free strategy session
free strategy session

Content promotion and distribution have been hot topics in growth marketing, and for good reason. Brands that have struggled to find success through content marketing initiatives are beginning to understand why they need more than a favorite social media channel. A struggling content distribution strategy is usually less of a quality content or platform issue and more of an audience issue. (more…)

Over the years, fortunes have been made and lost on Google’s algorithm. Its technology has advanced leaps and bounds since its inception in the late 1990’s. What was once ripe for manipulation is now a search engine results page (SERP) that mostly delivers what Larry Page and Sergey Brin originally envisioned – relevant search results free from spam.

It’s taken Google many years to get its search engine where it is today. SEO is not something you do anymore; it’s what happens when you get everything else right. SERP success is now a trailing indicator of good PR and inbound marketing. Sure, there are some on-page best practices, but that’s not rocket science.

Several weeks ago, Visualsoft, an ecommerce marketing agency based out of the UK, asked if I’d participate in the creation of its interactive infographic Which Google Updates Have Had the Biggest Negative Impact for SEO. I agreed and answered a number of questions related to how updates have impacted my SEO efforts over the years.

They curated my answers and the answers of several other industry insiders and created a beautifully designed parallax scrolling website that takes visitors through 11 years of algorithm updates in an animated way. After reading this article you should definitely click through and give it a scroll. Bravo, Visualsoft!

Here are 16 of the many Google algorithm updates they featured:

Boston – 2003

This update was the very first to be given a name. According to Moz’s Google Algorithm Change Historythis update was a combination of algorithm changes and major index refreshes. The announcement of this change took place at SES Boston.

Boston-Algorithm-Update

Cassandra – 2003

This was the first update that claimed to target link spam, like mutual links between co-owned websites. It also targeted hidden text and links.

Dominic – 2003

The exact nature of this update was unclear, but the way inbound links were reported or counted seemed to havechanged in a big way. In addition, webmasters were seeing new Google bots on their servers that were bouncing.

Florida – 2003

This update is reported to have ushered in a new era of SEO by completely destroying the value of 1990s tactics. Massive keyword stuffing was severely hit.

Austin – 2004

This was purported to be the update to clean up what Florida missed. It further cracked down on spammy on-page tactics like invisible text and Meta data stuffing.

Bourbon – 2005

Webmasters speculated that this update changed how non-canonical URLs (www vs. non-www) and duplicate content were treated. It was also the first appearance of “GoogleGuy,” the Matt Cutts persona we know today.

Google-Bourbon-Update

Big Daddy – 2005

This update rolled out in December, but continued to rollout until March of 2006. This impacted URL canonicalization, site redirects and other related items.

Buffy – 2007

According to Wikipedia, this update was not a deliberate one, but an accumulation of many smaller changes. Visualsoft reports the update focused heavily on keywords.

Google-Buffy-Update

Vince – 2009

This was the first update that led webmasters to believe Google was favoring big brands in its SERPs. Cutts called the update minor, but the implications of showing favor to large brands is not a minor change for mid-market companies and SMBs.

Caffeine – 2010

This update directly impacted how and how fast Google indexed the Internet. It was a much needed technological update and laid the infrastructure to handle the vast amount of content being created today. Indexation moved from a stratified methodology to a more dynamic approach. According to Google, it resulted in a 50 percent fresher index.

Panda/Farmer – 2011

SEOs named this update Farmer prior to its official release. However, when announced, Google named it Panda.The update focused on spam, thin content, content farms, scrapers and sites with high ad-to-content ratios. Many updates to this algorithm have occurred since its initial launch and continue today.

Freshness – 2011

This update was an extension of the indexing infrastructure put in place by Caffeine. It sought to reward the newest most relevant content in the SERPs. According to Google it impacted 35 percent of all search queries.

Venice – 2012

According to Moz, this update appeared to have aggressively localized the SERPs by more tightly integrating local search data.

Venice-Google-Algorithm-Update

Penguin – 2012

This update looked to identify and diminish websites that were considered over-optimized – sites built for search engines and not people.

EMD – 2012

Exact-Match Domain (EMD) sought to devalue domains containing desirable keyword phrases. Speculation existed that this update was another way for Google to help big brands do better organically.

Hummingbird – 2013

This was a major update by Google. It was reported to have evolved its core algorithm and indexing infrastructure to understand the relationship between words and subsequent queries. It’s also reported to have laid a foundation for the Knowledge Graph and mobile search.

Google-Hummingbird-Update

Many other updates are featured and covered by Visualsoft’s animated and interactive parallax scrolling website. Understanding Google’s past through these algorithm updates helps us understand where the search behemoth may be headed tomorrow. It is this writer’s opinion that Google is looking to completely eliminate the field of SEO in the future and to favor brands with the largest and most engaging online audiences.

