Sarah Shade - Express Writers

Are You Missing The “Value” Points Of Your Online Content? & Other Reasons Your Content Isn’t Working

December 31, 2020June 7, 2016 by Sarah Shade

Sarah Shade is the Content Specialist at Express Writers. In order for customers to want to read your online content, it needs to be valuable, unique and exciting. No big deal, right? While everyone knows that creating, curating and distributing valuable content on your website and throughout all your web marketing is the key to online marketing success, it’s not always that easy to create content that wows your audience in a world were 27 million pieces of content are shared across the web. If your content hasn’t been working lately, it’s possible you’ve been missing important “value points” of great content or that you’re simply not giving readers material that is applicable to them. Fortunately, these problems are easily fixable and content marketers who have been struggling to create successful content can do well to go back to the basic value points of fantastic content. What are “Value Points?” Value points are the things that make your content stand out from everybody else’s. For example, if there are 5,700 articles on the web on how to plant a garden correctly, the strength of your value points is what will make your article the one people choose to click on. The 5 Value Points Your Online Content Should Have Although the above definition sounds intimidating, value points can be broken down into very specific sections that outline how, exactly, content goes about providing unique value to its readers. 1) Your Content Should Be Capable of Shifting With its Audience You’re a good content marketer so you’ve probably taken the time to develop target personas, right? The thing about even the best target personas, however, is that they change with time. Your target persona at the beginning of your business’s lifespan will absolutely not be the same as your target persona five years later. Additionally, target personas can (and do) vary by product, location, form of content and even website or social media platform. The people you target on Instagram may not be the same people you target with your videocasts, and so on and so forth. With this in mind, one of the most notable value points of great content is that it is capable of shifting as its target persona does. If all of the online content you create is aimed at Jane Doe, a 53 year old woman who lives in the Midwest, works a middle class job, is concerned about coupons and saving money, isn’t particularly tech-savvy and wants information about living frugally, all of the John Does and Laura Jones out there are going to be left in the dust and, as such, they won’t find your content interesting or valuable. With that in mind, take the time to research all of your target audiences and then create content that caters specifically to them. Update your target personas as your business grows or your values change. A great way to stay on top of shifting trends is to use a tool like Prismatic or Klout, which allows you to keep tabs on the people you follow via keywords, so you can stay abreast of what’s going on in your industry. Additionally, be conscious of the customer’s position in the buying journey. If they’re in the early phases of research or inquiry, they probably don’t want product-specific content. With that in mind, seek to offer content that isn’t directly related to your company’s product, good or service but that offers helpful information nonetheless (For example, consider clothing company ModCloth’s Twitter feed, which offers everything from tasty sangria recipes to shots of the company’s clothing). This is a valuable and non-intrusive approach that is absolutely killer at attracting new customers Additionally, it is the primary way you can ensure your material provides solid value to readers and differentiates itself solidly from the churning sea of content consumers deal with daily. 2) Your Online Content Should Fill in the Gaps With upwards of 27 million pieces of online content whipping around the web on a daily basis, it’s hard to imagine that there are any gaps anywhere, right? Think again. What takes content from being run-of-the-mill to outstanding is its ability to see the things other content misses. Maybe those garden articles all tell customers how to plant a garden but they leave them wondering when and where. By providing an answer for these unanswered questions, you meet an important value point and set yourself up for success by dominating the market for those queries. By filing in knowledge gaps or acknowledging unacknowledged challenges, you can stand out in the eyes of customers who want valuable, solid information. 3) Your Content Should Play the Long Game While it’s great for content to go viral, it’s also valuable for content to draw a steady stream of customers for months on end. With that in mind, don’t allow yourself to be perpetually obsessed with content that goes straight to the top of the charts immediately. While viral content does offer specific value, the value is typically trend-based, which means it may not offer sustainable use to customers or readers. In order to reach its peak value potential, content needs to be able to play the long game, as well. By dedicating yourself to creating varied content with a wide array of goals and functions, you can provide a variety of valuable pieces to customers. 4) Your Content Should Be Unique While it’s all well and good to cite statistics and provide great information, truly memorable content will stand apart via its use of new information, anecdotal evidence, themes relevant to a specific audience or well-placed action tips. Again, there’s a lot of content out there and everything sounds roughly the same. In order for your content to stand out, it needs to be unique and offer the value point of substance and relate-ability to customers. With that in mind, offer anecdotes that come from your personal experience or that they can relate to directly and, once you’ve disseminated information, offer them a … Read more

