5 Tips for Crafting Higher Converting Long-Form Content

Any blogger or business owner can pump out a 500-word blog post and call it a day. And while there’s some immediate benefit in a short, compelling post, there isn’t a ton of long-term value. Long-form content is what you should really be investing your resources into.

What’s the Secret to High Converting Long-From Content?

Marketers are always arguing about which type of content they should invest in and which formats yield the best returns, but at the end of the day, nothing beats long-form content. It’s the answer to just about every need or marketing goal.

“Ultimately, you should create long-form content because it will get you more of what you want: more online visibility (social shares, links), more proof of your authority and industry expertise, and more material for altruistic community building and engagement,” content marketing specialist Emma Siemasko explains.

The challenge lies in creating high converting long-form content that’s engaging, not boring. In pursuit of this goal, here are a few suggestions you may find helpful:

1. Choose the Right Topic

It all starts with topic selection. If you choose a topic that’s boring or irrelevant to your audience, you’ll find it difficult to engage your readers, regardless of how you structure the post.

In order to choose the right topic, you have to know what your audience wants. Thankfully, social listening tools give marketers the ability to observe what audiences are searching for and discussing. Pay attention and they’ll point you in the right direction.

2. Craft a Compelling Intro

You’ve probably run across the statistic that says the average person now has a shorter attention span than a goldfish. While sobering, this reveals just how important it is to hook people from the very start of a piece of content.

In addition to a magnetic headline, long-form content needs a compelling introduction. You don’t have enough margin for error to start off slow. Get the reader hooked within the first couple of sentences and your conversion rate will be much healthier.

3. Provide a Table of Contents

If you have a piece of content that’s 3,000, 5,000, or 7,000-plus words, you need to consider the searchability of your article. Very few of your readers are going to start at the beginning and read all the way to completion. Most are going to skim and search for the parts that they find interesting or relevant.

Recognizing that your readers are skimmers, it’s helpful to give them some guidance. One effective technique is to implement a “table of contents” at the beginning of the article. (You can see an example in this Nutrisystem review from Training in the Bay.)

4. Use Plenty of Visuals

In today’s day and age, it’s almost impossible to produce an effective piece of long-form content without including compelling visuals. In fact, the highest converting pieces of long-form content feature a variety of different content mediums. (This article from the New York Times is a great example.)

5. Maintain a Consistent and Engaging Voice

Because most marketing teams produce long-form content in multiple sessions – as opposed to a single writing session – the end product often feels choppy. Make sure you’re prioritizing consistency in your voice and focus on seamless transitions in the copyediting process.

6. Move Past Shallow Content

Short-form content has value – in fact, social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram have made it relevant again – but from a larger digital marketing perspective, you have to move past “shallow” content and invest in long-form, information-rich content that generates leads and drives revenue.

Hopefully the tips featured in this article will help you make progress in this area.

Original post: 5 Tips for Crafting Higher Converting Long-Form Content

This post is courtesy of: https://www.dailyblogtips.com

Looking for Content Strategy Buy-In? Don’t Rely on the Same Old Arguments

There have been more posts than I can count about how to make a compelling case for a content marketing strategy. I’ve written some of them and read any number of them on this site and others. If you search on Google for “business case for content marketing strategy” (yes, in quotes), you’ll get more than 10 million results.

Examining the business case for strategic content marketing brings up value-focused terms such as “optimized brand engagement,” “better leads,” “higher shopping cart value,” “lower churn,” or even “direct revenue.” In other words, in prioritizing marketing activities, we make the case that content marketing has the potential for more value.

But what about content strategy? Google “business case content strategy” and you’ll get only 72,000 results.

Now, when I say, “content strategy,” I mean the holistic approach to using content as an asset to the business. Why should the business care about careful governance, management, adaptation, optimization, and scale of the way it uses content? What is the business case for organizing a centralized strategic approach around content as an overall business asset?

Unlike the case of a content marketing strategy, here we have no real comparison. We can’t make the case that content strategy is more effective or efficient than doing something else. It’s not an alternative strategy. Rather, the comparison is to do nothing about organizing an activity – creating content – that the business isn’t already doing.

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3 inadequate reasons for content strategy

After looking up and reading through recommendations for making the business case for content strategy, I found that they tend to fall into one of three arguments.

• It’s already hurting your business. Not having a centralized method of creating, managing, and distributing content costs more, hurts revenue, impedes sales, or challenges your ability to effectively service customers. But, this argument is almost never universally true. And it’s also not mutually exclusive. The lack of a centralized approach could be costing the business, but a centralized process could slow things to a point where it hurts sales and revenue, and teams would move more slowly.

• It’s necessary for the future of customer experience. Scaling your content is necessary to feed all the digital channels that the enterprise is managing. Is it any wonder that this is the common argument from enterprise technology providers? It argues that to create better, more consistent experiences for your customers, you need a centralized content management strategy. But, the argument is self-defeating. It makes the case that all content and all customer experiences should be managed from one “brain.” It doesn’t address the real world of global differences, skill sets, talent, and technology prowess. Anyone who has had to create a nimble and agile approach to using an enterprise-class content management system to launch a simple blog will know how this argument can fall apart quickly.

• Organized is better than disorganized. Content is important (we all know that, right?) and thus having some form of organized approach for it (rather than chaos) is simply common sense. This might be the most common and certainly the simplest business case for a content strategy. But, you again run into the except-when-it’s-not cases. I worked with an organization earlier this year to implement an organized approach to its global digital content. The brand would create and manage all the content centrally and hand down “modules” of well-structured content to the regions. It mandated that the regions use these modules for everything they were creating. What the organization found was that for the content to be used by all the regions, accounting for local tastes, regulations, and brand maturity, it had to be extraordinarily vanilla. By the time the content was customized for local channels, translated, and localized into the regional languages, the content simply had no relation to any of the modules created.

Now, to be clear, all three arguments can be sufficient in the right situation. And I’m the first to admit that each of them has more nuance than I’m giving here. But they all have weaknesses that I’ve personally seen fail in the real-world politics of the business.

