by Fronetics | Jul 10, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
As with many things, blogs improve with age — drawing more traffic, generating more leads, and building more credibility with search engines.
The average lifespan of a tweet is around 15 minutes. And a Facebook post’s lifespan is about 6 hours. But the lifespan of a blog post averages two years. TWO YEARS.
[bctt tweet=”80% of our website traffic comes from blog posts that are over six months old. HubSpot discovered a similar trend: 76% of its monthly views came from old posts, as well as 92% of the company’s monthly leads!” username=”Fronetics”]
In fact, we find that 80% of our website traffic comes from blog posts that are over six months old. HubSpot discovered a similar trend: 76% of its monthly views came from old posts, as well as 92% of the company’s monthly leads!
Why is that? Because, as with many things, blog posts improve with age. Search engines give value to older content that has had more time to accumulate social shares, likes, and referrals from other web pages. The more relevant a blog post proves itself to be to readers over time, the higher it will rank in search engine results.
Optimizing older content
Blog posts also give marketers an opportunity to dust off older content and rework it to be relevant and up-to-date to target audiences. Using analytics tools, marketers can track posts that had high traffic and conversion rates and work on optimizing the content. Updating older posts with new statistics, relevant keywords, and spruced-up calls-to-action will breathe new life into your older content.
Lead-generation tool: your blog
A blog is an excellent lead-generation tool. But, as I’ve written before, it takes time to generate leads and sales. Patience is a virtue, but it’s a particularly difficult one to keep in mind when you’re trying to grow business and keep your boss happy.
Your posts need time to start drawing traffic — and then, from traffic comes leads. Here’s why blog posts, like a fine wine, will continue to improve with age and why you shouldn’t give up on your efforts.
Video: Why blogs improve with age
Takeaway
With high-quality, relevant content, your blog will pay off. You should keep tending to your already published content, particularly those posts that prove to be a consistent source of traffic.
Update information; add links to new related posts or other relevant resources; and seek opportunities to insert or update calls-to-action to current offers and campaigns. Making sure those older, consistently popular posts continue to serve and engage your readers will increase your chances of conversion.
And, don’t forget: Something that doesn’t get a lot of views in the first week may be a huge traffic source and lead converter in a little time. Many content management systems, like HubSpot, can generate attribution reports, which tell you which web pages users most often visit before converting to a lead. Compare these pages with your high-traffic pages that don’t make the list to see how you can create more opportunities for lead conversion on the pages earning the most traffic.
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by Fronetics | Jun 11, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy, Supply Chain
You have to take the long view with content marketing, allowing time for your strategy to develop, your brand to build authority, and your sales cycle to play out.
When you undertake a new content marketing program, you’re making a big investment. So it makes sense that you want to start seeing immediate results. But it’s important to understand from the get-go that content marketing doesn’t really work like that. Yes, you’ll start seeing incremental results within the first few months. But what we tell our clients is that things aren’t really going to start cooking with gas until the 12-18 month mark.
I’ve written before about why you shouldn’t give up on content marketing after a short period of time. While you’ll probably see growth in web traffic, improved social reach, and generally better engagement metrics like time on page, you’re not likely to see new leads or sales to speak of in the first few months after instituting a content marketing strategy.
And that can be hugely frustrating. But the key is understanding that content marketing isn’t a gimmick, and it’s not a short-term strategy. It’s a long-term solution that, if allowed to germinate and grow for the long haul, helps you build brand awareness, grow your audience, and generate new leads and sales. When it comes to content marketing, your goal is to be the tortoise, not the hare.
Content marketing is not a short-term solution
In fact, rushing your relationship with content marketing is one of the worst things you can do. Let’s talk about why that is.
First off, content marketing isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution. You need to develop a strategy that works for your business, and that doesn’t happen overnight. When we first engage with a client at Fronetics, we generally take 30-45 days to do an in-depth dive into the company’s data to develop a custom strategy that aligns with the client’s specific business goals. It feels exhaustive at times, but it always ends up paying off.
