The following post was initially published on the Content Marketing Institute Blog (October 11, 2011) and Marketing Trenches (November 2011).
“Uh oh,” you may be thinking. “The marketing department is talking about that whole blogging thing again. Last time we did this, it was a disaster. Worse, no one seemed to like my posts.”
Yikes! Stop right there! And think again!
Yes, a lot of corporate blogs are awful. But neither your company’s blog nor the posts you contribute to should bear a sense of impending doom. We spend a lot of time helping clients manage their blogs. This involves bringing together subject matter experts, sales reps, marketing employees, and executives — many of whom have unique ideas but have never written a blog post.
One of the first questions we get from new bloggers is, “What makes a good blog post?“ As we answer, the doom drifts out of the room and is replaced by the glowing light of nurturing leads and increasing sales. Cha-ching!
We thought we’d share our answer with our readers here.
1. Good blog posts speak to a target audience.
Figure out who is buying what you’re selling and write for them. If your company specializes in building mobile applications, you’re likely selling to executives and marketing departments, not mobile app developers. Your own developers can still write content for your blog, but they should keep content way less technical than it would be if they were writing to their peers.
The following post was initially published on the Content Marketing Institute Blog (September 15, 2011) and Marketing Trenches
At Right Source Marketing, we get a lot of questions about where to allocate content marketing resources. On blog posts? Webinars? eBooks? The possibilities can be overwhelming. Yet knowing how to allocate resources is essential to successful content marketing. Even though the USDA’s food pyramid has transitioned to a food plate, content marketers would do well to consider a pyramid concept for balancing their use of the many content formats they use. While every content marketing program is different, I’ve created the below chart to show the basic portions of content that should keep most content marketing programs healthy and happy.
The base: Curation, creativity, and coordination
These three concepts form the base of the pyramid because without all of these elements your content marketing efforts will fail. Here’s what I mean:
Content curation: You’ve probably heard content marketing referred to as “thought leadership.” To be a thought leader, you’ve got to know what everyone else is saying, make sense out of it, and then add something original to the conversation. This means your entire content team will need to spend time reading industry blogs, following industry hashtags on Twitter, and keeping their eyes open for new ideas and trends. Sometimes, this research and reading doesn’t seem to accomplish much, but without soaking in industry content it’s hard to create anything notable yourself.
This post originally appeared on Marketing Trenches.
Creating content for a company’s social media properties, website, and blog (just to start the list) can be tough–and without a thorough understanding of the company and its audience, it’s hard to get it right. Whether you’re taking on a new client or starting a new job, you need to ask a lot of questions before you dive into creating content. Every business is different, so at Right Source Marketing, we never ask exactly the same questions for each new client, but below are a few of our staples.
Note: even if you’ve been working for a company or with a client for a while, you may realize that you don’t know the answers to these questions, or that the answers have changed since you started. It’s a good idea to reevaluate and periodically ask these questions again, even if you’re just asking yourself.
1. What’s your audience like? Who are these people who buy your stuff? What age, what gender? Where do they work? Where do they play? What’s important to them personally and professionally? What do they already love about your business? What do they hate about it?
Keep asking questions to get as full a picture of your audience as possible. If no one can answer this question, then you need to do some research (like a survey), or bring someone who would know in the room (like a salesperson). Knowing details about what makes your audience tick helps you figure out what topics to cover and language to use. We start with this question because all of the other questions and answers should be colored by a focus on audience.
This post originally appeared on Marketing Trenches.
Improving your skills in email communications improves your content marketing efforts, and vice versa, as an audience member (nonprofit technology consultant Kate Bladow) pointed out after a presentation I gave about writing for the web last week.
I couldn’t agree more. To follow on Kate’s point, here are five best practices to think about when you’re communicating with an audience, whether you’re organizing a team or writing for the company blog.
In the spirit of shark week, I, an accomplice to a fishing team that brought in two sharks at Bethany Beach, in Delaware (ok, I watched and shrieked), will take you through the steps of catching a shark, at least as it pertains to Bethany. This is the method of brave fishermen Travis Gold (that’s my not-so-baby brother), Ben Schneider, and Owen Smith. So far, they’ve caught two sharks that are over 6 ft, and several smaller sharks.
Don’t believe me? Check this out:
Before we begin, a disclaimer: I will not be held responsible for any loss of life or limb. And you might want to at least consult a true expert, not just an accomplice, before you try this at home.
Without further ado:
Shock and disgust: the reaction I’m used to getting from friends who live in the DC area when they find out that I, lover of live music as I am, have never been to DC’s 9:30 Club. No more can they scorn me, because last night, my 9:30 Club virginity was taken by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, and it couldn’t have been a more lovin’ affair.
Before, I was a casual fan of their hits—you may know “Janglin” from the Ford Fiesta commercial featuring the song—but didn’t know or care much for the rest of their music. Yet, with 10 band members, and special guests occasionally accompanying them, these wild haired hippies know how to lay down a show.
The show was not without its suspense. While waiting for tickets, we all saw Jade Castrinos, one of the band’s leads, climb into a cab, looking characteristically jolly. We checked our watches and wondered where she was going off to 30 minutes before the show was supposed to start. The tension built up as we waited for the show to start. Sure enough, the show was delayed about 30 minutes on account of a missing Jade.