What is a more foundational argument for content strategy? How can you make the case to the C-suite and mollify skeptical colleagues in other departments? Why does a centralized content strategy make sense?

It turns out we are trying to answer the wrong question. We are trying to solve for a centralized means of creating and managing content. So, we start from the premise that we need to move the creation and production of content to the limited few who can actually govern that process effectively. Instead, we need to ask, how we can create a process that moves the creation of content as close to each and every customer experience as possible.

A great content strategy enables a balance between the need for enterprise consistency, efficiency, and scale, while enabling the creation of content to be as close to the customer experience as possible.

Moving content closer to the customer

To better shape the argument for content strategy first look at how we got where we are. Creating business content has always been something mostly performed at the individual level. Even the lowliest job in the information age has the requirement “must write/communicate well.”

From a marketing and communications perspective, we built strategies around the creation of content for whatever part of the product life cycle we were in charge of. Product marketing/management created the packaging content for the product. Integrated marketing teams developed the positioning content of the product. The advertising and promotion teams created the promotional content for the product. Sales often created the pitches and other materials needed to sell the product. And, finally, customer service often created content to help customers learn how to better use the product.

Because each segment had its own methods and ideas for how to create content for its output or purpose, this approach worked well. Now, enter all the complexities of digital disruption and the arguments made earlier:

• Yes, now the customer experience is integrated across channels, and must be made wholly consistent from the customer’s point of view. But don’t we need the ability to customize and personalize content for new markets and personas across product segments?

• Yes, now the content must scale to the new and disparate digital channels that emerge daily, and we must be reactive to the new expectations of customers who expect instant access to consistent experiences. But aren’t we concerned a centralized approach can encourage the brand to become vanilla and undifferentiated when content is created from a common source?

• Yes, now we must be more organized and considered with the huge amount of content we are creating. But what about all those exceptions where it would be better to create one-off content?

In my experience, we are trying to centralize the wrong thing. Most enterprises believe creating a content strategy is about centralizing the creation of content for use as a reusable widget across the enterprise. That view looks at content as a factory output – and seeks to argue for a business case to create a scalable, automated, and consistent moving assembly line.

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Don’t view #contentstrategy as a formula for a content assembly line, says @Robert_Rose.
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That thinking is where the case for centralization trips up.

Instead, the question should be: How can the business create a strategy to ensure that content – independent of where it is created, managed, and promoted – serves the enterprise as a strategic asset?

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Ask HOW to move #content creation closer to the customer, while balancing need for consistency. @robert_rose
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The better argument for content strategy should be that it creates a process that can move the creation of content as close to the customer as possible. It’s the only way to balance enterprise scalability, and a consistency in brand, customer experience, and effectiveness, while moving the creation of content as close to the customer as possible.

A great content strategy doesn’t limit where content creation happens. It seeks to ensure that wherever content creation happens it is as close to the customer experience as possible.

Strategizing around the customer requires creating foundational education, governance, workflows, measurement, and, yes, technology, to create multiple wellsprings of content. It should be created centrally, where applicable; locally, where needed; and it should use separate technology, when warranted. Great content strategies aren’t occupying militaries, they are well-oiled governments allowing local economies to flourish.

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Great #content strategies are well-oiled governments allowing local economies to flourish. @Robert_Rose
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The next time you think about building that business case for enterprise content strategy, look to enabling these economies. This is what inspires our constituents to follow our lead.

HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT:

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Learn more about how to create a customer-focused content strategy at this year’s Intelligent Content Conference March 20-22 in Las Vegas. Register today.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

The post Looking for Content Strategy Buy-In? Don’t Rely on the Same Old Arguments appeared first on Content Marketing Institute.

How to Turn Your Obsession Into a Profitable Social Media Business

“Follow your passion” is probably one of the oldest-known pieces of advice for business success. Sure, if you genuinely love what you’re doing, then you’re less likely to run out of drive in the long run. You’ll also be naturally inclined to take opportunities that will help you grow.

But what if your passion is spending hours scrolling through your news feed – reacting to posts from people you don’t even know personally?

What if your passion is social media?

To some people, building a social media network with thousands of connections is nothing more than an act of vanity. While it makes sense for businesses, there’s no real reason for individuals to have thousands of friends on Facebook – right? Well, if you can shrug off the privacy and security concerns of being connected to people you don’t know, you can actually leverage your social media reach to generate some profits.

Here, let me drop you a quick list of the monetization strategies you can use on social media:

• Build yourself as an influencer and promote products or content related to your niche.
• Sell products from marketplaces like Amazon and earn a commission per sale.
• Get paid to create reviews or post mentions of other brands.
• Sell products directly on social media networks.
• Leverage your social media presence for a full-on eCommerce site.

These may all look intimidating at first. But with the right approach, you can actually accomplish these without large capital or a team of experts by your side.

Got your attention? Then let’s get started.

Step 1 – Define your niche

If your friends’ list grew naturally without your active effort, other users probably saw something valuable from your personal brand. Your physical appearance, of course, could be a small factor. But it most likely has something to do with the content you share.

This depends on the platform you’re using. For example, if you have an established network on Instagram and you mostly post photos of food, then your follower base is probably interested in seeing more of them in the future.

In most cases, the niche you’re recognized in should be glaringly obvious. You can also define it further by inspecting which of your posts garnered the most engagement.

Some networks have built-in analytics to help you determine your most popular posts. For example, if you’ve already built an official Facebook page, then you should have access to the “Insights” tab.

In any case, embracing a niche that already resonates with your existing follower base will prove to be beneficial for your would-be business. For one, your audience should be more receptive when you share curated posts, branded content, or product promotions in the future. This leads us to the next step…

Step 2 – Build your social media presence

As an aspiring social media entrepreneur, your reach and authority are your biggest assets. They directly impact your brand’s discoverability, follower growth, and your conversion rate. And with that being said, the next steps involve improving both with the help of tools.

