About Me
Monday, June 20, 2016
Useful
information must be the center of your marketing strategy.
Around the world, there is a revolt
happening. The consumers are waking up to the fact that they have choices. The captive
audience of yesterday is fading away as broadcast and print media give way to
media on demand in a million different platforms. They skip ads with digital
recording and download media commercial free. Ad blockers even make the passive
pay per click ads of just a few years ago almost irrelevant.
Smart businesses see that the game
is changing. The marketing plans they used to rely on produce fewer and fewer
results. They are looking for a new way.
That’s where content marketing can
help.
But, the problem is, there are so
many definitions of content marketing it can be hard to determine what it is
exactly.
I define content marketing as a strategy built around the creation and distribution of intelligent, useful content that is written in a consistent voice and aimed at building a targeted audience, that can be convinced to become paying customers.
The purpose behind content marketing
is the attraction and retention of consumers for your goods and services. This
is achieved by building and sharing relevant content, with the express
purpose of altering, or increasing purchases of goods and services. With
content marketing, you are committing to an ongoing strategy, built into your
overall marketing scheme, designed to build media that you own, not buy time on
someone else’s platforms.
At its foundation, content marketing
is the art of conversation. It allows you to speak directly to a targeted
audience that wants or needs your products, without selling. It allows you to
market to them without interrupting their normal behavior. Rather than begging
or cajoling them into a purchase, you educate with relevant information your
customer is genuinely interested in. The central belief is this, people want to
learn, and if we can consistently provide them the opportunity to learn more
about things they love and are interested in, we can build trust and earn their
loyal business.
The good news is, it works!
Companies like Proctor and Gamble, Sysco, John Deere and Cisco are actively
using it to make millions! The concept is so simple, it can be scaled to suit a
multi-national conglomerate, or a locally owned corner store.
Looking for examples, here are five
that I really like!
- Coco-cola on Pinterest! https://www.pinterest.com/cocacola/ Early in their brand development, Coca-cola started using art to sell, until it became an American icon
- The Disney Parks Blog: https://disneyparks.disney.go.com/blog/ They share information about how to have more fun with your family, including, dropping more than a few hints about Disney parks.
- Go Pro on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/GoProCamera to showcase what their cameras can do, Go Pro curates user created video to inspire the next generation of users.
- Home Depot on Vine: https://vine.co/homedepot sharing tips through low budget, 15 second videos, Home Depot is making their brand accessible and helpful.
- IBM’s resources pages: http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/z/resources/ IBM clearly established their expertise in business machines and systems by compiling an impressive library of white papers, case studies and other helpful documents.
The beauty of content marketing is,
yours doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s and in fact, it shouldn’t.
Content
marketing is today and tomorrow!
Take another look at my definition
of content marketing, but this time don’t read intelligent and useful, instead,
just think “content”. This is what separates content marketing from trying to “sell”
with tons of information. I get sales pitches all the time, pretending to be
content marketing. Instead of feeling I’ve learned something, I generally hit
the “spam” button to make sure I don’t waste my time on their sales pitches
again. The idea that entertaining, engaging, informative content can also be a
sales tool is what makes it different! If your content marketing is good, it
makes people pause, and consider their choices, and hopefully changes their
actions in your favor, by getting them to buy from a trusted source, YOU!
Around the world, the thought
leaders and marketers are learning that this isn’t just an idea that is coming,
it’s here!
Great
content is a necessary ingredient in the marketing recipe
No matter how you like to market,
you should consider adding content marketing to the mix. It needs to be integrated,
not just added on. If you think about it, quality information, good content, is
a part of all marketing.
· Content strategy is at the heart of every good social media
campaign. You need to decide what your content will be, before you can publish
it.
- · Search Engine Optimization proves that if you share intelligent, engaging content, not only will consumers love it, but the search engines will help them find you.
- · In Public Relations strategies, the focus is not selling, but building a bridge between public interests and your brand.
- · Content is the central ingredient to Inbound Marketing. Without good content, what will you drive traffic to?
- It should be evident, but content strategy must be laid as a foundation to any marketing strategy. All marketing is built on content, every word, every image, every video, it’s all a part of the bigger picture.
The Content Marketing Flow
- Visitors come to your website, social media, or receive an email.
- Visitors become a lead when they give you contact information, allowing you to market directly to them
- You provide opportunities for leads to become educated, build trust in your products and services, turning them into qualified leads
- As your relationship progresses, sales messaging is introduced through offers, and your lead takes advantage of an opportunity to become a customer
- You supply high quality goods and services, turning your customer into a satisfied customer
- You retain and reservice your satisfied customers by offering them ongoing opportunities to engage with your products and services
- You upsell your customer to bigger and better products and services so that they become a loyal user
- Finally, your loyal users will tell friends and families about what your products and services have done for them, creating a "Brand Evangelist"
.
Picture this, you develop a killer
content marketing strategy that works so well, your customers not only open
your emails and read your posts, they look forward to it! They spend their time
consuming it, and they share it with their friends! (become brand evangelists,
as pictured above)
Now, imagine that happening with
your current marketing strategy, if you can’t it’s time to upgrade to a modern
method. I’d love to help.
- Content marketing new to you? I’d love to discuss what it could mean for your business and engage to help you develop or implement your strategy.
- Need a content strategy? Check out my step by step guide on developing a strategy, let me know if you have questions, or would like to discuss getting some help.
- Ready to start, but can’t do it yourself? Contact me for a free initial consultation and a proposal on getting your content marketing started ASAP!
Before you start your content
marketing, it’s important that you have a method for documenting your strategy’s
effectiveness.