It used to be that SEO professionals could create enough of the signals Google’s algorithm used to determine relevance. Today, however, it’s become increasingly difficult for an SEO to mimic the signals created by a true brand audience. It’s become easier, in most industries, to do good PR and growth marketing in order to build a real audience than it is to manipulate the link graph and sculpt on-page factors. There’s too much risk for manual or algorithmic penalty to do anything else but build real audiences by creating helpful and engaging content that people want to consume, share, cite and evangelize.

If you would like to connect with an SEO strategist to speak more about implementing innovative strategies, contact one here!

This article was update 3-10-22.

What makes a top-notch content marketing campaign is a mix of phenomenal strategies, out-of-the-box ideas, and thoughtful execution. What shapes breakthroughs is creativity. We know that what brings results is consistency. What humanizes content is storytelling, but sometimes, it’s the “little” things that shake the cornerstone of great creations. Grammar is one of those little things busy content managers and entrepreneurs may overlook when creating a blog post or writing any type of business correspondence. This is a huge blog mistake.

Recurring grammatical errors can affect one’s credibility especially when your mission speaks of delivering high-quality content and the smooth fusion of engagement and conversion. Being complacent about grammar is not ideal for content managers and bloggers. The problem can be easily overcome by using online grammar check tools and apps that can check messages, articles, and documents for commonly made grammatical errors. You can try Grammar Checker tools to make your content free from grammatical mistakes and errors.

According to this report, the number of Fortune 500 companies launching their own blogs has increased. With so many voices online, almost everybody can claim they have unique content in order to beat the competition. But is that unique content also clear and free from distractions? Can its quality sustain the trust and loyalty of readers? Exemplary content marketing takes the audience seriously and treats them with respect.

Using grammar correctly does not mean you have to be an expert and ace a 50-page grammar exam. Paying attention to grammar may begin by knowing the fundamentals: subject-verb agreement, prepositions, and pronouns.

To avoid overwhelming yourself, learn and practice one grammar rule every day. When editing your blog or email, get a fresh pair of eyes. Ask a colleague to read what you have written. You can also use an online editing tool for quick proofreading.

Content managers and content creators can also start by identifying the grammatical issues that constantly bother them. The only way to be confident about one’s blogging or writing skills is by confronting the weak spots. The infographic below breaks down the most common grammar blog writing mistakes bloggers commit and how they can be addressed.

10 Common Blog Writing Mistakes (Infographic)
Source: www.grammarcheck.net

Effective social media marketing means pulling together your entire client’s data. Achieving maximum grasp of your clients requires you to combine and put together every bit of information you have about them. Instead of creating new channels and data files with your online clients, you should consider bringing together all the accessible information. You will only understand the behaviors and needs of your social network customers when you have all the information you need about them in one place.

Here Lies the Secret

The Impact of Social Media on Database MarketingWhen embracing social media for database marketing, you should consider integrating various social media platforms in order to attain the best results. That means being present on multiple social media platforms and effectively participating in each one of them.

You will only know which social media platform is best for your database marketing ventures if you try out individual ones and see the one which is more efficient. Take a closer examination and find out on which platform your customers are more responsive.

Additionally, you should be able to analyze which channel the customers are more receptive to. Analyze Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, Email, and other platforms to find out what best works for you and your business. Additionally, doing this also helps you to identify secondary channels through which you can get in touch with your clients. In the process, you will also get to know the kind of messages suitable for varied platforms.

For instance, when you are a car dealer, it is more resounding to engage your clients on Facebook after-sales rather than bombarding them with unnecessary emails. Get them to discuss the features of the cars involved. You will not only be facilitating brand awareness but also strengthening customer relations.

A notable example is Morton’s The Steakhouse. This company normally invites its customer to share freely their views and experiences with others. Other potential customers get to learn about their capabilities as a firm and what best to expect from them. For the best results in database marketing, you need to adopt such strategies.

Precisely integrated data can enable one to create information-packed client profiles, which will translate to efficiency, commitment, and full dedication. Most importantly, practicing this helps you get insights into your social customers and find a better way of managing them. Subsequently, you can increase the enthusiasm for spreading your database marketing news.

Promotes Targeted Marketing

Notably, sorting out the social media users according to sub-populations helps you identify further their special needs. By doing this, you may be in a better position of understanding your clients. Eventually, this will help you come up with working strategies that will help you achieve nothing short of success.

Evidently, social media is distancing itself from the initial stage of mass data collection, which is a characteristic of undeveloped marketing channels. This makes it a more relevant marketing sphere that can be used so easily in achieving targeted marketing and more goal-oriented specifications. The most successful database marketer is one who realizes the essence of integrating social media with other relevant marketing channels with an aim of developing profitable interactions with their customers.

It Comes Down to Regular Update Customer Records

Analyzing your user profiles in a social media marketing setup gives you the advantage of understanding better the kind of people you are dealing with. Using social media as a database marketing vehicle helps make it easier for you to study your clients the easier way and subsequently update their records.

Keeping a close record of the social users within your sphere of influence can make it easier to analyze consumer behavior. What is it that they find more appealing to your brand? What are some of the evident areas that they might need possible changes?

