Search engine optimization (SEO) isn’t what it used to be. Modern SEO is a combination of the art of writing to attract readers and the science of making a search engine respond to your content.

To generate good SEO writing, you need to have a solid strategy and a sound tactical approach. This article will cover the necessary ingredients of both.

Let’s dive in.

SEO content strategy

With Google accounting for nearly 86 percent of desktop and laptop searches and 96 percent of searches on mobile devices, having an SEO content strategy is critically important.

Your content strategy includes the tactics you will use to ensure your content ranks as close as possible to the top of search engine results.

There are three components to an SEO content strategy: content, indexing, and measurement.

Write content for people, not bots

Don’t write content solely for an algorithm. Write content with your readers in mind. In the early days of SEO, people would stuff their content with keywords that helped achieve the short-term gain of a higher page rank.

This continued until readers, the ultimate arbiter of content quality, chose higher quality content.

Search engines noticed. Not only did they reduce the rank of unnatural or unoriginal content, but they went so far as to penalize SEO content that appeared to have been stuffed or spun.

The good news is this — if you write your content uniquely and naturally, you generally won’t have to worry about these measures.

Write your online content to provide value to an audience, not to boost your search results. For example, if you’re writing material for a business blog, the focus should be on the subjects and discussions relevant to your prospects and customers.

That can be as simple as addressing customer pain points, answering frequently asked questions (FAQs), or speaking with expertise on a specific topic. Most users go to Google for exactly those reasons in the first place.

Meeting users’ needs gives value to both search engines and your potential customers.

Indexing

To quickly generate the results of your searches, Google parses billions of web pages and indexes their content in its database. Google’s algorithm uses that data to determine which content may benefit readers the most.

Google Search Console is useful for analyzing whether your blog posts are properly formatted. The Search Console reviews your site and offers guidance to help maximize the discoverability of your articles via the algorithm.

Here are some of the things that Google searches for in order to properly index a page:

• Titles and descriptions that accurately describe the content on your pages.
• Meta tags that contain relevant, high-quality keywords
• Proper use of H2 headings that break up the content on your page into relevant segments.
• Concise, readable URLs to assist users in finding your content.
• Responsive code that makes your content readable on any device.

Measurement

So now you’ve put your blog strategy to work and published a few articles. How do you know how well that SEO content is performing over time?

Measuring the effectiveness of your SEO strategy involves analyzing a series of key performance indicators (KPIs) that together give you an overall picture of your performance.

Ranking is the first and probably most obvious KPI. You want to know if your SEO strategy is boosting your page rank.

PageRank is the Google algorithm named after what it does, and after Google co-founder Larry Page. It is the complex math Google uses to measure the importance of a web page, compare it to other web pages, and rank it accordingly.

There are dozens of tools online, both free and paid, that you can use to check your page ranking.

Traffic is the measurement of how people are finding their way to your content. Are they reaching you organically through a simple query on Google?

Perhaps they’re getting to you through social media or through other websites with similar content that links back to you. Does one source provide more traffic than another?

Time on the page is another important KPI. When people find your content, are they immediately leaving to find better content or are they staying on your site to scroll down and read everything you have to say?

Click-through rate is a KPI that can be used to segregate those who visit from those who actually follow the links you place on your site, whether internal or external. The click-through KPI is particularly helpful when analyzing sales funnels to trace how far users make it through the consumer journey.

Best practices for writing SEO content

So you have your code properly formatted and ready for indexing, you know what KPIs you’re looking to measure, and now you’re ready to generate content. Let’s take a look at some best practices that make both readers and search engines happy.

Know your audience

Before any search engine can index your SEO content, you have to generate reader enthusiasm. To truly get an idea of which people might best respond to your content, ask a couple of key questions.

• Who are you trying to reach? What kind of person, specifically, do you think would benefit the most from the content you are producing? Note whether you’re trying to deliver on an unmet need, or provide better content than what is currently available online.
• Who is currently reading similar content? Social media is a good place to find answers to this question. Facebook provides a Graph API which any user can use to query the social network’s database.

Use social media tools to evaluate your audience both quantitatively and qualitatively. You can generate reports that show who is reading your content and their demographic information like gender, age, and interests.

Clearly define your topic

One thing you shouldn’t do when generating SEO content is to try and be all things to all people. Writing about too many disparate topics can result in not creating good articles about any of them.

In your effort to build content that people want to read, focus on material about topics that you are an expert in or can speak intelligently about. One way to set your content apart from others is to be a veritable subject matter expert or true authority on that topic.

Use the 10x or skyscraper formula to create content that sets you apart from the competition.

After you have generated an ample amount of material, you can use your KPIs to narrow and refine the scope of your content by tracking what readers respond to and don’t respond to.

Refine your keywords

Keywords go hand in hand with audience insights. You want your content to contain, as closely as possible, the keywords they will be using in their search queries.

Research tools like KeywordTool or Clearscope let you plug in relevant keywords and use Google Auto-Complete to see which keyword combinations give you the best results.

Keep content dynamic

A major part of keeping your page rank optimized and driving new visitors is to refresh your content regularly. While this might sound simple, it’s not always easy to just generate evergreen content ideas on a variety of niche topics.

Here are some simple but effective ideation writing strategies.

• The most direct way to generate ideas is to talk to your readers. When running a blog, allowing readers to give feedback by way of comments or to contact you via email is one way to get a real-time feel for what your readers want.
• Social media is also effective at helping you find what readers and potential customers are thinking without engaging them directly. Social also will tell you immediately what’s trending and what isn’t. If it’s trending on social media, it’s likely to be a Google trend as well.
• Use cluster content ideas as part of your content ideation process to generate many fresh content topics from a single idea. Clustering uses a core, broadly focused pillar topic for the initial piece of content with other more narrowly focused pieces of content built around it.
• Incorporating rich media, like videos, can also help SEO. Video has been shown to keep viewers’ attention longer which increases time on the page and reduces bounce rate.

Keep it current

Your blog is an engine designed to help bring new and existing customers to your company and its products. Your content keeps that engine running. If you implement an effective SEO strategy and practices, that will ensure your material stays fresh, your ideas are authoritative, and that people consider your site a reliable source of useful information.

If you need help creating high-quality SEO content that both readers and search engines will love, ClearVoice has your back. Talk to a content specialist about creating optimized blog posts, web copy, social posts, and more to help you rank higher, attract organic traffic, and convert more leads today.

The post Blog Ideas: How to Write SEO Friendly Content appeared first on ClearVoice.

Expert content marketing tips can be a game-changer for your strategy that helps you create more strategic content. In fact, strategic content works especially well for small versus large business marketing teams.

It helps build brand awareness and an active, loyal audience of users. That audience already has a certain level of interest in your offer, so it’s a much simpler process to sell to them, and turn them into repeat buyers.

