Did you catch our latest #ContentWritingChat over on Twitter? If not, you missed one informative chat! We talked all about successful content creation to help you prepare for the year ahead. If you missed out or you need a refresher on all those amazing tips, this recap is for you!
#ContentWritingChat Recap: Successful Content Creation and Marketing in 2017 with Don Purdum
For this week’s chat, our guest host was Don Purdum. Don is an award-winning blogger and a marketing consultant. He joined us to share his top content creation and marketing tips so you can put them to use for your brand this year.
Q1: Why is it vital to have a relevant message for your audience, especially in 2017?
It’s so important, now more than ever, to make sure you’re sharing a message that’s relevant to your audience. But do you know why? We’ve got the answer, courtesy of our chat participants!
A1: #1 – Relevance determines how they experience you based on their problems, needs, wants or desires. #contentwritingchat
Don said that relevance determines how your audience experiences you based on their problems, needs, wants, or desires. He also brought up a great point that your content shouldn’t be all about you. It needs to provide some sort of incentive to your audience to get them read, comment, share, and link to you.
As Jason said, without a relevant message, your audience won’t resonate with you. You have to develop a connection with them and understand their needs.
A1 – Talking to everyone = talking to no one. Know thy audience (like you went to camp together) #ContentWritingChat
Jason pointed out that talking to everyone is essentially talking to no one. You aren’t going to attract your ideal audience if you aren’t directly speaking to them and addressing their needs.
A relevant message is going to help you stand out in an otherwise crowded online space. Jacob said you need to produce a relevant message if you want your content to be read.
As Savannah said, there’s a lot of noise online today. We have to be wise about what we choose to consume. When you provide a clear message to your audience, it will help them easily decide if your content is right for them and worth their time.
Our CEO, Julia, is spot on with her answer. Relevant content = winning content! You want to create the content your audience will love.
Q2: Define giving value in content marketing. How do I know if my audience receives it?
We know it’s important to give our audience tremendous value in the content we create, but what does that actually mean? And how can you tell if your audience has received value? Here’s what you need to know:
A2 – I define value as solving one problem, meeting one need, or fulfilling one desire, for one person. #contentwritingchat
For Don, he feels that providing value is when you can solve a problem your audience is facing or meeting one of their needs. He also said that you can tell your audience has received value when you notice things like social media shares, links to your content, and comments.
Sarah from ThinkSEM said you can provide value to your audience by knowing what they need and want and delivering on it. When you see them taking action, that’s when you know they’ve received the value you aimed to provide.
Zala brought up some great questions you can ask yourself to determine if you’re providing value. Are you speaking to the needs of your audience? Are they giving you their attention? Are they actually reading your content, leaving comments, buying what you’re offering, or coming back for more?
Engagement and conversions are two ways you can tell if your audience is receiving the value you provide.
Q3: In order to increase conversion rates, what should be a content creation focus for 2017?
Whether you’re trying to get someone to buy a product, sign-up for your email list, or something else, those conversions are very important. So, how do you increase your conversion rates to get major results online? Check out these tips:
A3 – #3 – Follow Google’s EAT principle… E = Expertise A = Authority = Trustworthiness #contentwritingchat
You should have a purpose to every piece of content you create. You need to have a goal that you’re working toward so you can measure the results you receive. It’ll let you know if your content is working or not.
A3 If you want conversions, focus on content that fills a need and drive clear calls to action at every stage of funnel #ContentWritingChat
Great advice from Bill! He said to focus on content that fills a need for your audience and provide clear calls to action throughout the customer funnel.
A3: Don’t forget to actually include a call to action. If you want to increase conversions, TELL them what to do next. #ContentWritingChat
Once you know what you want to achieve with the content you create, you need to tell people want to do next. Don’t just hope they’ll figure it out on their own. Provide a call to action so they know what the next step is with you.
Jason also knows the importance of a call to action, but he also said you need to connect with your audience. If you lack that connection, they aren’t likely to take the next step.
Julia said you should spend time researching hot topics that your audience would be interested in. She loves tools like Answer the Public and BuzzSumo for this.
A3: #2 Understand how your audience is receiving content. Audio? Video? Blog post? Know what they want and create it. #contentwritingchat
Caleb brings up a great point about knowing how your audience likes to receive content. Do they prefer audio, video, or written blog posts? Figure out what they want and create it because you’ll be more likely to see conversions taking place with the right content.
Q4: What are steps you can take to ensure a lower bounce rate on your website?
