Quick: what do you think of when you hear John Deere?
If you answered “big green tractors,” you’re on the same page as most people.
If you answered “content marketing genius,” you’re privy to a rare secret.
The truth is that John Deere was nearly as good at content marketing as it was at tractors, and marketers looking for some inspiration on how to make their marketing strategies better need only to look backward about 120 years.
We’re here on the Write Blog today, sharing everything you wanted to know about this intriguing story. Read on to learn more!
John Deere: The Marketing Prowess You Probably Didn’t Know About
John Deere is a well-known, household-name farming equipment company that was originally founded in 1837. While the brand was well known within its community in the years between the 1830’s-90’s, John Deere took a big step in the late 1890’s that ultimately defined the trajectory of the brand: it started a news magazine.
This news magazine was called The Furrow, and it was meant to cater to farmers with “practical information devoted to the interests of better farming.”
Here is one of the earliest recorded images of The Furrow back in the 1890s:
The look evolved throughout the years, reaching an incredible peak in 1912, with over 4 million consumers avidly reading its pages. It’s still being published today, reaching about 2 million readers worldwide, in an ultimate testament to the power ofincredible content.
Could this be the longest form of content marketing that’s been around? It very well could be.
The magazine was distributed to customers at no charge, and the only sign that it came from a John Deere dealer was a small inscription on the cover that recounted that the magazine had been sent “with compliments of your John Deere Dealer.”
With the exception of the small inscription, however, there was virtually no indication that John Deere published the magazine. The company ran no ads, and the articles included within the little magazine didn’t focus on John Deere’s products. Instead, they covered topics ranging from how best to address various farming challenges to trends in the agricultural community as a whole.
In 1912, at the peak of The Furrow’s subscriber quantity, John Deere actually purchased its first electric printing press to publish the successful magazine. It could print in two colors and publish 50,000 copies in eight hours: and back then, the cost amounted to what would be $850,000 in 2013 dollars. What an investment!
Look at the artwork on this edition:
And the classic look of the 1960 spread:
Here’s a look at a recent 2015 edition:
The magazine was a huge success and, today, it stands as one of the earliest and most durable examples of great content marketing. The Furrow still exists today and has since also been digitized into an e-version.
What John Deere Got Right
John Deere knew something very early on that many marketers are still struggling to learn: the best content is informative content.
Even in the late 1890’s, customers didn’t want big, splashy advertisements and “listen to how great our company is” rhetoric. Instead, they wanted helpful information that would assist them in addressing their problems.
The Furrow focused entirely on editorial content meant to be informative and helpful. Pieces ranged from scientific breakdowns to funny editorial pieces about the difficulties of living a farmer’s life. Throughout the magazine, John Deere’s name was interspersed on a rare occasion, encouraging customers to build an association between the helpful, informative content and the John Deere brand itself.
Successful content today is no different than successful content back then.
Here are the top six things that John Deere got right in The Furrow:
The content was engaging
The content was valuable
The content shared farming culture and information
The content built brand loyalty
The content positioned John Deere as a passionate, engaged brand
The content developed relationships between farmers and John Deere
Today, marketers who want to increase the effectiveness of their content marketing need only to look back to The Furrow and take some lessons from John Deere.
10 Content Marketing Lessons You Can Learn From John Deere
Despite the fact that John Deere was founded more than one hundred years ago, the company’s first big content marketing move still has a lot to teach today’s modern marketers. Here are the top 10 lessons to take from The Furrow:
1. Address pain points
Before The Furrow hit the scene, farmers didn’t have an organized place to see their challenges, hopes, and community-specific knowledge reflected at them. What The Furrow got so right from the get-go is that it addressed farmers’ pain points.
By offering actionable information about how to cope with difficult farming situations and address various issues in the community, The Furrow proved it understood its audience. What’s more, it offered truly valuable information that increased the quality of their lives.