First of all, you can’t build authority without a little bit of content marketing. Remember, the social community will judge your brand’s image by the content you publish. If you share authoritative content, then they’ll have a more positive perception of your brand.

But rather than tediously looking for popular content to share, a more efficient strategy is to automate content curation with the help of three tools: Feedly, Buffer, and IFTTT.

In a nutshell, Feedly lets you curate content ideas, Buffer can be used to schedule social media posts, and IFTTT can link both services together via applets.

A quick word about using Buffer: make sure you create a posting schedule based on the most active times of your audience. Whenever you add new content to your queue, it will automatically be assigned in the next upcoming slot.

For the automation part, here’s what the specific IFTTT applet you need looks like:

Don’t worry – all three tools can be used for free. Once you have created accounts on each and activated the IFTTT applet, then your content curation activities on social media should be like clockwork.

Another way to use automation to boost your social media presence is through Narrow.io. It works by automatically following users on Twitter who post about specific keywords, which could indicate a purchase intent. In turn, this will encourage them to follow you back or, at the very least, give your account a quick glance.

If all goes well, you may start receiving messages from other brands that request you to do reviews or simply upload posts about one of their products. Just be sure to embrace your niche and keep up your content curation game.

Step 3 – Look for products to sell

Now that you’ve already identified your niche and established your social media presence, it should be a lot easier to look for products you can sell. If you’re already running a brick-and-mortar, small business, then feel free to skip this step. But if not, or if you’re open to branching out to more product types, then a cost-effective strategy you can consider would be affiliate marketing.

Here is a quick rundown of its benefits:

• Little to No Overhead – Unlike traditional businesses or fully-fledged online stores, selling an affiliate product requires very little overhead costs.
• Easy to Do – Being an affiliate marketer can be as easy as sharing an affiliate link on Instagram. There’s no need to worry about technical things like logistics, inventory management, and shipping.
• Scalable – Once you’ve found a profitable product opportunity, you can focus on scaling your online presence by building a blog, launching ad campaigns, and so on.
• Easy to Monitor – Every affiliate marketing platform provides their sellers with adequate tracking capabilities, allowing them to monitor metrics such as click-throughs, conversion rates, and so on.

The Amazon Associates program is a popular starting point for social media users who aspire to be affiliate marketers. Not only does it cover practically every niche thinkable, it also offers tools and learning resources to help you get started.

After finding an affiliate product to sell, it’s time to start doing what you do best – publishing social media content. There’s no specific rule for this, but using images would definitely get attention from your audience. When it comes to your affiliate links, the most straightforward approach is to include them in the description:

When sharing promotional content, don’t forget to comply with the platform’s regulations, if any. For instance, while Facebook allows affiliate links to be shared or embedded inside posts, you need to make sure it doesn’t violate one of their advertising policies and community guidelines.

Another way to sell products on social media is via drop shipping, which is an order fulfillment strategy where you don’t have to be in possession of your products to receive orders and payments. It doesn’t require a huge investment, eliminates the complexity of inventory management, and allows you to enter just about any market you’re interested in.

A good first step is to scan yellow pages or online directories for drop-ship suppliers near you. You can start with a website like SalesHoo, which is a trusted directory with over 8,000 suppliers and 2.5 million products.

Once you find your drop-shippable products, you can enlist them in marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, and Bonanza. Of course, you can also sell them on a self-hosted eCommerce site, which will be discussed in the latter parts of this guide.

To avoid any complications with customers, make sure you disclose the details of your supplier, especially their location. Doing so will give customers realistic expectations when it comes to delivery times.

Just remember that as simple as drop shipping sounds, it can be quite tedious. Products can get mixed up, customer service can be too taxing, and profit margins can be insignificant. Returned items will also be considerably more complicated than if you have total control of your operations.

Step 4 – Allow purchases within networks

As your brand’s social media presence proliferates, it only makes sense for you to prioritize the convenience and experience of your loyal followers. That’s why the next step involves making purchases possible within the social network itself.

In recent years, major social networks have integrated online shopping capabilities in their platforms. Facebook, for example, allows business pages to feature “Shop Now” buttons, which may contain affiliate links, a link to a drop-shipped product, or a URL to an external eCommerce store.

At this point, you should now be capable of creating a profitable business that runs entirely on social media. But you still have a long way to go before you get to the big leagues.

Step 5 – Create an official online store

If you truly want to attain online success, then creating a self-sustaining selling channel on social media should not be your end goal. You need to officially instate your brand as an eCommerce company that the online community recognizes and trusts.

The good news is, setting up a professional-looking online store is now easy – thanks to platforms like BigCommerce that smoothen out the learning curve of site development.

BigCommerce allows you to build an eCommerce store from scratch using templates, a visual theme editor, and a WYSIWYG or “what you see is what you get” page builder.

Eventually, you’ll want to leverage your social media presence to maximize the exposure of your eCommerce storefront. As far as social media goes, BigCommerce makes it easy to use networks as selling channels. Simply head to the “Channel Manager” section, pick a platform, and follow the on-screen instructions.

Delving into eCommerce for a social media entrepreneur might be a big leap. It is a new frontier that comes with a number of challenges you must overcome. But since you’ve already developed a brand on social media, then you should have an easier time amassing an audience for your newfound business.

Step 6 – Engage your social media audience

When it comes to social media promotions for new eCommerce businesses, one of the most accessible solutions is to launch PPC ad campaigns. By rolling out ads that are targeted at a specific type of user, you can instantly boost your brand’s visibility while staying within a set budget.

Of course, there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all solution in social media advertising. Your approach depends on a few variables, such as your industry, budget, and platform of choice.

Finally, you can try offering coupon codes to your social media followers to spike up sales. With a platform like BigCommerce, you can easily create coupon codes that provide benefits such as free shipping or discounts to prospective buyers.

