Content Marketing Today

Social media marketing is a trend, not a fad.  Moreover, it's a terrific extension of your content marketing strategy.

What’s clear from current research is that when we evaluate social media, we are not talking about the marketing longevity equivalent of the hula hoop or the Lambada. Social media marketing is here to stay.  If you are not already active in venues such as a business blog, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Slideshare, and YouTube, you should be asking yourself whether it's way past time to jump in with both virtual feet. The answer to the question is yes with an important caveat… …Before making the commitment to one or many possible social media outlets, it is vital to determine whether:

• you understand the target audience that you intend to reach
• you have something valuable to communicate to that target audience
• you have someone with the time, skill, and enthusiasm to execute a consistent social media program--either inside or outside your organization
• you will make the time to listen and respond to your social media audience.

There is nothing sadder than a business blog whose most recent post was a year ago. And, there is nothing less impressive than a Facebook fan page with only a few fans and hardly any messages to or from those fans. Yes, social media can be an extremely effective marketing tool. But, you will need to make a serious company commitment to ensure that it is effective for your organization. Read More

 

Image hazel.estrada via Flickr CC

[This is a perfect example of what John is discussing. We have curated his post via Scoop.It.]

Written by John Jantsch

You need lots of content, you know that, but you also know that content creation is one of the more time intensive marketing activities you have to tackle.

While you do need to create your own content as the foundation for your total content and teaching strategy, you can – and should – supplement your content with that from other people.

One of the best services marketers can provide these days is to act as a filter for all that’s being produced out there and aggregate the best of the best on behalf of our communities. Read More

Content Marketing Beats Social Media

A report from BlogHer suggests that tech businesses targeting American women can be most effective with blog content marketing. Read More

  Get content. Get customers.,has now sold more than 10,000 copies in its hardcover, paperback, and eBook editions.

Even though Joe Pulizzi and I wrote and updated it in the early stages of the content marketing revolution, our book’s vital lessons and detailed case studies are just as valid and valuable today. The range of organizations that we analyzed extended from huge multibillion dollar public companies to midsize companies with a few hundred employees and even to very small single owner organizations.

If you haven’t yet read Get Content Get Customers, we know that you will want to run out and buy the book because it is chock-full of content marketing knowledge that you can put to work immediately.

But, just to wet your content marketing whistle, here are the top 10 takeaways we gleaned from some brilliant content marketing practitioners. These represent the themes that we recognized again and again as we examined how organizations are putting content marketing to work.

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Beautiful blog design and compelling, relevant content by historical novelist Catherine Delors.

This is one of the best websites I've seen from a novelist. It brings us deeper into the 18th century period about which she writes. The engaging content and simple, but elegant style are a perfect match. Kudos to Catherine.

More about Catherine and how her writing journey may inspire budding authors:

Catherine Delors was born and raised in France. She graduated from the University of Paris-Sorbonne School of Law and became the youngest member of the Bar of Paris at the age of twenty-one. She later moved to the United States and passed the California Bar. She worked at a few large American law firms before setting up a solo practice following the birth of her son. She now splits her time between London and Paris, while remaining a partner in an international law firm based in Los Angeles. Her second novel, For The King, was published in July 2010. Catherine is currently writing on a third novel, a prequel to Mistress of the Revolution. She is also researching a fourth one, which shall revolve about Jane Austen and her French connections.

For those of us who are authors--or would-be authors, she traces her journey from unpublished to published:

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Via Scoop.it - Content Marketing Now

From the Hubspot Blog, by Karen Rubin

HubSpot launches a free new tool to help you evaluate and improve the effectiveness of your entire marketing program.

Since 2006, HubSpot's award-winning free tool, Website Grader, has graded more than 4 million websites. Website Grader has given marketers advice on how to improve many aspects of their websites and encouraged millions to bring their website presence to the next level, all for free. But now the time has come to replace Website Grader! A lot has changed since 2006, and these days, marketing is about much more than just your website. Read More

Content Marketers Can Deliver Great Information Products to a Targeted Customer Base

Fortune 500 companies have long had the technological resources and investment capital required to build sophisticated content marketing solutions—and to manage huge amounts of demographic data relating to their prospects and customer bases. Many of these firms, such as Best Buy, Proctor & Gamble, Microsoft, and Amazon.com, probably know more about us than some of our relatives do. They also do a terrific job of delivering relevant and compelling content to different segments of their prospect bases.

Smaller companies, however, have had to rely on media companies to deliver their message to their targeted buyers . This has certainly been true with print publications and, until  recently, online as well. Affordable technology is now changing all of the rules.

Just a few years ago, it would have been laughable to imagine that a very small organization could create and maintain a Web site that could be updated daily—and that would allow visitors to interact and even buy products and services. Today, this is not only possible but pervasive. In fact, a 10-person company may be able to outmarket a 10,000-person company in a carefully chosen niche.

There are four core components underlying the shift in the technological balance of power away from media giants and toward companies of all sizes:

• The ability to create sophisticated online publications such as Web sites, digital magazines, and e-newsletters
• The ability to manage huge amounts of data relating to current and future customers
• The ability to leverage social media to engage targeted customers
• The ability to do each of these simply and inexpensively

 

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George Bowers Grocery Makes a  Fun 1 to 1 Connection That's Impossible for the Big Chain to Match

The right niche and the right approach enable a two-person company to outshine a retailing giant on Facebook. That's true of George Bowers Grocery in Staunton Virginia where owners Katie McCaskey and Brian Weidman have created a delightful grocery store that focuses on high-quality foods and other specialty products.

The couple knew they could not compete head-to-head with the local Kroger supermarket in their community. Instead they have captured the spirit of the original 19th-century owner as a provider of "staple goods & fancy groceries."

They offer wonderful local meats, cheeses, wines, and craft beers as well as a variety of specialty items. They target the diverse mix of neighborhood residents, local food enthusiasts, and culinary tourists each with their own distinctive interests and needs. The atmosphere of the store itself is an eclectic blend of the old-fashioned and the modern.

And, they have a lot of fun with their marketing, in person and online.

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Simply Combine the Two Online Personalities to Get a Very Happy Ending

The frightening story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde wove the tale of a saintly doctor whose alter ego was an evil murderer. Sadly, there was no happy ending.

In a parallel but more modern context, I found a company that suffers from a similarly split online personality.

If you first meet the good half—the blog, you will want to spend more time getting to know them. But, if you first meet the bad half—the website, you're likely to head off as fast as you can.

The company in question has a website with very little content. At the same time, it has an excellent but completely separate blog, that lives, like Dr. Jekyll, under a different name.

By integrating the two separate content components, this company could deliver compelling content that immediately engaged visitors. The result: a happy ending.

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[Updated Version]

If any self-described search engine expert tells you that comments like the following actual example will get you SEO-friendly links back to your blog or website, I suggest you neither pay for nor follow their advice:

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