It is possible to get an insight into all of these resulting in better productivity. You will also be able to follow trends on how best customers are interacting with your brand. Social media gives you a more sustainable platform for ensuring you address your users through the most sustainable marketing platforms.

For the best results, have regular updates of your user database. Where necessary, add the extra details you need pertaining to your clients. You can also do away with obsolete records to make them more relevant and precise in achieving your database marketing goals.

Learn What Works For You the Easier Way

One undoubted aspect of using a combination of social media tools in achieving your marketing goals is that it will enlighten you on the best marketing channels and strategies. Trying out various strategies through social media and analyzing them makes you realize the working strategies and those ones that are not worth the struggles.

You will only get better at using social media as a database-marketing tool when you are able to keep all the records and subsequently analyze them to get a deeper insight into the direction your business is taking.

With a closer analysis of your user database, you will be able to realize the best thing that works for you as a manager. It is only by doing this that you will be able to make greater achievements and notable milestones in your journey as an entrepreneur and business manager.

Most importantly, you can be assured of more returns on investment. No one wants to waste efforts and resources working on something that is not beneficial in the end. That gives you every reason to take closer consideration of social media as a database-marketing tool.

Ideally, social media is effective in achieving workable database marketing goals. The ease and efficacy that comes with using various social media platforms, including Twitter and Facebook, cannot be overlooked. With the increased assurance of promoting target marketing, there is no doubt that social media has a significant impact on database marketing.

However, it takes critical analysis and a sixth sense to figure out all these. For the keen and insightful business manager, the seamless opportunities that come with using this marketing vehicle are unstoppable.

As more marketers are using Inbound Marketing to shape their digital strategies, it’s important all inbound elements are used to get more engagement, leads, and sales. Inbound marketing strategies can still succeed with isolated channels, but we’ve got the evidence to show why you need a holistic approach.

What is Inbound Marketing?

Inbound Marketing is a methodology born from the changing habits of modern buyers. Outbound advertising strategies may not be as successful as they used to be. For example:

As the success of traditional outbound methods declines, more marketers are looking to other strategies. Many are now looking to inbound.

The methodology of Inbound Marketing focuses on creating marketing strategies that engage with your ideal customers. Unlike outbound, inbound strategies work to attract customers who are actually interested rather than bombarding people who aren’t.

With inbound, you can attract buyers with relevant, helpful, and useful information and convert them into customers. Here is the process:

holistic-inbound-marketing

With each stage, you create useful and relatable content to move the buyer along.

 

But it’s not all about offering premium content. There are many different sections you have to master to create a successful inbound strategy for your business.

Elements of Inbound Marketing

SEO

SEO is an important part of inbound. With SEO you can get more visitors to your site via organic channels. Using highly searched keywords in your pages and blog content, relevant people can find their way to your website and see your content.

Social Media

Just like SEO, you need to use social media as a channel to bring more people to your site and as a tool to share your content online.

Blogging

Having a blog is central to any inbound strategy. A blog with valuable content is what attracts ‘strangers’ to your site and turns them into visitors.

CMS

Customer Management System (CMS) is a valuable hub that holds on to your contacts’ details so you can reach out to them with relevant emails.

Call-to-Action

CTAs in your blogs and on your website are vital to converting visitors into leads. A clickable button that leads to a landing page allows a reader to progress down the conversion funnel. Without one of these, the only option is to leave your site.

[xyz-ihs snippet="Agency-Link"]

Landing Pages

After clicking on a Call-to-Action, the visitor is brought to a landing page where they will submit their contact details in exchange for valuable content, helpful templates or professional advice. (A central part of inbound is offering something valuable for free to online visitors, in exchange for their contact details which you can use to turn them into customers!)

Email Marketing

After receiving their contact information, you can then reach out to the buyer via email marketing. Tempting offers and helpful advice can nurture these leads into paying customers.

CRM

Having a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) can help you record and track all your leads. This management system can help you see the history of your potential customers. You can see what pages they looked at and even what emails from you they have opened. This gives the marketing team the data they need to make key decisions.

A Holistic Approach to Inbound

holistic-inbound-marketing-2

So, we’re clear on all the ingredients that make a successful inbound strategy, but we regularly experience a lack of cohesion between them. Very few of the above parts deliver results on their own. Let’s pick out a few of the key pillars of Inbound and explain why they all need each other.

Social media is a fantastic, low-cost method for getting your message heard. Unfortunately, a huge number of businesses only go as far as posting news pieces from other sites or sharing a decent meme. The interaction and engagement for these sorts of social messages will always benefit an external site.

So while they may show your followers you have your finger on the pulse—you won’t see much of a benefit. Diversify your social sharing with links to your service pages, products, or self-written blogs. Again this will promote a continual flow of interested traffic to your site, not someone else's.

As we’ve mentioned Blogging, or creating content in general, is a great way to show that you are committed to educating your visitors. It also shows you are happy to give expert knowledge and opinion away for free (a central strategy in inbound marketing).