After creating your coupon code, you can freely promote it to your social media followers via a regular post. If you’re on Facebook, you can also utilize the “Create an Offer” feature, which can be found on your business page:

Conclusion

All in all, a social media presence is indeed a valuable asset to have in the online-driven world. Apart from staying in touch with your peers and the people in your life, it can also lead to feasible business opportunities.

Hopefully, the ideas above have helped you gain a more profitable direction for your social media hobby.

Guest Author: Vikas Agrawal is a start-up Investor & co-founder of the Infographic design agency Infobrandz that offers creative and premium visual content solutions to medium to large companies. Content created by Infobrandz are loved, shared & can be found all over the internet on high authority platforms like HuffingtonPost, Businessinsider, Forbes , Tech.co & EliteDaily. 

The post How to Turn Your Obsession Into a Profitable Social Media Business appeared first on Jeffbullas’s Blog.

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How to Develop and Grow a Successful Podcast

Robert Rose and I just completed four years and over 200 episodes of our podcast, This Old Marketing. While far from the most successful marketing podcast on the planet, our one hour of weekly shenanigans has done fairly well.

Since we launched in November 2013, the podcast has been downloaded nearly 2 million times from listeners in 200 countries, while generating approximately a half-million dollars in direct revenue in sponsorship support.

But the best part is what we know about our listeners. Those marketers who regularly listen to This Old Marketing are CMI’s true fans … they are more likely to come to Content Marketing World, attend one of our master classes, purchase training, attend our webinars, engage in our content, and talk about us on social media.

At our recent master class in Washington, D.C., one of the attendees asked me to write an article about creating a successful podcast. And so, Mike, here you go.

The podcast should not be first

This Old Marketing was successful from Episode 1 because we already had an audience of over 75,000 email subscribers who opted to receive CMI content. Once we notified this audience that a podcast was available, a good percentage listened to it.

Now, I’m not saying you can’t be successful by launching a podcast first. John Lee Dumas was incredibly successful with his Entrepreneur On Fire podcast. Pat Flynn also accomplished this feat. But it’s rare.

Most successful podcasts started with an audience already in place. Just look at the ones you listen to and do your research. They probably started with a blog or a video series, or maybe a network or print magazine, or the podcaster was a published author with a following. If I were starting a podcast today, I would work for 12 months to build a solid list of email subscribers first, and THEN diversify the platform with the podcast.

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#Podcast Tip: Work for 12 months to build a list of email subscribers then launch the podcast. @JoePulizzi
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Identify the content gap in the marketplace

This Old Marketing started with a simple phone conversation between Robert and me. We chatted for over an hour, ranting and raving about the news of the day.

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#ThisOldMarketing podcast originated after a phone conversation the creators wished they recorded. @JoePulizzi
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At the end of the conversation, we lamented that we didn’t record it.

The next day we talked seriously about the fact that no resource in the industry regularly covered the news around content marketing. Sure, Adweek, Ad Age, Digiday, and others covered it on occasion, but no resource took all the content marketing news from all the sources and distilled it for an audience.

After talking to the staff about it and doing more due diligence, we had enough data to tell us a podcast could be successful if we executed it correctly and delivered consistently.

We were lucky to identify a gap that was truly needed in the marketplace. If five or more competitors already were vying for that space, we probably would have passed on the opportunity or tilted in a different direction.

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Format and frequency

In the marketing industry, most podcast formats revolve around one host with a new guest every week. We wanted to do something different. Plus, we didn’t think we could accomplish our goal of delivering the most important news each week with variable guests.

Add to that, we wanted to make sure CMI’s point of view on content marketing was delivered consistently each episode. It made sense that Robert and I serve as co-hosts with a no-guest format.

And, just like any news program, we wanted a consistent format for the show. We believed that ESPN’s PTI (Pardon the Interruption) format, where the two hosts bicker over the news of the day, worked best for Robert and me. We thought it would be entertaining, plus the format would make sure we could cover multiple news stories in one show.

One of the podcast’s goals was to make sure that the audience knew content marketing had been around for a long time, and we needed to learn from these older case studies. That’s where the idea of “This Old Marketing” came from. Every week we would include one “older” content marketing case study.

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Although we’ve edited the format on occasion, it hasn’t changed much from the first episode.

• Opening thought (from Robert)
• News of the day (generally three to five stories)
• Rants and raves (something each of us loved or hated from the week)
• This Old Marketing example of the week

Initially the podcasts lasted around 45 minutes. Over the first few months, we added more to the introductions and more news coverage to go for 60 minutes every week.

As for the consistency, we didn’t feel we could be great by delivering a daily podcast. We simply couldn’t make the time with our travel schedules and other assignments. Plus, there wasn’t enough content marketing news for a daily show, and we were certain our audience couldn’t handle us on a daily basis.

We settled on a weekly schedule, delivering every Monday night via iTunes and Sticher.com.

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Production

Robert and I quickly worked out who would do what for the show. He managed the content for the program. He created an Evernote email address where we would send all news stories and then select the stories for the show.

Later, as we gained popularity, listeners began to send stories and This Old Marketing examples through a Twitter hashtag (#ThisOldMarketing) and directly through email. We asked for this at the end of every show. Ian’s Maxwell House Haggadah example was used in Episode 209.

@JoePulizzi @Robert_Rose My girlfriend’s family has been using the Maxwell House Haggadah for 30+ years! FANTASTIC read: https://t.co/1sEFfu7p52 #thisoldmarketing

— Ian Faison (@ianfaison) November 15, 2017

Robert also put together the introduction. At first, he read the introduction as we recorded the podcast, but, after about 100 episodes, Robert started to pre-record these five-minute introductions, adding music and clips. Frankly, the introductions might be the best part of the show.

All in all, Robert spends about two to four hours producing his part of each episode.

I handled the post-production. Robert recorded directly to his laptop wherever he was in the world, while I did the same. We both used professional microphones, which is about the most important thing you can do. I use an Audio-Technica AT2020USB and cannot recommend it highly enough. It plugs directly into the computer and can be taken anywhere (I travel a lot with it, often recording from hotel rooms). My recommendation is not to spend time building a studio and just find a quiet room and get a great microphone.

