Did you know that LinkedIn allows actual blogging ON their platform?
In February 2014, numerous sources, including Search Engine Journal, announced that LinkedIn’s blog platform was now open to users, not just influencers. According to SEJ, “250,000 members [would now] have the ability to publish content on [the platform].” If you missed the news or haven’t had time to look into it, you’re not alone. We didn’t until just recently. And our conclusion is that this platform is an untapped breakthrough asset in content marketing, and too many people aren’t aware of it! What have we discovered, and what do you need to know? Let’s take a look:
Our LinkedIn Posts Case Study
Once we learned that blogging was allowed on this powerful business platform, we jumped right in. We had to first “apply” to be contributors and were successfully approved. We immediately started publishing a handful of posts, including this one about copywriting; and we kept a close eye on the provided analytics, curious to see just how large of a reach we would see. Here are the results, just 3 days after posting! Over 1,000 views, 60+ likes, and comments on our very first LinkedIn post: We also discovered that LinkedIn will FEATURE your posts publicly on your profile, like so: LinkedIn sent us some insider emails after we published some content, with these helpful tips:
Tapping Into LinkedIn as a Content Marketing Asset
Our case study indicates some solid potential. LinkedIn posts get a lot of views and shares for content, much more than a single blog would get, especially if your network is extensive. And if you’ve been a marketer for over a year with a LinkedIn presence, you probably have a decent network. Let’s face it; those of us already using LinkedIn likely have an extensive network, and growing that network is super easy using their platform and our own connections. Strengthening your profile will contribute to this, and all of this adds up to one epic revelation: you have an untapped audience at your fingertips! A few Dos, Don’ts and common sense tips are important to review before using this platform. LinkedIn has been built on a very simple concept: career growth and advancement. Therefore, it only makes sense that, according to InformationWeek, the “blogging tool [is for posting] career advice and insights to share with your connections.” How can you best use this tool? Let’s take a look at the top tips:
Write about what you know. According to InformationWeek, your LinkedIn posts should reflect your profile. In other words, write about what you know. Consider choosing topics that range from the career challenges you’ve faced, the opportunities you’ve successfully seized, and important trends in your industry or field of expertise.
Be professional. Obviously, you don’t want to knowingly (or unknowingly) break your company’s privacy policies. The rule of thumb when blogging on LinkedIn is to stay professional at all times. Don’t post anything that you wouldn’t bring up in normal conversation with an individual you just met at a professional event or conference.
Keep to the point. InformationWeek reports that, according to LinkedIn data, an ideal post will be approximately 700 words in length. The idea is to compose a blog long enough to cover your topic and position without running the risk of losing the reader’s interest. You can add a combination of images, videos, SlideShare presentations and external links as appropriate.
Be a sport and comment. If you have any blogging or social media experience, you already know that audience engagement is important. Unlike some other networks, LinkedIn is closed and requires an account for complete profile viewing AND commenting. Therefore, the comments you receive on this platform are likely to be high-quality. Not only are they absolutely worth your time to respond to, but commenting will boost post engagement, thus promoting it beyond your network.
Pay attention to your analytics. As you saw from our case study, LinkedIn isn’t shy about disclosing how many people clicked on, liked and commented on your post. Take these analytics into consideration as you prepare future blogs. What topics triggered great engagement through comments or brought in more likes? Use popularity trends to guide future content choices.
Share your content. InformationWeek noted that people don’t have to set-up a LinkedIn account to read your posts. And once you publish, anyone—from your connections to your followers—can see it. You should share the links to your posts outside of the LinkedIn network. Before posting, you should have the option to automatically post to Twitter. Once a blog post is live, you can share it with audiences on your other social networks by using the available media buttons. This type of out-of-network sharing can assist in increasing your LinkedIn network.