Yet, small businesses still struggle with how to implement and optimize content marketing consistently in a tailored, strategic way that actually leads to more leads, more closed sales, and higher revenue.

9 essential content marketing tips

In this post, we break down the top nine content marketing tips to help you write better content and get better results.

1. Take a broader view of what content marketing is

What kind of content are we referring to in small business content marketing? Variety is the spice of life and the secret ingredient for great content marketing.

With the expansion of web-based technologies in recent years, we’re increasingly seeing compelling, well-crafted content in many formats beyond just blog posts.

Content formats to experiment with include:

• Interactive content
• Videos
• Social media content (including graphics, tweets, Facebook status updates, and posts)
• Podcasts and other audio content
• Ebooks and white papers

Visual content is often more memorable than pure text. To keep your content fresh and top of mind for your audience, go beyond blog posts and explore infographics, images with layover text, and short videos. You can also get started with a brand podcast with a relatively small initial investment.

2. Manage your content creation process better

No matter how big or small your content marketing plan is, your company will face challenges along the way. Staying aware of potential traps the way helps your small business maximize your chances of success.

Here are a few content marketing tips and questions you should ask yourself:

• Do you have adequate resources? At a minimum, that means time, energy, money (if you’re outsourcing any part of your content marketing tasks), and expertise in the creation process (if you’re handling any part of those tasks in-house). It’s especially crucial to make sure you’re giving your content marketing program sufficient time to show results. It often takes a lot of time and skill to create enough of the kind of content your brand needs.
• Can you cut through the noise of a crowded marketplace? You’re competing with lots of brands for your targeted audience’s valuable and limited time and attention. That means you need top-quality content that’s aimed at the sweet spot between what you do and what your targeted users want. You also need a strong and consistent plan to promote that content so it gets in front of them when they’re receptive to it.
• Do your stakeholders have realistic expectations? It can be challenging to manage the expectations of company leaders, especially those who aren’t directly involved in your marketing efforts. Content marketing works, but it doesn’t produce results overnight. It takes time to increase brand awareness and build a loyal audience. Make sure everyone understands that and knows what to expect.
• Do you have a strategic plan? A strategic plan that covers both the immediate future, the next six to twelve months, and the next one to five years, all crafted to help your team make progress towards the company’s business goals, is invaluable. Use that plan to craft your editorial calendar and tightly align your content with your audience’s needs and wants.

3. Address each step in your buyer’s journey

Take the time to audit your brand’s existing content. Know the kinds of content you have, the topics you cover, and the calls to action (CTAs) that you use.

You don’t need to extensively inventory social media content, especially if you have accounts that have been active for a long time, but you should review the metrics associated with those accounts to identify top-performing shares and how engaged your social media audience is.

Look carefully at where your content maps onto your company’s customer journey and sales funnel. The point here is to identify gaps where existing content can be revised and repurposed, or where new content can be created from scratch, to fill in those gaps.

Ideally, your content moves each member of your target audience from the very top of the funnel all the way through to a closed sale — and on to future repeat business.

4. Focus on content results with measurable metrics

To achieve a positive ROI on content marketing for your business, you must focus on the actual, measurable results. That means putting into place the mechanisms necessary to measure and track the relevant metrics from your content marketing efforts over time. It also means making a habit of monitoring those metrics consistently to see what’s working, what’s ineffective, and how best to adjust your efforts and optimize them for better results.

Remember: What gets measured, gets improved.

5. Broaden the reach of your own website

Next up on our list of content marketing tips is advice you’ll want to apply in many areas of your business. Tools and platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (among many, many others) are indisputably valuable for small business content marketing teams.

Third-party sites support, host, and share your content, while many small businesses use sites like Etsy and Amazon as direct sales platforms.

So what happens when one or more of these sites go down? Worse yet, what happens when the entire site fails permanently, leaving you and millions of other users high and dry? Technology is never, ever perfect. Glitches happen.

The lesson here isn’t “don’t ever use third-party sites.” That’s unrealistic. Instead, develop your own channels and use them simultaneously alongside these larger third-party sites. Create space on your brand’s website to host, share, and promote content.

6. Explore user-generated content

Getting your users to create content about your product or service can capture and expand your brand awareness and widen your audience and leads.

For example, Canva launched a user-generated content (UGC) contest called the #CanvaDesignChallenge. Users create new content using Canva’s tools, then post their entries on Instagram or Twitter.

Weekly winners get prize packages from Canva, including subscriptions to Canva Pro and credits they can use toward Canva Print.

By restricting the prize to services and tools Canva already offers, they’re creating an audience that’s already aligned with what they do. They might not attract as many new users and leads if they’d offered, say, Amazon gift cards only.

7. Tell compelling stories supported by relevant data

Storytelling is next up on our list of essential content marketing tips. But storytelling doesn’t mean making up fictional narratives—just the opposite. The way to use storytelling in content marketing is to tell true stories supported by relevant data in a compelling, well-crafted way.

By incorporating data, you can tell a story that is authentic and one that captivates and entertains at the same time. Hopefully, it also persuades the reader to take a closer look at your brand and your offer. You can also tell some aspect of your brand story, whether that’s focused or the company or its founder.

8. Create ongoing buzz with serialization

Serialization has been an effective means of driving up interest in content since the days of Charles Dickens.

Publishing an ongoing series of any kind of content can help you build up an audience and keep their collective interest growing, although this technique is more often associated with written, video, and audio (podcast) content.

Podcasts can produce highly effective content. Look at what Charles Schwab does with its “Choiceology” podcast on behavioral economics. Or you can simply publish a “tip of the week” post on your blog or your email newsletter.

9. Explore ways your content can support your brand’s values

The last of our content marketing tips is about brand values. Customers and clients expect the brands they interact with to live up to their values. They want to understand what your brand is all about, and they want to see your company act in ways that actively support and further those values.

When your content explains and supports the foundational principles on which your brand is built, you’ll naturally attract leads and prospects who share those same principles and values.

For example, Rowan for Dogs, a coat-care company for dogs, spotlights its partnerships with other nonprofits in its Instagram content. And the famed ice cream company Ben & Jerry’s is well-known for furthering its commitment to social and economic justice through its business activities.

Initiatives like these can become the basis for rich content that helps your ideal customers identify and align with your brand.

Get strategic with your content marketing

The single best thing you can do to help your content marketing efforts is to tailor your approach to your existing and prospective customers. Strategic approaches built on your known user or buyer personas always produce better results than throwing everything you’ve got up against the digital marketing wall to see what sticks.

Keep an eye on what your competitors are publishing and figure out how you can produce content that’s different, better, or both.