To bring this into your content, one of the most critical things you can do is address your customers’ pain points. While this requires a background of plenty of target audience research and exploration, learning to hone in on your readers’ difficulties is one of the most active steps you can take toward great content marketing.
2. Focus on informative content
The Furrow did something else that no magazine before it had done – it brought scientific, editorial content to consumers, and it didn’t try to sell them on anything in the process. While the magazine was published by John Deere, a casual passerby couldn’t have picked up on that, and this was one of the magazine’s greatest strengths.
By focusing first on informing consumers and leaving all of the sales pitches and product placement out of the equation, John Deere created a brand of trust, loyalty, and mutual benefit with its consumers.
3. Build a community
In addition to farming insights and instructional content, The Furrow also offered peer insights. By building a farming community that focused on the magazine itself, The Furrow managed to establish itself as a meeting place for information, advice, and relief from the stressors of everyday farm life.
In your content, building a community is a critical step toward good marketing. If you can create a community around your brand voice, content, and material, you know you’ll always have a group to rely on. This, in turn, allows you to leverage the support of your community whenever you need it, which makes for better marketing and a more efficient content strategy.
4. Offer actionable content
One of the things The Furrow did beautifully was that it aimed to teach farmers to run better businesses. By providing tips on more efficient means of harvest and ways to circumvent various difficulties in the industry, The Furrow managed to provide valuable, actionable content to farmers who were hungry for useful information.
5. Be adaptable
Since The Furrow began its publishing debut more than one hundred years ago, it’s continued to adapt to the landscape around it. Today, The Furrow is available online, on social media, and in digital, tablet formats.
Despite the fact that the magazine has its roots in a very different time than we’re living in now, it’s continued to adapt according to the environment around it. This, in turn, has allowed it to be flexible and to continue delivering valuable content to consumers wherever they are at a given moment.
6. Find your niche and dominate it
The Furrow did beautifully at finding a niche with its consumers and dominating it at every turn. By consistently offering helpful, actionable, relevant advice on industry challenges, it managed to create a community of buzz and value around its content.
The other unique virtue of defining a niche is that doing so allows you to cater specifically to a unique group of people. Establishing a niche creates more targeted content, more practical value, and a stronger brand voice – all of which are ideal for ensuring that your content serves its ideal purpose.
7. Use your content to strengthen relationships
The Furrow built two communities – both internal and external. On one hand, the editorial content within the magazine strengthened the relationships of the farming community. On the other hand, however, it was ideal for strengthening the relationship between consumers and the John Deere brand.
By focusing on providing value for consumers first and integrating products much later, John Deere managed to use The Furrow to strengthen its relationships with customers.
8. Use your content to display your passion
Why should people read your content? Are you exceedingly passionate about your topic? Do you know something that nobody else does? What value can you offer? By using your content to display and find a home for your passion – be it farming or SEO – it’s easy to create a group of passionate, like-minded followers who want to engage with you.
With millions of pieces of content shared every day, the only way for content marketing to succeed in today’s environment is to be unique. Passionate content is unique content and using your platform to market things you truly connect with and care about is one of the best possible ways to improve your marketing instantly.
9. Be consistent
If there’s one thing The Furrow is, it’s consistent. With more than 120 years of publishing prowess, it’s easy to look at this magazine and understand the value of being predictable. While the magazine has always been niche-focused and specific, it’s also always showed up when it’s supposed to – providing value to readers on a regular and predictable basis.
This, in turn, helps build consumer trust in the magazine while also ensuring that The Furrow remains a helpful tool for boosting John Deere’s brand voice.
While The Furrow has been required to adapt to various distribution channels and consumer preferences over the years, it’s still a regular, predictable publication that serves readers well.
10. Use your content to establish yourself as the expert in your industry
When it came time to build a dynasty, John Deere didn’t use The Furrow to offer “10 Shocking Secrets of Today’s Biggest Celebrities.”