10 Key Ways To Stand Out From The Crowd & Be A Thought Leader

December 31, 2020December 7, 2015 by Sarah Shade

To be a “thought leader” is one of the most sought-after titles a marketer can hope for. Thought leaders are influential individuals who play a huge role in informing the public, leading the direction of the industry, presenting new information and breaking barriers. Theirs is the content that is loved; shared; read; and sought-after. You can’t just go to school to be a thought leader, though. It requires the careful cultivation of a set of particular skills, strengths and networks. It’s not enough to simply be intelligent, hard working or interested: you also need to be passionate, unique and unafraid of pushing the boundaries of possibility. What is a True Online Thought Leader? Thought leaders are many things but, to put it simply, they’re the people to whom everyone else goes for new ideas and key questions. They are informed individuals who offer valuable opinions and inspiration for the people who learn from them and they serve the amazingly important purpose of turning intangible ideas into solid realities. Thought leaders make things happen and, more often than not, they undertake the task of transforming industries and instigating great change across varieties of platforms. Thought leaders in the content marketing world include Brian Clark, the CEO of CopyBlogger; Brian Halligan, the Co-Founder of HubSpot and Joe Pulizzi, the Founder of Content Marketing Institute. How to Be a Thought Leader: 10 Solid Tips Becoming a thought leader is a little bit like becoming a unicorn: it takes a lot of effort and just a little bit of magic. Fortunately, you’re totally capable of both of those things. In the world of content marketing, the process of becoming a thought leader boils down to having unique ideas, expounding upon them in a unique way and offering people real, tangible value. Follow these 10 tips to become a thought leader in your industry. 1) Be Authentic Although it’s part of a thought leader’s job description to create high-level content that answers tough questions and provides real value for readers, it’s also important to know yourself and know your audience. This is especially difficult when you take into account the external pressure that is exerted on though leaders all the time. While it can be tough to avoid becoming distracted by things like the analytics attached to your blog, it’s important to remember that those things don’t provide a real window the to the big picture. Additionally, they make it hard to remember that there are actually people behind all those swoopy lines and numbers. Because of this, the first step to becoming a thought leader is to be authentic, both to yourself and your audience. You came to this business because some aspect of it was interesting to you. Therefore, there is very little that is more important than continuing to chase that interest. By writing what you know and are passionate about, your content will already have an edge over a great deal of content available on the Internet. Additionally, doing