Tag Archives: content marketing

Conquering The World With Content Marketing

How content marketing worksHave you ever seen the movie, Finding Nemo? It’s about a fish named Marlin who was looking for his son, Nemo. One part of the movie caught my attention. Marlin was telling the turtles about his adventures while looking for Nemo. The story is so interesting that the turtles couldn’t help but talk about it to other sea creatures, passing the story on and on until it reached Nemo, who was inside a dentist’s aquarium that was half way across the world in Sydney!

That, my friend, is how content marketing will work for you.

It’s the present and future in marketing. Content marketing is creating and sharing material that is relevant to your customers and prospects. When done right, you are communicating to them without the need to sell. Although it’s basically promoting your product and service, it does not sound “salesy” as compared to other forms of marketing.

Who Can Use Content Marketing?

Everyone! From small and mid-size businesses to the biggest corporations in the world, this marketing strategy can do wonders.

More consumers favour scouring the Internet for information about products and services. TV shopping is next to dead, and so are newspaper advertisements. With the growing prices in basic commodities, spending for dailies is almost always out of the question.

Content Marketing

How Does This Work?

You create interesting and relevant material, someone reads and finds it compelling and shares it with his golf buddies, his colleagues, and his family. It won’t stop there. His golf buddy will tell more people, more co-workers. Well, you get my point.

Smart marketers actually keep their customers hungry for more information, making them feel that the company is doing them a favour by providing valuable products and services.

People talk about it and spread it around. Sounds familiar? Works like gossip, I know. But you have to those gossipers first. Or let them find you. Contrary to what you know about how big the world is, people can find you faster than Marlin can find Nemo. Seconds, in fact, if content promotion is done the right way.

What exactly is talk (and share) worthy material?

  1. Useful – You can’t expect them to talk about you and promote your brand if they feel that they don’t have any use for your products or services.
  2. Not “Salesy” – People hang up on telemarketers most of the time. If you create material that sounds very promotional, they’ll move on the next site.
  3. Relevant – Why write about water purification when your company is not selling water purification systems or even remotely involved with such? It does not make sense, right?
  4. Gives them proof – If you say you are the market leader, prove to them that you are ultimately the expert by providing valuable information, testimonials and statistics.

Where Does SEO Fit In?

I know Google will tell you that the Internet is made up of algorithms. But hey, algorithms do not look for you, people do. Google is just there to guide them in searching for you. That’s where Search Engine Optimisation comes in. An SEO and web design company can help you in this aspect. Aside from creating a remarkable website design for you, they can help you with relevant and valuable content and market your brand using effective e commerce solutions to make you Google ready and share-worthy.

Conclusion

Traditional marketing like 30-second television ads won’t work anymore. Even if you put it in print by handing out leaflets, your hard work will just end up in the garbage bin. Content marketing is becoming a must for small and big corporations because of its importance and how influential it can be. And if you publish content that’s simply arresting, you’ll have a significant number of Internet users buzzing.

By Debra Wright

Debra Wright enjoys a multi-hyphenated identity. She is an online marketing specialist, writer, cat lover, and aspiring cupcake critic. Wright’s articles about web designing and online marketing draws on her passion for learning and dedication to share her discoveries to others. Get updated on what she’s discovering now @debrawrites

Content Marketing – More Than Just Text

The hidden power of alternative content marketing

alternative content marketing

Content marketing is a very powerful tool. It can be used to bring in new customers, retain existing customers, and help your brand to establish its authority. All in all, content can do a great number of beneficial things for your brand when it is marketed correctly.

Beyond the blog

There is more to content marketing than simply posting in a blog. Content marketing extends far beyond basic text content – if you want to reach as much of your market as possible, you will need to explore alternative types of content marketing. With different types of content you can appeal to people with different learning styles and those who prefer to receive information from sources other than plain text.

Why alternative content rocks

alternative-content-ideasFor a visual learner there isn’t much that’s more difficult to get through than a wall of text, regardless of how much they need the information it contains. For someone who learns best when someone else is demonstrating a process, text isn’t going to do much good unless it is accompanied by images or a video of some kind.
Alternative content appeals to individuals like these as well as others with similar learning styles.
Examples of alternative content include:

    • Infographics – An alternative to typical text-based content, an infographic can provide consumers with a more visually appealing representation of the information that they need. Infographics are ideal for visual learners and are well-suited to instances where the information that needs to be shared can easily be illustrated by a knowledgeable professional.  Take for example the infographic below, the idea is to take a subject matter of expertise and create something unique and entertaining that has never been done before.

    • Videos – Videos can attract consumers and can be used alone as well as in combination with test, images, and more. Videos appeal most to visual and auditory learners because they can simultaneously show and explain an idea. Video marketing is very popular, and there are even video search engines (think YouTube) to help locate just the right video for your needs.

Video: Why Use Video Marketing?

Alternative content allows you to diversify the content that you offer and broaden your brand’s appeal by reaching out to a wider audience. There is no more need to worry about alienating anyone by not providing the right kind of content; now you can build your audience with as much content as you can afford to create.