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#Podcast Tip: Forgo building a studio. Find a quiet room & a great mic like @USAudioTechnica. @JoePulizzi
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While Robert uses GarageBand (Mac user), I use Audacity for PC. Audacity is a free and easy-to-use program. Robert and I talk via Skype to record the show, but we record our individual tracks separately.

Once completed, Robert sends me his MP3 file and I merge the two in Audacity. It’s really easy – just import the MP3 file into Audacity and make sure it’s synced. I almost never need to adjust the timing since we use a vocal countdown to hit record for each episode.

After the episode is recorded, I paste each of our files into the template (that includes the up-front and back-end music), save the file, and then export the file as a WAV file.

I take the WAV file of the episode and run it through another free program called Levalator. This makes sure that all the audio levels are even so Robert isn’t louder than me or vice versa.

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Use a free tool like @levelator to make sure all audio levels are even, says @JoePulizzi. #ThisOldMarketing
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Then I import the WAV.OUTPUT file into Audacity, add Robert’s new intro and output as a final MP3 file. The process takes 60 to 90 minutes.

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Distribution and integration

Once the podcast’s MP3 file is complete, it is published using Liberated Syndication (Libsyn). In this program, we add tags such as the episode title and metatags, and then publish on iTunes and Stitcher.com. (We later added distribution on Soundcloud and Google Play, but this needs to be done separately.) Libsyn starts at about $10 per month, depending on usage.

Libsyn also provides the download stats and a dashboard, much like you find in Google Analytics (iTunes doesn’t provide any data).

From there, I notify the editorial team, so it can prepare the show notes for publishing on the CMI blog. We decided that Saturdays would be a good time to distribute the show notes because that gives the editorial team time to construct the textual content, verify the links and images, and allow for uploading and approving the content into our WordPress platform.

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Publish your #podcast show notes on your blog for extra promotion, says @JoePulizzi. #ThisOldMarketing
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We found approximately half our audience subscribes to our podcast in iTunes and Stitcher. The other half waits until Saturday when the show posts on the CMI site. About half our overall audience subscribes to CMI’s daily email, which promotes the show notes on Saturday.

Summary

While there is never one way to execute a successful content initiative, I believe our success was tied to the following factors:

• CMI had a fan base of followers who were open to checking out the initial podcast. It would have been much more challenging to build an audience from scratch.
• Finding a content gap where we could offer something truly differentiated was critical. The news coverage worked. We were able to save our audience time every week and told them what we thought was the most important news of the week.
• Audio quality is critical. Spend the money and get a microphone that emits a professional sound. Don’t skimp here.
• Integrating the podcast into our weekly articles and email newsletter was essential for success. The podcast shouldn’t sit outside your other content marketing efforts. Find a way to weave in the content to everything you do.

For other great resources on how to start a podcast, check out this post from Pat Flynn and this amazing resource from John Lee Dumas. Good luck!

Please note: All tools included in our blog posts are suggested by authors, not the CMI editorial team. No one post can provide all relevant tools in the space. Feel free to include additional tools in the comments (from your company or ones that you have used).

Want to be in the loop of CMI’s new content and activities? Subscribe to the daily email or weekly digest recapping the highlights from the blog and exclusive email-only content. 

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

 

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The 11 Best Social Media Automation Tools For Smart Content Marketers

Social media takes time, and finding the head space to consistently do it well over and over again is challenging.

That’s why social media automation is so important.

The thing to remember with any type of social media marketing is that you will still have to spend some time on social media.

Whether you are replying to a customer or commenting on another person’s post, the human factor still has to be there.

With the social media world going mobile, interaction is always important.

But for those things you can automate, let’s have a look at some of the best social media automation tools available. These tools will help save you time and can do a few other things to make your life easier too.

1. Hootsuite

Hootsuite is a dream for all of us social media lovers. There are so many actions that Hootsuite can help with that if you have not learned the full scope of this social media automation tool, then I recommend you start looking it over. If you are serious about social media… then Hootsuite it is.

Hootsuite gives you the ability to keep track of many social media channels at once. This is perfect for those who work in the social media world, because it truly does make life a lot easier. Not only does it allow you to have multiple channels, it also lets you know if your brand has been mentioned.

Knowing when your brand is mentioned allows you to know what consumers are saying in real time. If it is great news that is being mentioned, the information can be used to let your company know what is working for the consumer. If the news is not so great, the problem can be addressed swiftly.

Hootsuite works across many different platforms and allows scheduled posts. It will also help to determine the best times to be posting in order to garner the most attention.

Using Hootsuite Advanced Search

Another wonderful thing about Hootsuite is the fact that it allows you to search for many different things.

One of the little used tools in the advanced tools is searching by sentiment. People can find out what is being said about a company and brand, by clicking the Advanced Search and ticking the box that will show both positive and negative mentions.

Sure, we all like to read the good stuff, but the negative can also be a good thing. If there is a negative Tweet it gives the company time to address it quickly. Knowing what your customers are looking for and dislike can be a great advantage.

2. Buffer

Buffer makes posting to social media a whizz. All you have to do is add your post to the queue and it will be posted for you. No need to even schedule a time that the post will be posted because Buffer will take care of that too.

Buffer is also known for providing great analytics. If you want to know what is working and not working, these analytics will let you know. Buffer is always adding more to the analytics so keep an eye on this application.

Want to keep track of a campaign link? Buffer now makes this available by making sure that each and every link is unique to each update or post. Be sure to use the web app and click on the settings, then go to “Campaign Tracking”. Yes, this makes all of us social media mavens happy because we are able to see the analytics and study them.

Compare: Buffer vs Hootsuite

3. Crowdfire

Crowdfire works with both Twitter and Instagram. Want to know who unfollowed you? Crowdfire is the source to go to have your questions answered.

In both business and personal life, we want to know about those who are following us and those who have decided they do not like the posts we are putting put up. Crowdfire also allows you to find those Twitter users who are inactive and delete them if you want to.

