Content Marketing Today

Unless You Address This Top of Mind, Unspoken Question, You are Out of the Game

Imagine for a moment, that you are looking out at a hoard of your customers in an actual or virtual audience and that each and every one of them is wearing a hat.

And, on each and every hat, are the words "so what?"

Essentially, that's what they're thinking when you are talking, sending them an e-mail, inviting them to your website, sharing an eNewsletter, mailing them a brochure or presenting them with an advertisement.

Classic Truths about Skeptical Customers Remain Modern Business Realities

More than 50 years ago,  McGraw-Hill created an ad that became legendary in the decades to follow  among business-to-business marketers--and among those folks like me who were selling advertising to those skeptical business executives.

As you can see above, the print advertisement featured the ultimate skeptical prospect who says:

• I don't know who you are.
• I don't know your company.
• I don't know your company's product.
• I don't know what your company stands for.
• I don't know your company's customers.
• I don't know your company's record.
• I don't know your company's reputation.

Now, what was it you wanted to sell me?

In a single powerful page, McGraw-Hill made the case for business-to-business print advertising.  I used this on countless presentations because it makes the point so simply and eloquently with its visual representation of one very hard-nosed customer.  He is one tough cookie, who is absolutely not predisposed to accept what you have to say at face value.

If Your Visitors Have To Search for It, They Won't.

I continue to be surprised by the number of marketing and advertising companies who have websites that hide examples of the great work that they do behind a bunch of content clichés that fail to distinguish them from every other similar company. 

I recently stumbled upon the website of such a company who is missing its primary content marketing opportunity. They have great stuff, but it's really hard to find.

Content marketing is all about providing relevant, compelling, and easily accessible information to your prospective customers.

In this case, what is genuinely relevant and compelling is the work that this agency has done on behalf of of its clients. That  visual content represents potential solutions to the problems that its Web visitors are facing.Unfortunately, the content that counts is lurking behind some same old, same old verbiage.

Another Excellent Infographic Offers Content Marketers a First Baby Step to Findability

Courtesy of PPCBlog.com

If you're in business today, you have to be on the Internet.  But, being there is barely a beginning.

Once you are on the Internet, it's vital that your potential customers can find you and your content by searching on Google and other search engines. That’s what SEO is all about.

Before Fretting about SEO, First Get a Clue About How Google Works from PPCBLOG’s Infographic

When They Learn How Hard It is to Do It Well,  They Will Turn to You as the Trusted Solution Provider of Choice

If you provide professional or other  services, you and your organization must be expert at what you do. Therefore, with your advice and instruction, your customers can learn to install their own wall-mounted TVs, organize their own closets, create their own business plans or optimize their own sites for search engines, etc., etc.

You might wonder why you’d want to offer that invaluable assistance at no charge. Wouldn’t you be working yourself out of a job by teaching them to do what you do so very well?  Here’s why I think you don’t have to worry.

Even small companies can make a news splash by emulating these best practices on PR Web

The iPad is the new computing superstar with 2 million units sold in 2 months. As a result, plenty of small companies are benefiting from the apps they have developed for the new tablet computer. Within this new environment, startups can thrive by creating unique and usable software applications that enable iPad users to be more productive.

Todo from Appigo is one such app. It's a very intuitive application that helps users manage to-do lists, tasks, and projects on their iPad. Because the iPad is hot news, great apps are potentially newsworthy, too. Unfortunately, there are plenty of competitive choices even at this early date.

How, then, can this one small player stand out from the crowd?

Why An Effective Content Strategy is Fundamental to Effective Content Marketing

We hope you're a firm believer in the value of content marketing. If so, you know how important it is to deliver relevant and valuable content to your most important current and prospective customers. With that understanding, you are ahead of the game.

However, it is vital to incorporate a content strategy process so that you can deliver on the full promise of content marketing.

Content strategy is the kissing cousin of content marketing. As Wikipedia defines it, content strategy is "the practice of planning for content creation, delivery, and governance" and "a repeatable system that defines the entire editorial content development process for a website development project."   If you don’t have an online content strategy, it’s high time you begin work on developing one to keep your content marketing on target.

Thanks to two info-packed days I spent at the April 2010 Content Strategy Forum, I’d like to give you a head start. The Forum provided a wealth of insights on developing and deploying the right process to transform your content marketing vision into a reality that delivers bottom-line results.

Here are the top 10 takeaways on the how-to's of content strategy:

Why That Very First Impression is Vital to Your Content Marketing Strategy

Your website may be chock full of terrific content that is both relevant and compelling to your ideal target customers. But, you won’t have a chance to share that content unless you communicate  instantaneously that you provide the precise solutions they are desperately seeking.

Your visitors are the potential customers for whom you have developed your content.  But those visitors won’t root around in the hope of buried treasure. They have neither the time nor the inclination to guess whether you understand their needs and how you can help them.  That’s why you have to engage them them immediately on their arrival on your site.

A Quick Guide to Getting Started with this Essential Social Media Tool

Thanks to content marketing maven, Beth Hrusch of Interact Media for this great guest post.

Marketing your small business with Facebook sounds like a lot of fun and a great idea—until it hits you.  You really have no clue how to do it.  Sure you’ve heard of it, and people are certainly on board (some with remarkably good results).  But, getting started can be intimidating, maintenance is scary and how do you measure returns, anyway?

So, now you know how your parents felt when confronted with email.  Don’t worry.  One of the great things about social media for marketing is the fact that it gives small businesses some of the advantages once enjoyed by large corporations with big marketing budgets—namely, tremendous reach and measurable results.   And, you can play around with it until you find the way to use it that works best for you.  And it’s cheap.

If you want to start marketing your small business with Facebook, here are a few pointers:

Plenty Has Changed from 1960 to 2010 but What Is Most Important Has Stayed the Same.

If you're not already a fan of the TV classic in the making, Mad Men, it's all about the Madison Avenue ad agency world of the early 1960s. There was plenty of drinking, smoking, and carrying on. But, there was plenty of great, and surprisingly timeless, marketing taking place, too.

Most of you probably are not old enough to remember when housewives really did wear shirtwaist dresses to do housework, when color TV was just beginning to take hold, when JFK  had just promised a man on the moon, and when a lot of famous brands were invented or enhanced by the ad agency Mad Men in the title.  That may have been a long time ago, but we can still learn some timeless content marketing truths from one wonderful segment.

In a Mad Men segment about the creation of the Kodak Carousel the roots of content marketing shine through when lead character, Don Draper, makes it clear that building a brand is all about storytelling and engaging the consumer--and not about technology or the company itself.