Your takeaway

your-takeaway-bags
In the early days of the internet there were no alternatives to plain text. The most that could be done at the time was basic formatting; text could be bold, italic, or underlined. Lists could be made, and text could be separated by headings and subheadings, but that was the extent of a brand’s ability to make their content stand out and be easier to consume.
Fast forward to today and there are so many more options than the early founders of the web might have ever dreamed of.
Now is the perfect time to invest in an alternative form of content and see where the experience will take you and your customers – who knows what your first infographic or video series will bring to your brand?

infographic-about-infographics_5089d6abbf593

Our guest blogger, Kris Dietz, loves creating something amazing then spreading the word about it! My mission is to develop and mold SEO into an amazing outlet of sharing valuable resources. I enjoy networking and meeting like-minded individuals.

Importance Of Updating Your Website’s Content

Importance Of Updating Your Website's Content

Making a well written, organized and efficient website is a vital element in online marketing and it can make or break a website. It doesn’t matter when a website was created, what matters is how fresh, up to date and accurate the content is.

The Internet plays a very significant role in the lives of many individuals. In the span of 10 years, the internet has gone from being a novelty, to becoming a vital tool in  everyone’s life.  Some people even use it to order groceries, while others connect with friends and family members. For some it helps to earn cash while others use it to pay bills. It is clear that the Internet is a very dynamic and ever changing and evolving tool.  Therefore, it’s imperative that frequent website maintenance must be implemented so your visitors get the best content and user experience.

The Importance of Updating Your Website’s Content

On every website there are about two kinds of content: that is the one that is dynamic and the one that is static. Static content includes some things like, contact pages, FAQ’s, and About Us, whereas dynamic ones include the blog or news section. Dynamic content is supposed to be occasionally updated and therefore should be of high quality every time. The same is true of static content, however it does not require frequent maintenance.

During a website’s content update, it is important to make sure that the content is always fresh and relevant and personally crafted. Most new search algorithms require that content be fairly drafted for someone’s eye instead of search spiders.  For this reason more emphasis should be put on original, high quality content that is never limited to ‘keyword’ terms, but rather it should also include infographics, citations as well as videos.

If a webmaster doesn’t make updates for a certain period of time, it will not be able to compete within it’s market. This means lower search visibility, a lower ranking on Google and, thus, less exposure to potential clients.

Therefore, getting multiple people to take care of your blog can be a way to maintain and keep your content fresh on net.  You will encounter times that people you hire to write content for you don’t write the best all the time, or they make some errors in judgement, grammar or spelling but you’ll still be seen on the net and being seen and making mistakes once in a while is part of growing and being human.  A good client will appreciate that, whereas a neurotic client that thinks you must be perfect all the time is not the one you want anyhow.

This guest post was written by Ludwing a programmer and web developer in New York. Zinzzchat Founder. Application that helps people share their favorite blogs and websites. Follow @LudwingNY.

Seven Tips For Engaging And Traffic Generating Content

content marketingWebsites tend to be the first place that your customers turn to in order to find the information about your company, products or services that they want. Most businesses today know that having an online presence is important, which is why most companies today have a website.

Along with simply having a website, the content on your website is important. You need to make sure that your site contains information that your audience wants, and you also want to make sure it includes the information that will give you a better chance at having a solid SEO strategy.

In order to create the best possible content for your website, you need to implement the following tips.

1. Be concise.

Internet users don’t have hours to spend reading the content on your website, so don’t bombard them with long pages full of copy. In fact, if a reader believes that your content is too long, they’re not going to stay and read what you have to say. Make sure that your content is clear and concise. Don’t write fluff copy. Instead, stick to the point, and give your readers exactly what they want.

2. Use headers.

Most Internet users will scan websites before deciding whether or not they’re going to read the copy. This is why it’s extremely important to use headers on your website. This allows you to break your content up into appropriate sections and allows your readers to easily find what it is that they’re looking for.

3. Format appropriately.

The format of your content is important. If your content is formatted in a way that allows your readers to find information in a clear and easy way, it’s going to attract them to your site. Be sure to keep your paragraphs short, use bullet points when appropriate, and always bold your headings. The better your content is formatted, the more attractive it will be for your audience.

4. Stay active.

Your readers are scanning your content in real time, so make sure that you are always using active voice and calls to action to help your audience stay interested in your content and stay on your site.

5. Proofread your work.

The last thing you want to do is work hard on content, publish it, and find that you have spelling or grammatical mistakes. Make sure that you are always proofreading your work before you launch it live on your site. Have other people read through the content to ensure it’s perfect, and even use a spelling and grammar checker like Grammarly grammar check online tool to help ensure your content is complete and error free.

6. Add content to all pages.

Search engine crawlers will look at every web page that has content, so in order to give your website the best advantage for being ranked on search engines, you want to make sure you have content on every page. Even a sentence or two can help boost your site’s rankings.

7. Don’t forget about your images.

Images and videos on your site should have alt tags that contain content. These items are also scanned by search engines, so adding keywords to these videos and images will help your site’s SEO strategy.

Our Guest Blogger – John Martinez is a marketer and freelance writer currently living in San Francisco. John loves teaching interactive marketing and SEO techniques.