Content Marketing Today

Cool company uses videos to explain complicated concepts for its customers.

Common Craft is a very small company with a very big idea.  And, it is one that you can emulate easily and inexpensively.

To understand what they do, think for a moment about the current generation of UPS television commercials. These uniquely simple UPS commercials use drawings to explain complex supply-chain concepts. 

UPS is big enough and wealthy enough to afford unbelievably expensive television advertising.  They could have gone with a cast of thousands, elaborate outdoor shots, and expensive spokespeople.  Instead, they offer commercials that are content rich.  They understood that their customers almost certainly did not understand many of the concepts and practices behind their ability to get packages exactly where they needed to be, when they needed to be there, anywhere in the world.  To make the complex simple they use animated drawings that perfectly illustrate a variety of supply chain and logistics concepts.  This content is powerful because it makes customers believe that UPS understands its business so well that it can explain even the most complicated process in a very simple way.

You may not be a fan of Bob Barr or of the Libertarian political persuasion.  Nonetheless, there is a lot to like about his WordPress driven website,BobBarr2008.com.  There is also a lot to learn about his effective use of an online content marketing strategy to spread the word and to raise money.

Barr's site illustrates how flexible WordPress can be as a tool for building out a full-fledged website. It also illustrates how an effective online content marketing strategy might be able to take a candidate from relative obscurity and little funding to someone who might be taken seriously on the national stage.

Barr, a former Republican congressman from Georgia, recently announced that he is running for president of the United States as a libertarian.  In pre-Internet days, such a candidacy would have gained no traction whatsoever.  Raising campaign funds would have been a prohibitively expensive proposition. Moreover, telling his story to a nationwide audience would have been virtually impossible.

Excellent Book Tells us Why Storytelling is So Important. 

You should apply its lessons as you invent and reinvent your content marketing strategy.

We all have heroes. Garrison Keillor, creator of the Prairie Home Companion, is one of mine. Why? He is the best storyteller on the planet. Until recently, I hadn't made the connection between what Garrison Keillor does so well and the business world we all inhabit. The Story Factor by Annette Simmons pulls it all together.

Annette is a consultant with roots in major corporations. In 1992, she attended a bucolic southern storytelling event that reshaped her thinking about making an impact within a business context. She believes that facts may be important, but they don't make the difference.

As she puts it, "People don't want more information. They are up to their eyeballs in information. They want faith-faith in you, your goals, your success, in the story you tell. It is faith that moves mountains, not fact."

Stephanie Diamond lays bare mysteries of online marketing for small business executives.

Hyperbole?  Maybe.  But, this is a terrific book.

Marketing is probably the biggest challenge for small business owners and executives.  We typically spend so much time running the business day to day that establishing and maintaining a marketing focus just doesn't happen.  The accelerating pace of Internet marketing change makes it all that much more challenging. 

Happily, Stephanie Diamond has written that rare book which both forces us to think in new and different ways about marketing issues--and simultaneously provides a detailed roadmap so that we can put those thoughts into action. Once you have finished the book, you will be ready to develop and deploy a successful Web marketing strategy. 

Her new book, Web Marketing for Small Businesses, is a much-needed addition to the literature of online marketing.  This book enables us first to grasp complex concepts and then to put them into practice with easy to follow steps.  Even solopreneurs will find significant value in Stephanie's book.  I know that I have already begun to implement several of the strategies about which she writes so knowledgeably.

We were delighted to learn that we had achieved the number four spot in Junta42's second top 42 content marketing blog list. 

Even better, we have moved up two places from our number six ranking in the first research study.  This is particularly gratifying because we've only been blogging since October 2007. 

Even more surprising, perhaps, is that I was not even using the term "content marketing" until about this time in 2007.

Best of all, we are honored to be in such great company with so many well-known and highly respected bloggers.

Junta42 made the announcement on May 6, 2008 noting that they had selected from more than 100 blogs specialize in the field of content marketing.  The list was reviewed by their team of custom-content experts who made their choice from some of the best-known marketing blogs as well as many lesser-known blogs that are just beginning to stake a claim to marketing authority.

Whether you have already developed and deployed a content marketing strategy or whether you are still in the planning stage, you should seriously consider how to extend the reach of your core content product.

For example, let's suppose you have decided to create a quarterly print magazine that targets an important audience segment.  You will need to spend a significant amount of time and effort in generating the content that will make this magazine relevant and valuable to its readers.  That is obviously critical.  But you can do even more.

After all, the print magazine has a finite reach.  Think beyond print.  Think beyond the magazine.  You can dramatically increase the impact of your content marketing by thoughtful repurposing of the information and resources you developed in order to create the magazine itself.

Here are 15 great ways to extend the reach of your content far beyond the circulation of that print publication.  Many of these involve little or no incremental expense while offering dramatically improved incremental impact.

That is either terrific news or horrendous news for your company.

It really depends on your approach to online marketing.  I was alerted to this somewhat counterintuitive idea by a great eNewsletter from Stephanie Miller.  While she writes about e-mail marketing, the implications apply across the board in terms of how you connect with your customers online.

She quotes a study from Sirius Decisions: "Selling now takes more time and resources than ever before.  The sales cycle has become 22% longer as buyers are taking longer to consider their decisions.  Plus, buying is being managed more professionally."

Here's a quick three question quiz.

Give the home page of this website a 10 second review (no cheating--you can't look at any interior pages). Then answer the following questions:

1. Who are their target customers?
2. What product or service are they selling?
3. How can those products or services solve customer problems?

Here's the best I could do:

1. Somebody in public transit
2. Some kind of technology relating to transit operations management
3. I have no idea.

Actually, I was probably cheating because I spent more time looking at the site before I decided to write this post.  So I might not have picked up both one and two in a quick look at the site. 

The 5 Most Important Lessons He Learned about Blogging Success

My pal, content marketing mentor, and book-writing partner, Joe Pulizzi is celebrating his 1st year in the blogging business with his Junta42.com blog.  I would wish him many happy returns, but that might be superfluous since he is already getting plenty of happy returns from his devotion to quality content that he delivers with regular frequency.

In fact, I can thank Joe for introducing me to the world of blogging--and to the joys of book authorship as well. I can also attest that my blog has been a source of new colleagues, new friends, and new business.  It doesn't happen overnight, that's for sure. But, if you are consistent, quality-focused, and patient, you will achieve tangible benefits from your blog.

How can you replicate Joe's success? 

Here are quick takes on the top 5 lessons he learned after 100 posts--and has relearned and expanded upon in subsequent months that led up to the 1st Blogiversary:

The problem: A great Southwest Florida company with a mediocre website.

The solution: Use a content marketing approach that pulls visitors in and offers them solutions to their insurance challenges.

Many of us rant and rave about big insurance companies, their irritating bureaucracies, their frustrating approach to claims payment, and their frequent unwillingness to insure us when we really need insurance.  But, I'm willing to bet that however we feel about the insurance giants, most of us also count on our local insurance agents to give us reliable advice and assistance whenever we need it.

GulfShore Insurance is one such reliable company.  This Naples-based firm has an excellent reputation and has grown steadily over the past 38 years.  Gulfshore could be even more effective by making some basic but important changes to its website. 

Here is a list of opportunities for significant content marketing improvement: