Those of you who know me and are familiar with my role and responsibilities as “Principal of Practicality” at Insight180 will chuckle at how NOT surprising it is I would coin the phrase or espouse the concept of “Practicality Marketing.” (Well, some things should be predictable in life, shouldn’t they?)
Over the past few months we have been updating a bunch of our client websites to WordPress and with that has come the synonymous question of whether or not they “need” to have a blog on their site. The answer depends on a few key elements: The goals you have for your website, the size of your current audience, your current domain rank, if others sites with a high domain rank are regularly linking to your site and whether your website is regularly putting out fresh content in other ways. If the end doesn’t justify the means, spending time on blogging may not be for you. However, if your company is putting time, energy and money into a new website, it could all be for nothing without a blog. It all depends on your goals.
How you rank with search engines is an important part of building a successful business. But the active tasks of search engine optimization (SEO) are very different in 2014 than they used to be even just a year ago.
It’s that time. You know you need to write another blog post, but you’re just not feeling it. Where do you start? If you are an expert advisory firm, you are aware of the importance of providing valuable thought leadership, also known as lead-generating content. Your website needs to substantiate the work you do for your clients. When a prospect who is “on the fence” about your services comes across your site, your content can make the difference.
Are you just starting out with social media and interested in developing a content marketing strategy? After you’re done setting up your blog and numerous social media outlets, the next step is to create a clear and concise strategy for what types of posts you will make, and why.
Hey, Wendy:
I’m reading a book and insight180 came to mind. The Art of Doing: How Superachievers Do what They Do and How They Do It So Well, by Camille Sweeney & Josh Gosfield. The book features interviews with respected, high profile professionals about how they do what they do. I heard the authors interviewed on two different radio programs during their book tour.
One of the most effective marketing strategies helping advisory businesses (those that sell advisory services to consumers or other businesses) grow these days is content marketing — writing effective blog posts that resonate with your target audience and that get noticed by search engines.
Trends and predictions were the big topics at the Mid-Atlantic Marketing Summit held in Baltimore a couple of weeks ago –– marketing experts sharing what they’ve seen in the ever-changing landscape of branding and marketing, both online and off, inbound and push. What was especially interesting to me was that for every new approach, there was a traditional approach that still proved effective. For every new tool or technology, brand strategy and marketing planning trumped tactics every time.
A landing page is a special, stripped-down page in your website that’s dedicated to capturing information about your site visitor. In order to entice your visitor to give you that information, landing pages usually contain special offers — like a free e-book, or other information product, or a special offer related to a product or service.
I recently treated myself to an ipad. But what I find myself thinking a lot about is just how nice my buying experience was with it. Add to that, the fact that half the businesses we work with have, at one point or another, asked us to make them the Apple of their industry. A daunting request. But we know what they are asking for when they say it. They want to be a leader, to be different, to be about more than just exchange of services for renumeration, but mostly I think they want to be liked and successful.
I walk into Starbucks and without thinking I place my order, a Grande in a Venti cup iced Starbucks Double Shot with two Splendas, non-fat milk, and room. I guess there is only one way to put this – I am a creature of habit! I know I am not alone; most people follow a daily routine and are creatures of habit. Perhaps you, too, drink the same coffee every morning, or you wake up every morning, read the newspaper, drive to work, read your emails, and then get on with the tasks you need to accomplish.
There’s so much buzz and competition these days to try to make content go viral, that it has, by nature, become more difficult to do. But it is still possible. Going “viral” only means that a piece of content has enough appeal, either broadly or narrowly, that people take the time and effort to spread it to their friends and colleagues with their endorsements or commentary.
