Updated July 20, 2022

It’s impossible for your content to hit the mark when you don’t focus on your aim.

Yet, content marketers do it every day. You track clicks, impressions, and shares, thinking those metrics will indicate if the content asset is on target to meet its goals.

But fixating on those metrics causes you to lose sight of the bull’s eye. They don’t tell the full story of what your content is doing. To help you refocus on what counts, I’ve compiled the metrics that best tell the stories for brand awareness, demand and lead-gen, sales enablement, and audience-engagement goals.Continue Reading

Updated July 5, 2022

Content marketers know how to sway people. You know exactly who your audience is, what they need, and exactly how they want to consume it.

You can use the same skillset to persuade editors at third-party outlets to publish your contributed content. Then, you can widen your brand’s reach to new people who have an interest in your content.Continue Reading

Joe Pulizzi said it best when he wrote, “a book is perhaps the ultimate piece of content marketing that can position you or your company as a leading expert in your industry.”

Writing and publishing a book can provide substantial value to your company. By authoring and publishing a book, your company can engage your audience on another level, generate opportunity in the form of new business and press, and cement itself as an industry leader.

Just publishing a book, though, doesn’t guarantee that you achieve any of these results. It doesn’t even guarantee that your book will be read by the audience you want to read it. For your company to achieve these kinds of results – the kind of results that should sound familiar to any fellow content marketer – your book needs to be guided by a strategy. Ideally, that strategy is the same one you use to direct your other content initiatives.

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American Express’ OPEN Forum stands out as a content marketing success story. By enlisting professional writers and focusing on quality, the OPEN Forum team turned its platform into a widely read site that has become one of the best client sources for American Express.

American Express followed the lead of traditional publishers – something all marketers could stand to learn. The best traditional publications are consumer-oriented, while brands often publish with a “me” mentality. When a business becomes so focused on sales numbers, it can quickly turn off audiences with sales- or spam-like content. Traditional media, on the other hand, builds engaged, loyal audiences that it can monetize. By following the lead of successful publications, brands can use some of those dollars to attract qualified clients.Continue Reading

Many companies think they need to shield their knowledge from the outside world to stay competitive, and they’ll only exchange intel with paying customers. But business – and the relationships that drive it – doesn’t work this way anymore.

Sixty percent of people are inspired to seek a product after reading about it, and if you want to win these sales, you need to let your audience in on a few secrets.Continue Reading

We live in a world where image is everything. It’s common for people to base their decisions — on anything from candy bars to new cars — on appearance alone. That being said, there are good ways (and not-so-good ways) to make your personal brand stand out. Here are some guidelines for creating content that shines a positive light on your image, without coming off as overly self-serving. Content marketing is extremely influential for your brand, and if you come across as an egomaniac, you will be taking two steps back, rather than taking your brand to a new level.Continue Reading