Need help creating content for your business? ClearVoice has a pool of talented writers that can create anything from blog posts and ebooks to social media posts and video scripts. Talk to a content specialist to get started.

The post 9 Content Marketing Tips for Small Businesses appeared first on ClearVoice.

Luckily, you can easily learn how to write tabloid-worthy headlines (minus the clickbait) to help improve your content marketing results.

How to write tabloid-worthy headlines

Let’s take a look at the nine lessons we can take away from tabloid headlines. These lessons can help you improve your content headlines and keep your users on your page and site for longer periods of time.

1. Boil it down to foundational facts

Learning how to write tabloid-worthy headlines starts with the basics. Before you try to create something pithy, witty, punny, or just funny, first make sure you’re communicating something essential about your content.

While tabloid headlines, just like catchy digital content headlines, often use humor, puns, or cultural references to grab attention, that’s not their only function or purpose.

The headline makes a promise that the body of the content must deliver on if you want the user to keep reading. If there’s any kind of substantial disconnect there, the user will feel duped or deceived. This is one of the primary reasons users will derogatorily label a piece “clickbait.”

To avoid this, start by simply jotting down words and phrases that convey the most elemental facts of your piece or story, which you can then work into short and creative headlines.

2. Add specific details

Headlines are not the place for vague references and archetypes — not if you want them to zing. Be specific. You’re not simply writing about “headlines” but “tabloid headlines,” or “HR in the fintech industry” instead of just “HR.” The more specific you are, the likelier you are to hit your target.

Look at the elemental words and phrases you jotted down in the first step. How can you add specificity and nuance to those elements?

Play around with those words and phrases so that you can precisely target your headline to the exact kind of readers you want to target. Don’t worry yet about the character length of your headline. You can always tighten it up before publishing.

3. Decide how best to support your piece with the headline

A headline can stake out territory along a number of different spectrums. Should your headline be formal or funny? Should it cite data or should it use poetry? Who exactly are you trying to reach?

Think about the contours and the nature of the content you’re writing. A snarky, funny, or punny headline works great for a piece that’s light-hearted and infused with humor, but it will be jarring and inappropriate paired with a more serious and business-like piece of content. Let the content tell you what kind of headline it needs.

4. Make it negative

It might seem counterintuitive, but negativity sells when learning how to write tabloid-worthy headlines. Consider using your headline to stoke just a little fear or anxiety. Your readers will be more inclined to click and read a piece on “7 Ways to Avoid Getting in Trouble With the IRS” than a piece on “How to File Taxes Properly.”

You can also evoke that need-to-know feeling in your reader by conveying urgency and a built-in deadline or consequences. But don’t think you have to state an actual date or specific consequence to prompt that click.

“What You Must Know Before You File Your Freelance Taxes,” for example, is more compelling than “How to File Your Freelance Taxes.”

5. Create curiosity

Remember when we suggested you make your headlines clearer and more specific? We still think that’s a good idea — but you also need to create a bit of mystery and curiosity with your headline. Nothing draws in a reader and persuades them to keep reading like an unanswered question.

What can you withhold from your fundamental facts to stoke a little curiosity in a person who comes across your headline? For example, “3 Financial Missteps That Will Ruin Your Startup” evokes a little fear, a little negativity (see above), and also some curiosity. What are those three missteps? A startup founder or CFO will absolutely want to find out.

6. Add a bit of wit

Smart puns, clever wordplay, or a dash of humor can transform good headlines into tabloid-worthy headlines. This isn’t easy to learn — some folks seem to have a facility with written humor, whereas others find it a challenge.

Here are a few tips for infusing your headlines with humor or wit:

• Pay attention to letter sounds. Even a little alliteration can create enough interest to prompt a click. Consider “Five Financial Fumbles for Startups to Watch Out For” versus “Five Financial Mistakes Startups Should Avoid.” The additional alliteration with the third “f” sound in “fumbles” gives the headline just a dash more color and fun.
• Use a thesaurus to find similar words that you might be able to build into puns. Be careful with puns, though; they work well with the right kind of content tone, but if your piece is serious or professional in tone, puns can be off-putting.
• Consider a short, well-placed parenthetical. In a headline, it can provide just the right format for a small, funny aside that makes your user do a double-take and click out of curiosity. Consider the difference between “Financial Stumbles Every Startup Should Avoid” and “Financial Stumbles Every Startup Should Avoid (Yes, I’m Speaking from Experience)”— they’re both clear and persuasive. Still, that second one adds a personal bit of schadenfreude and self-deprecation that most readers won’t be able to resist.
• Subvert reader expectations. With headlines, the best way to do this is through a twisted cliche. A headline along the lines of “A bird in the hand is worth a year of your CEO’s salary” or “No use crying over spilled single malt scotch” will take the reader by surprise and encourage them to read the piece that accompanies it.
• Go big. Overstating things a little makes readers roll their eyes. Overstating things to a wild degree makes readers laugh — or at least want to read more to see how you defend your characterization. “How to gain an Instagram audience the size of Switzerland” is funny. No one will take it literally (probably), but it’ll definitely grab their attention.

7. But don’t go overboard

To keep your humor appropriate and avoid offending a large swath of your audience, follow these tips:

• Make your humor self-deprecating, where possible. This might not be as practical with headlines as it would be for the body of the content itself.
• Avoid humor that’s insulting or derogatory toward any person or type of person.
• Keep it simple and minimal. Think about adding a dash of spice to a nearly perfect dish, rather than dumping in too much and ruining it.
• Don’t force the issue. Humor that feels forced or crammed into the headline purely for the sake of making it funny almost never has the desired effect. Err on the side of caution.

8. Review the headline with an eye toward SEO

Humor, wit, a little scarcity, or negativity — these are all helpful ingredients to tabloid-worthy headlines. But on the web, they must all get in line behind readability and SEO. Make sure you’ve included your primary targeted keywords and that it reads like it was written for a human being, not a computer.

If you have to sacrifice the funny bits or the SEO, you’ll want to keep the SEO in most cases. Of course, there are always exceptions. You might have a piece of content that’s so strong that it’ll get shared often enough to overcome any SEO shortcomings. If that’s the case, keep the humor, lose the keywords.

9. Trim your headline down to keep it lean and punchy

With few exceptions, shorter and pithier is better for tabloid-worthy headlines. Keep it tight. Don’t use nine words if you can use five. Don’t use five if four will do just as well.

Of course, you want to avoid trimming it so much that you lose meaning. The classic example is the exhortation to “omit unnecessary words.” You could trim that to “omit words,” but something rather essential gets lost in the edit.

Real tabloid headline examples

Now that you know how to write tabloid-worthy headlines, let’s look at some examples.