This platform helps the user find others that are relevant with the “Copy Followers” feature. Checking the relationship between any two Instagram or Twitter accounts is possible with the Crowdfire platform.

With Instagram, Crowdfire has the ability to schedule posts, use viral hashtags and even suggest images. The clean, engage and grow technique cuts out a lot of the time that would be used to get the tasks completed without this application. A great way to keep Twitter and Instagram accounts under control and up-to-date.

4. CoSchedule

CoSchedule is a writer’s dream. This management tool allows for articles to be scheduled, blog post management, scheduling for marketing projects and social media management.

CoSchedule allows for the organization that many writers and social media marketers yearn for. If you have given up on complex spreadsheets like some of us have, CoSchedule is a gift of organization.

CoSchedule allows for the scheduling of posts and will suggest the best time to send out your posts. Over 60 messages can be scheduled at a time. This number of post allowance frees up time in order to answer customers or to interact with others. You can also collaborate with your team.

5. SociAlert

Socialert automates your hashtag search and allows a user to analyze what is happening on Twitter for your twitter campaigns in realtime.

From digital marketers to established brands and media agencies, everyone can make the most out of their twitter campaigns with this hashtag tracking tool.

You can also use socialert to track event hashtags and monitor your brand as well.

If you are really interested in how your twitter marketing works for you than this is the application to be using.

6. BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo allows for many different tasks to be accomplished.

Here is a short list of just a few of the things that BuzzSumo helps with:

• BuzzSumo has an influencers search that cannot be beaten. It allows for searches being conducted by location, topic and area.
• You can also analyse influencers with the filter you can go by authority, reach, engagement and influence.
• It also has the ability to build lists and communicate with key influencers.
• Follow those influencers you choose to and add them to your Twitter lists.

Finding great quality content along with all of the statistics will allow you to be able to know what is working with the consumer and what is not.

Searching for viral content and the analytics to go with it has never been easier. Reaching out to a list of authors and establishing relationships with them is also worthwhile while using BuzzSumo.

Remember, influencers already have a following built up, so if you are able to gather information and share it with their audience it will amplify its reach. Building relationships with influencers always pays off in the end.

7. Scoop.it

Scoop.it allows for content publishing in less time than any other social media automation application.

With Scoop.it content can be curated from other sources and shared with your opinion or angle. It also allows posts to be shared across social media platforms with the push of a button. Searching for content is easy with the use of the search bar for a particular topic.

Scoop.it is great for when you want to share something on a certain niche or topic. It also allows for freedom from writing all of your own content.

Looking for ideas on topics and what is getting traffic? Head over to Scoop.it and I bet you will be mildly surprised.

8. Post Planner

Post Planner is a helper when it comes to finding, planning and posting content that helps to increase followers and visibility on Twitter and Facebook. Finding content that works and will draw customers to your website is what post planner does best.

With Post Planner the user can actively choose photos, articles and even statuses to share.

Having issues with content creation? Post Planner will certainly fill the void when needed. Hit that writing block or just need something intelligent to share? Try Post Planner!

9. SocialPilot

SocialPilot is a marketing tool with social media scheduling for marketers and social media management teams. SocialPilot allows you to collaborate with your team by sharing their social media calendar.

Over 500 posts can be shared to 200 social media accounts. Bulk scheduling of posts and updates is easy with SocialPilot. To use bulk scheduling all the user has to do is upload a file in CSV format or text. The bulk text will then go out as scheduled.

Looking for article topics to write about? SocialPilot takes care of that too so that you do not have to wrack your brain trying to think of something when in a pinch. Separate account groups and calendars for each of your clients keeps things organized and helps with team communication.

10. Sprout Social

Sprout Social has some great analytic tools for those interested in growing their following on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and more. That being stated, here are a few other things that Sprout Social will help with.

• Engagement – Sprout Social gives the user insights on monitoring and user engagement. With the ability to monitor these things, your engagement can rise, thus allowing for more followers and interaction with influencers.
• Article and blog publishing can be accomplished using Sprout Social. From planning to scheduling and posting, Sprout Social cuts the time down on having to get these tasks accomplished.
• Social listening tools allow for tracking of hashtags, mentions, and keyword usage. This is also a great way to keep track of competitors. It is a super handy tool if your competitors are sneaking up on you for certain keywords in search engine rankings.

Sprout Social has many valuable tools that can both increase business revenue and help social media managers remain organized and save time.

11. Zapier

Zapier allows you to link your web apps together to streamline your information and make things a whole lot easier.

Once the apps are connected it is then possible to pass the information between them creating workflows which are named zaps. Zapier will automatically finish routine tasks so that you are able to complete other tasks that need your attention. Having the ability to plan and build workflows results in more work being completed and staying organized.

Zapier is great for those who want to integrate process and automation into a business. The next wonderful gift is that building process and automation does not include having to know how to code because this application will handle it for you. Can’t put out a bit of code? Do not get discouraged because Zapier will keep things stress free.

Data entry getting to be too much? This is another task that Zapier handles like a pro. Data entry can be so time consuming and who wants to spend a few hours with data entry? Most users would agree that cutting down on the time it takes to do data entry is something to be happy about.

Wrap

The above social media automation tools are designed to be helpful and save you time.

Whether you are a small business owner or a social media manager in a large corporation, these tools will prove to be more than helpful.

Learning what each automation tool can accomplish will surprise even the most social media savvy folks around.

Guest Author: Along with social media marketing Pankaj Narang is determined to shape his ideas into perfect products. CoFounder of Socialert, he believes in coming up with engaging tools to redefine the face of social media marketing. You can check his blog here.

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How To Successfully Market Your Business In A Controversial Business Niche

Have you ever sat down and thought about how your business niche impacts your marketing strategy?

Countless marketers operating in niche markets face this very issue on a daily basis. Specialized and unique products tend to require a different sort of marketing strategy, and meticulous research is required.

