Content Strategy

The cornerstone of effective content marketing is developing a rock-solid content strategy.

Here are some posts to help you create yours:

10 Better Ideas Than Looking at a Top 10 List For Advice

top ten list advice

Top 10 lists are like new year’s resolutions. They seem great at first, but they quickly make you feel bored, hopeless, and like you’ve wasted your time. And that’s usually because they are filled with things you know you should do but can’t commit to doing. They’re too aspirational. Too shoot-for-the-moon-y. Which is why I’ve [...]

How Betty Crocker is Baking Content Marketing Success

betty crocker content marketing success

Betty Crocker found a great recipe for content marketing success. (I know, that pun was hard to swallow.) When food brand giant and cultural icon Betty Crocker, a brand owned by General Mills, wasn’t having success online they developed a digital video series centered around solving common problems for at-home chefs. Since launching in 2008, [...]

7 Tips for Content Marketing Webinar Success

7 Tips for Content Marketing Webinar Success

According to CMI’s newly released 2012 B2B content marketing study, marketers give webinars the second highest effectiveness rating as a content marketing tactic. Why, then, do only 46 percent of marketers use them? They are, after all, another great way to showcase your quality content and position yourself as a thought leader in your marketplace. [...]

5 Tips for a Successful Website Launch

launching successful websites

The launch date is tomorrow. Your software developers are running on fumes. The days are a blur of email, trouble tickets, status updates, and everyone asking you how it’s going. The stakeholders are getting anxious, which is making you anxious. What do you do?

5 Content Marketing Resolutions (That You Might Actually Keep)

content marketing resolutions

The resolution bandwagon is full of false hope and empty promises at the beginning of every year. You’ve got the classic “I will lose X number of pounds before bathing suit season” and “I will save more money this year (and stop buying so many video games.)” Sure, those resolutions are good hearted but many [...]

5 Lessons From my Biggest Blog Fails of 2011

blog fails of 2011

I failed a lot this year. My gut reaction was to quietly sweep my failures under the rug, whistle, and walk away. But instead, I figured I’d scrape the bottom of the barrel to see if there was any gold. Sue me. I’m an optimist. Instead of a collection of successful case studies, this post [...]

A Farewell to Content Overload

content overload

When writing about simplicity, it’s almost impossible to not sound like a bumbling idiot. Therefore, I’ll get right to the point: Creating a simple interface for your content is the greatest thing you can do for your audience. Here are 5 reasons why:

Why the Fate of Your Website Will Be Decided in Less Time Than it Takes You to Read This Sentence

Why the Fate of Your Website Will Be Decided in Less Time Than it Takes You to Read This Sentence

Speed kills on the web. The same people who a decade ago would wait patiently through the screeching greeting of a dial-up modem are now frustrated when the homepage of CNN doesn’t refresh as quickly as a wiper blade across a windshield. Consider the following:

QR Codes: Misunderstood? Or Are We Missing the Point?

qr codes: are they misunderstood?

Until recently, I didn’t have a smartphone, so I never paid much attention to QR codes since I wasn’t able to scan them anyway. But now I’ve finally joined the ranks of 72.5 million (and growing) smartphone owners in the U.S. and I downloaded a free QR code scanner from the App store so I could try [...]

A Letter from Mark Zuckerberg*

letter from mark zuckerberg

Editor’s note: OK, so this is not a real letter from Mark Zuckerberg, but it’s a real satire of what could be in a letter from Mark Zuckerberg, hypothetically speaking, of course. Hey there! It’s Mark Zuckerberg, everyone’s favorite socially awkward billionaire! I am here to walk you through our latest exciting changes at Facebook. [...]

Look Before You Leap When Creating a Marketing Plan

stake your marketplace claim

Is your company brand image a Mercedes or a Ford Fiesta? Before you try to answer, the key question you must answer to figure out how your company stands out from the crowd is, “what is your value discipline?” The answer is not as straight-forward as it may sound.