Seize the Opportunity
With the rise of today’s self-publication mediums, everyone wants to be a publisher. It’s no secret that content drives marketing and sales because people flock wherever it is. It’s also no secret that building an audience is hard work. While LinkedIn’s platform offers an opportunity to seize a new, untapped audience, you should plan content with care. The last thing you want to do is alienate your audience or damage your Google ranking. What are we talking about? The dangers of duplicate content! Remember the tip to share your LinkedIn posts with your other social networks? While this is a great piece of advice, we have to stress the need for continually focusing on the creation and production of FRESH copy. In other words, don’t jump onto this platform by reposting a piece of content you’ve posted on another network. Yes, you can repost your work, but you run into two huge risks:
Audience estrangement: “Did I see this before?” It’s the question you NEVER want a reader to ask. It’s recommended to post unique content to each of your social networks. Otherwise, readers who follow you on three different networks will see the same content three times over.
Decreased Google ranking: Duplicate content annoys users, therefore Google frowns on it. Posting the same blog across every platform you use can result in decreased SERPs.
Instead of excitedly jumping onto LinkedIn and posting content you’ve used elsewhere, quell your excitement. Invest a little time into brainstorming and posting fresh copy. You’ll be investing in building your online presence with value. Your networks (and Google) will thank you. According to Diginomica, “LinkedIn’s decision to roll out its publishing platform to all members [was] the right one.” The platform offers you access to more “decision makers” than any other platform. If you’re looking to grow your online presence and advance your career right alongside your business, this is a blogging platform you DO NOT want to overlook.
In a nutshell, here’s what’s actually happening to Authorship. First—no, it isn’t completely gone; Authorship still exists. Secondly—yes, Google has made a major change to it, and yes, that means our Authorship pictures will be deleted over the next few days. And yes, that is quite a big deal.
What the $*&^, Google?
Really?! My profile image, linked to my Authorship from my G+ profile, is not going to appear in search results anymore?
It’s true. The announcement has been sourced from John Mueller, Google’s Webmaster Trends analyst. John shared an official support.google.com link an official G+ status, just days ago on June 25.
What’s happened is that the Authorship picture, which normally looks like:
…is now completely gone from SERPs. So is the listed amount of Google circles in the search results. Authorship is still there, but in the form of just a light grey clickable name:
Google News results are slightly different. Author profile pictures will still appear in News, but their G+ count is gone.
Basically, Mueller said that Google’s efforts in deleting Authorship is to improve the visual appearance and design of their SERPs overall…especially on mobile. Ah, mobile improvement! A straw we can grasp at in the overall disheartening picture of bye-bye Authorship pictures. He also basically stated that click-through really won’t change by removing the Authorship picture in SERPs.
(That is directly against the human nature—John, really? Seeing that little image next to a search result definitely influenced viewers to click that link. SearchEngineLand agreed, stating the Author picture led to more visibility and clickthroughs.)
In the official Google Support page about the huge change to Authorship, Google again claims it is only “helping users discover great content.” It also lists how to get Authorship going.
The REAL Reason Why
Wordstream authors did some internal research and discovered that Authorship clickthrough rates were taking away significantly–and interfering with–Google Adwords clickthroughs. By removing Authorship pictures, Google came up with a tidy little solution to their Adwords distraction–just delete them.
Now, Google denies that clickthrough distraction was the answer, but our talented Rand from Moz called them out on their BS:
I am frustrated @JohnMu saying that it will not cost CTR. Either Google lied about the increase in CTR with photos, or they're lying now.
The important takeaway is that Authorship still exists and is very strong and very much alive still (the Google Support page itself helps you get Authorship going, if you haven’t already).
But, only credible, real authors are going to be able to acquire Authorship, going forward. This isn’t a new thing. Google reduced their Authorship results just last December to only show “more authoritative authors”. The drop in Authorship across the board was big, with a lot of stagnant author profiles no longer being featured with their image in SERPs.
Simply put, Authorship is going on a pedestal. It’s not within everyone’s reach anymore. You need to publish well-researched content on an ongoing basis; and you need to interact on a regular basis in social media (this includes your G+ profile), so Google regards you as an author credible enough to grant Authorship status to (which they’ve now minimized to just a linkable name). Publishing high quality content for your niche that gives you an authority voice is crucial.
Ann Smarty, Internet marketing expert, also says that:
Authorship markups can now show up in results multiple times — instead of your headshot just showing up once, your author name will appear multiple times for multiple pages in one page of SERPs.