this will allow you to draw a series of followers who genuinely care about your topic. How We’re Being Authentic (On Social) One way we’re working on our authenticity is bringing a new level of transparency in our social media. In August 2015 we opened an Instagram account. We’ve started to feature a weekly #virtualworkforceculture post about our remote writers, with a picture of their faces, in their location: and our CEO has been traveling weekly to local businesses for a #localbusiness feature. among other things. Here’s a glimpse: Featured #virtualworkforceculture of the week – our full time creative #writer, Oana G, based in Milano, Italy: “As you can see, I’m fighting a lost battle with clutter. To be honest, I like to surround myself with eclectic, odd, one-of-a-kind things that offer me the highest dosage of inspiration and energy. I love to connect objects with places and experiences, and I adore my job, because it allows me to get creative in my own environment.” #workfromhome #homeoffice #copywriter #copywriting #writing #marketing #SEO #contentmarketing #blogging #SMM #content #inboundmarketing #growthhacking #marketing #webtraffic #success #sales #expresswriters #photooftheday #loveit #selfie #instadaily #picoftheday #igers #instacool A photo posted by Express Writers (@expwriters) on Nov 5, 2015 at 6:49pm PST This is the start to a very transparent social account that shows just what we’re up to in the office, and ties together faces in our work-at-home based team. 2) Seek to be a Hub of Information Nobody wants another loudmouth marketer who takes over a huge portion of the Internet by hawking products or hard-selling readers. For this reason, one of the most important steps in becoming a thought leader is to dedicate yourself to being a hub of information rather than a blaring siren. Business and personal blogs should act as platforms for reader engagement and should seek, primarily, to offer value to customers. Additionally, these platforms should offer a place for people to gather and engage in conversation via blog comments, tweets and re-tweets or social media shares. By doing that, you serve the most important purpose of a thought leader: inspiring ideas and facilitating cohesion. 3) Inspire Action One of the most important purposes your content can serve is to inspire action within your readers. Your content should be so irresistible that people want to share it on social media, read the book you mentioned, try their hand at something new or travel to the exotic locale outlined in your most recent post. The goal can vary but the outcome should be the same: in order to be a thought leader, your content needs to move people to action. 4) Cultivate Your “Breakthrough Idea” One of the traits of thought leaders everywhere is that they’re associated with a breakthrough idea. Depending upon your niche, your breakthrough idea could be an area of expertise or a particular approach to an old topic. Whatever your breakthrough idea is, it should inform the rest of your content. For example, if you’re going to run a blog … Read more