If you want to lower your bounce rate and get people staying on your website for a long time, here’s what you need to know:
A4 – #1 – Create amazing content that is specific, relevant and organized. It’s about value over selling. #contentwritingchat
When you actually deliver on the value you promised to people, they’ll want to stay on your site to read more and more. One great way to get visitors to check out more content on your website is to interlink relevant blog posts.
A4: First, target the right audience with your content. Second, provide high quality & helpful content. #contentwritingchat
You also want to make sure you’re creating content that is targeting your ideal audience. If you aren’t, you’re going to wind up attracting all the wrong people and they aren’t going to stick around.
A4: Write content you are passionate about, your community wants to read what you love, solve problems, be vulnerable #ContentWritingChat
It’s also a great idea that you don’t mislead people with a clickbait headline. They won’t be inclined to stick around if you do. Then, provide readers with quality writing and real value.
Don said you need to keep your content within your area of expertise, as opposed to straying from your core message. This helps to create relevance. You can also use your content as a way to position yourself as an authority.
A5: Your message is what you want to say – content is how you say it – and SEO is how you can get it found organically. #contentwritingchat
Don recommends building relationships with relevant influencers. You can comment on their blogs and share their content on social media as a way to get them to take notice. When an influencer shares your content, it’s a great way to make new people aware of your work.
@ExpWriters A6: Answer the questions that they are searching for and go where they already are going and converse there #ContentWritingChat
Jacob said to figure out where your audience is already spending time online. Go there and start engaging with them. It’s a great way to build a relationship with them.
As Debi said, you need to start by optimizing your content. This ensures people are going to find it organically. Then, spread the word yourself by sharing content on al relevant online channels that your audience is using.
Shanelle offered a piece of helpful advice as she reminds us to be persistent. You can’t expect to receive results overnight, so keep trying to get your content out there.
Q7: What kinds of content work best to earn links and shares for your brand?
What kinds of content are going to get you the most links and shares? Check out what our chat participants had to say about this one:
A7 – What works best for us are expanded list posts (6,000+ words), infographics and resource guides. #contentwritingchat
For Don’ts brand, long-form content reigns supreme. His audience loves the 6,000+ word content they create, as well as infographics and resource guides.
Lex knows that long-form content that provides value is key to getting that SEO juice.
Q8: Share a few tools you use to create compelling content and relevant messaging.
The good news is, there are always tools to help you create amazing content for your brand. Check out some of these tool suggestions and try using them for yourself:
Smart answer from Michelle! She knows the importance of social listening, as it’s a great way to figure out what your audience wants and needs.
We look forward to seeing you at the next #ContentWritingChat! Mark your calendars weekly for Tuesday at 10 AM Central Time for great chats centered around content writing and marketing. Follow @ExpWriters to stay updated on our new topics and guests!
Did you miss #ContentWritingChat this week? There’s no need to worry, friends! We have you covered with a recap of this Tuesday’s chat. If you want to learn how to create great content online, just keep reading!
#ContentWritingChat Recap: How to Decide What to Write About & Create Great Content Online with Carrie Morgan
Our guest host this week was Carrie Morgan. Carrie is an author and an expert when it comes to public relations, content marketing, SEO, and social media.
It’s her second time joining us as a guest host (her first #ContentWritingChat hosting session with us was back in February about rising above the noise), and we were thrilled to have her back sharing her expertise!
Q1: Share a few qualities that make up outstanding online content.
What makes a piece of online content amazing? There are a few specific qualities it needs to have! Check out some of these answers from Tuesday’s chat:
A1. Great content doesn’t echo what everyone else is talking about, but dives deeper. THINKS harder. #contentwritingchat
As Carrie said, great content doesn’t just echo what everyone else is saying. You need to dive deeper and think harder with the content you’re creating. It needs to be unique in order to stand out from the crowd.
She also said it reflects a strong understanding of its customer and audience. The content you create is about them, not you!
@writingchat A1: Quality and VALUE. Content that solves the readers problem and is easy to digest will always win out #ContentWritingChat
When creating content, it needs to be high quality and valuable for your audience. Top-notch content that solves a problem your audience is facing will always yield results.
A1: Easily readable such as using headlines or lists. People want to be able to find things easily. Also, pictures! #contentwritingchat
Lexie from Netvantage Marketing knows readability is essential when it comes to creating great content online. To make your content readable to visitors of your website, use headlines and format text into lists when appropriate. It makes your content easy to scan. Pictures are great, too!
a1: Trustworthy, accuracy, entertaining, intriguing, informative. It depends on your audience, always cater to them. #contentwritingchat
You should always cater to your audience when writing content. You want to be trustworthy, accurate, entertaining, intriguing, and informative depending on what you’re writing.