[bctt tweet=”According to the Content Marketing Institute, 11% of companies without a documented content marketing strategy find their efforts successful, compared to 60% of companies with a strategy in place. ” username=”Fronetics”]
Keep in mind that only 11% of companies without a documented content marketing strategy find their efforts successful, compared to 60% of companies with a strategy in place. And that number rises to 86% when the company designates someone to lead the strategy.
The bottom line? Skipping this step to rush to results will pretty much ensure that your efforts won’t be worth it.
Building trust
In addition to the time it takes to develop a strategy, becoming an authority — and earning the trust and loyalty of your audience — takes time. Your goal is to be a consistent source of information and value, building your brand as an expert in the area.
It goes without saying that this doesn’t happen overnight. But it’s extremely well worth the effort and the patience. Remember that the average B2B buyer consumes between two and five pieces of content before making a purchase decision. If you can position your business as the premier expert on the subject by having the best, most informative, most helpful content available, you’ll have a leg up in the buyer’s decision.
Let the sales cycle play out
Once your strategy is documented and in place, and you begin to create and curate consistent, well-researched, high-quality content, there’s also the process of letting your sales cycle run its course. You need to allow your target audience time to find you and complete thorough research about you and your competitors before making a decision.
After all, content marketing can’t shorten your sales cycle. But lead nurturing with content can keep moving your prospects down the sales funnel. And content can help your sales team close deals. But you can’t expect a buyer to read your first blog post today and make a big purchase tomorrow. That’s just not realistic.
I cannot urge you enough: Don’t give up on content marketing before you give it time work. Hang in there long enough for your initial investment to pay off, and don’t be afraid to adjust your strategy along the way. If you stick with content marketing, it will generate those leads and sales you’re looking for.
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by Jennifer Hart Yim | May 30, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Logistics, Marketing, Supply Chain
Larger societal changes are affecting the way companies are planning their Supply Chains of the future. Here are the five biggest fallacies in supply chain management right now.
This guest post comes to us from Argentus Supply Chain Recruiting, a boutique recruitment firm specializing in Supply Chain Management and Procurement.
Lots of things are happening in Supply Chain Management. The field is becoming more digital, with end-to-end planning and blockchain technologies transforming the way products are coming to market. It’s becoming more strategic, as companies integrate their Supply Chains and use them as a source of competitive advantage – instead of just a back-office function. Larger societal changes are affecting the way companies are planning their Supply Chains of the future – everything from the looming arrival of driverless cars, to consumers’ demands that companies be more socially responsible.
We’ve written about quite a few of these topics ourselves. They’re exciting. They’re impactful on business. And – most relevant for us at Argentus as a recruitment company – they’re changing the talent picture by transforming the skills that Supply Chain professionals need to succeed.
[bctt tweet=”A new article in Forbes, “The Biggest Supply Chain Fallacies,” by Supply Chain researcher and beat writer Steve Banker, challenges a few of the assumptions underlying current supply chain management trends.” username=”Fronetics”]
A new article in Forbes, “The Biggest Supply Chain Fallacies,” by Supply Chain researcher and beat writer Steve Banker, challenges a few of the assumptions underlying these trends, and calls out some of the conventional wisdom that’s taken hold in the field.
We wanted to take the opportunity to discuss and respond to some of Mr. Banker’s points (because who doesn’t love a little bit of controversy?) as well as to throw it to our readers for further discussion. Whether you agree or disagree with some of Mr. Banker’s arguments, they’re thought provoking to say the least.
So here are the biggest fallacies he sees in the field right now, as well as our thoughts:
Fallacy 1: Blockchain will make everything traceable in Supply Chains, leading to greater supplier transparency.
We’ve covered Blockchain quite a bit in recent months. In short, companies are using Blockchain’s distributed ledgers to form a public record of where goods come from, allowing consumers to trace goods in the supply chain. The goal is to make the origin of goods more transparent, allowing companies to prove that goods haven’t come from workers under abuse or unsustainable sources.