Companies that are able to create high-quality content have the opportunity to develop a sense of value between the visitor and a brand. However, it isn’t as easy as throwing up a few paragraphs. There is minimal strategic advantage to posting blogs without calls to action, as without one the only option after reading a blog is to leave.

Whether you attract visitors to your blogs through social media, paid ads, or SEO—ensure you include a CTA on the page so people can continue to engage with your site and move further down the buyer's journey.

Once you’ve written a great blog and included an attractive CTA—this clickable button is completely useless unless it is aligned with a suitable tone of voice and buyer journey stage. Avoid creating CTAs that repeatedly lead people to a purchase page, that’s a big jump from a blog.

Vary your offers and free content—allow people to interact in a way that suits them. For example, a blog that explains the definition of SEO should not have a CTA that leads through to a purchase page for SEO agency services. We’d advise that the CTA moves the reader on a step, maybe offering them an eBook that talks about the key benefits or compares it to other methods.

As you can see, inbound marketing is connected by different factors that bring the customer to the website and then encourage them along the Buyer’s Journey.

In our example, you can see the journey of one of our customers. Our CRM has recorded all activity and sent out timely automation events to direct them through the Buyer’s Journey.

holistic-inbound-marketing-3

Let’s look at automation in more detail. Here’s an example of a workflow we use at Digital 22 for people who use the Website Grader Tool.

holistic-inbound-marketing-4

 

Automation takes the humble email and can make it infinitely smarter. While the weekly newsletter can work for more generic updates, it’s nearly impossible to create unique email campaigns that reach specific people when they are ready to read without well-planned automation. This is where automation steps in.

Modern CRM systems can build up rules for when to send certain messages, which behavior to look for, and how long to wait until the next message is sent. By creating rules and allowing an intelligent system to follow an automated set of guidelines—you will be able to interact 24/7 without any work beyond an initial setup.

Automation should be set up in a way that gently nurtures people down the Buyer's Journey—think of it as the most attentive and uninterrupted sales team in the world.

Let’s re-cap:

Social Media / SEO > Blog > CTA > Landing Pages > Contact Form > Premium Free Content > Email Automation > Customer!

holistic-inbound-marketing-5

And there you have it. A holistic approach to inbound drives customers!

Conclusion

There are no shortcuts when it comes to inbound. Having an Inbound Marketing strategy is a long-term investment that works by interacting with potential customers at different stages of the Buyer’s Journey.

Although marketing has a very clear and precise set of goals that have not changed for ages, the methods through which these goals are achieved changed immensely from the time the people first started making comprehensive marketing strategies. Those changes were sometimes very interesting, rapid, and influential. One of the latest trends in this line is the rise of “marketing agility” which quickly became a popular buzzword in the world of marketing. But, as we know, not all buzz words end up being really relevant, so let us see how “marketing agility” holds up in that regard.

Defining the Marketing Agility

Still, before we can determine does marketing agility has any real heft, we should first see what those two words mean and, in turn, understand what is marketing agility supposed to be.

Agility – According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, agility means nimbleness, or in other words, the ability to move or act quickly. If we would consider, for example, manufacturing, instead of marketing, we would say that agile manufacturing would be lowering the time of production, so production is able to keep up with current market demand and optimize its operations.

Marketing – Marketing is usually described as the process of anticipating and identifying customers’ desires in order to eventually satisfy their needs.

It is very easy to see that, unlike manufacturing, marketing has no tangible product as a result. Therefore, agile marketing cannot be defined as the speed at which you are executing the marketing solutions, but instead, a speed at which you can adjust the marketing mix in order to deliver greater customer value. That can make marketing agility a very relevant, and indeed, tangible quality, and not only the buzzword stick CEOs use to beat their marketing teams.

The Difference between Marketing Agility and Agile Marketing

As mentioned, marketing agility represents a concept, while agile marketing is the manifestation of that concept. Marketing agility is the ability to quickly assess market trends, make rapid business decisions, and reduce the waste by removing uncertainty. Agile marketing is the formal approach through which these ideas are brought into existence. It should be clear then that marketing agility deals with structural changes, and one business’ core operations, which makes it interested not only in quick decisions but also in some long-term developments.

How to Achieve Marketing Agility

Now, we should look at some of the examples of how marketing agility can be encouraged within some companies.

Make your organization a learning organization.

The only way your business will be able to provide an answer to the marketing agility challenges, is if itself becomes equally as agile, and one of the most important things that need to be set in motion is the expertise of your employees and organization in general. Promote creative thinking, demonstrate the value of formal training, and be sure to reward the expertise.

Introduce agile marketing assets.

Your marketing team will be able to come up with viable marketing solutions only if it has access to some of the flexible marketing assets such as a visa gift card, or a voucher, instead of using the alternatives which are related only to some specific scenarios.

Harness as much data as you can.

Big data makes the necessary prerequisite for making any kind of meaningful marketing decision. Agile marketing requires that you harness as much of that data as possible, and put your focus not only on your potential customers, but also on the competition, industry trends, and even in-house developments.