Here are some notable historical examples of tabloid headlines:

• “Headless Body in Topless Bar” (New York Post, April 1983)
• “Super Caley Go Ballistic Celtic Are Atrocious” (The Sun, February 8, 2000)
• “OVER £100M! Is this the rail price? Is this just fantasy? Caught up in land buys; No escape from bureaucracy!” (The Armagh Gazette, April 19, 2013)
• “She didn’t see it coming: psychic arrested for $800,000 fraud” (The Guardian, May 12, 2018)

Tabloid headlines excel at three things, in succession:

1. First, grabbing a reader’s attention;
2. Then persuading them to buy a copy of the tabloid;
3. And finally, to read that article.

That’s what makes them the perfect model for writing great content headlines. No matter what your niche or topic, and no matter what kind of content you’re creating, your goal as the writer or content marketer is always to grab the attention of the audience you’re targeting, then persuade them to read your article or blog post.

Remember the headline’s sole purpose

The goal of every headline is to convince the reader to click on the link, to read the article, and to keep reading because the content is actually valuable and of interest.

The value of writing tabloid-worthy headlines is that they help meet that goal. Always keep your eyes on the objective, whether you’re writing a headline, subheads, a deck, or the copy itself: Keep that reader interested so they stay on the page.

Great headlines are compelling, intriguing, and optimized for search engines. If you need help writing tabloid-worthy headlines that get all the clicks — and exceptional content that keeps readers coming back for more, talk to us about our managed content service today.

Our expert team of writers will create high-quality, ready-to-publish content that attracts and retains your target audience, allowing you to focus on other areas of your business.

The post Back to Basics: 9 Lessons in Writing Tabloid-Worthy Headlines appeared first on ClearVoice.

Whether you’re evaluating the benefits of creating your own brand’s NFT now or jumping into any new marketing channel or strategy that develops in the future, you need a framework to make a quick yet still informed decision.

Take advantage of the possibilities offered by a new channel or marketing strategy while minimizing the risks by following a fairly straightforward formula, tailored to your own unique circumstances:

• Do your research: Identify the nature of the new channel and how it operates. Learn the basics of the new channel’s foundation, whether that’s a new technology, a new business model, a new audience, or a different set of operating rules
• Evaluate the drawbacks: Each new strategy or channel will pose a set of drawbacks, and someone will have to bear the cost of those drawbacks, whether individually (as in the case of added legal or financial risk) or societally (as with environmental damage or societal costs of misinformation).
• Outline the advantages: What good can possibly flow from your investment into or adoption of this new channel or strategy? List out those benefits, both tangible and intangible.
• Perform a risk assessment: Evaluate the potential worst-case scenarios and what each would mean to your brand. Balance the drawbacks against the advantages to get a good picture of what you’re likely to face, no matter what the outcome turns out to be.

How three brands got creative with NFTs

Before you can execute on an idea, you need to actually have a solid idea in the first place, right? But how do you get from a wholly new thing like NFTs or a completely new social platform to a value-added way to integrate it into your marketing plan?

Let’s look at the following NFTs for brands as an example of how you can creatively put new concepts into play to promote your business. As you can tell from the following three use cases, NFTs have been used as charitable fundraisers and as more straightforward promotions.

1. Taco Bell

In March 2021, Taco Bell announced on Twitter that it would offer NFTs based on taco-themed GIFs and graphics. Using the NFT marketplace Rarible, it sold all available 25 NFTs in less than an hour.

For the original owner, the fast-food chain also had a $500 gift card, and all proceeds were directed to its foundation to fund the Live Más scholarship.

2. Pizza Hut

Also in March 2021, Pizza Hut Canada offered the first “NFP”— that’s non-fungible pizza, of course — in a collection of “1 Byte Favorites” on Rarible. The pizza chain took a delayed-drop approach to the release of these NFTs of some of its top-rated recipes, dropping a few each day to create more interest.

The collection was designed to promote the restaurant’s $10 Favorites promotional campaign.

3. Campbell’s Soup

In the summer of 2021, Campbell’s Soup announced a new venture in which it planned to partner with artist Sophia Chang to create NFTs celebrating its iconic red, white and gold soup can labels.

The collection included 100 NFTs designed by Chang based on the label art and was available for purchase via NTWRK, a video shopping platform well known for handling sales of NFTs.

In the same way Taco Bell did, Campbell’s also turned the venture into a charitable act by directing all proceeds to Feeding America to fight food insecurity.

What’s an NFT anyway?

Before we can get more into NFTs for brands, you need to first understand what they are. NFT stands for non-fungible token. That probably doesn’t do much to illuminate the nature and value of an NFT, though, so let’s break it down a bit further.

Non-fungible simply means that it’s one of a kind. It can’t be reproduced or traded with others of its kind and still maintain its intrinsic value. For example, if you have a $10 bill, and someone else has two $5 bills, you can make a fair and equal trade.

After you exchange your respective notes, you still have the value of what you started with. The same is true of Bitcoin or Ether units.

But that’s not true of other types of property, such as artwork. If you have a Degas painting and someone else has a Jackson Pollock (or even a different Degas!), you can certainly trade your pieces, but you won’t end up in the same situation as before the trade. One isn’t the same as another.

Token, in this context, means that this non-fungible asset — the artwork, for example, or a digital asset like a graphics file or a tweet — has been reduced to a digital form that can be easily bought, sold, or otherwise traded. Tokenizing is a key part of what makes cryptocurrencies tradable, while using blockchain technology reduces the risk of fraud.

Examples of NFTs

NFTs for brands are far from the only uses. What can be turned into an NFT? So many things. Consider these examples:

• Remember Jack Dorsey’s very first tweet on Twitter? He sold it for almost $3 million as an NFT.
• In an auction run by Christie’s, graphic designer and artist Beeple sold a compilation of daily images dating back to 2007 for a mind-blowing $69 million to a Singapore cryptocurrency investor.
• Musician Grimes sold an NFT of a short video for over $300,000.

So, therefore, the underlying purpose of the NFT structure can vary. In one primary use case, brands and owners can use the NFT process to reduce a physical, real-life asset into something digital yet still secure enough to trade.

However, don’t confuse an NFT with any run-of-the-mill digital file. Sure, you can right-click on any image or download any video, and you’ll technically “have” it through possession. But it’s not the same as purchasing an NFT because downloading digital files doesn’t transfer ownership.

For an analogous example, consider printing off a digital image file of a Degas painting. That’s not the same as actually purchasing the Degas painting itself, nor does it transfer any rights of ownership as buying the artwork would.

Where blockchain comes in

The blockchain technology involved in NFTs for brands and otherwise serves to create and bestow a unique identifier on the NFT, making it unique and less susceptible to fraud. As a digital representation of some other kind of asset or property, it must be unique to convey some value in owning it.