How to Create an Endless Stream of Unforgettable Content

December 31, 2020September 28, 2015 by Sarah Shade

Sarah Shade is a Content Specialist at Express Writers. Regardless of niche, vision, profit margins and aspirations, you and all business owners have one thing in common. You give your best on different fronts to stand out from the crowd. Quite often, you might engage your efforts in a battle with competitors, and also with your own limitations. During this process, you might rely on premium content to highlight your uniqueness, make your products more desirable and form solid communities around your brands. However, achieving consistency in content creation is more difficult than you may think, especially when you are faced with multiple work-related challenges on a daily basis. Truth be told, every once in a while, we all get distracted. Sometimes, we are overwhelmed by all the tasks that require our full attention and prompt intervention. We run out of fresh, creative ideas and we lose our motivation for a second or two. Nonetheless, we shouldn’t let these temporary impediments stand in the way of our success. Why Does Your Business Require a Steady Content Flow? Nowadays, content is still a powerful game-changer that could represent the perfect liaison between businesses and their clients. Robust, consistent, unique content is an invaluable asset that can separate you from your main competitors, boost your revenues, maximize your online visibility, tighten your bond with prospects and existing customers and give you hope for the future. According to Brad Friedman from Social Media Today, by posting content regularly and keeping your website updated you could improve your search engine rankings and implement more effective link building strategies. After all, it’s always easier to find and use links that are relevant to your pages when you’re running a blog that counts hundreds of quality posts reflecting your grand vision, mission and purpose in business. 8 Ways to Stay Consistent with Your Web Content at All Times A steady content flow can help you make a name for yourself in any field of activity, while managing to impress both human visitors and search engines with your commitment and consistency. But churning out dozens of first-hand articles and blog posts is no easy task, especially when you’re writing with your audience in mind. A stream of unforgettable content requires a mix of inspiration, creativity, talent, motivation and hours of research. If you want to be able to take pride in a flawless, uninterrupted content flow in the long term, here are a few key steps that you should follow to achieve your goal. 1. Stick to an Editorial Calendar That Makes Sense to You We will let you in on a well-kept secret: even the most experienced bloggers, journalists and business owners count on an editorial calendar to control content publication across a great variety of channels, such as newspapers, blogs, social media platforms and email newsletters. An article published by CrazyEgg reveals that a good editorial calendar adapted to your goals can improve your current content strategy. Using this handy little helper you can manage and schedule social media posts, gather new ideas for inspiring articles and posts, track events that could become your most generous sources of inspiration, and schedule your own blog posts, as well as the ones signed by guest authors. Now you can make the most of three great editor calendar plugins for WordPress (CoSchedule, Editorial Calendar and EditFlow) to plan your every move in advance and make sure that deadlines will no longer catch you by surprise. 2. Explore Key Themes That Could Never Get Boring Instead of creating dull, perishable content that essentially puts your products and services into the spotlight and praises the uniqueness of your brand, opt for a different approach. Tackle the real-world problems and concerns expressed by your audience. Humanize and personalize your brand. Be helpful. Be engaging. For once, put your skills, expert insight and experience to good use to explore a series of interesting themes and convey information-rich messages that will raise the interest of your audience. 3. Create, Publish and Distribute Evergreen Content No matter how active you are in your field of activity, you may get hit by a serious case of writer’s block at some point. Does this mean that you should lay down your weapons, while praying for the return of your inspiration? Of course not! Instead of opting for a passive approach towards content creation, you should explore a series of evergreen content ideas that are long-lasting and sustainable and can continue to stay relevant long after their materialization. How-to tutorials, videos, list posts and product reviews match this description and can help you satisfy your readers’ hunger for premium content even when you don’t really have anything new and groundbreaking to write about. Choose high-interest evergreen topics (romance, pet care, weight loss, finance, parenting and so on) that are fully compatible with your business and find the most creative methods to add new meanings to old stories. 4. When Your Content Ideas Are Drying Up, Improvise! At some point, you may get tired of crafting list posts and how-to articles. While these types of content will always return the desirable results as long as you keep your quality standards high, simply because they stress out the problems experienced by your readers and promise miraculously effective solutions to these issues, it is always recommended to play the diversity card to keep your readers engaged. By improvising every once in a while you could break the monotony and avoid dull topics that you may be tempted to use as a last resort. Here’s an idea worth exploring: talk to influent people in your industry and turn your dialogue into the essence of your new article or blog posts. Make a list of interview subjects and unleash your creativity. If everything goes according to plan, consider turning interviews into a prominent, regular feature of your content flow. 5. Unleash the Power of Multimedia Content Your content shouldn’t be limited to chunks of text, especially today, when multimedia elements … Read more