As we can see, investing your time and money in encouraging this concept throughout your business can make it able to provide very quick, efficient, and precise marketing solutions. In this day and age, when entire industries rise and fall over the course of the night, the ability to make the right decisions and swift moves might just save your business.

Giving your email address to a company carries the same fear as giving out your number at a bar. Even if you liked the person initially, there's always the risk he or she will call and call and never take a hint.

Too many companies are sending emails like the creeps who keep calling even after being rejected. They're flooding inboxes with content that does nothing to improve the customer experience.

The way to change that trend is to build a foundation of context. Context takes "right message, right person, right time" to a whole new level. It forces you to approach subscribers in such a way that they actually appreciate hearing from you.

Surprise and Delight with Your Emails

Every morning, I get an email from What to Wear Daily that tells me what to wear for that day's weather. I provide data upon signing up — a range of temperature thresholds for when I feel comfortable exercising outside — and the email shows which times in the day fall within that range.

I love getting that email because it legitimately helps me prepare for my day. It might not be hard to check a forecast and know that I should dress warmly on a cold day, but the breakdown of different factors and expected timeframes makes my life simpler.

All marketing emails should do the same. Be genuinely helpful so consumers actually like hearing from you. It builds trust, and when customers trust you, they become loyal and view you as a partner or friend rather than a business that just wants something from them.

Without understanding where and how your users read your emails, you're unlikely to create this kind of positive experience. Here are four questions to ask that will determine how to approach your subscribers:

1. What are your users trying to accomplish?

Unite your needs with those of your users.

When I first got a Karma Go hotspot device, I used it a ton on the first day. A few hours in, Karma sent me an email warning me that the battery was running low and I needed to charge it. They knew that I, as a new user, might have been upset if the device had died while I was using it and they knew that I probably needed a reminder to plug it in.

It was a genuine — and mutually beneficial — customer support experience. Karma united my needs (to charge my device) with its needs (my using the hotspot) to be useful and enhance my experience.

2. Where are your users?

Literally, where are your customers physically going to be when they open your emails? Commuting on the subway? Standing in front of an ATM? At home?

Bank of America gives you the choice of a paper or email receipt at the ATM. If you choose to email, though, it sends a barely legible (on a phone, at least) email receipt. If you're going to send an email to users when you know they're not home, that email should be optimized for mobile.

3. Where are your users in their journeys?

You need to understand users' histories with your company and any expectations they might have from your email marketing program. Are your users new sign-ups from social media, are they long-term customers who make frequent purchases or did they meet you at a trade show? Each of those experiences can give you clues about what your users expect from your marketing and how you can tailor it to meet their needs.

4. What devices are your users on?

People have different expectations for different devices. People checking emails on their phones probably don't have as much time to follow through with registration as if they were using their desktops.

Scott Stratten tells a story (with much frustration) about getting an email on his phone that contained a QR code. You can't use your phone's camera to scan its own screen!

The point is, don't use technology just because it exists. If it doesn't enhance the user experience, it's counterproductive.

To avoid frustrating your subscribers, sign up for your brand's emails and purchase your products yourself. Emulate your target users' experiences. Are they pleasant and helpful or confusing and annoying?

In 2013, Jack Dorsey (founder of Square and Twitter) advised tech companies to "meet customers where they are." His advice, which was intended for entrepreneurs, also applies to marketers and emphasizes the need to consider the context when creating meaningful interactions.

Take Dorsey's advice a step further. Meet customers where they are, but also contextualize that information and anticipate what they're using, what they're trying to do, and where they're going to be.

It’s a job to look for a job, especially when a recruiter isn’t proactively sourcing you for your next opportunity in digital marketing. And depending on where you are in your career, that scenario may not readily present itself. In the meantime, use your content marketing prowess to make your job search work for you.

By now you know that blasting your resume to fifty employers and praying for an amazing response rate isn’t going to propel you to new and amazing career experiences. You also realize (hopefully) that taking the time to network, personalize messaging, and incorporate social media into your search tactics is a more productive approach. However, what you may lack is a road map to incorporating these elements into an effective job networking strategy.

This article offers eleven guidelines for using your content marketing skillset to create a following and dramatically improve your chances of finding an optimal career opportunity. In fact, this approach worked for me a handful of years ago when I landed my job at ExactHire, and I’ve witnessed it being a game-changer for many others since then.

Be Assertive

You have to put yourself out there when seeking a new position. While that comes naturally to some, it can be very uncomfortable for others. However, it is less daunting these days because so much proactive reach-out can be done digitally.

When you first embark on a job search, you may decide to tell your existing contacts that you’re looking for a new job in the hopes that they will remember to tell you about open positions they discover. The only problem with this incomplete approach is that who knows how long it will take to land a job so that you can then send out the customary “here’s my new contact information” message. Consequently, it’s reasonable to expect your contacts to forget you are looking during the gap between those two events.