This wouldn’t have gotten the brand anywhere and, if this had been their approach, we wouldn’t still be talking about the magazine today. Instead, John Deere used its new content platform to tie back to the unique knowledge they were capable of distributing.
While even back in the 1800s there were plenty of expert farmers and ranchers, what The Furrow did well is that it compiled that expert knowledge all into one place. This, in turn, allowed them to showcase their brand while also building a community of dedicated and like-minded followers.
The 3 Commandments of Great Content Marketing
1. Value first
Through and through, it’s easy to see where John Deere used content as a vehicle for value rather than sales pitches. In fact, it’s arguable that putting the value of their content first was the key factor that allowed them to succeed to the level they have.
By avoiding pushing sales pitches onto their consumers, John Deere managed to create a unique, value-based magazine that didn’t alienate people or come off as overly sales-y. This, in turn, has contributed to their longevity.
2. Own the places you publish
While things like social media are fantastic, having a content distribution platform that is entirely in your control is a critical factor in success.
When John Deere began publishing The Furrow, it did two things right: first, it created an environment in which the publishing channel was also owned by the company, thus creating an atmosphere of freedom and authority.
Secondly, it allows John Deere to take full advantage of all of the data and relationships mined from said distribution platform. By cutting out the middleman and speaking directly to consumers, John Deere created a platform for strong content from the get-go.
3. Be the expert people want to talk to
Expertise is about a lot more than just knowledge. Expertise is also about approachability, friendliness, and accessibility. By distributing world-class information and tying it in with phrases like “your friendly John Deere dealer,” The Furrow managed to be all of these things at once. In content marketing, it’s critical to ensure that you’re approachable and authoritative since one can’t exist without the other.
John Deere – The Content Marketing Expert You Never Expected
John Deere is more than just big green tractors –the brand is also a powerhouse of content marketing know-how that dates back more than one hundred years. Today, it’s easy to see where John Deere’s magazine, The Furrow, went right with marketing.
By paying attention to the lessons the magazine has to offer, it’s easy to apply these tricks to your content marketing and boost its effectiveness today.
All of these services have been introduced because of a popular demand from our clients, and priced fairly to include expert team members for each stage of the project. An expert content marketing writer who sometimes ghostwrites for me is behind the new category just for CM, and we have a sales and marketing copywriter guru ready to deliver on the new marketing copy category and array of formats there with expertise.
I’m excited to introduce these new services to our Content Shop and answer more needs for our incoming leads. Keep reading to learn more about each one of these updated new content products!
New Services in our Content Shop: Kindle Ebook Formatting for Self-Published Authors, & 2 New Expert Category Products (Marketing & Content Marketing)
Here’s the lowdown on our new products in the Content Shop! First, we’ll start with the two new expert categories, and then discuss our Kindle ebook formatting solutions.
2 New Expert Categories: Marketing & Content Marketing
Our two new expert copywriting categories are live at the top of the expert copy category:
New Expert Category: Content Marketing
When it comes to content marketing, we’re the perfect team to write on the subject. So it was about time to launch a dedicated expert copywriting category to the Shop, just for the subject of content marketing.
The beauty of this product is that it comes from what we do every day. Before we write and deliver our copy services for clients, we create content for ourselves – and that content fuels 90% of our entire marketing. (Check out our case study on our own success in that area.)
You can trust our team to deliver the best copy on the topic of content marketing. Crafted by experts in the field, we’ll deliver successful content, ready to gain and rank online. We have a content marketing expert copywriter lined up to take these orders (he sometimes ghostwrites for me, and I trained him on our Authority Content copy format launched last year).
New Expert Category: Marketing
One of our very common requests lately has been for a wide variety of marketing copy formats. So, we’ve added a Marketing expert copywriting product that encompasses the common requests we get, including PPT copy, flyer copy, and brochure copy. See it here.
Kindle Formatting & Cover Design for Self-Published Authors
We’ve already had ebook writing as a service in the Content Shop ever since we launched our site, but it was time to add Kindle formatting services for the aspiring self-publishing leads that have been visiting our site and services.
