is a slightly more advanced version of the pi shaped marketer – π. Whereas the pi has a broad knowledge base and two distinct specialisms, psi shaped marketers have a slightly different spectrum of knowledge; three specialist skills, or personal traits, that they then channel into one even more powerful, all encompassing specialism. The result is that three distinct skills and personal traits feed into one specialism. That specialism is increasingly going to be content marketing. Why? Because, as lots of brands are discovering, the digital blurring between search, social, PR and display, which all form part of the make-up of content marketing, means that those that practise it need to have multiple skillsets....
Today, the entire business community is aware of the fact that social media marketing (SMM) is a hugely rewarding way to retain existing customers.... Social Media has remarkably altered the way people connect, interact, and share information. Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and LinkedIn are the most prominent sites where social interactions constantly take place. SMM may be defined as a method to profitably use social media to build relationships, obtain repeat business, and attract to convert prospects through friends sharing with friends. In short, SMM is word-of-mouth powered publicity leading to enlargement of customer-base. SMM means connecting with customers and prospects where they hang out online and actively participate in conversations about the topics most interesting to them. Remember, there are already ongoing conversations between your customers and prospects and it is up to you to take advantage. As a rule, people like doing business with people they know and transact business with people they trust. Though prospects are available aplenty, successfully connecting with them calls for a well-conceived and meticulously executed strategy....
Excellent learning... One of the simplest ways to boost your conversion rate is by tweaking your headline copy. If you don’t believe me… just look at KISSmetrics.com, I was able to boost my conversion rate by 40% just by adjusting the headline copy. That’s right… 40%. So what was the original headline? It was… KISSmetrics helps you get actionable metrics for your business. And the new one is… Google Analytics tells you what happened, KISSmetrics tells you who did it. So how can you boost your conversion rate through headlines? Well, there are a few simple strategies you can test....
Tips for developing a SEO content marketing strategy for your business blog. You need great content and a plan to get that coveted top spot. The coveted #1 position in Google is sought by everyone with a business site. How are you going to beat out everyone jockeying for that number 1 spot? You can make it to the top with a strategic SEO content marketing plan. Do you know what that means? Not certain your strategy is working? I’m sharing my 5 five tips to developing a SEO content marketing strategy that will send your business blog to the top. ...
While putting together our recent series of posts looking at how major brands use the four main social networks I’ve somehow managed to overlook Coca-Cola, so today I have rectified that startling omission. Coca-Cola is one of those instantly recognisable brands that would rake in fans and followers without even trying, so it’s to its credit that it has active account across the social web. So, here’s a quick look at how it uses Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and Google+....
The iOS legion has been able to play around with Cinemagram since February of last year, but now it's finally time for Android users to also experience what the app's all about. And while there are certainly other animated applications on the platform that are somewhat similar, Cinemagram stands out from the majority due to its built-in social features -- think of it as an Instagram of sorts, where other users can easily comment on and keep up with your recent four-second creations. What's more, the app allows other tidbits like special effects to be added to videos, while the ability to share these "GIFs on steroids" to Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr are also options within Cinemagram....
Traditionally, news readers first picked a publication and then looked for headlines that interest them. Google changed that process with its computer-generated Google News site. Google News aggregates headlines from many news sources, groups similar stories together and displays them according to each reader’s personalized interests. Articles are selected and ranked by computers that evaluate, among other things, how often and on what sites a story appears online. Google News also ranks based on certain characteristics of news content such as freshness, location, relevance and diversity. Google’s Maile Ohye further explains how Google News works in this video. Google News provides 100,000 business opportunities to publishers every minute or 4 billion clicks each month. They also have 50,000 competing publishers and with competition this fierce everything that can give you an edge counts. Here is a list of editorial tactics that journalists can employ to increase traffic from Google News....
Quick! Name a corporate brand that does amazing content aggregation! Hmm ... wait. I can't think of any, either. Okay, let's try this: Name a brand that creates amazing original content. I can think of a dozen. Red Bull, Gilt Groupe, GE, BirchBox ... the list of memorable branded content campaigns surely goes on. As the deluge of content that gushes from our screens intensifies, the odds of a brand standing out get dimmer all the time. Couple that with the storm of brands now starting to do content -- whether for native advertising, as owned media or for social-media flow -- and the noise is only going to get worse....
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Every day, businesses are inspired to bring creative marketing ideas to life on Facebook in ways that have a real impact on their bottom line. Many have discovered how to leverage their Facebook communities to strengthen brand loyalty and communicate directly with customers. As your company invests in the social network for marketing, advertising, and branding, it’s useful to have a few examples of what others have done with the platform. These case studies look at the goals, approaches, and results for several Facebook campaigns.
...One of the interesting things about these B2B content marketing campaigns is a fairly consistent LACK of attention to optimizing content assets (images & infographics, video, PDFs, etc) for search. Many of these campaign assets could continue to attract new prospects or at least attract more than they are if the assets were more visibile for relevant keywords. Just using the titles of the files and documents was difficult to find many of these. Many of these content assets are near invisible when it comes to buyer-centric keywords. Just remember marketers, when it comes to content, there’s no excuse not to socialize, advertise, publicize AND optimize. This approach represents a lot of what we do at TopRank Marketing. Here’s the full deck for details on each Killer Content Marketing campaign plus performance data. Enjoy!
