by Fronetics | Jul 1, 2014 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Strategy
Content can grow your business.
How can content such as blog posts, white papers, eBooks, newsletters, infographics, podcasts, webinars, and video grow a business? Content can grow your business by increasing your search engine ranking, positioning your company as an industry leader, attracting new customers, and helping you retain current customers.
Not convinced? B2B companies with an active blog generate 67% more leads per month than those who don’t. What’s more, a study by the Custom Content Council found that 72% of marketers believe branded content is more effective than advertising in a magazine, 62% believe it is more effective than advertising, and 69% believe it is ‘superior’ to direct mail and PR.
Not all content is equal. Not all content will help you grow your business.
Content that will move the needle for your business is valuable content. It is content that is informative, educational, interesting, and speaks to your customer’s emotions and speaks to their pain points. Valuable content is not a sales pitch. Furthermore, valuable content is content that is delivered consistently over time and at the right time.
Strategy is vital
A 2014 study of B2B marketers found that companies who have a documented content strategy in place are more likely to consider their efforts to be effective than companies who do not have a documented strategy in place (60 percent vs. 11 percent).
The 12 steps to creating a content strategy that will help your company drive profitable customer action are:
- Put someone in charge
- Define your goals
- Define your audience
- Define your metrics
- Identify the right distribution channels
- Create a publishing calendar
- Create content
- Curate content
- Distribute content
- Engage with customers and prospects
- Track and analyze metrics
- Make adjustments as necessary
Want to learn more about these 12 steps and creating an effective content strategy? Download our eBook.
by Jennifer Hart Yim | May 8, 2014 | Blog, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
This is the third in a series of blog posts written by Adam Robinson, Director of Marketing at Cerasis. Founded in 1997, Cerasis is a top freight logistics company and truckload freight broker.
Now that you know about how to create a strategy, you have to execute it. This means content creation, content curation, and using the best tools possible to be effective.
#1: Content Planning
Categorize Target Audience By
- Industry: For example, we knew that within our target audiences, we had the following industry categories: Manufacturing, Distribution, Supply Chain, Logistics, Transportation
- Job Function: Next you then need to understand who are the buyers and what are their personas? Once you do this, you can weave in messaging into your content that speaks to all of them. At Cerasis, we knew our job titles were: C-suite, Managers, Employees
Create Content to speak to categories
Now that you have the categories, it’s time to create and plan for content. When you are coming up with topics, make sure you write the categories down and start creating headlines and doing research in those categories. You will notice on the Cerasis blog that there are broad categories like you see from the ones stated above, but over time we started shifting towards creating sub categories of those broad categories (e.g. Reshoring under manufacturing, or inbound logistics under logistics).
Ways to Generating Content Ideas
- Internal Interviews and Brainstorms
- Use an RSS aggregator such as feed.ly so you can curate articles and start to better understand the marketplace
- Be active in Social and Notice Most Shared
Using a Calendar
Whether you are doing one post (or more) per day or just one per week, a calendar is vital to long term success. If you don’t know what you are writing about each day, it is really easy for you to NOT write it and NOT achieve your goals. Content marketing is an ongoing project plan, and you can use tools such as Asana to have multiple people share the same workspace and work through the content.
Look out for Guest Bloggers
Another great idea for scaling content marketing and not burning out is to reach out to influential bloggers to guest blog for you. Or these can be other companies who are noncompetitive but share a similar target audience. We have had several guest bloggers that line up nicely and are relevant to our content categories. However, don’t take anyone that doesn’t add value to your readers. Think like a publisher and protect yourself from those spammy guest bloggers. You also must be proactive in networking and reaching out in social platforms as you establish relationships online such as on LinkedIn and Twitter.
#2: Content Creation
This is really where most companies get stuck. At Cerasis we leverage our employees and interviews to help get content written. You can also use great ghost writing services if you would like, but I would urge you that you write in house, as you know your authentic voice. The key is to stick to a regular schedule. Sporadic posts are going to find it difficult to build an audience. Think about your TV guide and the schedule of shows. You don’t always have to watch it the day it airs, but at least you know that it will be there.
#3: Content Distribution
If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is there to hear it, does it really make a sound? This old adage is very true when it comes to content and social media marketing. If you are not posting your content in any of the social media channels or online communities, then you are not going to be effective either. Even with search engines out there crawling your new content, search engines are now favoring social signals from sites like LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+.