For a few months now, we’ve received an odd number of random requests for Kindle formatting. We talked to our team, and discovered that Kindle formatting was among the skillsets of one of our our full-time writers, Ashley. So, we’ve created a workflow, priced the service at a fair cost, and added the service to our Content Shop this weekend for Kindle ebook formatting! Our designer has crafted incredibly good covers for our clients’ custom design orders already, so we added on a variation to get an ebook cover along with a fully-formatted, ready-to-go Amazon .mobi and .epub file.
We’re also getting ahead of a serious, permanent trend, by catering to the self-publishing crowd. Per a Bowker report, the amount of self-published books have increased by 375% since 2010. And that was a stat from last year. Here’s some more stats about the self-publishing industry (via PublishersWeekly):
31% of all ebook sales on Amazon go to self-published authors.
Self-published authors are outdoing traditionally published authors, in the sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, thriller, and romance genres. What’s more, they are taking a large market share in all genres!
Self-Publishing Testament to Success
In April last year, I self-published my own book, So You Think You Can Write? using Amazon KDP and Amazon’s paperback publishing service, CreateSpace. So, I’ve been through the entire process!
The reason I didn’t choose a publisher? Self-publishing on Amazon nets you a large 80% return on all your author royalties: a typical publisher will net you around 8%. That’s a tremendous difference. Of course, you have to market your book yourself when you’re self-published, and that can be difficult if you have no audience. Fortunately, I built up an audience through owning a business and starting several communities years before my book came out: and my book has sold over 500 copies across the last year just through word of mouth and publishing the link in my communities. (I’ve learned, though, that you can’t live off the income a single published book brings, not by a long shot—I net a low $150/month income from the sales. Still, it’s nice to have!)
One of the most difficult parts of publishing my book was finding a trustworthy formatter. In the process of formatting my book for CreateSpace, which was 1000x harder than formatting for the simpler KDP process, I was scammed out of quite a bit of money. Apparently, after the book was out, I learned I’d been overcharged about 50x what I should have paid.
So, this product in our Content Shop is something I’m very proud of offering. I know what it’s like to be a self-published author, both the struggles of the journey and the great reward afterwards from putting in the effort!
Conclusion: New Services in the Content Shop for April
That’s it for the roundup of the new services launched over last weekend in our Content Shop. Questions, comments, or thoughts? Drop us a comment below – or, if you have questions in particular about how we can help you with your needs, talk to us today! We’d love to become your go-to writing solution.
Grammar nerds, hold onto your hats.
On March 23 of this year, Carol Fisher Saller, editor of The Chicago Manual of Style’s online Q&A section, gave a presentation about some of the updates that would appear in the Chicago Manual’s 17th edition, due out in September of this year.
Among the big news?
It’s about time for these changes:
internet will now be lowercase
email will lose its hyphen.
Take that Kim Kardashian. Who broke the Internet internet now?
What The Chicago Manual Is Changing For 2017 (A Win for Online Grammar)
If those two changes weren’t large enough for you, Saller also announced that the manual will begin accepting a singular “they” and that the 17th edition will include citation recommendations for social media posts, like Facebook and Twitter updates.
Each year, editors announce the changes to the Stylebook at the American Copy Editor’s Society annual meeting. This meeting is where the world heard, in 2011, that the Associated Press intended to stop using a hyphen in email.
Here’s a snapshot from that glorious moment:
In 2016, the Associated Press announced that it would remove the capitalization from the word internet. The Chicago Manual of Style has since announced its intention to adopt these styles.
Here are just a few of the notable changes from the recent meeting:
Gender Changes
Many of the recent changes revolve around what QuickAndDirtyTips.com calls “gender-related entries.” Here’s a breakdown:
Her, his. Before, AP style required writers to use he when a gender was unknown. Today, it’s acceptable to use they, them, or their.