Why This Might Be a Fallacy: According to Banker, Blockchain doesn’t solve the “garbage in, garbage out” problem that goes along with big data. His point: if a supplier lies about the provenance of a good at the point of origin – say, a farmer pretending beef is grass fed if it’s not – it doesn’t matter how transparent the Supply Chain is from that point forward. He says that Blockchain won’t eliminate the need for other kinds of certification in the Supply Chain, and we tend to agree – but does that mean it won’t be useful? No.
Fallacy 2: Corporate Social Responsbility initiatives improve a companies financial performance.
We’ve touched on Corporate Social Responsibility (or CSR) when discussing the annual Top 25 Supply Chains list with Gartner’s Michael Massetti. More companies are raising expectations of environmental sustainability. Some massive companies have pledged to eliminate excess waste in their supply chains entirely in the coming years, and there’s a lot of talk that sustainability helps the bottom line by improving sales and lowering costs (e.g. fuel).
Why This Might Be a Fallacy: Banker points out that companies shouldn’t assume that CSR efforts will necessarily improve sustainability. In his eyes, they’re good for society – but they have less financial benefit in business-to-business-selling industries (where customers won’t pay a premium for sustainable goods) and developing economies.
Fallacy 3: There’s a shortage of truck drivers – a threat to the Supply Chain stability – because young people don’t want to drive trucks.
The Logistics industry press has been writing a lot about a shortage of truck drivers, with a lot of anxiety about how the demographics of truck drivers are skewing older and older.
Why This Might Be a Fallacy: Banker is responding to the prevailing wisdom that says the truck driver shortage comes from millennials wanting other careers. He retorts that the median truck driver salary of $42,553 is the reason why young people don’t want to go into the field, and that the industry should raise drivers’ wages if it wants to attract applicants – instead of waiting for driverless trucks which, in Banker’s opinion, are father off than they seem. He cites data from the American Trucking Association that wages have risen between 15 and 18 percent from 2013-2017, and says this should mean that the shortage will be overblown.
Fallacy 4: Improved forecasting will always lead to lower inventory levels.
This one is a bit of a sacred cow in the world of Supply Chain analytics. Everyone knows that demand planning isn’t completely foolproof, but these forecasting solutions are improving with the advent of machine learning and other technologies.
Why This Might Be a Fallacy: Similarly to #2, Banker wants to put a bit of a pin in the hype about forecasting. He wants to challenge the assumption that better demand forecasts will always lead to lower inventory levels. In his mind – and we tend to agree – some things are still unpredictable no matter how advanced the forecasting technology. For example, if a recession hits unexpectedly, demand will be way lower than expected and you’ll likely have tons of excess inventory.
Fallacy 5: Companies who have functional excellence will always win.
Banker challenges the assumption – or “trap” as he calls it – of privileging any function’s Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) over the success of the Supply Chain ecosystem as a whole. Better reporting and data have made for an increased reliance on KPIs to maximize performance in areas like Sourcing, Logistics, Manufacturing, and Sales.
Why This Might Be a Fallacy: According to Banker, if you rely on excellence in any particular function’s KPIs, you risk hurting another function and the overall business. For example, if a company is measuring their Procurement function on price, and they source materials based on price without emphasizing quality, this can harm manufacturing will still making it look like Procurement is succeeding.
Banker argues that companies who take a more holistic approach – through processes like Integrated Business Planning (IBP) – will win over companies who prize excellence in any particular function. From our perspective, this is something most companies recognize they need to do, even if they aren’t always successful at executing it.
Whether you agree or disagree with any of Mr. Banker’s assertions, we still think it’s always valuable to question conventional wisdom and hype.
Please check out the original article, and then we want to hear from you! What do you think about any of these topics? Is Mr. Banker right, or is he barking up the wrong tree?
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by Fronetics | May 21, 2018 | Blog, Logistics, Strategy, Supply Chain, Talent
Millennial talent seeks employment opportunities with companies that promote transparency, technology, excellence, and social change.