NFTs are also “extensible.” This simply means you can use two NFTs to create yet another, third NFT that’s wholly unique from the others.

Thanks to the security offered by blockchain technology, NFTs have also been used in more serious business transactions, such as real estate deals and transfers of private equity holding.

Parties to these transactions can also combine various NFTs into one deal, all backed by the security of blockchain. They’re also used to support trading of collectibles as well as transactions of digital property in the metaverse.

So blockchain helps reinforce trust by making NFTs identifiable, which helps make assets more easily traded, sold, and bought. This results in a more efficient market by removing the middle people and agents, which leads to more accurate pricing as well as higher security in the transaction itself.

Drawbacks of NFTs

If NFTs make it simpler and safer to deal, trade, and own all kinds of property and art, both digital and analog, then what are the drawbacks? Why isn’t everyone dealing exclusively in NFTs? And why were so many media outlets claiming the NFT boom went bust?

To start with the drawbacks of NFTs for brands and personal use, there’s the potential environmental damage caused by the process of mining the cryptocurrency used to buy NFTs. That process results in greatly elevated releases of carbon dioxide, which leads to a hotter planet and a higher degree of climate change.

Some but most likely not all of those emissions may be offset by investments in carbon recapture technology and other methodologies. That may not be a controversy you want your socially conscious brand to wade into.

NFTs also carry a somewhat questionable intrinsic or resale value. Of course, that’s true of any piece of fine art, too. You might pay $100,000 at an auction for that Degas sketch, but will it have increased in value when you sell it again 10 years down the road?

An NFT’s value may vary wildly over time. Many artists and traders think that won’t happen — that the value will only increase — but others believe the exact opposite is more likely.

Finally, the market for NFTs is still fairly immature and volatile. You might find several ready and willing buyers who will pay top value for your NFT when you’re ready to sell — or you might not, as evidenced by that mini-bust in 2021. Most people still don’t understand NFTs and its underlying technology well, and confusion can lead to bad trades or reluctance.

What’s so great about investing in a new channel?

Given the potential risks, why would anyone want to embrace a new channel as an early adopter?

First and foremost, expanding your channels helps you broaden your reach, engagement and impressions. Depending on any single channel too much is a dangerous thing.

Not everyone in your target audience segments will naturally participate in a specific channel. The more you diversify your efforts, the likelier you are to reach more of the different customer personas you’re targeting.

Diversification into new channels helps you build a more solid marketing foundation and reduces the negative impact should the unexpected occur with another channel you rely on.

There’s also the intrinsic value of more access to new data. Any time you branch out into new marketing strategies and channels, you produce or gain access to data you otherwise wouldn’t have.

Whether the new channel or strategy works or not, you’ll learn something new about your targeted audience. When you know more about the individuals in your market, you can better connect with them and help convert them into paying customers or repeat business.

Finally, don’t discount the early adopter legitimacy bump of NFTS for brands. Being one of the first brands to use a new channel or strategy carries a certain cachet, especially if you do it well. This can lead to gaining some momentum that could even follow your brand outside of that channel — leading to more Instagram or Twitter followers, for example.

Evaluate NFTs for brands carefully

The bottom line is that whatever new channel you’re considering, whether it’s NFTs for brands or TikTok for your business, both will carry potential risks and rewards. The essential question in deciding whether to become an early adopter of NFTs or other new marketing strategies and channels is to accurately estimate your ROI.

Of course, before you can determine your return on investment, you must also know what you’ll be required to invest, so first estimate your jumping-in costs, in terms of money, effort, skill sets, and opportunities you’d have to forego.

The answer will also depend on your business model and goals. The perspective of an artist or other type of creator will most likely differ from that of a larger B2B brand and will definitely result in a different set of costs and potential benefits.

If you’re considering exploring new channels, from NFTs to TikTok, you’re going to need content. ClearVoice’s expert team of writers can craft ready-to-publish press releases, blog posts, social content, ebooks, and much more to help elevate your brand and establish you as a thought leader. Talk to a content specialist today to get started.

The post NFTs and Your Brand: When and How to Explore New Channels appeared first on ClearVoice.

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That perceived bubblegum image with mass appeal masks a sharply savvy businesswoman who understands the power of content in developing and growing a brand.

In fact, we can all learn some pretty impressive content marketing lessons from Taylor Swift.

6 Content Marketing Lessons from Taylor Swift

No matter what your niche or small business model, you can use the Swiftian model to raise your own content marketing profile, attract new audiences, inspire true fan devotion, and grow your brand. So shake it off swiftly and take a look at how you can borrow Tay-Tay’s approach for your own content marketing work.

1. Taylor Swift Took (Back) Control Over Her Brand

Late in 2020, Taylor addressed the sale of her master recordings by Scooter Braun and her prior record label, Big Machine Records, to a private equity holding company by publishing a written explanation on her social media accounts.

This was the second time such a sale of her masters had taken place, and the purchaser told Taylor (after the fact) that they’d been forbidden from talking to Swift before the sale was closed.

In response, Taylor announced she had already started to re-record her back catalog, starting with her first six albums, in an attempt to regain control of her brand and creative mission. Her fresh take on 2008’s ‘Fearless’ arrived on April 9, 2021, and ‘Red’ (Taylor’s Version) was released on Nov. 12, 2021.

The fuller context of Taylor’s re-recording of her back catalog was complex and included her long-running feud with Kanye West. However, if we’re looking at content marketing lessons from Taylor Swift, this one is fairly simple and clear: Keep control over your content and don’t let it get redirected to someone else’s hands.

In Swift’s case, the sales were legitimized by a contract she’d signed when she was 15. Once she gained a few years of experience and business acumen, she realized her content wasn’t in safe hands.

That feeling was validated when her fan base bought the album releases in droves. Swift had taken control over the underlying music and regained the upper hand by beginning the process of re-recording it.

How to make it work for you:

For content marketers, the strategy isn’t much different. Take control of your content. If something isn’t working or producing expected results, diagnose the content marketing problem and fix it.

That doesn’t mean you can’t outsource its creation, formatting, or promotion. It just means you must stay aware of the content processes carried out on your brand’s behalf. Moreover, you can’t shy away from stepping in if those processes go off-track.

In addition, consider keeping most of your content on your own blog, rather than placing it on large social networks every time you publish. This way you own your own content going forward.

2. She Mines Her Life for Her Content

Even folks who aren’t huge Taylor Swift fans and hence don’t devour every single word ever written about her probably know one key fact: She writes songs about her exes.

This is sometimes bandied about by critics and competitors as something odd or inappropriate. In fact, it’s a smart content creation strategy. (People have played videos on TikTok and Instagram Reels about Swift and her exes millions of times, which says a lot.)