A1 The best online content makes use of visual and emotional storytelling hooks–and leads with value to the audience. #contentwritingchat
As Bill said, the best online content makes use of visual and emotional storytelling. It’s the best way to hook your audience and establish a connection with them.
A1A: And for the love of all things language, please proofread your content or hire a skilled editor. (Why hello there!) #contentwritingchat
What’s one thing you should never forget when creating content? Proofreading! Make sure you proofread everything before you hit publish. Alternatively, Tara suggests hiring a skilled editor to do the job for you.
A1 Don’t put out content that isn’t your best. A few qualities: incredibly useful. Audience-focused. You’re proud of it. #ContentWritingChat
As Julia said, you should never put out content that isn’t your best. Your audience deserves better than that and you want to make sure you’re proud of the work you’re publishing. When striving to create great online content, you want to be useful and focused on your audience.
Q2: How do you figure out what topics to write about online?
Considering there are so many things you can write about, it can be hard to choose which topics are right for you. Here are a few tips from the chat:
A2. Don’t rely too heavily on online tools – get out and talk to your audience, customers, prospects. #contentwritingchat
Carrie feels you shouldn’t rely too heavily on online tools. Instead, the best way to figure out what you should write about is to ask your audience. Ask your current and prospective customers what they’d like to see. You can address their biggest concerns with your content.
She also suggests keeping a specific file that holds all of your topic ideas. This makes it easy to refer to when you’re searching for ideas.
Tara knows that online tools can still be handy when it comes to choosing topics to write about. She likes to use Answer the Public and SEMrush to find questions from her audience. She also searches categories and competition and evaluates keywords.
A2 A good indicator is knowing what content your audience likes/responds to & then creating your own original pieces. #ContentWritingChat
It’s a good idea to keep track of what your audience is responding to. Which of your blog posts have been the most popular so far? That’s good indication of what your audience is interested in.
@writingchat A2: Learn what your customers and buyers are reading, what problems they have-use this as a starting place #contentwritingchat
Jacob’s advice is to learn what your customers and buyers are reading. What problems are they dealing with? This can help you come up with great content topics.
There are three main questions Jenn asks when deciding what to write about. What are my consumers engaging with? What’s relevant in the news? Where’s a gap in coverage? Try asking these questions the next time you’re stuck for ideas.
Q3: How can you learn more about your audience and what they want you to share with them?
If it wasn’t already obvious, it’s important to know and understand your audience if you want to create great online content. However, you may be asking how you can possibly learn this information about them. If you’re not sure how to find out what they want, keep these tips in mind:
A3. Dive into where your audience hangs out, listen. Don’t write until you listen. They’ll tell you what to write. #contentwritingchat
Listen, listen, listen! You need to pay attention to your audience and truly listen to what they have to say. If you do, you’ll come up with plenty of great ideas.
Carrie also suggests turning to your customer service or sales teams. Find out what customers are asking so you can address those issues with your content.
A3: Keep tabs on hot topics via discussion areas online. ASK people what they want to see/learn about. #contentwritingchat
Tara suggests keeping tabs on hot topics your audience is discussing online. You can find this through social media, online forums, and even Facebook groups. All you have to do is ask people what they want to see and create content accordingly.
A3: Again, ask them. You can also learn a lot from product reviews. What info should you have shared for a buyer. #contentwritingchat
Lexie agrees that all you have to do is ask. People will tell you what you want if you just ask and listen to what they have to say. She also said you can learn a lot from product reviews, so keep an eye on those if you receive them.
A3: Analytics, engagement, and/or just point blank asking them through forums or surveys. *cough* Twitter polls *cough* #contentwritingchat
Take advantage of online forums and Twitter polls as ways to ask your audience what they want to see. You should also keep an eye on your site analytics, plus engagement you receive from your audience.
Debi said you should become your target audience. When you understand them, you’ll know what you should write about. Aim to address their pain points and provide a solution for them.
A3: Make a genuine connection. Get to know the reader/viewer on a human level. #ContentWritingChat
Zachary said you should make a genuine connection with your audience. Get to know who your readers are so you can write the content they’re looking for.
A3: Talk to them… Survey, face-to-face, sales, customer service, trade show – anywhere, anytime. #ContentWritingChat
As Zlatka said, there are a variety of ways you can reach out to your audience. You can create surveys, ask them face-to-face, reach out to sales or customer service, engage at trade shows, and more.
Don’t forget an effective headline! If you want to get people clicking over to your website, you have to grab them with an enticing, but accurate, headline. No clickbait.