Singular they. One of the largest changes, the AP Stylebook has recently begun to accept the use of they as a singular pronoun. This is especially useful in places where his or her would be overly clumsy or confusing. The only exception is when the phrasing would suggest there is more than one person.
Additional Changes
Additional, non-gender-related changes include the following:
Autonomous vehicles. Thanks to the rise of autonomous technology, the AP Stylebook has taken up a guide for how to refer to them. Instead of using the word driverless, however, the correct method is to use the term self-driving, unless the vehicle can only do some of the driving, in which case it should be called semi-autonomous.
Fact checks, fake news. “Fake news” may well be the term of 2017! Because there’s been such a sharp uptick in the use of these terms, the AP Stylebook now recommends using fake news in quotation marks to refer to deliberate falsehoods. The Stylebook also recommends not labeling individual news items as fake news that are disputed. Obvious enough, right?
Flyer, flier. Thanks to the new AP changes, you’re now a frequent flyer rather than a frequent flier. This change is due in large part to the fact that flyer is more common in both American and British spelling.
The Oxford comma. Today, clarity is more important than anything else, especially when viewed from the AP Stylebook’s standpoint. While the standard style has generally been to avoid the serial comma, the guideline now is to use it, but only where it’s needed for clarity.
Virtual reality. Like autonomous technology, augmented reality has become a major fixture in modern society. When you refer to it now, the AP Stylebook says it’s fine to use VR on the second reference, as long as you spell out virtual reality the first time. What’s more, you may use AR to refer to augmented reality, on the second pass only, though.
Why Updated Grammar Rules Matter to the Online Creator
If you don’t write, or read, or interact with content of any kind, this might not seem like a big deal!
To everyone in the content and online marketing communities, however, this is massive news. While online grammar has long since accepted these new realities, traditional grammar guidelines have seen them as “wrong” until very recently.
Now that the recognition is formal, though, it frees online writers up from being looked down upon by grammar professionals across the web and print media. It also helps standardize digital content and ensure that it matches up with print media.
Are the Stylebook and the Manual of Style Two Different Things?
If you’re flashing back to a time when you had to map sentences in high school grammar, it’s okay. Grammar can be a confusing and often overwhelming topic, and wondering what the heck the difference between the Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook is doesn’t help matters.
Here’s some clarity: they’re two separate entities.
Here’s what grammar.yourdictionary.com has to say about the separation:
“The Associated Press Stylebook and the Chicago Manual of Style are very different guides for two very different groups of people who make their living with the written word. The Chicago Manual of Style is by far the larger reference work, with over 950 pages.The AP Stylebook has only 330 pages.The Chicago Manual of style is the guide for authors, editors and publishers of books, periodicals and journals. The AP Stylebook is the prime reference for those in the news and public relations fields.”
The fact that both entities agree on many of these changes means an enhanced sense of cohesion for writers everywhere!
A Good Day for Grammar
The recent changes on the part of the Chicago Manual do one thing: help unify online and print writing for the sake of journalists and copywriters everywhere. By syncing grammar rules with digital grammar style, they help reduce confusion and make good writing easier for everyone.
The print version of the AP Stylebook will be available May 31, 2017.
While this guide is updated annually, the Chicago Manual of Style is updated less frequently, and the last update was in 2010.
Check back with both entities regularly to stay on top of future updates!
Are you looking for a professional writer to help you create quality web content? Look no further than Express Writers, your source for award-winning content marketing material. Visit our Content Shop today!
What’s the one thing you need to do to master a new skill?
Practice, of course!
This is as true with learning to play tennis as it is mastering content writing: the more you practice, the better you get.
Today, content writing is a critical talent, and mastering it can help you stand out in the crowded online world.
Sound hard? Don’t worry, it’s easier than you might think. Just follow these seven simple tips, and you’ll be on the top of your content writing game in no time at all.
How to Improve Your Content Writing: Why Creating Great Online Content Matters So Much
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for all of 2016 (and maybe the decade before that, as well), you’ve probably interacted with some form of online content.
