Stephan Marais
Douglas Karr We've been consulting clients large and small for several months now and really believe that there's some gaps in most strategies and a whole lot of hype with others. When our clients are struggling, we typically see that there's a gap in a key dependency of their overall marketing.
Native advertising is all the rage in publishing right now. The Atlantic and Forbes are doing it, as are the Washington Post and The New York Times. Federated Media, the big ad broker, is pushing native advertising. BuzzFeed, the fast-growing news and gossip site, is building a network to sell native advertising.
Content has rightly taken a far more prominent role in SEO in recent months. Given the fairly new but oddly familiar status, we are currently somewhat in a state of flux; brilliant content is a necessity, but many of us are unsure about how to create it.
Make Something Compelling At last week's SMX Advanced, Google's Matt Cutts advised site owners that a top priority should be to "make something compelling." Make something compelling, you say? Sounds familiar, especially when it comes to content. A best practice for any site owner, indeed, is to create unique content that drives traffic and engages users - or, as Matt said, is "compelling."
Pat Flynn of The Smart Passive Income Blog has parlayed his everyday-guy persona into a six-figure income supported heavily by podcasting. "I've been able to make a much deeper connection with my audience," Flynn said. "When I go to conferences, the first thing people who meet me say is, 'I love listening to your podcast.'" He has become an expert at connecting with his audience.
A public relations strategy is a big part of successful search campaigns. Getting your company's brand and employees exposed through media and social channels is incredibly important and can have a profound impact on links, rankings and traffic. If you need a refresher or an overview on this topic, check out piece from earlier this year on search marketing integration.
Have you ever wanted to send out a link request to thousands of people without being a spammer? Now you can, thanks to social media. Let's look at the ways you can use great content + social media to establish trust, build an audience of bloggers who love to link out, get exposure for your link worthy content, and learn how social media really affects your link profile.
This situation sound familiar? You have an idea, then lose it, then come back to it again. You write it down quickly, check some email, get derailed, jump into a meeting, grab a coffee, then settle back in ... only to hate what you thought of in the first place.
There can be a lot of thought, research and development that goes into a piece of content. In putting together a robust content marketing campaign, why not make the most of that investment? Getting the most mileage out of your content can be achieved with repurposing.