Google will look at Authorship asone more foothold for credibility when determining how to rank you.
Helpful Resources
View Google’s Support page with the official details on the Authorship change. Need to get some ideas on how to publish quality content? One of our blogs this year addressed how content is setting the Google trends (and talks about how you can publish that type of content); and in this SiteProNews piece, we addressed how to focus on quality content in line with Google’s new updates.
The BBC or British Broadcasting Channel is definitely a powerhouse in the television and news market. It used only to be available for British citizens, but the BBC has since branched out to reach a wider audience. In the past, American citizens could watch things such as Miss Marple or other BBC mystery shows or dramas on PBS, but these shows were few and far between. Now, the BBC has a channel in America called (of all things) BBC America.
This has given American citizens the ability to watch extremely popular BBC shows right away and on their own TVs. This has saved the BBC from people illegally downloading shows and has brought in significant revenue. How are they so successful that Americans desperately want their shows? The BBC has some incredible content marketing skills! Anyone can learn these skills from the BBC and this blog is going to explore this company’s excellent copywriting skills.
BBC and America: Doctor Who and Sherlock Taking Over
The main thing people think of when they hear the BBC mentioned is the company’s two successful shows – Doctor Who and Sherlock. While the BBC has many popular shows both in the United Kingdom and America, these two shows are television juggernauts. There is no denying the power of these shows and the fandoms created around them. How did the BBC get here though? Easy. They made two shows that are expertly crafted with great marketing strategies and made them available to anyone. Before Sherlock ever came about, Doctor Who was taking America over, but it began long before Matt Smith took the mantle of the 11th doctor.
In the early days of this science fiction show, the BBC would show it on a few HAM television stations. It was poor quality, but people loved it nonetheless. This show brought about something no one had done yet: it was science fiction, yet incredibly human. After a hiatus, the show came back in 2005 and took the world over by storm.
How did the BBC manage to take over the world with their shows? They expertly marketed to different audiences. Each show is varied; Doctor Who is story-based with cheesy special effects while Sherlock, also story-based, is filled with gorgeous filming and graphics. They appeal to different groups and the BBC knows that this is how they bring in money outside of a British audience. As a copywriter, you can learn from this. You need to reach a wide audience with your content marketing. The best way to reach them is to research each audience and make different content formats available to bring them in.
BBC News: Becoming A Trusted Source
Outside of popular television shows, the BBC has become a trusted news source in America, surpassing CNN or Fox News. How did this happen? They started writing articles that were filled with facts without any personal opinions until further in their articles. Many times, they do not seem like they are trying to influence people to feel one way or the other about an event, which is refreshing for many.
Outside of keeping personal bias separate from facts, BBC news and TV channels also offer a wide variety of different content. They have their news section, they have entertainment, and they offer simple stories as well as in-depth articles about various things. This is great for copywriters to learn from because it shows that the varied posts are beneficial to anyone. Sure, the BBC could write on simple news stories around Britain but that would cut down on the amount of international readers and watchers.
Understanding the Need For Social Media Copywriting and Engagement
The BBC also understands the power of social media and promoting engagement among customers. On all of their articles, they encourage people to share with their friends through social media sharing buttons. On the news angle, they use social media to share news articles but to also keep followers up-to-date with any breaking news around the world. Social media is a powerful tool for all businesses whether it is for a news corporation such as the BBC or for small businesses in a small town. Social media gets you out there and makes important information available for followers.
The BBC is also incredible at promoting fan engagement. A perfect example of this is Sherlock season three’s interactive trailer. The BBC released the season three trailer with an unusual fanfare of involvement. They provided fans with the ability to watch the original trailer, but to also click on various things throughout to receive insider information about the show. This could be a clip from the new season or interviews with cast and crewmembers. There were many a fan who spent countless hours watching behind-the-scenes information and this interactive trailer was shared far and wide across the Internet.