We recommend the following tools to use to distribute your content:
- Oktopost: This is a fantastic platform for distributing content as well as analyzing your performance. Their strong suite is the ability to post into multiple LinkedIn groups and mimic the categorization of your content through tagging of your groups. You can also post to many platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn pages, profiles, and groups, Google+ and more. Our favorite feature is the Autoposter. This feature allows you to load up a cache of content and set a schedule in the future so you don’t have to use resources to post every day. In one sessions you could set up a 30 day posting schedule right in the platform and view on a calendar!
- Buffer: This platform is great for content curation. You can load in your social profiles and then set pre-determined times on any day. We really love buffer for mostly Twitter, since Twitter is much like a newspaper where you go to find all the latest news and articles on topics of interest to you. Each morning we load up our RSS aggregator, feed.ly, and buffer all the best articles for our audience.
- Feed.ly: We love feed.ly as it allows to mimic (again) our content categorization but for other sources! It’s also a great way to find other blogs and influencers in your space you can network with and potentially guest blog for. All you have to do is search for content by keyword, add them in the respective category and bam, in one platform you have your own customized newspaper from which you can curate content. It’s got the buffer app loaded in so you can easily add articles to your buffer. This is also a great way to find new ideas for content and keep you up to date on your industry!
- Tweetdeck: This platform is owned and maintained by Twitter, but allows you to not only post to and monitor your account, but also allows you to monitor industry hashtags, such as #manufacturing or #logistics so you can start to follow and interact with those in your target audience. It’s a great tool and we recommend using it!
by Fronetics | Apr 21, 2014 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Strategy, Supply Chain
When it comes to content your company doesn’t need to go it alone. Not only is it possible to outsource content, for many companies it may be the best solution. Here is how to determine if outsourcing content is right for your company, and what your company needs to consider when looking for an outsource partner.
Is outsourcing right for you?
Outsourcing is not the panacea. It may be the right solution for your company – or maybe not. Here is what to consider when determining if outsourcing content is the right solution for your company:
- What are your company’s core competencies?
- How can your company deliver the best value to your customers?
- A successful content strategy needs to be deliberate and needs to have someone in charge. Do you have in-house talent who can put together a content strategy for your company and manage the execution of the strategy?
- Does your company have in-house talent that can consistently create good content?
- Does your company have in-house talent that has the time to consistently create good talent?
- Does your company have in-house talent that can distribute your company’s content?
- Does your company have in-house talent that can track and analyze your company’s content strategy?
Be honest. Cobbling together staff or passing content like a hot potato from one person to another is not going to be effective. If content is not an area where your company excels, or if content could be carried out more efficiently and effectively if the service was outsourced – start looking for an outsource partner.
If you do decide that outsourcing is right for your company, know that you are not alone. Forty-four percent of B2B marketers report that they outsource content creation. Diving down further, 72 percent of large B2B companies (1,000 employees or more) outsource content creation and 34 percent of small B2B companies (10 to 99 employees) outsource content creation. Looking specifically at the manufacturing industry – 55 percent of manufacturing marketers report that they outsource content creation.
As shown in Figure 1 the content functions that B2B marketers outsource vary from writing to design to distribution to creating a buyer persona. When it comes to outsourcing content functions it doesn’t need to be the kitchen sink.
Figure 1
What to look for in an outsource partner
When it comes to finding an outsource partner you want to find a partner that will bring value to your company and to your customers. Whether you outsource all content functions or just one, here is what to look for in an outsource partner:
- Experience and knowledge of your industry;
- Willing to work with your company to help you achieve your goals;
- Open to exploring and furthering your company’s creative ideas;
- Able to follow instructions and execute with minimal oversight;
- Able to create the type of content your company needs;
- Interested in entering into a long-term relationship.
More generally, Frank Cavallaro wrote that when choosing your perfect outsource mate it is important to start by looking at the mission or value statement of your potential partner. Are these aligned to your company’s? If they are, move on and explore the partnership further. If not, walk away. “Mission and value statements speak to the core culture of the company, so if you can’t find common ground here, it is unlikely you will be able to build a positive working relationship.”
This post was originally published on DC Velocity.
by Fronetics | Apr 15, 2014 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy
When it comes to content, a strategy is essential for success
A 2014 study found that 93 percent of B2B marketers use content marketing and that there is a significant difference in the effectiveness of content marketing if a strategy is in place – 60 percent of companies who have a documented content strategy in place consider their efforts to be effective as compared to 11 percent of companies with no documented content strategy in place. Similarly, the study found that companies who put a person in charge of content marketing were more likely to be successful than those who did not (86 percent vs. 46 percent).