...Creating more content” was cited as the biggest challenge for content marketers in 2013. But without a content strategy of some kind, you simply don’t know if that’s true. How can more content fix your problem when you have no concrete plan? It’s like building a house with no architectural plans. So, we are going back to basics here. Expert content marketers with defined and working strategies can skip this article. For the other 90 percent of you, all I ask is that you start thinking about some of the steps below before creating any more content....
I recently blogged about consumer brands that had come up with successful Twitter strategies, highlighting ASOS and Nike among others as companies that knew what they were doing with social. Many commenters mentioned that it would be useful to see a similar post focusing on B2B examples and I was obviously happy to oblige. Twitter is a difficult medium for B2B companies as it’s all too easy to simply view the platform as a broadcast medium and churn out dull corporate messages. But here are six examples of businesses that have managed to buck the trend and create interesting or useful Twitter feeds...
Social media lay people may regard LinkedIn as, primarily, a venue for networking and for career advancement—but smart business owners know better. They know that LinkedIn is nothing less than a critical tool for brand enhancement and lead generation. Indeed, when used properly, LinkedIn can actually be used to drive traffic to a company website and ultimately to garner higher sales. The trick, of course, is having the right LinkedIn marketing strategy. Six basic pointers are offered below....
I’ve been in several duels myself. Not of the pistol-slinging variety — but the copywriting kind. You’ll probably recognize the scenario … I trot out my idea. The client cringes and says, “It will never work.” He’s got a better idea. “Fine,” I say, “let’s test them both and see which one works better.” And so, we let the marketplace declare the winner....
Content Marketing is important to the success of your biz, so we’re going to keep bringing you lots of info, including this newly released infographic from Uberflip. If you’re targeting other businesses (B2B), you may wonder how your marketing tactics compare to others, or may be looking for inspiration. We think you’ll find both in this infographic; here are a few key points: 94% of B2B marketers create new content rather than share. 82% of B2B marketers use content marketing to gain new customers and leads. The top three ways to share content: Social media 87% Website articles 83% Email 78%...
...Towards the end of 2012, WordPress recorded more than 56.6-million blogs on its platform. That doesn’t include Blogger, Tumblr and a host of other blog platforms available.
So why do people blog? Some have an opinion they want to share, others simply enjoy writing and many are blogging because the digital marketing folk are telling them their business needs them to — search engine optimisation, being considered an expert in your field… there’s a variety of reasons they’ll tell you this a good idea.
Blogs beat traditional mainstream media in that there are no fast and hard rules governing them. Bloggers are free to express an honest and unedited opinion. Didn’t like the service you received at a restaurant? Absolutely horrified that the latest skin product you used left your neck in red patches? Well, blog about it.
Brands have realised that the readership of a blog is far more loyal than that of a magazine. Readers have a personal relationship with the blogger, they interact with them on other social media channels and therefore they trust them – far more than their copy of Car or Cosmo magazine. Their opinion matters and it only follows that their opinion sells.
The blogging bandwagon has taken off and it has hit a few potholes in the road....
Content Marketing is the new buzzword. And as with buzzwords, every agency is trying to capture a slice of the action – but this means they all have their own definitions. Which leads to confusion. Naturally SEOs were the first to jump on Content Marketing as content and links are so intrinsically linked to success, but there’s a lot more to it than SEO. So to try and ease this confusion I spoke to our resident SEO specialist, David Freeman and we came up with this advice....
To answer the question about the future of content, I think it’s important to think about the relationship of information, technology and the human experience with content. A good place to start is understanding how your target audience discovers, consumes and acts on information. This effort towards empathizing with the consumer information journey provides the essential cues for meaningful content marketing planning, promotion and performance optimization....
For the latest in our series of posts looking at how the world’s biggest brands use social I’ve turned the spotlight on Microsoft. Bill Gates’ empire still looms large over the global software market, though its fortunes are often overshadowed by Apple’s astonishing level of success. And much like Google, Microsoft also runs a few of its own social platforms – enterprise network Yammer and Pinterest clone Socl. So it’s interesting to see how Microsoft makes use of other social networks to promote its products and maintain its fortunes....
Inbound marketing – or combining different online marketing processes such as SEO, content marketing, social media and conversions – has been one of the most effective ways to hit a site’s various business goals in one go, like driving more specifically targeted traffic, improving revenue and/or building a stronger brand mind share. Aside from involving practices that is measurable, utilizing inbound marketing as an approach to reach a business’ target audience (without disrupting their online activities) has proven itself to be very effective in terms of scaling and growing businesses in a shorter span of time. Some of the most known advantages of implementing these practices as a whole are: -Processes involved are cost-efficient and can be implemented in-house. -It works on almost any size of site/business and on almost any industry. -Can help cumulatively achieve business goals (like constantly generating traffic, leads, conversions), through all the past and current efforts done to improve the brand/site. There are so many tactics that you can choose inside the inbound marketing realm that can really help your business grow. Although, in this post, I’ve chosen to highlight a few strategies which I believe can really grow both traffic and conversions when implemented continuously....
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Can't say enough about this exceptional resource from KISSmetrics.for developing social media strategies. If you're new to social marketing or need some inspiration this is a must-read. Did I mention it's essential reading? ;-)