How to make it work for you:

You don’t have to unload every irrelevant story from your life on your audience (Taylor certainly doesn’t). Just be willing to share the unvarnished truth about your experience with your audience.

Stories transform good content into great content, and the very best stories for content marketing are the ones that elevate, connect, and evoke an emotional response from the audience.

Share your brand stories and personalize the members of your team by sharing past events that involved them. Nothing helps you establish a winning brand through content like your or your brand’s past.

3. She Knows Her Brand and Her Audience

Next up on our list of content marketing lessons from Taylor Swift is one that can apply to all brands.

While Swift may, on occasion, push the envelope with a creative risk or two, she generally delivers the content her audience has come to love and expect.

Without enforcing an insistently uniform sound or style, she creates music and other content that delivers the emotional, aesthetic, and kinesthetic experiences her audience members embrace.

She makes sure her creative output keeps pace with evolving tastes and trends without merely imitating or duplicating them. The result is pure Taylor Swift while still seeking an authentic connection with her fans and audience members.

How to make it work for you:

You can exercise that same brand power and audience awareness by integrating modern tools and strategies that help you collect, collate, and understand relevant data and metrics about your audience and how they interact with your brand along every point in the buyer’s journey.

From awareness at the top of the funnel (TOFU) to the purchasing decision at the bottom of the funnel (BOFU), each stage in that customer’s journey presents unique needs, pain points, and desires.

Use data collection and analytical tools to get to know your audience and prospects more intimately, then use that deeper understanding to tailor (pun absolutely intended) your content accordingly.

Social listening is another tool that will help you get to know your audience and how they perceive your brand. Pay attention to the conversations surrounding your field or niche as well as your brand, specifically on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Those mentions will help you understand your audience and how they see your company more deeply, which in turn empowers you to create content that better aligns with that audience.

4. She Talks to Her Audience Where They Are and How They Like

Sure, she could simply tweet out interview links, new album announcements, and the occasional selfie, but Taylor goes far beyond such basic social media fundamentals. Taylor was quick to embrace TikTok, for example, because that’s where a lot of her young fans were already beginning to congregate online.

And what does she share on TikTok? A solid mix of funny videos of cats, music video clips, and her own take on “The Assignment,” each with its own authentic T-Swift imprint. Her audience can relate to Taylor’s commentary on the pandemic, and they respond positively to it because it comes across as real and genuine.

How to make it work for you:

By all means, this is one of the content marketing lessons from Taylor Swift that will encourage you to put your best foot forward on your brand’s social media accounts, but keep it real and authentic. Audiences today are too savvy to fall for a false voice.

Don’t try to pull the wool over their eyes and come off as something you’re not, either for yourself or your brand.

Similarly, meet your audience and prospects where they already are. If they’re not really that into Twitter, why spend your precious time and content marketing budget dollars on a Twitter-intensive strategy? Go where they are, the way Taylor meets her fans on TikTok.

5. She Understands Her Platforms

Look at Taylor’s TikTok page and compare it to her Instagram or Twitter accounts. Notice anything interesting? There might be some similarities there, but it’s not all the same.

Taylor doesn’t just hire a team of poorly paid PR interns to post the same content across all her channels without tweaking or tailoring (we can’t stop, we’re sorry). Instead, she shares content that’s well suited to each platform in a format that aligns with its needs and limitations.

How to make it work for you:

Make sure you’re sharing content in formats that suit the platform and its technical limitations. If you’re sharing a TikTok, concentrate on clipping the larger video in a way that best communicates the major message (or depicts the funniest bits fully).

If you’re composing a tweet, try to keep it succinct so you don’t have to create an extensive thread that requires audience members to read a dozen or more sequential tweets. Think about your user’s expectations and context when they encounter your content, and try to craft the best possible user experience.

6. She Encourages Fan Loyalty

The last of our content marketing lessons from Taylor Swift is about the importance of loyalty. There are Taylor Swift fans, and then there are the Swifties or superfans. And while the former is devoted to her music and other content, Taylor knows how important the latter is to her brand.

That’s why she creates unique experiences that reward their loyalty.

From pre-release listening parties in her own home to special merchandise, Swifties get treats and bonuses just for being consistently loyal. In turn, of course, these rewards simply make the super-fans even more ardently devoted.

How to make it work for you:

Don’t ignore existing customers in your lust to acquire new ones. Don’t let it get to the point where longtime customers never, ever want to get back together with you. Improve your CLV (customer lifetime value) by rewarding customer loyalty with earned and free but unique perks.

Taylor Swift’s Key Takeaway: Always Keep Your Audience Top of Mind

Like a lot of artists, Taylor Swift has a vivid, viable brand that she’s carefully built and managed over her career. Looking at the ways she’s used content of all types — from her own music to her videos and social media content — can help you more precisely target your own content for your audience.

Whether you’re targeting existing customers or prospects, you’ll want to align your content with their needs, pain points, and location along the customer’s journey (TOFU, MOFU, or BOFU). Create and promote your content mindfully, with your audience always top of mind throughout your process.

Need help developing content that highlights your brand voice, provides value to your target audience, drives loyalty, and establishes you as a thought leader in your industry? ClearVoice’s expert team of writers can do all of this and more, delivering ready-to-publish content as often as you need it. Talk to a content specialist today to learn more.

The post 6 Ways Taylor Swift Excels at Content Marketing (and How You Can Too) appeared first on ClearVoice.

It’s supposed to be a shield to defend creative work and encourage artists and creative workers to put the fruits of their labors out into the market, free of worry that others might try to capitalize on their hard work.

But what if it happens to you? What if you’re the one accused of copyright infringement? What should you do then?

Getting down to basics: U.S. copyright law

First, it’s a good idea to make sure you have a basic understanding of U.S. copyright law, including your obligations as a content publisher or creator. Whether you’re publishing a personal blog, a social media account for a larger brand, or the content marketing for a company, you could be subject to copyright laws, so it’s important to know your obligations and rights.

What does copyright protect?

The U.S. Copyright Office publishes circulars that explain what kinds of rights copyright protects, who can claim a copyright interest and for how long, and how the copyright holder can protect those rights.

Copyright law protects any “original works of authorship as soon as an author fixes the work in a tangible form of expression.” Despite the use of the word “authorship,” copyright doesn’t just protect written text. It also covers blog posts, photographs, digital images, music, paintings, computer code and more.

Copyright does not protect ideas, systems, any work that hasn’t been reduced to a tangible form, titles, familiar designs or symbols, or mere ornamentation.

Who holds the copyright?

Copyright ownership immediately vests in the person who created the work in question or in the employer who hires out for creative work. So if you wrote a viral blog post on your personal blog or site, you’re the copyright owner for that post. However, if you wrote the post for a brand as a freelance content marketing writer, most likely, this is deemed work for hire, and the copyright would vest in the brand.