A4. Make it readable. Write in a real, relatable way. Use headlines, bullet points to make it easy to read. #contentwritingchat
As Brittany said, it needs to be readable. You should write your content in a way that your audience can relate to. Use headings and bullet points to make your posts skimmable.
A4: I’ve become a big fan of H2 and H3 subheads to improve skimability (is that a word?)–helps SEO, too, I believe. #contentwritingchat
If you want people to share your content, you need to make sure it’s shareable. Lex and the Digital Natives Cast team suggest making sharing options available so it’s easy for your readers to use.
Don’t be afraid to ask for the share, too. Provide your audience with a call to action, requesting they share your content. Tell them what you want them to do and you’re more likely to see results.
Q5: Discuss how to create visuals to help boost the success of your written content.
It’s no secret that visuals are essential to pair with your online content. To help you make complementary visuals that grab the attention of your audience, check out these tips:
A5. I love, love, love tools like @Canva to create branded quote images to promote content. #contentwritingchat
Carrie feels content reflects the writer’s level of experience. If you aren’t looking to write your own content, hire someone who is experienced to do the job.
A6 Don’t underestimate audience intelligence. Don’t put out mediocre just to get something out – take time to create. #ContentWritingChat
Julia said you should never underestimate the intelligence of your audience. Make sure you’re taking time to create quality content instead of putting out something that’s mediocre.
A6: Don’t: keyword stuff, sound like a non-native speaker, fail to provide new insights or information. #contentwritingchat
Tara knows keyword stuffing just isn’t cool. Make sure you aren’t guilty of doing this with your content. She also said you should aim to provide new insights or information for your audience.
A6 Don’t write for search engines, and don’t assume you’re too good for one last proof-read. 😉 #ContentWritingChat
Great advice from Shannon: be passion and have fun with the content you create. It really shows through in your writing and your audience will resonate with that.
Q7: What are tools you love that assist you in writing great online content?
There are a ton of great tools available to use that help us create great online content. Here are some suggestions on tools you should try out:
A7. What tools do I use daily? WordPress, Canva, Google, Word, Later, Photoshop, nothing too exciting. #contentwritingchat
Some of the tools Carrie uses on a daily basis include WordPress, Canva, Google, Word, Later, and Photoshop. However, she knows that practice and passion are more important than any tools you may use.
HubSpot, Buffer, Huffington Post, and more! These are some of our favorite content creators, too. We look forward to seeing you at the next #ContentWritingChat! Mark your calendars weekly for Tuesday at 10 AM CDT for great chats centered around content writing and marketing. Follow @ExpWriters to stay updated on our new topics and guests!
Today, one of the greatest challenges facing the content marketer is the balance between automation and creation.
With all of the fantastic automated platforms available for use today, it can be tough to determine where, exactly, the line needs to be drawn.
Toomuch automation kills conversation.
But too little automation means a lot of monkey work, lost time and excess stress for the busy marketer.
So, where’s the happy medium?
Your Guide to Effectively Balancing Automation With Creation In A Social Media Strategy
Let’s delve in.
Why a Mix of Creation with Automation?
Create: While automation may make life easier, creation makes life much more fun.
Creating content for your social media platforms is a deeply creative, interactive experience; it’s here that brands and individuals alike get to exercise their voices and styles. It’s also here that relationships are built and authority is made.
People who take an active role in the creation of their social media content often enjoy closer relationships with followers and fans as well as a more intimate grasp about the state of their social media presence overall.
Unfortunately, full creation zaps your time and creates distractions. Push notifications, pings, comments, messages, and re-tweets all demand our attention… if we’re not careful, it’s easy to get pulled away from the important tasks at hand to go engage on Facebook or Twitter. While this may help strengthen relationships in the long run, it’s not ultimately awesome for productivity.
Automate: There are dozens of great reasons to automate your social media posting, like this Buffer resource.
In addition to increased traffic and more consistent interaction, automating social media can also help you get more done with less stress. Because social media requires a large time and energy commitment, automating things like posts and promotions can give you a break from the Internet and free up some space for you to worry about other things, which is a huge draw for busy people that need social media-free space to focus.
Additionally, automation is often a more efficient way to interact with social media. While it’s possible to lose some of the “human factor” behind social media when you begin to automate, it also makes all of your social media interactions much more deliberate and saves you from getting tied up with trolls or comment chains, which is yet another way to save your precious time.