Therefore, in the spirit of CAN-SPAM compliance, invite your circle of contacts to receive periodic updates from you about your job search activity. Not only will this keep your employment situation top of mind for those people, but it will also put you in a position to hear about job openings that aren’t necessarily posted anywhere, but rather, presented to your network by their other contacts. Here’s a call-out message to get your viral job networking team started:

Hello!
I’m contacting you to ask if you’d be willing to be a part of my job search networking team? With your permission, I’d like to send you a brief, weekly message that highlights the jobs/companies to which I’ve applied. That way, if you know anyone at any of the companies mentioned, you might be willing to help me get a foot in the door by referring my information to the right employee.

I would really appreciate your assistance. If you’re willing to accept my job search updates, simply respond to confirm. Plus, you may opt-out at any time.

Thanks!

Be Respectful

Now before you blast this message to your entire contact list, make sure you are approaching this initial call-out with care. For example, consider the best medium for communication based on your personality, current employment situation, and network following.

If you gravitate toward email communication, then the call-out content above is certainly suited for that medium. However, if you have far more Twitter followers or LinkedIn contacts than you have close acquaintances in your email address book, then short, direct messages on those social networks may be a more efficient use of your time. It is important to make the message one-to-one instead of a mere status update on your social profile. It creates accountability to respond on the part of the recipient and it formalizes his/her “opt-in” to your updates.

If you’re really passionate about your craft and your network would be receptive (let’s say they’re mostly other content marketers), then why not create a squeeze page with a form that invites people to opt into your drip campaign of employment updates?

I’m personally partial to email because of the response rate I’ve seen with my own network in the past. If this avenue is the right fit for you, make sure you always blind carbon copy (bcc) all recipients and link to resources within the body text rather than attach large portfolio, reference, and resume files. Plus, then you can track the most engaged “teammates” based on their custom redirect clicks.

Be Social

The wider the net you cast in your job search, the more chances you will catch a job. While you may initially invite-only your inner circle of contacts, I encourage you to push your boundaries when it comes to engaging other lesser-known acquaintances in your efforts. Here are some obvious contact sources plus a few out of the box options:

[xyz-ihs snippet="Agency-Link"]

Be Concise

As you attract more contacts, keep them engaged by getting to the point quickly. Your weekly updates should serve as a digest of your latest employment exploits, not an unabridged, e-book explanation of your recent interviews.

Create a message template that includes a quick overview of your networking activities. Bullet points are preferable along with clear headings for different auction categories such as applications, interviews, follow-ups, and potential offers. Bold any mention of specific names of people and organizations so that it is easy for your recipients to scan. You should hyperlink to the websites or social profiles of companies and individuals to add context for your readers.

Succinctly follow up regarding any movement on items mentioned in the previous update as well. While this can be accomplished with bullet points or a short paragraph if you have the time and the know-how to flex your marketing muscles, consider a vlog series recapping the week’s events or a series of tweet screenshots that tell the story of your job search-related updates on Twitter. Not only will you more likely engage your audience, but also demonstrate your content production know-how in the process.

Here’s a message format that worked well for me:

Hello Networking Team!
Thank you so much for your continued support. I appreciate the job leads this team has produced for me! Here’s this week’s recap:

Coming Up Soon:

My Applications in the Past Week:
Do you know someone at these firms? Could you help me get my foot in the door?

Follow-up from Last Week’s Update:
I had a final interview with the ABC Group for the Social Media Manager position yesterday. I thought my conversations with Joe Johnson (VP of Marketing) and Suzie Chan (Digital Marketing Manager) went really well, and I definitely have a better understanding of the culture and direction of the department and organization.

Thanks for your attention!
[full name]
[email]
[mobile phone]
[link to LinkedIn public profile]
[link to Twitter handle]
[link to resume]

Be Creative

In addition to the aforementioned interactive content ideas, push yourself to better engage your networking team by being innovative with your message content each week. For example, throw in a mini-infographic highlighting your professional accomplishments if you dabble in design work. Or, highlight some posts from your personal blog or link to your personal “employee media kit” via Slideshare. Customize your digital assets based on your specialties, but think about which content has the greatest potential to be shared outside your network (as long as that’s your intent in the case of a public job search).

Be Consistent

Regardless of your occupation, employers of choice want employees who are consistent and reliable. View your job search situation as an opportunity to impress your networking team so that they will advocate on your behalf with organizations to which they are connected. An easy way to demonstrate your focus on delivering results is to stick to sending your update on the same day and time every single week. By doing so, momentum will be in your favor as your following grows and audience members condition themselves to expect and even look forward to your updates. Don’t disappoint your cheer section by flaking out on your regular responsibilities.

Be Candid

It’s important to clarify your expectations to your networking teammates. That is, explain how public your search is, and whether or not recipients have the right to share news of your search, as well as your resources (e.g. portfolio, resume, reference letters, etc.). If you are in job transition, then in most cases it is to your advantage to give others carte blanche on spreading the word about your employment goals. However, if you are already employed and conducting a more discrete search, ask your contacts to check with you before referring your information to individuals and organizations for which you have not yet expressed direct interest.