The same goes for marketing agencies that work on multiple projects at the same time. Usually, they are working within versatile industries. Recently, the Search Engine Journal polled Twitter to find out how many vertical industries they serve. According to the results, 44% are serving various industries, 28% serve two to four vertical industries, and 28% serve just one vertical.

However, the problem arises when the agencies are working on different verticals. They tend to follow a uniform strategy for all of their clients. This demonstrates a lack of awareness when you consider that every niche requires a unique and specific strategy, particularly the controversial ones.

What are controversial business niches and how are they different from others?

A controversial business niche is one where consumers experience a clash of opinions and beliefs. Such niches don’t always have a 100% approval rating from the audience. Other than obviously extreme controversial niches, like porn or the gun industry, some other common examples include pharmaceutical companies, loan groups, political groups, bodybuilding communities and more.

Here’s a more specific example. I put the query ‘carbonated drinks’ into Google and here is what came up:

As you can see from the screenshot, four search results are informative links, two are promoting the benefits of carbonated drinks and one is showing an unbiased opinion. In contrast, three search results are against carbonated drinks.

Hence, if a business was selling carbonated drinks, they would find tough competition out there as evidenced by these seach engine results. Therefore you can see that carbonated drinks are a controversial niche.

Consequently, a question comes to mind: how is each controversial business niche different and why should they be treated separately? The fact is, when you are working in such a hot and debated multi-layered industry, then you have to cater to both sides of the proverbial coin: the pros and the cons.

The fundamentals of controversial niches

• Audience targeting

A ‘niche’ defines a group or an audience being targeted. The group could consist of men and women of varying age groups, or it could be geographically distributed. Once you have determined your niche, you must group your targeted audience, after which the audience polarization process takes place.

• Audience polarization

Audience polarization essentially refers to dividing the audience group. The division could be along the lines of pros and cons. Most marketers focus on the supportive group (pro group) and skip the anti-supportive group (con group), considering the latter to be a waste of time.

The importance of audience polarization is best explained using an example: let’s say two parties are nominated for a presidential election. Party A has a strong hold over the nation with more than 60% of the supportive ratio, wheras Party B has a 40% supportive ratio.

You can see that when factoring in audience polarization, in order to win the election, Party B has to run a campaign to attract the other group as well.

• Strategy Planning

Once you effectively identify these two groups, you can then plan out your marketing strategies more effectively. The first group, who is already in favor of your product, is among the low-hanging fruit. You can use your usual marketing tactics to impress and convert them. However, to persuade the opposing group in favor of your product through your marketing is a bigger challenge.

Operating in a controversial niche using the Isolation Effect

Let me explain the impact of operating in a controversial niche using the Von Restorff Effect or Isolation Effect. With this approach, the isolated entities will always be recalled by the human brain.

If you cater to the opposed audience group using appropriate marketing strategies and channels, you will definitely stand out from your competitors. Due to the fact that you are putting in efforts to entertain both groups and also providing them with real value concerning quality products, you will be remembered and listed amongst the trendsetters.

Let’s put the two opposing audience groups into this effect.

Here, a vital question arises: how is the trust of the dissident consumer group gained? Let’s proceed to the challenges and core marketing strategies that need to be taken into account.

Getting traction with backlinks and controlling negative linking

Yes, negative linking inevitably happens in controversial business niches. Negative links are usually built by your competitors to decrease your search engine performance; other times they have been built by the dissident groups for reference.

Let’s say I have been working in a store that deals in waist trainers and have encountered this issue multiple times. Every week, I may have found two to three links coming from high authority websites which have a decent crawl ratio. This may cause minor fluctuations in keyword rankings in the SERPs.

As you can see in the above screenshot, the link was built on the website with a domain authority of 81, and the anchor text was also incorrectly placed. These types of links can be very harmful to your organic stability. It is important to track them on a weekly basis.

So what are the possible causes of negative linking? Well, as mentioned, it could be for citation or referencing purposes. While this may sound strange, it actually happens.

When your website is ranking on the first page of Google for a controversial product based keyword, then most of the opposite opinion believers want to link to your content just because of that.

I extracted this result when my client got a link from a high authority website, as shown in the screenshot above. At the time, my client was ranking in the second or third position with regards to the keyword ‘waist trainer’, and I could not find any other reason except the one I just explained.

An SQL injection could also be a tactic used by your competitors just to manipulate the search results of your website in a negative way. Hence, unknown pages are usually added to your website, which are totally irrelevant to your niche. Competitors can then spread those links on various irrelevant platforms to rank your brand for irrelevant keywords.

This technique is common across all niches, regardless of how controversial they are. For those who are unaware of this black-hat practice, let me quote an example here which is not from a controversial website, but just for the sake of knowledge.

Unfortunately, when you’re ranking well in the SERPs, then competitors will try to sabotage your efforts by building spam links, resulting in a reduction of rankings.

Other ways to control negative link-building attempts:

• Stay updated with all sorts of attacks on your website using Google’s Webmaster tool. Log in to your Webmaster account and enable the email notification to receive alerts for all kinds of issues.
• Monitor your backlinks using different tools. I usually use Ahrefs to perform this task. Keep an eye on the newly built backlinks. Using Ahrefs, you can filter them by selecting ‘New Backlinks’, and even filter by ‘date’ as shown in the screenshot below.
  
• Then comes the ‘Link Disavow’ process. Compile all the toxic links from the tool you are using – it could either be Ahrefs, MonitorBacklinks.com or any other. Create a Disavow text file and submit it to Google Webmaster.
  

Empowering your content strategy

Once you have disavowed all of your toxic backlinks, it is time to plot out your content strategy. An effective content strategy is a common practice across all niche types, but when it comes to controversial ones, you have to put in double the effort.

That’s because you have to produce content for two opposing groups:  ‘Advocates’ and ‘Dissidents’.

• Content for the Advocates

To sustain the trust of the Advocates, you need to keep producing content across various platforms. The benefit of marketing to this group is that the people in it are already in favor of your product or service. You just need to cater to them with quality content through media features, guest blogging, infographics and other media.