What rights does a copyright holder enjoy?

Think of copyright as a bundle of sticks. Each stick represents a specific right to the work in question. Unless you negotiate away or sell one or more of those rights, they all belong to the original author (or the brand that contracted it as a work for hire):

• Sell the work
• Display, perform, or produce it publicly
• Make copies of the work
• Create works that derive from the work (i.e., sequels, prequels, etc.)

How does a work become protected under copyright law?

As soon as the work is created and reduced to some kind of fixed form, it becomes protected by copyright law. When you take the picture, turn it into a digital file, write the blog post, or paint the painting, assuming the work is original to you, then you become the author and copyright owner.

To enhance the protection provided by copyright law, you can register the work with the U.S. Copyright Office. While that’s not necessary in order for the copyright to become valid, registration is necessary if you want to enforce those rights through a lawsuit. Registration also permits you to seek monetary damages and attorney’s fees.

How does a copyright holder enforce a copyright against an infringement?

A copyright infringement occurs whenever a person or brand reproduces or publishes someone else’s copyright-protected work without permission. Generally speaking, the copyright holder starts with a cease and desist letter sent to the infringer. They may request monetary damages, an explicit provision of credit to the copyright holder, removal of the infringing work, or other remedies.

If the parties can’t agree to a resolution through correspondence, the copyright holder may file a lawsuit in the appropriate federal district court. If the copyright holder prevails in court, the person who infringed the copyright might have to pay statutory damages as well as attorney’s fees.

What kinds of defenses can be asserted against a copyright infringement claim?

If you’re facing a claim of copyright infringement, you may have one or more defenses you can successfully use to defeat the claim in court.

Among the most common defenses are the following:

• The period during which the copyright holder can sue (the statute of limitations) has expired;
• The copyright owner licensed the work to you or otherwise gave you permission to use it;
• You created the work in question independently, without copying it from the original work;
• You used the work in what’s called “fair use,” typically by parodying or critiquing the original work.

Busting copyright myths

You might hear or read a number of questionable assertions about copyright law and protection. Some of the most common myths include:

• “There’s no © symbol”: None is needed. The work is always protected by copyright the minute it’s created and fixed in some form. It’s a good idea to include a copyright notice on any reproducible work or file, but it’s not necessary.
• “I found it on the web” or “I got it from Google images”: Frequently offered as a defense to copyright infringement claims on digital photographs, neither of these assertions offer any protection. You still need to get permission or a license from the copyright holder before publishing those images in your content. Finding it on the web doesn’t mean anyone can use it.
• “I didn’t make any money off it”: Whether you made money off the copyright-protected work might impact how much you’ll owe in damages, but if you didn’t make any money, that doesn’t mean you didn’t infringe on the copyright holder’s interests. It might help persuade a judge in a “fair use” defense, though.
• “I deleted it”: That’s great, and sometimes that’s all a copyright holder wants you to do. But that doesn’t mean you didn’t infringe their copyright for the period of time you published it on your site. You could still be held liable, though immediately deleting it from your site tends to suggest your good faith, which can go a long way with a judge.

When someone accuses you of copyright infringement

Content marketing creators and publishers are sometimes targeted with claims of copyright infringement. Some of those claims are bogus, but many are not. It usually takes place in the context of written content copied from other brands’ white papers, blog posts, articles, and digital images.

Your first notice may come through your website or through email, and it will take the form of a cease and desist letter, or an informal prelude to one. In either event, it’s important to respond appropriately and in a timely manner.

What not to do

First things first:

1. Don’t panic. It’s absolutely something you should take seriously, but it’s not the end of the world. It’s the start of a process you’ll need to manage and it’s much easier to do that when you’re not hyperventilating.
2. Don’t respond too quickly. Gather your thoughts and review the production path for the content in question. Take your time to craft a thoughtful, defensible response.
3. Don’t ignore it. “Out of sight, out of mind” will not make the claims go away, even if the claims seem silly or untrue to you.

Instead, take a deep breath and get proactive with the following steps.

Preserve the evidence

1. Identify the intellectual property (IP) in question. Take screenshots of everything, both in your CMS backend and any front-facing or publicly available pages or files.
2. Review your documentation. Gather and collect all the relevant research, drafts, emails to creators, entries in project management software, notes and other associated documents, whether paper or digital, and review them to become familiar with the chain of production. It’s especially helpful to highlight where the offending material — the asserted quote or image, for example — came into the piece and how it got there.

Investigate the claim

Next, put yourself on both sides of the claims. Try to first prove and then disprove the allegations:

1. Did you or your company publish the allegedly protected work for your or its own use?
2. Where did that protected work come from? How did you find it, gain access to it, copy it, and bring it into your own work?
3. Are you satisfied that the person who wrote to you about the infringement actually owns the work in question? (You can search for this information using the copyright public records portal.)
4. Did you get permission to use it and can you document that permission? This might be in the form of a Creative Commons or other kind of license, explicit permission granted through an exchange of emails, a website granting free and public use, etc.
5. Was the use intentional or inadvertent?

Think about potential defenses

Of the listed defenses above, think about what might apply to your case. Perhaps your piece is a commentary on the original, in which the fair use doctrine may apply. Creative works also fall out of copyright due to the passage of time.

If the work is now in the public domain, it’s perfectly permissible to make derivative works or incorporate it into your own. Or perhaps it’s a factual statement or condition, an idea, a process, a title, or some other formulation that isn’t entitled to copyright protection in the first place.

Find a good IP lawyer

Finally, hire a seasoned IP lawyer in your area and let the lawyer respond. Your job is to assist and support the attorney by providing evidence and factual support for your position. The attorney is best equipped to write the actual response to the cease and desist.

Further, if correspondence fails and litigation ensues, your attorney will already be familiar with your case and ready to defend you in court. Find a qualified copyright lawyer near you through the following methods:

1. Ask colleagues in your state or area for referrals.
2. Call your state bar association. Many will maintain a list of lawyers for referrals.
3. Use a web-based directory site such as Avvo or Thumbtack.

The best defense is a good offense

To prevent being put through the copyright wringer in the first place, adopt content policies and editorial calendars that minimize the risk of encountering protected works. Use CC-only image sites and provide proper attribution to the artist. Include the obligation to produce original work only in all your freelance content creator contracts (and make sure you have contracts for each of them).

Build in checks and reviews prior to publication to avoid accidental infringement. Commit to producing wholly original or fully licensed content, whether created in-house or with freelancers, and you’ll go a long way toward avoiding those C&D letters in the first place.

Looking for steady freelance writing jobs from top brands? Join the ClearVoice community — you’ll get a free portfolio to showcase your work, fast payments, and the ability to set your own rates. Take your freelance career to the next level today.