In short, the majority of companies do not have a strategy in place despite the fact that companies are budgeting for and creating content and, that those who have a documented content strategy in place are more effective than companies who do not have a strategy in place. If your company is going to be effective at using content to drive profitable customer action, your company needs to have a strategy in place. Arjun Basu wisely said: “Without strategy, content is just stuff, and the world has enough stuff.”
Here are 11 steps to a content strategy.
1. Put someone in charge
If you want your company’s content strategy to be effective, you need to put someone in charge. Make sure they are in charge not just in name, but also in execution. That is, make sure the person in charge is given the authority to execute the strategy.
2. Define your goals
Why does your company want to create content? Do you want to shorten your sales cycle? Increase leads? You don’t want your content to be just stuff. You don’t want content to be ineffective. Therefore it is important to define what it is you want your content to do for your company.
3. Define your audience
Who is your audience? Create a persona. Take your time. Be honest. If you identify and define your audience correctly you will be more likely to reach your target audience and engage them than if you get this step wrong.
4. Define your metrics
Determine how you are going to track and measure success. Determine the metrics that you are going to track on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis.
5. Identify the right distribution channels
When it comes to content, distribution is essential – your content will not reach your target audience and will not be read unless it is distributed. Take the time to identify the distribution channels that are right fit for your company, your content, and your goals.
6. Create a publishing calendar
A publishing or editorial calendar provides you with a framework to create and distribute content. It helps you create content that is consistent, that is quality, and is tailored to your company’s goals. It is also helpful in terms of managing workflows, meeting deadlines, and managing writer’s block.
7. Create content
Valuable and relevant content is not a sales pitch. It is not content that pushes your products and services. Rather, it is content that communicates valuable information to customers and prospects so that they have the knowledge to make better informed decisions. Moreover, it is content that establishes your business as a reliable source of knowledge – as the thought-leader within the industry. Be thoughtful when you create content.
8. Distribute your content
Distribute your content via your target distribution channels. Distribute the content consistently over time and at the right time.
9. Engage with customers and prospects
Once your content has been distributed, engage with your audience. Respond to comments, respond to questions, and provide clarification. Make your content more than words – make it a relationship.
10. Track and analyze your metrics
Track and analyze your metrics on a daily, weekly, monthly, and annual basis. Take a look at what is working and what is not. By tracking and analyzing your metrics you can see, for example, what type of content is most effective and which distribution channels are helping you achieve your goals.
11. Make adjustments as needed
Your strategy should not be set in stone. Your strategy should be flexible. Look at your metrics, look at the feedback you are getting through your engagement with customers and prospects – make adjustments to your strategy as needed.
Remember that when it comes to content it is important to think marathon not sprint. An effective content strategy requires patience and determination. Many companies make the mistake of giving up on a content strategy too early; make a long-term commitment to your strategy.
This article was originally published on DC Velocity.
by Fronetics | Apr 8, 2014 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
Content is king. By creating and distributing valuable and relevant content in a strategic and consistent manner you will be able to create demand for your products and services and will be able to drive profitable customer action. That being said, while content is king, content doesn’t go far (actually it goes nowhere) without distribution. Wise words by BuzzFeed’s Jonathan Perelman: “Content is king, but distribution is queen and she wears the pants.”
For content to be successful for your business you need to do more than create content – you need to distribute content. Moreover, the content needs to be delivered consistently over time, at the right time, and in the right place.
For your company this means taking the time to identify the distribution channels that are the right fit for your company, your content, and your goals. It also means taking the time to learn how to distribute content via these channels effectively.
For example:
- LinkedIn and Twitter are good candidates for letting people know about the white paper your company just released, whereas Pinterest is probably not a good white paper distribution channel.
- Levering your 140 characters for Twitter is key, but taking those same 140 characters to LinkedIn or Facebook will likely result in you falling flat.
- Distributing your content multiple times a day via Twitter is essential given the short lifespan of a Tweet; however, distributing content multiple times a day via email will not be well received.
Content will help you move the needle. Content will drive profitable customer action. However, your content, no matter how valuable it is, will not be seen and therefore will not be effective if you do not have a solid content distribution strategy. If you want results, remember who wears the pants.
This post was first published on DC Velocity.