Striking a Balance: 5 Tips for Using Creation and Automation Together
As is true with most things, the sweet spot between creation and automation is somewhere in the middle. To lean too much to either side is to sacrifice the benefits of one or both things, so it’s important to walk that middle line. Here are some tips to help you do that:
1. Keep a human eye involved
Some marketers would love to turn all of their social media dealings over to automated platforms and never look at them again. Unfortunately, this will only spell trouble for your brand eventually. The reason for this is that, while a large portion of your social media interaction can be automated, it’s pivotal to keep the human touch intact. This keeps social media personal and helps you avoid automated disasters like the one the New England Patriots endured when their automated platform retweeted a racial slur. The takeaway? Feel free to automate, but keep the human oversight intact.
2. If you’re going to reach out, do it personally
Some brands do things like send auto-generated messages to people who follow them. While this may seem like an efficient and personalized way to reach out to fans, it’s not. More often than not, this comes off as vacuous and more than a bit creepy, and it may actually turn fans off more than it helps to engage them. Instead of sending out auto-messages for the purpose of building relationships, dedicate some time each week to batch-checking and responding to social media messages. This can help keep your social relationships intact without derailing you on a daily basis.
3. Use automation to distribute content evenly
If you don’t use an automation service, you’re limited to posting content only when you’re awake, working, and free. This often leads to “blasts” that overwhelm your followers’ feeds and lead to much of your content being skipped over. Avoid this by using automation to distribute your hard-won content evenly throughout the day and night. In addition to avoiding content traffic jams, this also increases the likelihood that your readers will fully engage with your content and keeps you from becoming a spammy social media presence.
4. Keep an eye on current events
Social media moves quickly, and is one of the main news sources for people around the world. In light of this, I can promise you that you’re going to do your brand some serious damage if your automation platform is buzzing away while a national or global disaster unfolds. While it can be tough to stay on top of daily news and disasters all of the time, the best practice here is to cut off automation when there’s a known disaster at work. The exception is if you can use your automation to dispense content that is sensitive and directly related to the disaster in an intelligent and sophisticated way.
5. Keep testing your automation
Automation is the way of the future, but you need to be sure it’s working well in order to keep using it. Test your automation times, days, headlines, and activity levels often in order to ensure that you’re still in that sweet spot between automation and creation. Adjust anything that’s not working and move forward.
Conclusion
Automation and creation.
They’re like two peas in a pod when they’re used correctly: essential to each other, but not as effective or even as good-looking without each other.
These five tips can help you ensure that your social media displays the best of both worlds, and that you’re using automation and creation to the full extent and advantage of each, without sacrificing quality or personality in the process.
Struggling with managing your social media accounts? Let our non-robotic, human social media managers create – and schedule out (automate)! Check out our Social Media Services today.
We wish you a Merry Christmas, We wish you a Merry Christmas, …And a Happy New Year!
Merry Christmas From Express Writers!
It’s already the end of 2015. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are upon us!
I hope that you’re not spending too much time in front of the work screen, but if you are, you should read this one blog. (Insert brazen-faced winky emoticon.) I hope it’ll inspire you and that you’ll leave with some content marketing tips you can start using right now – and bring into your New Year.
First: Why Christmas Doesn’t Have To (Ever) Be Your “Slow” Season
I’m even more excited to bring you this holiday post and hereby “blog,” or “work,” on the holidays, because, well, December is becoming our hottest month of the entire year!
I couldn’t believe it myself, but we broke records and had over 1,000 pages of content ordered in 48 hours, our first week of December. This is the most we’ve had ordered in 48 hours since I created the company, in 2011.
Our financial graph for the entire year looks like this:
(The lowest point, in January, looks lower than it was because we actually started our online Content Shop then and had all our clients begin placing orders online.)
We still have one more half-week in December, and our team is in the office throughout this month still – so we expect the year to end with our busiest month yet!
That’s my reason directly to you why December doesn’t need to be your slowest month. We actually saw it become our best month for 2015 – which means anyone can, too, provided they never let go of the hustle and effort it takes to get a best foot forward and put in some real work and passion.
Copywriting Tips for the Holidays (and Beyond)
Even as the holidays are quickly whizzing past us, there’s still plenty of time to hone your skills for your holiday campaigns and start converting readers into buyers. But before you do, let’s take a look at the top copywriting tips to get your writing into shape.
8 Top Copywriting Hacks
1. 90% Of Your Time Should Be Spent Crafting Killer Headlines
There’s a lot to be said on the topic of headlines. Strong conversion copywriters spend at least 90 percent of their time crafting one, or two… or three for every piece.
It’s important not to stuff your headlines with keywords. And while you’re at it, throw out everything you were taught by those old-school SEO dictators on how to craft those headers. Make them attention-grabbing, borrow from winning formulas, do what you got to, to reel readers in.