For the Advocates, the inbound marketing methodology works within the conventional flow:

The concept is to craft the right content for the right place and at the right time. As Advocates are actual listeners, when you provide them with value, they will respect your argument.

• Content for the Dissidents

For the Dissidents, the flow slightly changes because, in the preliminary stages, a stranger is not willing to listen to you or is unaware of the benefits of the product/service you are selling. Hence, for controversial niches, I believe the inbound methodology cycle should look something like this:

Let’s proceed with the process to turn Dissidents into Conformists. Again, you can never persuade all of the Dissidents to agree with your argument. But a minor percentage of the group will definitely agree upon certain messages if the content provided is effective. The major focus in this process is to resolve the users’ issues regarding that particular product.

Creating content based on interrogative keywords

Interrogative keywords refer to those queries in which users are willing to confirm an argument.

Proceeding with keyword research, sort the interrogative keywords in your niche and put them into a spreadsheet. You can see some examples of interrogative keywords in the screenshot below:

Your next task is to produce content around these keywords, for both your website’s blog and other relevant platforms. Start building quality links and generate some social engagement around it. The results may surprise you!

Let’s take an example from the above keywords and see how the industry is actually working. I put the query ‘is it bad to eat spicy food while pregnant’ into Google and found some results that perfectly prove the case and share valuable pieces of advice.

The topics of the blog posts are well-crafted and the information has been placed onto solid platforms with a decent domain authority, which means they will rank well in SERPs.

Here are some other pro tips for creating powerful content for this scenario:

• Identify the right content form. To market to the Dissidents, you need to identify where they are, because each niche has a different audience and a different platform for promotion. Research the right medium through which to address the concerns of the Dissidents.
• Let your post headline say it all. As you can see in the above example of spicy food, post titles should be crafted superbly. When a user is searching Google, YouTube or another platform for answers, your post title should be capable of convincing them that you can answer their queries and pique their desire to read the full post.
• Come up with some convincing stats. Authentic statistics and demographics can help you in winning any content battle in any niche. If you come up with factual data, there are also higher chances of making your content go viral. Authentic factual data is enough to beat any content argument.
• Leverage the power of ego through video marketing. When your audience falls into the category of Dissidents who require detailed explanation to clarify their arguments, then vlogs are a great marketing source. All you need to come up with is a story-based video concept which highlights the positives of your niche and debunk any negative misconceptions regarding it.
• Add an emotional engagement factor for additional ego-bait. The ego-bait technique can be applied in any content form: videos, infographics, podcasts or anything else depending on the requirement of your niche. Just make sure it’s compelling.

Using influencers to support your case

Acorn Influence conducted a study of influencer marketing, print advertising and video marketing on Google trends and came up with the conclusion that influencer marketing has developed an edge over print marketing and is also giving tough competition to video marketing.

Have a look at the graph highlighting the top trends:

According to INC, 84% of marketers are planning to launch at least one influencer campaign within the next 12 months.

But how does influencer marketing relate to controversial niches, you ask? Well, you can safely assume that any given influencer is already using a product that some of their fans might dislike – but due to their influence, many of them may be persuaded to try or reconsider it.

Therefore influencer marketing is a highly cost-effective customer acquisition channel with the power to transform your audience’s thinking. According to Tomoson, businesses are earning $6.50 for each $1 spent on influencer marketing.

If you’re looking for real-world inspiration behind this technique, look no further than Kim Kardashian. She is a globally recognized celebrity who is renowned for her hourglass figure. When anyone asks the reason behind her figure, the answer she gives is ‘waist training products’ – a controversial niche.

You can see how a company has leveraged her reach to promote their product and create awareness amongst the Dissidents in the screenshot below:

Connecting your offline efforts with your online presence

Experiential marketing is all about getting into the shoes of someone who is already in favor of a product or service. According to the experiential marketing rule, Dissidents have to get into the shoes of Advocates just for the sake of awareness.

Try launching an offline event as part of your marketing strategy and invite an Advocate on the proviso that they have to bring a Dissident from within their circle. Why? Because it’s much more likely that Dissidents will attend the event on the recommendation of a friend and acquaintance than simply attending alone.

Make sure that your experiential stunt is based on the key factors below. This will actually lead Dissidents towards your brand.

Experiential marketing done right can be a highly effective community building, niche awareness and content repurposing tactic.

Next, try connecting your offline event with the online world. There are many ways through which you can promote your event online and social media will play a vital role in doing so.

Did you know that 81% of audiences watched more live videos in 2016 as compared to 2015? Broadcast your event or experiential stunt using live streaming apps to let people know about your awareness campaign.

Periscope is a great and unique way to broadcast your event to mobile users. The good thing about Periscope is that it will automatically share your post on your Twitter account as well. Additionally, viewers can invite their circles to view your content as well.

Other than Periscope, there are multiple other live streaming platforms in which you can promote your event-based content. Just don’t forget that Facebook and Twitter are the top-ranking social media platforms therefore deserve a lot of your attention.

Wrapping up

When you’re working in a hotly debated industry, your marketing moves matter a lot more because you are trying to appeal to two different crowds. Whatever you do, your content will either impress or disappoint people, so make sure your strategies are versatile and dynamic.

Always build awareness with your audience before trying to convert them over to your controversial niche, and tailor your strategies for different social media platforms. In short, your brand awareness model should be based on new prospects’ introduction, traffic, and increasing favorability.

Image Source: Turn

Ultimately, focus more on building awareness instead of just publishing links on different websites, regardless of their relevance. Once you succeed with building awareness, other decision-making phases will become much more convenient, effective and efficient.

Guest Author: Abbas Rajani is an inbound and SEO strategist at Pac and Copy Plus, a Florida based digital marketing agency. He assists B2B and B2C businesses with ROI growth and effective online presence, and works for a custom logo design company called PNC Logos. Follow him @abbas_rajani for more online marketing-related updates.

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