Whether it was a blog, a webpage, a social media post, or even a product description, online content has touched your life in one way or another.
This industry is nowhere near dying. In fact, it’s the opposite.
Today, online content is one of the primary sources that humans use to communicate with one another.
Sound crazy?
Think about it!
Regardless of what you do for work or fun, chances are that you interact with some form of digital content every day. Do you read blogs? Do you surf the web? Do you shop online? If so, you’re interacting with online content!
The average person interacts with 285 pieces of content every single day.
This rounds out to 54,000 words (the length of a novel) and 1,000 different links – consumed daily.
A whopping 63% of that content is written, while 37% is media content.
If that doesn’t put the importance of online content in perspective, I’m not sure what will!
Due to the rise of digital content, and the level of importance that consumers now place on it, learning how to improve your content writing is one of the smartest things you can do.
How to Improve Your Content Writing in 7 Steps
Regardless of whether you’re a marketer, blogger, small business owner, or just an online enthusiast, improving your content writing is one of the best ways to succeed in the digital world.
Here are seven tips to help you head into 2017 strong:
1. Up your image game
For most people, “adding an image” to a blog means plugging in a stock photo for the featured picture.
This is not enough.
Today, images make all the difference in a person’s willingness to read your content. In fact, HubSpot reports that content that includes a relevant image gets a massive 94% more views than content that is only text.
Fortunately, you don’t have to be a professional photographer to add images to your posts. Today, there are dozens of free and high-quality stock image sites you can take advantage of. You can also hire out custom images, or create your own on a site like Canva.
No matter what you do, make sure any images you include in your posts are high-quality – there should be no blurring or odd proportions – and relevant.
2. Dig deeper than average to verify facts and statistics
It’s easy to fill your writing with general statements. It’s much harder, however, to go to the source and find relevant, solid statistics to back up your claims. This is one simple way to beef up your online writing.
Today, it’s easier than ever to find quality statistics for any industry you’re involved in. A simple Google search with the word “statistic” at the end will reveal thousands, if not millions, of hits. Before you go plugging them into your content, however, you need to know how to determine what is a high-quality source and what’s not.
One fantastic, 100% trustworthy tool for determining this is Alexa.
Alexa is an Amazon subsidiary that allows users to access traffic and rank estimates based on mass browsing behavior. Alexa’s ranks are updated daily and the tool offers a quick view of sites that are high-quality and sites that are low-quality – the lower the site ranking number, the better it’s doing online.
To use Alexa, just head to Alexa.com/siteinfo, and type in your target URL. If it ranks over 100,000, it’s a high-quality link that you can include in your content.
Save this handy-dandy visual guide:
3. Add an infographic
Right now, infographics are shared and liked on social media three times as often as any other type of content out there.
Like any image, the infographics you use in your content must always be high-quality, relevant, and professional.
4. Publish a case study
A case study is one piece of content that announces “I have arrived!”
Here’s why: case studies are not something that every content writer produces. They take time, they take expertise, and they take real, demonstrable success that your clients are willing to let you share.
Because of this, they are an incredibly powerful type of online content that can serve to enhance your reputation and help you land more customers.
If you’re interested in publishing a case study, you’ll have to set a time frame and start paying close attention to your results. If you have a specific job or interaction with the client that you believe would be fodder for a case study, reach out to the client and ask for permission to share the details.
Malcolm Gladwell, the best-selling author, is commonly quoted as having said that it takes 10,000 hours of “deliberate practice” to become an expert at something. If that’s true, the more you write, the better at it you’ll be.
While there are dozens of technical or professional ways to improve your online copywriting, one of the best things that you can do to get better is simply to write more.
The more you write, the more honed your skills will be, and the more efficient you’ll be at spotting mistakes.
In addition to making you a better writer, writing more often can also help you become more visible online, since it will naturally increase your social shares and enhance your network of readers.