Google Panda 4.2 – What Does This Mean for Your Web Pages?

December 31, 2020August 13, 2015 by Sarah Shade

Sarah Shade is a Content Specialist at Express Writers. The newest Panda is here. Panda 4.2 is Google’s most recent updated to their algorithm software and it’s already befuddling content marketers everywhere. It’s no secret that Google can be a little, well…secretive, about its updates so it’s no surprise that nobody really seems to know what’s going on with the 4.2 update. Fortunately, we’re here to help. Here is what the Google Panda 4.2 updates mean for your web pages— in as plain English as I can utilize. Google Panda 4.2 Will Affect a Small Percentage of Search Queries According to expert estimates, the Panda updates will affect some 2-3% of all web searches. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that this is Google we’re talking about so 2-3% equals roughly 36 million searches. This number isn’t quite as large as some of Panda’s previous updates. Panda 4.0 affected 7.5% of web searches while 4.1 took a toll on 3-5%. It’s easy to understand why some SEO’s are concerned, however, because between September 2011 and May 2014, none of Panda’s updates affected more than 2.4% of web searches. Panda 4.2 Still Insists Upon Quality Over Quantity One thing that hasn’t changed with the Panda 4.2 update is the insistence upon quality content. The update puts a high premium on quality content and can be expected to punish scraped content and down rate sites that use shoddy content creation techniques. As with previous Panda updates, Panda 4.2 is out to do away with keyword stuffing, content mills, ugly, broken or unscrupulous websites and black hat SEO practices that attempt to fly below Google’s algorithm radar. According to Google’s recent post on Google+: “Based on user (and webmaster!) feedback, we’ve been able to discover a few more signals to help Panda identify low-quality content more precisely. This results in a greater diversity of high-quality small- and medium-sized sites ranking higher, which is nice.” For sites that are already creating high-quality content, these updates shouldn’t present a problem. For those that aren’t, however, it might be time for an about-face. Panda 4.2 will further emphasize Google’s insistence that sites need to focus on quality over quantity by producing original content that is well written and utilizes keywords correctly. Additionally, Panda 4.2 can be expected to crack down on ugly, overstuffed websites. On this same note, any site that has been penalized by any of the previous Panda updates will now have a chance to reform and step over to the side of all that is good and just in the world of content marketing. Sites that were down rated by previous panda updates and have made the needed changes will now have the chance see an uptick in traffic, providing the changes made were up to snuff. This is a double-edged sword, however, as sites that were not previously affected by the Panda updates may see a downtick in traffic due to the update and its accompanying requirements. If nothing else changes but you notice a lull in traffic post-Panda 4.2, it’s likely the new algorithm is to blame. Google Panda 4.2 is the Slowest Panda Yet Although this version of Panda was first introduced on July 18th of this year, the complete rollout is projected to occur slowly over the course of several months. This is not surprising, however, as Google’s updates have gotten slower and slower and the time between updates has expanded. It’s been ten months since Panda’s 4.1 update and sites that were dinged by that round of updates are anxiously awaiting 4.2 to take hold, although it looks like they’ll have to wait just a bit longer. On that same note, sites that haven’t placed the needed level emphasis on quality content may notice some downticks in their traffic with the 4.2 updates. Unfortunately, once the update is released, it is too late to make changes to a site and those penalized by the new updates will simply have to wait until the next slow Panda comes along. Because Google Panda 4.2 is such a slow-moving beast, SEOs may have a difficult time determining how and when the algorithm is affecting their site. On this same note, it will be somewhat difficult to pinpoint exactly what Panda 4.2 is promoting or penalizing although it’s safe to say that this update, like all the others, was born for the purpose of buoying quality content to the top of the search rankings. The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same With this recent Panda update, SEO’s have all the same questions they always have: what is the update targeting? How will webmasters become aware of penalties to their sites? What kind of content is best for rankings? Although the answers to these questions aren’t explicitly clear, it is a safe bet that this Panda is like all of the others in that it is seeking to promote and reward quality content. This means that sites that feature well-written, original content that utilizes high-quality links and has a high DA score are likely safe from any negative affects borne by the 4.2 update. In light of that, the high ground remains the same: create original content that is high quality, well researched and valuable to your readers. Although Panda’s updates may seem complex, they all point to the same thing: the value of great content and a war on sneaky SEO tactics that allow black hats to trick the system and artificially inflate rankings. This Panda, like all the other Panda’s in Google’s army, just wants to reward the sites that do the best job and let everyone else step to the back.