Be Open-Minded

Your path to your next position is not always a straight line from point A to point B. Depending on factors such as the current economic climate, your particular skill set and the reasons for your job change, there may be many twists and turns along your journey. Therefore, keep an open mind when it comes to considering new types of activities that could be fruitful for your end objective.

Seek out informational interviews in order to network with individuals in organizations that hold interest, but that may not be currently hiring. The goal here is to get introductions to other people that may be hiring at other companies, as well as to use the discussion to learn more about new skill sets and company cultures. Look for networking groups run by like-minded individuals as well as state workforce development initiatives. Lastly, explore position types that you may not have initially considered, but that could serve as stepping-stones to future career opportunities.

Be Reciprocal

You will make more networking progress when you make it evident to others that you want to help them in their endeavors, too. Particularly in the case of requesting informational interviews with newly acquainted individuals, lower any potential uneasiness they may have about speaking with you by offering to connect them with others who may help their own causes (e.g. committee volunteers, friends who share similar interests, potential customers of their company, etc.).

Other creative ways in which you may be able to return a favor include contributing to their blog or offering to volunteer for a short freelance project they’re managing. Having a “how can I help you too?” mentality will help you earn more legitimate networking connections and put you in a better position to be successful once you land your next position, too.

Be Responsive

You know that feeling you get when your phone chimes to alert you that someone just retweeted your latest status update? It’s a good feeling. It means that your contribution is valued and it makes you want to do more. Give your networking teammates the same high by acknowledging all of their contributions. In my job search experience, I was often surprised by the short and sweet replies of encouragement I received from mere acquaintances after my weekly update was sent. No matter how short the reply, I always reached out to that person to continue the conversation and let him or her know that I valued the correspondence.

The direct, personalized conversation is a rare commodity these days, and therefore more engaging than ever. Remember that these people are volunteering to help you so it is critical to get back to them in a timely manner.

Be Gracious

In the spirit of responsiveness, mind your manners and always thank others for their efforts to help you. Make the exercise more meaningful by reiterating to the person what he/she specifically did that truly made your search easier and more pleasant.

For bigger occasions, send an elaborate thank-you via any one of a number of communication channels. For smaller wins simply call out that person (by their initials only) in your weekly update to let them and others know you appreciate their help.

You know your job search content strategy is working when:

If you follow these guidelines, you can have more success in your job search. Be authentic, accountable and resourceful as you build your audience and please let me know if I can be on your job networking team!

 

[xyz-ihs snippet="Hubspot-CTA-Leaderboard"]

In today’s B2B landscape, leads have already browsed the web, read reviews and consumed every article they can find before even reaching out to another company’s sales team.

But did they read your article? The one that will lead them to your sales team?

Creating engaging and relevant content has become an essential part of modern B2B marketing, but the strategy behind how that content is distributed is just as important. What good is an article that’s perfectly suited for Millennials if it’s only read by Baby Boomers?

Effective content has just as much to do with placement as it does with production.

The Challenges of Content Distribution

Today’s companies face three specific challenges when it comes to closing a deal with potential buyers: speaking to the right audience, overcoming a general mistrust and dodging digital ad blockers.

B2B companies have a particularly tough time reaching the right people because their audiences tend to be more niche than B2C audiences. Many businesses struggle to identify potential consumers when specific titles, locations, and verticals come into play. Even after those groupings are ironed out, marketers still need to determine which channels will reach those people best. Then, they must tailor specific messages that suit the unique interests of each demographic.

Clearly, aligning all of these factors into the delivery of an effective message can pose a serious challenge for B2B marketers.

Once a company does speak to the right audience, it’s confronted by the fact that the average consumer has grown skeptical toward what he or she reads online. According to one study, 92 percent of Internet users say they trust earned media, while only half trust paid advertisements. They also tend to trust their friends, basing between 20 and 50 percent of their purchasing decisions on word-of-mouth recommendations.

To top it off, as digital devices become easier to use, so do their ad-blocking capabilities. In a matter of months, ad blocking went from a marginally disturbing trend that only impacted ad-supported business models to a top discussion point for marketers and advertisers alike. Today, more than 198 million people use mobile devices that are capable of ad blocking.

With so many factors working against marketers, creating a solid strategy for content distribution is critical.