6. Use a headline analyzer to test your titles
One of the simplest and most overlooked tools for writers is the headline analyzer. There are several different models out there, many of which are free.
Designed to test a headline for its concentration of emotional, spiritual, intellectual, and power words, a headline analyzer takes your headline, evaluates it, and lets you know what you need to improve.
If you’re just learning to craft a great headline, a headline analyzer is a fantastic way to catch common mistakes and pivot your writing style accordingly.
Even for writers who are already professionals, a headline analyzer is a fantastic way to improve your online content and learn how to be a better writer across the board.
7. Find out which topics your readers want
Doing some research into trending topics in your industry is another fantastic way to immediately improve your online writing. Use a tool like BuzzSumo to locate trending content in your industry.
If you’d prefer to take it to the “streets,” head to a website like Quora or Reddit to figure out what your audience is talking about and what their questions are.
While most people assume that the topics they come up with are the ones their audience wants to read, the audience is the best resource for figuring out what you should be writing about.
With that in mind go to the places your audience hangs out. See what they are talking about. Once you’ve done that, bring it back to your blog. This is a sure-fire recipe for becoming appealing and compelling online.
Learning to Improve Your Content Writing Just got Easy
There are tons of cheap tips for learning to improve writing on the web.
At the end of the day, however, improving your online copywriting comes down to wanting to do it.
Here at Express Writers, we’re passionate about helping you improve your online writing. With the help of these seven tips, you can become a better online writer, learn more about the digital world around you, and grow your skills in 2017, and beyond!
Still need a bit of help managing your online copy writing needs? Contact Express Writers today to learn more about our team of experienced writers and purchase your content package now.
You simply can’t be a self-serve menu, when you serve up content.
One size does not fit all.
We know this to be all-too-true, and it means that our Content Shop – and entire lineup of content services – change all the time.
And the needs of our clients drive these changes.
I love that this is one of our abiding principles, at Express Writers. We act when we see a demand – and learn, fit, and adapt to the changes necessary for progression in the industry, and to make sure the services that we sell to our clients are always one step ahead.
Behind the scenes, it means a lot of work for our boot-strapped business. I’m constantly working with Tara, our Content Development Specialist, Katria, Tamila, Hannah, and our CTO to map out, create, and plan the changes – and adapt our entire sales and editorial management team to the changes.
In the end: it’s more than worth it. We see real results from the hard work put into our improvements, and happy clients!
Keep reading for all the changes out in the Content Shop this April.
The Shortlist (TL;DR) of our Content Shop Changes: Biggest Changes, Biggest Benefits
Don’t have a lot of time? Here’s a TL;DR (too long; didn’t read) list of the changes and the key benefits of the changes in our Shop. For a full in-depth list, scroll down for the per-product changes! Blog Plans: We’ve heard for ages now that “that package just doesn’t fit me,” so we completely rehauled our preset, three blog packages. Now, you get to completely build your own, by: 1) picking your writer level, 2) word count, 3) one (or both) of two addons for images/topic and SEO keyword planning, and finally, 4) quantity (telling us how many posts you want per month). Hit “add to cart.” Congrats! You’ve just configured your monthly blog plan! (If clients aren’t sure what they want, we can build a plan for them, starting at $280/cart. See more details in the sections below.) Content Planning: Biggest enhancement here? All blog titles are now analyzed according to Advanced Marketing Institute’s Emotional Marketing Value Headline Analyzer, one of my favorite tools on this planet. (And to solidify that we’re on track, we use Coschedule’s Headline Analyzer, too.) When I implemented checking every headline on the EMV Analyzer by AMI, our blog shares and overall traction went up by 25%+ on every post with the analyzed title. In the planning service itself, you get a ready-to-go editorial calendar for the month, a list of best SEO keywords (researched using top tools), and a BuzzSumo topic analysis. Content Consultation: For $350 (a low, low price, considering the value of what this could bring you), we now offer a content consultation with one of our highest-level, most experienced Content Strategists (his bio is below!). The session comes complete with a Discovery Report including an analysis of what you can be doing better with your content, and an SEO and topic analysis report, highly customized to the findings in the consultation call. Price: The price of blogging plans and content planning went up a tad. (We discovered, especially in the blogging plans, after doing some math that we weren’t able to cover the payment for our high level, content-marketing minded editors and expert writers. The WordPress posting was far too cheap – below $10 per – in the plans. We couldn’t pay out at that rate.) But with content planning blocks still starting at $120, and blog plans as low as $280 at the first configuration, you’re still paying below average rates here – even after the small increase. Jump on our services! The industry keeps changing, and skillset expertise increasing. I’ll be upfront: we simply can’t retain quality or work at low rates.