Google Needs an SEO Guy! How Even Google Struggles With Ranking

December 31, 2020August 10, 2015 by Sarah Shade

It might seem impossible that Google, the king of SEO, needs help with SEO or that Google needs an SEO guy at all. But, according to a recent posting on the Google Careers job board – it’s true. The job board calls for an SEO project manager and describes the job like this: “As a Program Manager for Technical SEO, you will work with cross-functional teams across Marketing, Sales, Product Development, Engineering and more to help drive organic traffic and business growth. You will take part in website development and optimization, help shape blog and social strategy, improve website code hygiene and define web architecture for international websites.” (Source: google.com/about/careers/search#!t=jo&jid=120105001) Google Needs An SEO Guy: Why Even Google Needs Help Regardless of whether you run the system or not, the process of increasing organic traffic is tough. Google’s lucky new SEO will be responsible for everything from developing web code to advising, collaborating with and synthesizing feedback from departments like Product and Engineering and Marketing. Although Google employs a large team of technical developers, designers, writers and engineers, it is possible that the addition of a new SEO would indicate that, in a sea of content, Google has trouble standing out – just like everyone else. For years, Google has been a business shrouded in mystery and intrigue – it seems larger than life, its updates are secretive and it seems to literally rule the Internet. This job posting, however, may provide a well-qualified SEO with a look behind the curtain. What the New SEO Will Need to Qualify for the Job It’s fair to say that whoever eventually fills this job description will be the envy of many SEO’s across the web. Being the SEO guy for Google is a little bit like being a member of the Kardashian’s camera crew – it’s an exciting role that offers plenty of behind-the-scenes intel and a fair amount of excitement. In order to be that lucky SEO, though, you’ll need the following qualifications: BA/BS degree in Computer Science, Engineering or equivalent life experience. 4 years of experience developing websites and applications with applications and software such as SQL, HTML5, and XML. At least 2 years SEO experience. Experience working with Google App Engine, Google Custom Search, Webmaster Tools and Google Analytics. Experience creating and maintaining project schedules and extensive experience utilizing tools within project management systems. How the New SEO Will Boost Google’s Rankings Even if you are Google, there are no free lunches in terms of SEO. In order to boost the company’s rankings and drive more organic traffic, Google’s SEO will have to focus on content rather than simply relying on technical SEO. In addition to being vastly more evergreen than technical SEO, content is the #1 ranking factor these days and is the only sure way for a company, any company, to boost its rankings. Although SEO is and will always be an important factor to understanding rankings and boosting a site’s position in the indexes, it’s clear that Google’s new SEO will have to focus on a bit more than SEO alone. Why Content is King Not much has changed since Bill Gates used the term “content is king” way back in 1996 and, today, it rings as true as ever. Cliché though it might be, content is king, and there’s really no way to get around that in the world of rankings. While SEO is a pivotal piece of the structure that creates great rankings and high-quality, high DA websites, content is the crème de la crème of digital marketing, far beyond technical SEO. The reason for this is that content is essentially the only thing that deems a page worthy of a search engine result. Keep in mind that it would, of course, be almost impossible to rank a blank page with SEO alone. That said, creating great content is integral for any company that wants to boost rankings in the long-term. Content Meets Consumer Demand Content is a product and it meets the consumer demand for information. Great content will quickly be passed around the web in order to satisfy the demand of a certain community of consumers and will be the subject of potentially infinite links and backlinks. There is a huge abundance of content on the web and, in every niche far and wide, there is great content and there is poor content. The difference between the two is that great content satisfies a thirst while poor content simply clogs SEO indexes with badly written junk. Great Content Provides Links One of the most important purposes great content plays in creating natural traffic is driving links. Great content is optimized for linking and will quickly be shared across the web, driving traffic back to the home site and boosting its rankings in Google. Regardless of what Google’s new SEO does, it is obvious that organic traffic comes, first and foremost, from content and all the technical SEO in the world isn’t worth much if there is not a great platform of content from which to spring. A Suggested SEO Strategy for Google In 3 Steps To give Google’s new SEO a leg-up, we’ve laid out a simple SEO strategy that helps drive organic traffic and boost ranking: 1) Begin With a Site Audit: Site audits are an important tool for anyone who wants to rank in search engines. Many sites have duplicate content hanging around that may damage rankings and even Google isn’t immune. Cleaning this up will go a long way toward producing better rankings and driving more traffic. 2) Conduct Some Keyword Research: Determine what keywords to start using and working into the new content you’re going to create. Keywords are a large factor in overall rankings and can help a page show up in Google’s indexes according to search terms and links. 3) Start Blogging and Creating Original Content: Remember – there are no free lunches and content is king. Start blogging and creating great, linkable, shareable original content and … Read more