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However, each of these types of marketing shares some things in common. They’re all designed to grab user attention, build your brand, increase traffic, attract qualified leads, and, ultimately, convert casual users into paying customers. However, they are individual concepts, each with its own sets of advantages and drawbacks. Here’s how they work together to cover all your online marketing basics.

Content marketing: It’s all about the content

When it comes to types of marketing, everyone’s heard of content marketing, but you may not understand how it differs.

Content marketing is the strategic use of valuable information conveyed in text, graphics, video, audio, or a combination of these, designed to build brand awareness and attract a prequalified audience of users who are interested in your products and services.

Longer text-based content tends to rank well in organic search results, but shorter, snack-sized content also works well.

Examples of content marketing include:

• Blog posts
• Videos shared on YouTube, Instagram Reels, and TikTok
• Podcasts
• Infographics

Advantages of content marketing

• Requires you to focus on your audience and their perceived needs
• Build trust with users by fulfilling those needs through the content you create
• Targeted audiences demonstrate less resistance to valuable content that doesn’t directly “sell”
• Well-crafted content is more likely to stand out in a crowded field and grab attention
• Scalable as your brand grows

Drawbacks of content marketing

• Requires a substantial investment of either time or money
• Creative content requires skilled and experienced content creators, no matter what medium you’re exploring
• Can take a long time to bear fruit

Digital marketing: A variety of channels

Digital marketing refers to tactics of promotional marketing and advertising that use purely digital channels. In some contexts, certain aspects of content marketing also qualify as digital marketing. For example, performing SEO on a written blog post or creating an explainer video could be categorized as either content marketing or digital marketing, or both.

Examples of digital marketing include:

• SEM
• PPC
• Social media marketing
• Email marketing
• Guest blogging outreach
• SEO of existing content

Advantages of digital marketing

• A broader digital marketing strategy lets you pivot your focus where you need it and add channels fairly easily.
• Digital marketing does not require much skill or experience. However, for optimized campaigns, skilled copywriters and graphic designers help paid ad consultants create the best results.
• It’s possible to see results fairly quickly.

Drawbacks of digital marketing

• There’s a fine line between permission-based tactics and intrusive ones, with many individuals resistant to intrusive variations like pop-up ads, even though they’re often effective.
• Technological updates and policy changes can render prior iterations ineffective (ad-blocking software, cookieless targeting, and tracking, etc.)

Inbound marketing: Based on user opt-in

Inbound marketing comprises those methods and tactics that require the prospect’s permission before landing in their sphere of awareness. As a phrase, it’s used to distinguish permission-based marketing techniques from more advertising efforts.

When trying to understand the different types of marketing, consider how the messaging is received by the intended audience. Outbound marketing demands attention and is intrusive.

Think of brochures hung from your doorknob or tucked under your windshield wipers, for example, or billboards that hug the side of the highway as you drive by. The user didn’t ask for any of those experiences. Rather, the brand pushed the message out to a wide audience.

By contrast, inbound marketing is inviting and non-intrusive. It puts the user in control by opting in to receive content from your brand.

Advantages of inbound marketing

• Inviting
• Puts the power in the hands of the user
• Results in more qualified leads and more efficient campaigns

Drawbacks of inbound marketing

• Requires more thought and customization
• Segmentation is key but adds technical complexity
• Outbound is simpler and easier

What’s the right choice for your brand?

The short answer is that most brands can benefit from all three types of marketing, plus a few outbound methods — they’re not necessarily a bad thing, and they definitely can be effective.

Take radio, for example. Loud, catchy radio ads may feel at first like an intrusive bit of outbound marketing. But, as many people who enjoy radio will tell you, they know they’re getting the music, sports, news, or another programming for free. Ads are just an accepted part of the experience, and almost become a form of inbound marketing. That’s because people give their permission to receive the ads just by listening.

Overall, when properly implemented, the combination of digital marketing with content marketing tactics is greater than the sum of those valuable parts. When you frame that approach with an inbound strategy, you appeal to a varied assortment of user personas. Round out that plan with a few targeted outbound techniques, and you’ll make the biggest, deepest impact possible on your prospects.

Put all three types of marketing to work for you

Now that we have a fuller understanding of how these three types of marketing differ, as well as what they share in common, we can begin to sketch out how they work together in support of a single brand.

As an example, let’s use a hypothetical B2C company that sells skincare to women with sensitive skin. The company’s goals include raising brand awareness and ultimately increasing sales of its core three-product starter kit. To accomplish these goals, the company has embraced an inbound strategy, including both content marketing and other forms of paid and organic digital marketing. It’s created a basic marketing funnel that includes a free two-week trial of its products.

How can our hypothetical business put all the pieces together in a cogent, practical way that moves it closer to its goals?

1. Start with content. The company’s marketing team commissions an experienced content marketing writer to draft a useful how-to piece of over 2,000 words long about 11 things that aggravate sensitive skin. When the piece is polished and proofed, the company publishes it on the brand blog.
2. Promote the content. The brand’s marketing team works to promote the piece using social media and targeting skincare influencers through outreach emails. The piece begins to attract attention.
3. Refine the article. As the article gains traction, the marketing team makes sure the piece is refined and perfected, using the conversations it’s monitored on social media (especially on influencers’ accounts) to augment and update the piece accordingly. It also ensures the piece is optimized for search using primary and secondary keywords identified through keyword research and social media listening.
4. Boost the article. Using paid digital marketing tactics, the company boosts the article’s reach through paid social media advertisements (particularly on Twitter and Instagram, where it’s seen the most active engagement), boosted posts through its Facebook page, and paid search ads (search engine marketing, or SEM).
5. Capture leads. When users arrive at the newly optimized page, as they’re preparing to exit out, a pop-up invites them to join the company’s email list to receive a free ebook that discusses how women can respond to and treat those 11 triggers for sensitive skin. The subscribers are added to the email list and given a download link for the ebook.
6. Start delivering an email sequence. All new subscribers are emailed a sequence of messages that build interest in the company’s products, culminating in an offer for a free trial of the core regimen. Those samples are delivered to the prospects through a shipping company or the USPS. Two weeks later, the recipients of the trial receive an email message with a promo code offering a discount on the full-size products.

This sequence helps fill the marketing funnel and move prospects along the path toward a purchase. It uses an inbound methodology and incorporates content marketing that’s then promoted and built upon by digital marketing strategies. While it’s a simplified path, you can borrow it as a template. Build on it by expanding the tactics to reach your brand’s specific audience.

Talk to a content specialist today about creating a marketing strategy that combines the power of content marketing, digital marketing, and inbound marketing. Achieve your goals and keep customers engaged with a comprehensive marketing strategy that covers all bases.

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