Here’s an important tip to remember: great headlines are very often incarnations of the value proposition of the very thing you’re trying to sell.
Here’s another tip: ask yourself this about the prospect you’re writing for: “what was going on in their life that brought them to you today?”
2. Write Amazing Headlines Using “Without”, “Even If” and “Data”
There’s so much to be said about headlines and that’s because they really are THAT important. Here are a few things you could include to help make your headers stand out:
Use an “even if” clause to overcome hesitation
Add a little data about the outcome
Replace “even with” with “without” – what don’t your readers have to do to get the result?
3. Stay Away From Positioning Statements – Use Value Propositions
At its very core, a value proposition needs to express what’s desirable and unique about your offer. Never confuse it with a positioning statement. You should state something about that your product does. You can include an end benefit. But don’t make your value proposition a laundry list of benefits.
4. Get To Know Different Types of Awareness
There are a couple of different kinds of awareness your readers will have during the sales process. Depending on the stage of awareness they’re at, they’re going to need different messaging and content:
Pain Aware – in this stage people respond to seeing solutions to their pain, or even their own pain.
Solution Aware – this is where people respond to high-level benefits, so avoid thinking of the problem and think of the solution.
Problem Aware – during this phase, people realize they actually have a problem but don’t know how to solve it.
Product/Brand Aware – here people want to know what best and biggest benefit your product has to offer before they’re introduced to the benefits. People love the phrase, “but wait! There’s more!”
Completely Unaware – during this phrase, people are completely clueless about their problems.
5. Embracing Similarities Between Taglines and Value Propositions
Sometimes the very best taglines are actually your value propositions (as discussed above), just whittled down smaller while being specific.
6. Keeping Swipe Files for Inspiration
Never heard of a swipe file? It’s a collection of content that you can use for ideas – all that memorable stuff that’s resonated with you. Save everything you love so when the well runs dry, you have a file full of inspiration.
7. To Write Content That Shocks and Generates Shares, Go Ahead and Pick a Fight!
Take a completely accepted way of doing things and go and turn it on its head. Don’t be insulting, though, just provocative.
8. Top X Lists Can Still Work
These lists can work well, provided they add something meaningful to the conversation. Try to be better. Aim to be different.
5 Tips for Effective Holiday Content You Can Do Now
Here are 5 bonus tips for crafting effective holiday content as you leave my blog today (and go eat chocolates, or open gifts, and enjoy your holiday – in short, get away from the computer :D).
1. What Are Your Customer’s Holiday Needs?
One of the best things about the holiday rush is you get to offer your customers great value when you create content that will help them cross something off their to-do list, saves them time or makes the holidays more fun. Consider what your readers are trying to accomplish this holiday season and help them achieve their objectives.
This Christmas, we decided to give back and create the ultimate giveaway of five free days of gifts – for five total gifts. We created landing pages for each of the products after we finished creating the actual product (which ranged from a 10-day email course to eBooks and PDF resources), then wrote a blog and landing page for the entire campaign. We then socialized this like crazy–pinning to our Twitter, posting it on Instagram, highlighting on our Facebook business page, and more. We’ll probably even make a few Twitter ads for it, and we’ve already scheduled an email campaign for it.
2. Target Specific Audiences to Improve Performance
While the bigger brands and media organizations tend to create content that appeals to a wider audience, one of the best ways to drive performance for a holiday campaign is to determine the audience who is most likely to purchase your products and then create content catering to their interests and needs.
Let’s say you are a sports apparel brand, a very general holiday gift guide with products ranging from home décor to high-tech gadgets is far too wide-ranging to capture a particular audience’s attention. Rather create specific posts like “10 Perfect Gifts for The Sports Woman In Your Life.”
3. Make Sure the Subject Matter Fits Your Brand
Here’s another thing to keep in mind: your content needs to address a subject that you and your brand actually have the authority to speak about. Even if someone who purchases a state-of-the-art television set is likely to indulge in a fancy cocktail this holiday season, I highly doubt that customer is going to take much note of a post titled “5 Great Champagnes To Try This New Year’s Eve” that’s been put together by a tech company!
Discussing topics that fall naturally under your brand’s preview means you can give consumers a reason to trust your content and want to read it all the way through to the end.
For a cool example of what does work, take a look at Verizon’s post. In their post they perfectly targeted gift-givers who were in the market for those under-the-radar tech accessories, and the subject matter is perfectly aligned with what the tech company have to offer.