Over the next few weeks, I’m going
to share the process of building your content marketing strategy. If you’d like
help, you can contact me at any time and I am happy to consult, or take on any
part of developing and producing your content. Next time, I’m going to give you
some important questions you should ask before you start to help you develop a
strategy with some parameters to help you gauge its effectiveness.
Friday, June 10, 2016
5 Reasons Being an Entrepreneur is Actually HARDER Than
Rocket Science
Whenever someone sets out to do anything in our modern
world, it’s almost inevitable that some idiot somewhere pipes in with “It’s not
rocket science”. For generations, Rocket Science and Brain Surgery have been
the hallmarks for determining if something requires mental acuity, or really,
should even be acknowledged as difficult. I think it’s bullshit, and here are
five reasons I think my job is tougher than theirs!
Entrepreneurs Don’t
Get to Follow Formulas
Sure, being a rocket scientist takes a lot of time,
dedication and education. I’m not trying to say it’s easy, because it’s not,
but, for the most part, the elements of the job haven’t changed. If anything,
technology has actually made the work easier. Oxygen is still H20, the distance
between our world and the stars remains the same, but my job is constantly
changing!
- · There are no real formulas for entrepreneurial success and anyone who says there is, lies!
- · Markets, products, audience, all are growing, morphing and disappearing at an ever-increasing rate.
- · Even the tools we use are changing almost daily. It’s like trying to cross a street with traffic coming from all directions, against a conveyor that runs towards you.
Of course, I jest. While many things have changed, the
basics of success in almost any endeavor in life are essentially the same as
they have always been. Build relationships, provide excellent service, sell a
great product at a fair price, repeat. We can get so mixed up in the ever
changing user interface, that we forget, the game is still the same.
Entrepreneurs Don’t
Get Paid for Mistakes
Science is a game of trial and error. Granted, a rocket
scientist that produces a long string of mistakes, that don’t lead to
innovation or success, won’t be paid forever, but a part of their job is
getting literally paid to fail! If you’ve ever been self-employed, you
understand this, no one pays entrepreneurs for their screw ups.
- · You still have to engage in the trial and error, but it’s mostly self funded and needs to be short lived if you expect to survive.
- · Learning to learn from other’s mistakes is critical, you don’t have enough time to make them all.
- · If you’re not earning, you’re not eating. In the entrepreneur game, there are rarely contracts that give us years, or even decades to sort out the fine details of a problem.
That being said, there’s a lot to gain from mistakes.
Sometimes mistakes teach us that we were headed down the wrong road entirely,
and lead us to success. Be prepared for the times when you work for free
because your profit is eaten up in correcting mistakes. Learn to minimize them
and laugh at them, and sometimes even turn them to your advantage.
Entrepreneurs Take
the Blame as Well as the Credit
In science, it is all about process. If a researcher follows
the established protocol, it’s rare you’ll hear about their responsibility for
a failure, even a colossal failure like blowing up a shuttle with astronauts on
board, will be chalked up to equipment or atmospheric problems. Not so when a
solopreneur screws up, it’s all your fault. There is rarely a “system” to fall
back on.
- · Clients and partners are often more ready to blame than praise. Learn to accept this and move on.
- · If you become defensive in failure, you’ll miss out on some great learning opportunities. Learn to evaluate, find and solve issues so they don’t repeat themselves.
- · By recording your efforts, measuring results and tracking outcomes, you can establish some parameters that will help minimize failure.
It’s okay. Honestly. I’d rather own my mistakes than not
have control over the solutions. When you are the cause of your failure, that
means you also hold the keys to creating success the next time. When someone
else controls your fate, that’s hard to do.
Entrepreneurs Can’t
Do Cost Overruns
We hear on a regular basis how this or that project was over
budget, but somehow it got finished and everyone kept their jobs. This is
almost never the case with
entrepreneurs. If you extend yourself beyond your ability to pay, that loan
belongs to you and you can only go so far before you’ll hit the end of your
ability to spend money you don’t have.
- · Cost overruns in entrepreneurship are also known as “pay cuts” usually for the boss first. We have to learn to watch expenses and income meticulously.
- · Running over budget can mean failure to deliver, or the need to sell valuable assets and tools to make right with a client.
- · Learning to estimate, bid and manage a project budget to avoid this issue is essential to your survival as a entrepreneur, something most rocket scientists don’t deal with directly.
You also get to be in control of cost saving measures, or deciding to take on new work to increase revenue, a
serious advantage over those that are part of a large institution or
enterprise. As an entrepreneur, you are directly in control of your expenses and income
and can often make choices not available in other situations to correct your
course and keep projects on track.
Entrepreneurs Aren’t
Tax Payer Funded
If I had my way, we wouldn’t fund nearly as many things as
we do with taxes. But, since I’m unlikely to ever run for office, that’s just
an opinion. For those in the research community, the support of being part of a
large government agency allows them the luxury of funding that cannot be
refused, unless someone wants to go to jail. It’s unlikely you have that kind
of iron-clad contracts with your clients as an entrepreneur.
- · Economic forces, competition and a million other factors can make a “sure thing” dry up and blow away in a minute.
- · Forecasting your future business can be a huge challenge as well, since it is up to you to attract, convince and service clients to produce revenue.
- · Since you don’t start your year with a guaranteed budget, gearing up to meet demand can be tough as well.
The old adage, expect the best and plan for the worst comes
to mind. While you certainly want to maintain a positive outlook, a certain
amount of pragmatism can help you keep from over extending yourself. In
entrepreneurial endeavors, too much can be as bad, if not worse, than not
enough. It’s a tight rope that we all willingly walk for the freedom it gives
us to live life on our own terms.
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