5 Future-proof Ideas For Your Website

future of websites

Predicting the future of the web is nearly impossible. Ever-changing technology provides fodder for our imagination to run wild. And it typically does. Imagination outpaces invention. And invention outpaces convention. Which is why we should focus less on technology, and more on human nature when we’re future-proofing our websites. If we bet on technology, we [...]

Why Distractions Mean Failure in Football and Marketing

distractions and content marketing

Once, after a loss, former Tennessee Titans’ coach Jeff Fisher made this statement to the media about his team’s effort: “I think you have to be able to deal with distractions, put them in perspective and move on. Distractions are the primary reason for losing football games. ” He didn’t chalk up the loss to [...]

3 Questions to Ask Before Jumping on a Marketing Bandwagon

3 Questions to Ask Before Jumping on a Marketing Bandwagon

It’s tough not to fall victim to me-tooism in our competitive media landscape. There are oohs and ahhs to reap, awards to win, client and board expectations to exceed and egos to stroke. So we see something shiny and we chase it. We see a toy and call it a tool, and make it part of our marketing [...]

The Joe Paterno Guide to Branding

joe paterno guide to branding

Whether you bleed blue and white or boo when you see it, it’s hard to deny that Penn State football has a strong brand. And most of the credit for that is probably due to the life work of Joe Paterno – the de facto face of Penn State football and the winningest coach in [...]

You’re a Human, Act Like It. Unless You’re OK with Being a Digital Marketing Failure

human digital marketing superior to robot digital marketing

Audiences are made of people, they aren’t made of logos. And when building an audience, you must connect with other people as a person, not as a logo. There are very few that can succeed while ignoring this basic mantra. According to the law of averages, you are not one of them.

5 Reasons the Intern Shouldn’t Run Your Social Media Campaign

carrying the load alone as a social media intern

Your intern has more Twitter followers than you do. That is great. But what happens when she gets offered that gig with the agency across town? Will your corporate blog survive? How about that snarky Twitter account or well-maintained Facebook page? Though much of management is wearing the “social media strategy” hat in the board [...]

Why It’s OK For You to Hate This Blog Post

velvet rope showcasing theme of exclusivity

We spend a lot of time wooing people to like us. “Follow us on Twitter!” “Like us on Facebook!” “Get our email updates!” “Share us with your friends!” “Please hang out with us Friday night!” (OK, so that’s from my personal life, but you get the drift.) And it makes sense that we do, kind [...]

The Boy Scout Handbook of Social Media

boy scout social media

The lessons the Boy Scouts taught me about being a good citizen are the same lessons that can be directly applied to your organization’s social media strategy.

4 Boardroom-Approved Reasons for Content Marketing

content marketing for the board room

The CEO of your organization doesn’t give a damn about your Klout score. She’s not interested in the achievements you’ve unlocked or what your social media “style” is. It’s not that she’s cold-hearted or mean-spirited. It’s just that none of that contributes to the bottom line. And that’s what she’s got her eye on. So, [...]

How to Enter the Circle of Trust With Your Audience

building trust online

Building trust is hard enough to do in the real world (remember trying to convince your girlfriend’s parents you were worthy of their daughter?), but building trust online is even more difficult. Fortunately, social media affords organizations the opportunity to build trust with consumers online, but only when done correctly.

Don’t Propose Marriage on the First Marketing Encounter

will you marry me

It’s pretty easy to get carried away when you’re excited about the possibilities of a potential relationship. You feel the connection. They’re just your type. And they even seem mildly interested in what you have to say. So then, of course, you pop the question. You ask them to marry you. And then they get [...]

4 Must-Haves for Must-Have Brands

branded tattoo

When money’s tight, people look at their budget and separate things into two columns: must-have and might-have. And lately, branded goods haven’t been making it into the latter column as much as they used to, as a recent Harris Poll has found that 62% of people are making the choice to go “generic” instead of [...]

The Best Practice is Practice

best practice is practice

We spend a lot of time reading how-to articles, case studies, and best practices. We want to make sure we’ve got the best advice and the surest path to success. We want to see how others have conquered problems in the hopes of replicating their success. And who can blame us? We don’t want to [...]

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