[xyz-ihs snippet="Agency-Link"]

Strategies for Boosting Your Content Distribution

To capture today’s elusive audiences, you must rethink what it means to be a great marketer in a digital world. These five strategies can help your message resonate with the groups you want to reach:

  1. Maximize your SEO
    Test different keywords and buzz terms on different articles to see how far they stretch your SEO outreach. Without being too obnoxious or redundant, pepper them throughout every piece — in the title of the page, the headline of the article and the introduction. So search engines can bring you the audience who’s searching for exactly what you provide.
  2. Recycle your content
    Starting every piece of content you produce from scratch is a great way to waste time and energy. Some projects require 100 percent unique content, but not all. Keep a robust library of reusable content, and don’t be afraid to tweak previous work to fit today’s needs. Doing so allows your team to invest more time in the projects that really deserve it.
  3. Turn employees into advocates
    People trust other people, even if they happen to work for the company they’re promoting. An essential part of an effective word-of-mouth strategy is installing an employee advocacy program throughout your company. Happy employees make great brand ambassadors, so be sure to also make an internal investment in your distribution strategy.
  4. Provide social variety
    If you blanket the same messages in the same manner across Twitter, Facebook and any other social account your company uses, people will start to tune you out. Each channel has unique quirks and user demographics, so be sure to vary your topics and word choice across them. Further, consider posting your material to niche outlets to reach a smaller, yet more interested, group of people. For instance, if you provide products for classic cars, establish your presence on classic car forums and offer targeted incentives to users of those sites.
  5. Create interactive content
    Today’s audiences expect content to go beyond words on a page, so go out of your way to incorporate interactive components throughout your marketing material. Quizzes, surveys, games and clickable infographics are just a few ways to get your target demographic more involved with your message and excited by what you have to offer.

Takeaways

When employing these methods and testing new strategies, it’s crucial to collect data to analyze their success. Different metrics apply to different scenarios, but a few to keep an eye on include voice, engagement, traffic generation, conversions, and clicks.

Regardless of the metrics that best suit your campaigns, track them properly and analyze them continuously so your strategy can improve with your insights. Set goals and benchmarks, and then compete against them so your content marketing never stagnates.

The challenges of marketing today are greater than ever, but so are the opportunities. These five strategies can help you get the right material in front of the right people and make the most of your content distribution.

 

[xyz-ihs snippet="Hubspot-CTA-Leaderboard"]

As we move into 2016, it’s becoming clear that the terms “content marketing” and “social media marketing” are virtually synonymous. While content marketing certainly exists outside of social media, brands can no longer run effective content marketing campaigns without including popular networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Social Must be All-Encompassing

Before we dig into some platform-specific ideas, it’s important to remember that social media requires a full-fledged effort from content marketers. It can’t be something that you simply view in the context of the internet. If you’re going to grow your presence and maximize your content marketing strategy, you must focus on social in everything.

Whether it’s online or offline, you need to emphasize the importance of driving leads to these platforms. Give out business cards with QR codes to your social profiles. Tell people at networking events to add you on LinkedIn. Incorporate links into your email signature. Everything you do needs to revolve around driving people to your social platforms. Otherwise, your content marketing efforts won’t have an audience.

[xyz-ihs snippet="Agency-Link"]

Facebook

As Roxanne Somboonsiri, global business manager for Facebook APAC, mentions, social media has evolved from its humble beginnings. It’s no longer a place for simply connecting with friends. Social networking sites are living, breathing content sources.

“Facebook is a personalized newspaper,” Somboonsiri says. If you want to reach the modern consumer, you need to put your content in his newsfeed. While there’s certainly value to be extracted from content that’s distributed independently of Facebook, it’s becoming clear that Facebook shares provide a solid and sustainable foundation.

While Facebook doesn’t have the character limitations that Twitter does, you still don’t want to overwhelm users with long-form content. Posts with less than 250 characters see roughly 60 percent more engagement than those with more characters. It’s okay to link to longer blog posts, but keep the length of the content and calls-to-action you post to a minimum.

Twitter

The key to successful content marketing on Twitter is sharing images. Images increase retweets by 150 percent and are much more effective at grabbing a user’s attention. In fact, it’s not uncommon for users to completely skip over a tweet if it doesn’t contain an image.

When pursuing a Twitter content marketing strategy, it’s a good idea to invest your time and resources into strong image selection. You don’t necessarily want to let images guide your content, but it would be unwise to look at these two aspects independently.

Instagram

For content marketers, Instagram is perplexing. That’s because most content marketers aren’t super savvy at visual content marketing. This is about to change, though. The industry is clearly heading in the direction of more visual content and less text-based content, which means you need to study what successful brands are doing on Instagram and other similar social platforms.

Marketing consultant Brooke Ballard encourages content marketers to check out these five Instagram accounts. She says they do a great job of leveraging user-generated content, providing behind-the-scenes access, and avoiding cliché content like memes.

Ultimately, content marketing on Instagram is all about storytelling. How can you tell a story without using words? What images do you need to convey your message? It’s certainly an art form, but one that successful content marketers will need to hone in the coming months.

Social: The Heart of Content Marketing

At the very heart of content marketing is social media. If you want your strategies to be complete, focusing on effective distribution and traffic generation is a good place to start. These two aspects of content marketing can help you to maximize your returns and expose your brand to a larger market of consumers.

 

[xyz-ihs snippet="Hubspot-CTA-Leaderboard"]

Privacy PolicyCookie Policy
Privacy PolicyCookie Policy
linkedin facebook pinterest youtube rss twitter instagram facebook-blank rss-blank linkedin-blank pinterest youtube twitter instagram