We write often about the supply chain talent gap and how supply chain companies should be proactively recruiting millennials to join their companies. So a recent Harvard Business Review article, which talks about how companies that “young people find dull” (like electrical distributors and manufacturers) can make their businesses seem “cool,” seemed particularly relevant.
While we adamantly disagree that the supply chain isn’t cool, we do think it’s important that logistics and supply chain companies think strategically about recruiting millennial talent.
Millennial talent and the vision thing
According to a new study by strategy firm Department26, “Transparency is the millennial standard operating procedure in the workplace.” Honesty and security are top of mind for this generation that came of age just as the country plunged into The Great Recession.
[bctt tweet=”Beer kegs and ping pong are nice, but millennials are more impressed with leadership that sets goals and delivers on them. ” username=”Fronetics”]
Beer kegs and ping pong are nice, but millennials are more impressed with leadership that sets goals and delivers on them. They want to know how their role contributes to the organization’s success, and they want to know the effort they’re putting into a job is worth it.
“Setting them up for success means regular check-ins, both positive and constructive feedback as a rule, and structured mentorship,” write the authors of the Department26 study.
People say millennial talent doesn’t work for money, and it’s true that they’re not motivated by salary alone. Younger employees want meaningful work that enhances their personal growth.
They also want flexible work rules that show an employer respects and trusts them. Sharing details of your strategic plan or examples of how your HR policies reward personal initiative can help millennial talent see your “boring” business in a new way.
“The thought of not being granted flexibility in exchange for hitting performance metrics is absurd to millennials, and it’s a concept that’s diametrically opposed to the freedom they crave,” the study concludes.
Talk tech
Logistics or trucking can sound dull to the iPhone generation — until you paint a picture of forward momentum and innovation that might surprise them.
Automation, robotics, autonomous vehicles, blockchain, drones and the Internet of Things (IoT) are reshaping the industry. Companies like Amazon, Pfizer and Wal-Mart are experimenting with new technologies to reduce costs, boost productivity, and improve handling performance.
“Wearable technology could soon become a standard must-have in the logistics industry,” according to a recent story in The Business Journals. “As these technologies continue to carve out their role in the global logistics industry, we’re likely to see previously unimagined levels of optimization — from manufacturing to warehousing to delivery.”
Find ways to change hearts and minds by exposing young people to the realities of today’s supply chain. If they think it’s boring, it’s because they really don’t know what it is.
Be the best damn supply chain company anywhere
People want to work for “the best” — the most innovative, the most profitable, or the most admired brand — in every industry. Workers are proud to say they work for a company recognized as being the best at what it does because it says they’re the best, too.
Even millennial talent that has never thought about a career in logistics might reconsider if they’re being recruited by an industry leader.
Celebrate excellence at your company. Promote the awards you’ve won. Share customer testimonials, positive media coverage, and community recognition with prospective recruits.
It also helps to do well by doing good. This is a generation that trusts business, not government, to create positive social change. “Millennials are hungry for a work culture that inspires them. At a macro level, companies should communicate clear plans that reflect their core values,” says Department26.
HBR author Bill Taylor summarizes these sentiments well: “What [millennials] value is the chance to join companies that make a difference and where the work brings out the best in them.”
How is your company recruiting millennial talent?
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by Fronetics | May 24, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing
Ready to give up on content marketing? Chances are, you haven’t given it a fair shot.
You’re three or maybe even six months into your new content marketing program. Congratulations! You’re probably noticing an uptick in web traffic, social reach, and other engagement metrics like time on page. You’re right on track! But you have no leads or sales to speak of. And whether that’s got you nervous that you’re doing something wrong, or just has your boss breathing down your neck to get some results FAST, I’m here to tell you: Now is NOT the time to give up on content marketing.
In fact, giving up now is just about the worst thing you can do. You’ve already made the majority of the investment without giving your program time to deliver your return.
Why does content marketing take so dang long to work?
Content marketing is a long-term solution that helps businesses build brand awareness, grow their audience, and generate new leads and sales. But it takes time and effort to achieve results. You shouldn’t give up on content marketing before the seeds you sow have time to bear fruit.
