Nine Content Marketing Ideas That Work Every Time

Posted in Content Marketing, Infographics, Podcasts, Slideshare

Setting up a blog, and then posting articles regularly is apparently the key to success. Everyone is doing it, but from my experience the results are mixed. First of all, there are some boring industries, where it is very hard to come up with interesting content ideas. Then, even if you manage to create insightful content, it may get drowned into the Ocean of Content that flows throughout the Internet every day.

I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that over 2 million blog posts are created each day. If that is true, it means that you may need to compete with thousands of industry related articles each day. So how do you make your content stand out?

1. Begin by segmenting your audience. It is very difficult to address all the problems in your industry, even though, I’ll admit it, it is very tempting to do so. You are trying to get as many clients as possible, after all! But the reality is that by segmenting your audience, you are narrowing down your content, focusing on the actual problems that your potential customers have.

segmenting your industry

Find out the perfect industry segment, and then learn everything there is to know about their problems, their pain points, their desires, the things that appeal to them, and keep them awake at night. Then, start writing outstanding content, or hire somebody to do it for you.

2. Having great content is only the first step. What should you do next? Try to beautify your content, presenting it in a delightful, easy to understand, attractive way. This means formatting it properly and adding lots of attractive visuals to it. Insert an image every few text paragraphs. But don’t just put an image for the sake of it! That image should have a purpose, and provide useful information.

data-charts

Often times, you can create great looking graphs using Excel. They are quick to create, and there are also several online services that will help you build them within minutes. And to top it all, most of these services are 100% free!

3. Create high-quality infographics every now and then. People love infographics, so they will gladly spend time staring at your infographic, rather than reading those long, boring blocks of text.

4. Yes, you will have to create some videos as well. Website visitors are seven times more likely to spend time on your website if they can find a video on a page. I know, it’s a worrying statistic, but these are the kind of people that we will have to deal with from now on. People have much shorter attention spans these days, so we have to offer them information in an attractive, entertaining format.

5. Sometimes you will suffer from blog writer’s block. If this happens, you can either avoid writing that day, or – my recommendation – curate some content from one of the top industry websites. Even websites like Reddit can serve as solid sources of information, offering you lots of unique content ideas.

6. If you are selling similar products or services, create comparison tables for them. You will help your potential customers learn more about your merchandise, and you will also add a valuable content piece to your arsenal. Here’s a good example from Data Alliance.

product-comparison-tables

If you compare your product with one or more competitor products, always be fair and highlight both their cons and pros.

7. Okay, so now we have gotten some high-quality content in our hands. The next step is to promote it everywhere it is possible. Slideshare is often times an overlooked resource, and pretty much any piece of content can be repurposed into a presentation, which can then be uploaded to this powerful website.

8. Then, share the content using your social media channels. Contact the industry influencers and ask them to share your content with their followers. If it’s got great quality, some of them will do it. Talk about free exposure!

9. Convert your content to audio, and then create a podcast out of it. This way, people will be able to download your content and listen to it while they’re driving, for example. To make your audio content attractive, run your own show, but be sure to interview customers and industry experts every now and then.

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Seven Creative Ideas That Will Boost Your Online Business

Posted in Business Growth, Pinterest, QR Codes, Twitter

I know you’ve been there: you are staring at a blank Word page, and you’re thinking what you should do to get your online business a little boost. Should you write a new article? Or maybe post an update on your Facebook page? What about Twitter? It looks like other businesses get lots of active social media fans, but this hasn’t worked that well for you so far. If thoughts like these sound familiar, take a look at these fresh business promotion tips – some of them may be a perfect fit for your company.

Twitter isn’t growing as fast as is used to, but this doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t continue to use it. In fact, some recent Twitter research suggests that this social media giant is the perfect spot to connect with your audience, especially if you consider the fact that it has lots of users pretty much anywhere in the world.

twitter-user-base

So try to incorporate Twitter into your daily routine. Maybe you’ve just printed some new business cards; if this is the case, why not post a picture on Twitter? Or maybe you are running a contest, or a product discount campaign; post those announcements as well. This will make your Twitter account look busy, and it may even draw some extra visitors to your site.

Another social media giant is Pinterest. So whenever you post something on Twitter, make sure to pin that image on Pinterest as well. I know, some of your posts will not consist of images, but fortunately there are online tools like this one, which will help you convert any text snippet into a great looking picture.

turn-text-into-images

Handing out invitations and printed coupons on the street is so 2000, I know, but you can hit the road and use some simple and yet clever marketing techniques to boost your online business. Print some QR codes, for example, and then hand out flyers that include them and special offers.

Contests have the potential of going viral, and photo contests are really easy to set up and run. Just ask your customers to post pictures of them using your products or services, and then upload all those photos to your site. This will get you a lot of visitors, and often times mentions and backlinks from other websites. It is true that you’ve got to convince your clients to take the time and post those photos, but this can be easily done by providing a free or discounted product or service. Don’t see this as a business loss, you are actually paying for those nice people’s time.

Have I mentioned steep discounts? If you’ve decided to apply this method, make sure to post your fantastic offer to the top deal sites as well. People love huge discounts and free stuff! And since the top sites are visited by lots of people, chances are many of them will also visit your website and hopefully become customers. If you go this way, add a unique tag to your contest. This way, you will be able to track the entries and boost its visibility on the top social media channels. And while we are here, make sure that your contest is very easy to promote and share with others.

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