Search engine optimization (SEO) is a very important consideration in today’s digitally-driven content environment. After all, if you can’t get visitors to your site, and get them to engage with your content, you’ve obviously missed the mark. But, in an increasingly competitive quest to rank ever higher in Google SERP (search engine results page), some content marketers may go a bit overboard when it comes to chasing the numbers.
Archive for the ‘Content Marketing’ Category
Are You a Slave to SEO Keywords? Why You Should Write for People, Not Bots
Sunday, November 3rd, 2019
Is Your Content Review Process Out of Control? How to Fix It
Tuesday, October 22nd, 2019
Companies crave content—high-quality, timely, and accurate content that is brand supportive and designed to connect and compel target audiences to some desired action. To achieve these goals content providers, publishers, and organizations must establish content review processes. These processes generally involve multiple touchpoints, and many eyeballs. Everyone is reviewing content for different reasons—from grammar, spelling, and style compliance, to SEO, content accuracy, and more. Content marketers in regulated industries are subject to even more scrutiny.
Unfortunately, more reviews means more costs. Circular rounds of review squeeze the life out of carefully crafted content.
Best Practices for Business Building on LinkedIn
Saturday, October 19th, 2019
17877227 – social media
I’ve had a profile on LinkedIn for a number of years now. LinkedIn and Twitter are two of my favorite social media platforms. Most business people would agree with me that LinkedIn is a great tool for building a strong network and engaging with others. Most would likely not agree with me that Twitter can also be a great business-to-business (B2B) business-building tool. We have, though, definitely found that to be the case for ourselves and for our clients. (More on that another day.) Here we want to focus on LinkedIn. (more…)
Use Your Boilerplate to Sell, Your Content to Tell
Tuesday, October 1st, 2019by Linda Pophal
Strategic Communications has been working with clients for a number of years now (since 2008). We’ve helped dozens of clients establish themselves as thought leaders and/or drive traffic to their websites to generate leads and drive conversions. Long before then (I won’t even say how long because it scares me!), I was writing features for business and professional trade publications and spent a number of years as a copywriter, writing marketing copy as part of my full-time job.
Don’t Slack With Your Social Media Marketing
Friday, September 20th, 201917877227 – social media
Social media marketing should be a key component of the marketing mix for virtually any company. Not only is social media marketing relatively inexpensive, it also provides a greater level of engagement than mass marketing efforts because it’s targeted at those who have some connection with your brand—shared interests, common connections, etc. At the same time, many companies pay lip service to social media marketing. They are technically doing it, but they aren’t putting in as much effort as they could, or should. (more…)
Does Your Business Really Need a Mobile App?
Wednesday, September 18th, 2019
Have you ever pulled up a company webpage on a smartphone and immediately been asked if you’d rather load the content on the company’s app? It seems like businesses of all sizes have gone app crazy over the last several years. Google Play currently hosts 2.6 million apps and the App Store is not far behind with 2.1 million.
Many small businesses may fear falling behind on this ubiquitous form of customer interaction, but does your company really need to have an app? In an article for Entrepreneur, Thomas Smale discusses several factors to consider when deciding whether or not to spend the time and money to develop a mobile app. (more…)
How to Deal With Communication Dabblers
Thursday, August 15th, 2019If you’re ever created content for any purpose, chances are you’ve encountered a dabbler. A dabbler is someone who, when asked to review copy (or who is responsible for reviewing copy because of their position), suffers from severe scope creep. They just can’t stop themselves from offering far more, and far more detailed, input than what was expected.
Dabblers like to dabble. It’s what they do. Unfortunately, what they do can create a lot of headaches, and much rework and added expense, for those in the business of producing and publishing content of any kind. (more…)
No-Cost, Low-Cost Ways to Boost Your Brand
Tuesday, July 30th, 2019
We’ve previously discussed the challenges many companies face when trying to calculate an ROI on their marketing efforts. For small and medium-sized businesses, this can make it difficult to justify increasing spend on marketing efforts.
But, just because you feel like you can’t spend more money on marketing doesn’t mean you can’t invest in your brand. (more…)
The Promise and Perils of Performance Marketing
Tuesday, July 23rd, 2019
One of the challenges for — and criticisms of — the marketing function is that it’s often difficult to calculate an ROI on a company’s marketing efforts. For example, how does a soft drink or beer company determine whether or not their multi-million-dollar Super Bowl ad was worth the investment? How can they tell whether a customer made a purchase based on that ad as opposed to a purchase they were going to make anyway? Not an easy task.
And yet both employers and clients want (and deserve) to know if their marketing investments are paying off for them. Fortunately the measurement game these days is often much more straightforward than in the past. (more…)
Tips for Using Content Calendars
Tuesday, July 9th, 2019
Social media marketing is an inexpensive and effective way to engage with your target market and position yourself as a thought leader. But to make it an effective tool, you need to be diligent in keeping your content up-to-date and post regularly. An infrequently-updated blog or social media page with stale posts can actually do more harm than good to your brand and engagement efforts. But many small business owners struggle to find the time to keep their social media profile up to date.
One solution to this is to use a content calendar.
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