4. A Sense of Urgency Is Key. Your Customers Are Expecting It
One of the main challenges of marketing during holiday time is that you only have a short period of time. If people don’t make their purchase before the end of the year, they’re not likely to return to your brand in January, are they? What’s more, if you fail to be aggressive about converting readers into paying customers, there’s a big chance they will make that purchase from a competitor.
While more blatant sales pitches could turn people off any other time of the year, customers tend to be more receptive to them at holiday time as they’re actively shopping and in fact, they are expecting companies to promote featured product items. So it’s easier to create a sense of urgency with your customers by presenting them with exclusive sales offers that expire within a certain amount of days or hours, enticing them to buy from you before even bothering to see what your competitors are selling.
Even if you don’t wish to use calls to action in your content, you can still create a robust retargeting plan that will resonate with your most engaged audience with a tailored sales pitch later on in the holiday season.
5. Launch Your Content Early and Start Testing It
It’s really never too late to start laying out your holiday content campaigns. Of course you want to get a head start so that you can optimize exactly how you’re going to promote your work in order to reach out to your audience. So let’s say you have five pieces of Cyber Monday content, be sure to give yourself enough time to see which articles perform best in order to allocate more budget towards those winners in the days leading up to your sale.
You can run a range of similar experiments, both on social media and in content recommendations, with your thumbnail images and headlines to see which combinations will drive engagement and therefore conversions.
One of the best things about holiday campaigns is that you know they’re going to come around, so you can give yourself loads of time to create amazing campaigns that will get you the results you want.
Does the idea of creating any kind of content campaign terrify you? Don’t worry, at Express Writers we know how to create and deliver on expert content that says all the right things for your audience, just in time for the holidays!
What if you could take one great idea and turn it into dozens of even better blogs?
You actually can—with a process called serialization.
Content serialization, once a tool in the belt of novel-writers worldwide, has become a popular blogging tactic today that can help writers dig deeper and provide an astounding amount of value to their readers.
Content serialization is more than just drawing out an idea; it’s a particularly effective way to become an expert in your niche, draw more readers, promote your site and gain visibility.
What is Content Serialization?
Content serialization is essentially one large idea broken down into installments for easier readability and a higher level of mastery. “Content marketing”, for example, is a large topic. It would be impossible to cover everything that content marketing is and offers in one blog post and, as such, it’s an ideal topic for serialization.
A serialized run of blog posts with a focus on content marketing might look something like “12 Weeks to Outstanding Content Marketing” and would offer periodic blog posts diving deeper into progressively more challenging areas of the topic.
Serialization offers bloggers a way to get out of the habit of thinking of their content marketing strategy in terms of individual posts, which can inhibit creativity and contribute to poor content and very little site cohesion. Good short-term serialization can help content marketers shake up their strategy and dig deeper into topics their audience wants to know more about.
Why Serialize Content?
In the days of olde, bibliophiles used to hang out on shipping docks, anxiously awaiting the next serialized installment of a favorite book to arrive. Things have modernized since then, but serialization still has the power to create anticipation and keep people coming back for more.
By serializing content that is of interest to readers, content marketers can easily reap the following benefits:
More Readers: Like we said, serialization promotes anticipation and people will soon be looking out for the next post in the series. Additionally, since each post builds off of the post before it, serialization is an amazingly effective internal linking strategy that drives users to other portions of the blog.
More Creativity: Serializing your content forces you to dig into the cracks, so to speak, and can help your writing become much more creative. Additionally, since serialization requires you to plan each post ahead of time and come up with a considerable amount of content, it is likely that the process will also drive you to employ social media formats, such as video, podcasts or infographics, that you do not typically use. For this reason, serialization is a great way for bloggers that are “stuck” to get the creative juices flowing.
Increased Productivity: Since you’ll have to come up with regular and substantial posts, you’ll be forced to make the best possible use of each day’s writing time. This, in turn, promotes better writing and more effective communication.
Mastery of Knowledge: By far the most valuable benefit of serialization is that it allows bloggers to become niche experts. By digging into the nooks and crannies of a subject, writers can learn new things and disseminate information effectively without overloading their audience or saturating a single post with so much information that it’s virtually useless. Additionally, serialization allows you to build your online authority.
More Conversions: Serialized content provides value for people interested in learning more about a topic. When you provide value to readers, they reward you with increased interaction, subscriptions and purchases. Because of this, serialized content often results in increased conversions for your site. Regardless of what your site’s goal is – be it subscriptions, purchases, or shares – serialized content can definitely help you get there.
In addition to the above benefits, serialization can be a great option for bloggers who have not yet developed a content marketing strategy and are looking for ways to provide regular, high-quality content to their readers.