Just how long will it take for your content marketing strategy to yield results? Well, that really depends on your business and your goals, but you can count on at least six months. (Joe Pulizzi, founder of the Content Marketing Institute, says more like 18.) The point is, content marketing is not a magic, overnight solution. The reason reflects why content marketing is effective in the first place.
4 reasons why it’s NOT time to give up on content marketing
1) Developing your strategy takes time.
Only 11% of companies without a documented content marketing strategy find their efforts to be successful, compared to 60% of companies with a strategy in place. (That number rises to 86% when the company designates someone to lead the strategy.) The significant increase in effectiveness can be attributed to the careful thought and research that goes into building a strategy.
You will need several months to build the foundation of your content marketing plan if it is to be effective. You need time to research the kind of content that resonates most with your audience and to truly understand the (very specific) demographic that finds value in what your company offers. Then you need time to determine and test which distribution channels will most effectively reach your target audience, to discern a plan for content production, and to build out an editorial calendar reflective of your strategy.
Without getting all of these pieces precisely right, you’ll waste an enormous amount of energy and resources working on an ineffective strategy. Take the time to evaluate the market for your business and its content marketing strategy, and you’ll realize results in time.
2) Becoming an authority takes time.
The goal of your content marketing efforts should be to be a consistent source of information and value to your audience, who gradually will come to trust your authority and reward you with their business when they are ready to make a purchase. And establishing yourself as an expert doesn’t happen overnight.
Consistency is key for two reasons. For one, the average B2B buyer consumes between two to five pieces of content before making a purchase decision. If your content is old, arbitrary, contradictory, or otherwise unreliable, buyers will chose a different vendor whose content is more trustworthy. Consistent and consistently good content keeps your target audience engaged and builds your credibility with them.
Secondly, search engines rank websites based on several factors, and one of the most important is consistency. If your company blogs every other month, compared to companies that post several days a week, your posts will be penalized in search results. And since very few readers click beyond the top five search results, you’re drastically reducing your organic search potential.
As a SumAll article put it, “Whether getting traffic to your blog or your content ranked in the search engines, it doesn’t happen overnight, but instead by repeatedly creating and distributing quality content on a frequent basis for the long-term.”
3) Building your audience takes time.
The B2B buying process is becoming longer and more complex because the majority of buyers (82%) are using more sources to research and evaluate products and services, and they are spending more time in the research phase itself. In fact, 71% of B2B researchers start with a generic search — rather than searching for a particular company — and do an average of 12 searches before even engaging with a specific brand’s site. They are 57% of the way down the sales path by this point, meaning they have already spent a fair amount of time educating themselves with the enormous amount of information available to them on the internet.
This means you need to allow your target audience time to find you and complete thorough research about you and your competitors before you even realize that the lead exists. And likely there will be more time before a sale takes place.
Content marketing is much more about lead nurturing than producing instant results. As you build your reputation as a valuable source of information, you will simultaneously build a loyal following of readers and content consumers who continue to return to you for knowledge and, ultimately, purchases. Relationship-building is not a streamlined process, but it does foster the ever-valuable repeat business that will have a greater impact on your bottom line than a one-and-done sale.
4) Your sales cycle takes time.
Unfortunately, content marketing cannot decrease the length of your sales cycle. Thus, you can’t expect to see the fruits of your labors (in terms of dollars) until at least one cycle is complete.
There should be, however, hints along the way that your efforts are working. Metrics like increased website traffic, email registrations, and social reach offer clues that more potential customers are finding your business in their research. You should take these signs and continually evolve your strategy to accommodate what is working for your business.
Also keep in mind that while content marketing can have an enormous impact on generating and nurturing leads, it does not deliver sales on a silver platter. Sales teams still play a major role in building on those relationships and closing deals.
Please don’t give up on content marketing before it’s had time to play out. You’ll not only lose out on your initial investment, but also all the leads and sales that will eventually come your way once your program has had time to develop fully.
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