How a Poorly Executed Content Strategy Can Eliminate Your Full Potential

March 24, 2022July 29, 2015 by Sarah Shade

Sarah Shade is one of our Content Specialists at Express Writers. Content strategy. You and I both (as good Internet marketers) know all about these by now. Without one, it’s like trying to find a black cat in a dark room without a light bulb. But did you know that a poorly executed content strategy can be even more harmful than not having one at all? Even Harvard Business Review notes that most management professionals agree that a mediocre strategy that is executed well trumps a great strategy that is executed poorly. In the realm of content strategy this is usually the case, although some exceptions to the rule do stand out. The How-To’s of Content Strategy Development In order for a content strategy to be successful, it must first be properly defined. Far too often, marketing professionals underestimate how important it is to undertake the basic steps of content strategy development. Like any good plan, a well-developed content strategy takes time and effort and no small amount of consideration. Even Forbes notes that even though content marketing can be complicated, it’s not in your best interests to put it on the back burner or ignore it altogether. Getting to Success – When Your Content Strategy Comes Together It’s a wonderful feeling to realize that your content strategy is coming together. All your key performance indicators are pointing towards a steady increase in traffic and your company’s name is on the public’s tongue. They know who you are and what you stand for. You’ve even managed to convince users to evangelize for you and things could not be better. In a perfect world, this would be what you’d come to expect from content marketing strategies. The truth of the matter is that this is the exception, rather than the rule. There are so many things that could possibly go wrong with a content strategy that ends up with it performing far worse than it set out to do, or even doing the opposite and driving consumers away from your site. How Content Strategies Fail If a content strategy is not delivering to its fullest potential the fault may lie in one of two places. Firstly, in the initial setup of the content marketing strategy there could have been a number of problems with how you approached the problem. On the other side of the coin are the problems that occur with the strategy that happen after its implementation. Both planning-level snafus and implementation level mistakes can lead to a content strategy failing. Let’s take a closer look at where the process seems to break down in these two key areas. 4 Major Planning Level Failures In planning level failure, a content strategy is doomed from the time it’s conceptualized. Although this seems like a bleak prospect, it is usually the case when an unskilled content strategy team tries to develop a strategy plan without having a proper grasp of planning principles. There are a number of key areas where this problem can persist and lead to failure for the strategy, such as: 1. Wrong Target Demographic While you would expect companies to know their own target demographic, you would be shocked to see how many of them aim their content strategy at a demographic that it doesn’t work for, while ignoring the demographic that it would appeal to best. 2. Not Budgeting Enough Having a budget is a good thing in a corporate setting because it gives you a figure to work with regarding what you’re allowed for purchasing new content. However, budgeting too little can make you sacrifice quality in order to meet your quota. 3. No Clear Distribution Channels Defining your distribution channels enables your content strategy to perform the way it was designed to. The distribution channels you choose should be the ones where your target demographic exists in large numbers. 4. Being Out Touch with your Audience Content marketing has a marked focus on the audience you are creating content for. If you don’t know what drives your audience, what motivates them and what makes them take action, then you need to find out before embarking on a content marketing campaign. Planning level failure isn’t the end of the world for a content strategy, however. Even though these things can limit the success (or even reverse it) for a content strategy, it is likely that the content management team will realize what’s going on and correct themselves before they get too far into content production. Four Implementation Level Failures This is where things get kind of complicated. At planning level failure it is a simple matter of fixing the behind-the-scenes work and redirecting resources where they have to go. When it comes to implementation level failure, things that go wrong here can severely damage the business image in the public eye. Depending on what goes wrong the impact could range from minor to catastrophic. Implementation level failure can include problems such as: 1. Failure to Streamline Content Although not a capital sin, failing to streamline your already produced content can lead to users leaving your site as they get there. Things such as consistent typography, working external links and relevant topics of discussion all fall under this broad heading. Properly vetting your content through an audit is a great way to deal with this problem, although it can be time consuming. 2. Not Engaging your Audience Properly The aim of content when developed in tandem with a strategy is to engage the audience so that they build a bond of loyalty with your brand or company. In order to engage your audience properly, you need to develop content that highlights hot-button topics and then discuss these over your comment section or on social media. Remember when discussing these things with your audience, it is recommended that you have a non-aggressive tone, even if members of the audience disagrees with your point of view. 3. Poor Quality Content Probably the number one problem that strategists have when … Read more