Choosing Which Content to Serialize
As a general rule, the content you serialized should be made up of your most high-potential topics. In other words, serialized topics should be those too broad, involved, detailed or important to be covered in a single post.
The genesis topic for serialized posts should be of great interest to your readers and broad enough to explore for a number of weeks without writing duplicate content or creating filler. Before you choose to serialize a topic, ask yourself these questions:
Will this information provide value to my readers?
Can I explore this topic in a unique way?
Could I write a book about this?
If the answer is “yes” to all of those questions, it’s likely that you’ve got a good candidate for serialization.
Keep in mind that it is not enough, however, to simply choose a topic that you find interesting. The topic also needs to serve a purpose and will be most successful if it meets an unmet need, offers a solution and is easy to structure.
As with any type of marketing, finding a gap in the market is one of the most important factors for success. If you choose to serialize a topic that’s been serialized hundreds of times before, it’s going to be difficult to be truly competitive in that market. Therefore, it’s important to choose a topic that addresses old questions in a new way or approaches a question that many people have an nobody is answering. By meeting an unmet need and providing unique solutions, you can ensure your content will stand out from the crowd.
How to Serialize Content
By far the easiest way to serialize content is to create a series of blog posts that spans no more than 12 weeks. This is enough time to adequately explore a topic but not so much that your readers begin to get bored. Regardless of what your topic is, the general structure of your serialized content should resemble the following:
Week 1 (First Post)
Week 1 will be the touch-point for your readers. That said, your first blog post should act like a value proposition. The post should introduce the series, explain its purpose to readers and help them understand exactly how it can help them, solve their problems, answer their questions or provide value in their lives.
To do this, your post needs to clearly outline what the weekly posts will cover. To make your outline compelling, write interesting headlines for each week that provide information about the problem or challenge being faced and how that individual post helps readers navigate around it.
Weeks 2-11 (Body Posts)
These posts should follow the outline you put forth in your initial post. Each post should adhere to a general length of your choosing and should offer a mixture of text and visuals or other media. In order to make each post as valuable as possible, be sure that you’re utilizing great blog-writing tactics like breaking up large bodies of text, utilizing headers and sub headers, incorporating images and writing magnetic titles.
Week 12 (Final Post in Series)
The final blog post in your series is almost as important as your first post. The final post should conclude the series by offering one final solution, nugget of information or hack, summarizing the information presented so far and outlining the importance of each week’s post.
The blog should end with a compelling call-to-action that directs readers toward whatever you want them to do, be it subscribing to your email list, purchasing your book or sharing your content. Additionally, the call-to-action could be used to launch a new product or promote an upcoming series.
By now, it’s likely that you will have gained considerably more readers and that those readers will be hungry for more of your content. Because of this, the end of a series is the ideal place to present a new product or ask your readers for subscriptions.
Content Serialization Success: The 4 Pillars
The entire point of content serialization is to provide in-depth, consistent value to readers and, when it’s done correctly, serialization can be an amazingly effective tactic for increasing a blog’s reach and catering to readers. In order for serialization to succeed, however, it must adhere to these 4 pillars:
Consistency: Serialization is nothing but a few haphazard blog posts if you don’t maintain a schedule. At the beginning of your series, choose one day a week when you’ll post your new installment. Be sure to tell your readers which day this is, as this will keep you accountable and also give your readers something to look forward to. The importance of having a regular blogging schedule cannot be oversold when it comes to serialization. Feel free to write additional posts during the week, but keep your series posts consistent and predictable.
Discovery: In order to be valuable, your serialized content needs to help your readers discover a new topic. When you bring a genuine excitement to your serialized content, that will translate to your readers and you’ll soon find yourself with a healthy following. Use your series to dig deeper into an interesting topic and disseminate that information to your readers. They’ll appreciate it, we promise.
Quality: Part of the purpose of running a series is to encourage bloggers to plan and develop a content marketing schedule. If you’re postponing your series post until the last minute and then writing sloppy content, you can bet it’s going to fail. Your readers should be able to expect a high-quality, informative post each week. When you deliver consistent quality, your series will be successful.
Accessibility: Regardless of who your target audience is, it’s important that each post you write is accessible to them. Don’t get too technical for beginners or too simple for people who already have some knowledge of the topic. Instead, ensure that your content is tailored to your readers and that each post in the series provides real, tangible value to your target audience.
The Case for Serialization
Serialization, when done well, is one of the best ways to boost your content marketing strategy and draw new readers to your site. Content serialization allows you to take one great idea or expansive topic and transform it into months of high-quality, original, shareable, authoritative posts, which is great for you and even better for your readers.