While you may not be able to do something as drastic as an interactive trailer, you can engage with clients through social media or on your blog site. You can even hide little Easter eggs throughout your webpage encouraging people to look through every little detail. One example of this is a group of women who wanted to start up the art of letter writing again. When the International Geek Girl Pen Pal Club (IGGPPC) released their new website, they also released an incredible achievement game. All one had to do was go throughout the entire site to find the various achievements. This helped all of the women using this site to learn every detail about the IGGPPC and created an excellent feeling of community.
In Closing
The BBC has countless copywriting tips you can learn; all you have to do is read through their numerous sites. Take a few lessons from them and start implementing them into your company’s website. You will notice that you start bringing in great revenue the more you involve your clients and craft incredible content.
Whether it is a stock image or the writer’s own, photographs really make a blog pop. Photos will grab the attention of the casual passerby or may convince a doubtful person to read your post anyway when the photo is combined with a stellar headline. Images are crucial to increase your blog views, but sometimes it is difficult to find the right image for your post. Let’s take this opportunity to look at the importance of images and three things you should consider when using them.
Are Images Really That Important?
Short answer: yes, images are important. Copyblogger says the reason images are vital to blog posts is because one simple image can create an emotional tie with your audience. Images also bring in readers who might not have read your post initially, but that image sure did catch their attention. Whatever the image does, whether bringing in an emotional tie to current readers or bringing in a new reader, it should always sum up your blog post. It might seem weird that a photo can do that, but we all judge whether or not a blog topic is interesting to us by the image the blog uses.
One of the best ways to learn is to have live examples. Several popular sites out there utilize images to gain the best results possible. Visit Buzzfeed, Mashable, MOZ, and Hubspot to see some great examples of using images in a powerful way. In addition, we utilize stock images for our blog posts and we have found some truly astounding images that relate with our content perfectly. This is attainable! Start looking through images and adding them to your blog posts to see incredible results from readers.
What to Consider When Picking Images
When choosing an image, there are many different things you will need to consider. Here are three things to think about as you use images on your site:
1. Do You Have The Rights? Rights to photos are crucial when you choose an image for your blog. If you steal someone’s photograph off Flickr or Google, you could be setting yourself up for some legal trouble in the future. Many artists will let you use their photos if you simply ask, but not asking is unethical, reflects badly on your company, and can cost more than a monthly subscription to BigStockPhoto.com. The best way to know if you are able to use an image is if it is listed under “Creative Commons.” You can use photos under CC as long as you properly attribute the photograph. If you are unsure, you should do some detailed research into the topic. You don’t want to be caught unaware and have legal problems regarding a simple image you pulled from Google.
2. Are the Photos Relevant to Your Topic? When choosing the right photo for your post, you must make sure it is relevant to your blog topic. You don’t want a photo of an adorable looking house cat if you are blogging about wild tiger and lion sanctuaries in the States. That would look very strange and wouldn’t give readers much confidence that you are a leader in your field if you can’t tell a regular house cat from a tiger or lion. Make sure the image you choose has an obvious tie-in with your blog content and attempt to make the photo a summary of your post. The best way to do this is to select the photo after writing your content.
3. Is It High Quality and Appropriately Sized? Another important element to consider is making sure your photo is high quality. You don’t want a low quality, pixelated image for your post because that will look sloppy and readers will click away quickly. Find images that are the highest quality possible to ensure that they are stunning and will grab your readers’ attention. We all love a good high quality image and we are more likely to click on a link that utilizes one for their post. Stock images are great for finding truly high quality images that will look great for your blog posts.
Images Are Expensive, What Should You Do?
A big concern for many people is how expensive the rights can be for one photo. A great idea to save money and budget appropriately is to set up a monthly or yearly subscription to a stock image site. This will help you allocate appropriate funding and will grant you access to hundreds of high quality stock images that will go with just about anything. This is what we do with our images and we are able to find some great ones our clients enjoy! Stock images are a great investment for copywriters and companies, and can provide you with many different photos from which to choose.