7 Ways to Show the World You’re Worth Listening To

December 31, 2020May 29, 2015 by Sarah Shade

You know that there is no business like show business, right? But who is to say exactly what is meant by “show business”? When you create content, you do so in an attempt to show readers that you know what you are talking about and that they should go to you if they want to learn more or use your service/product. So when it comes to the show business of content creation, how can you make sure your writing is a box office smash? (Or at least a cult hit or award favorite)? 7 Methods To Shout From the Rooftops (Or Get Your Content A Lot of Viewers) There are actually a lot of things you can do to make sure your content is seen by a whole lot of viewers, but here are seven good places to start. 1. The Preview Looked Good: Use Social Media to Attract Readers. Have you ever determined whether you would see a movie based off of its preview? There is a good chance that you have. Here are some things that my friends and I have been known to say after a preview: “I didn’t think I would want to see that, but the preview looked good.” “The preview looked funny, but they probably put all the funny parts in it. So it’s probably not going to be that good.” “I’m disappointed. I thought I was going to like it, but not if the preview is anything to go by.” You have probably said something similar at some point too. So what does that mean for content production? It’s not just the writing itself that counts, it is all the small, social media content you do along the way to advertise for your content. What you say in the Tweet, Facebook post, or summary can be just as important as the actual content. Because it is what viewers are most likely to see first, it is the main component in deciding whether they are going to read on. So you have to grab their attention there if you want to have any chance at grabbing their attention in the long-form post. Moral of this point: If you can’t catch them in the previews, then you are not likely to catch them at all. 2. Be the Headliner: Create Good Headlines. Just like it is the star headliner that is going to draw a lot of the crowd, it is your catchy headline that is going to get people interested in reading your content. So you know that you need to work hard on crafting a great title. Knowing you need a good headline and actually being able to come up with one, though, are two very different things. Not only do you have to get your creative juices flowing in order to write a good title, you also have stop trying so hard because people can always tell when you are trying too hard. Luckily for all of us, there are all sorts of tools to help us create amazing titles. Advanced Marketing Institute. The AMI has a headline tool that allows you to enter your headline and have its Emotional Marketing Value (EMV) ranked. It then walks you through how many EMV words a good headline should have and what type of EMV words you are using (e.g., intellectual EMV). Crazyegg Blog. This post walks you through several ways almost guaranteed to convert readers and tells you why they are successful. The Future of Ink. This post basically gives you some fill in the blank headlines that you can use with your own content. Moral of this point: If the headliner isn’t drawing in crowds, then everything else had better be a hundred times better to make up for it. 3. Open Strong: Create Catchy Intros. After the opening night of a movie or play, reviews are going to come in. That opening could just make or break the show because if it gets all bad reviews, people aren’t likely to come back for the rest of the performances. Think of your opening paragraph as the one that is going to get you the initial reviews. People are going to read it, and then they are going to determine whether they want to read more. If your intro paragraph is getting bad reviews, then no matter how good the rest of the content is, people likely aren’t going to be reading it. On the other hand, if you capture the attention of your readers from your opening lines, then you have a better chance of making it to the end of your run (i.e., getting people to read the entire article.) So don’t ignore that opening paragraph or rush through it to get to the meat of what you are trying to say. Moral of this point: If you want a long run, make sure you get good reviews from the opening. 4. You’re Gonna Be in the Pictures: Use Images. I’m making a long, drawn out analogy here comparing writing to show business, so you can see why images are going to be an important component to what I am saying. If you want to be a success in show business, then you need to actually show something. People like pictures. It’s just a fact of life. That’s why they say a picture is worth a thousand words. A good image will draw the eye so that the potential reader can see that great headline you created, which will cause them to read that opening line that is going to get you great reviews, which will make them read whatever it is you have to say. And all because you caught their eyes with a good image. Images could even help your SEO ranking because Google loves images as much as us mortals. You can find free images on places such as Wikimedia Commons or by searching Flickr’s creative commons images. You can also set up accounts on platforms such … Read more