Friskies – that wonderful cat food company with all of those wonderful commercials; whether you are a cat owner or not, you know this brand and what they do. They’re a huge contender in the cat food industry and they always play on the fun aspects of a cat’s personality. They are part of the Purina food company, which is one of the top pet food companies and many vets prefer Purina over any other store bought brand. Today, we are going to focus on Friskies and how they do copywriting. While you might not think you can learn anything from a cat food company, you may actually find some helpful tips and gain some awesome inspiration. Let’s take a look at this purr-fect company!
Friskies Food For All Cats
Friskies has a huge selection of wet and dry food for cats and they make sure to market this selection as much as possible. They have food for indoor and outdoor cats, elderly cats, kittens, and a number of foods that you can use to spoil your cat such as their new breakfast food line. Friskies knows what it takes to bring customers in and they make sure always to have something fun and new for their client base. Friskies know the universal truth of all cat owners – they spoil their cats as much as possible.
How does this help you in your copywriting? Friskies understands what their customers want and what their customers do. This is a prime example of researching your client base and offering them something that appeals to their interests and needs. While it may seem boring at first, research is one of the best marketing ploys out there. The more you know about your client base, the more revenue you bring into your company. Start researching, much like Friskies, and start offering products or services that your client base wants and needs.
It’s All Fun And Games
One step that Friskies made that raised a few eyebrows and created a lot of funny YouTube videos was the decision to release iPad games for cats. This sounds dangerous, but cat owners love to spoil their pets and with proper protection for their iPad, the cats won’t damage it. These cat game apps were the first ever to be released by a cat food brand and cat owners loved the idea. This is a great marketing ploy for Friskies because they know people are more apt to trust a company such as Friskies instead of purchasing an app from a company they do not know. It also helped bring in more customers for Friskies. If people didn’t use the Friskies brand, they most likely switched to the food brand after purchasing these games.
Another way Friskies involved their clients was by providing them with a link to a live cat stream on Facebook. This live stream enabled viewers to control the cat toys and zoom cameras in or out. This was a great way to involve cat lovers with something they all enjoy, playing with cats no matter who the cats belong to. One of the nifty little catches to this marketing technique? If a person found that they really adored a little cat from this stream, the person was able to adopt the kitty and take him or her home. Such a great marketing ploy on Friskies part! Giving cat people to ability to do what they love – play with adorable cats and adopt one that needs a loving home.
This shows the importance of fun elements and client engagement in copywriting. Friskies knows that they will only continue to grow if they continue to interact with humans and their cats. This is something you need to learn, as well, in your marketing techniques. Engage with your clients in a variety of ways and try to make the engagement as fun as possible. This promotes a positive attitude from clients towards your company and makes them more likely to tell others about your company, as well.
Grumpy Cat Sponsorship
One of the best marketing ploys Friskies has taken has been using Grumpy Cat as their spokes-cat. The company is using this opportunity to meld something that is incredibly popular with the food brand. This promotes both Grumpy Cat and Friskies; a match made in heaven. They have several videos with Grumpy and she became the face of The Friskies, an award show created by the company.
This award show gives awards to various Internet cats and their accompanying videos and photos. It is a great way to market off of the Internet’s love of cats while bringing in more customers for the company. But we all know that Grumpy Cat does copywriting very well.
The Grumpy Cat sponsorship is a great example of doing something involving current trends and being relevant with your content. If Grumpy Cat was not popular, Friskies would find another famous Internet cat or whatever the current trend was. They will continue to do this as trends change, staying up-to-date with what their customers enjoy. You should take their example and continue to stay up-to-date on trends on the Internet, as well as trends within your field. Always stay relevant; customers will appreciate it.
Friskies Copywriting: In Closing
You can learn a lot from the Friskies brand and how they do copywriting. Visit their site and take a look at all of their other items and content they offer. They are constantly coming up with unique ideas to engage their client base and bring in new customers. You can watch them over the coming year to see how they adapt to changes within trends and see how they shift their approach in order to continue to market relevantly. Start crafting content that is fun, trendy, relevant, and something that everyone can enjoy. Once you do this, you will watch your client base begin to grow and you will start bringing in more revenue!
We also discovered that LinkedIn will FEATURE your posts publicly on your profile, like so: 
LinkedIn sent us some insider emails after we published some content, with these helpful tips: 