And now for the in-depth breakdown.
1. Content Consultation Call with Reports
Built into the Content Planning service is a new variation: Content Consultation.
I’ll be real: content consultation was a long time coming.
There’s been a serious demand for it.
We hear this a lot:
“What should I be doing with my site? Can you analyze and tell me?”
“Can I get a dedicated consultation?”
“Can I get some keyword reports and talk to a Strategist about what I’m looking for?”
“I know I need content, but I have no idea what I’m doing.”
What’s more, we’ve noticed, for a steady eight months now, a major need in the content marketing industry: Customization.
All the way from quotes at a unique, per-word level, down to increased requests for a highly customized, per-site analysis – revealing exactly what you need, down to new site page recommendations, blog title and headline ideas, to the best keyword opportunities and what your competitors are doing that you could be doing better. Then, ongoing content publishing – a customized content recommendation at an ongoing basis.
So, FINALLY, content consultation sessions, complete with full content discovery reports, are live!
I just finished building a behind-the-scenes workflow that will ensure success at every step of the way, and hand-picked one of our most successful Content Strategists for the dedicated consulting call and report creation. Check it out:
I’ve even written the interview guide that my consultant will be using, with questions that are guaranteed to elicit the best information so we find your “sweet spot” in creating content that answers your audience’s (and customers’) biggest questions, and positions you as an authority in your industry.
Meet John G, our dedicated team member who will be working 1:1 with every client that needs a guided consultation:
John is awesome. He’s been such a team player at Express Writers, and I have no doubts that he’ll knock the ball out of the park handling our content consultations. Check out the Content Consultation page for a checklist of the reports that come with a consultation.
2. Blogging Plans: Customized to Your Online Presence & Needs
Completely, 100% customizable, create-your-own blogging plans are now available!
Let me go back a little to explain why our reinvented blogging plans are so great.
For several years, we’ve had pre-packaged blogging plans available to our clientele. We had typical plan names: Level 1, 2, 3, or SEO / Guru etc.
Over time, we noticed a trend happening over and over again. Notes, from clients: “I don’t see the blog plan I need in that list.” “ I don’t want general or expert level, I want authority. But packaged as a plan. With content planning.” Or, “Level 2 is nice, but not exactly what I need.”
So instead of three pre-set packages, we are finally allowing the client to choose and build their own (or have one built for them, by one of our Content Specialists)!
In blogging today, the truth is that one size does not fit all, when it comes to the quality, expertise, and length your blog should be. Our new blogging format allows for customization at every level. Time to engage your readers and keep them coming back consistently with a fully managed blog, designed at the level you need!
How to Use Our New Custom Blog Package
Here’s how to customize and create your own blog package:
Choose the word count you want your monthly blogs to be, once you’ve selected what level of writer you need.
Step 3
Choose from two available blog plan upgrades, at a flat, easy per-blog fee: – Content planning, where our Content Strategists research and put together your best blog topics, with timely, hot topic research (BuzzSumo) and keyword opportunities (SEMrush). We’ll even analyze and include a top-performing headline. (Highly recommended for achieving the best results from your blogging!) – Storytelling header sets are beautiful, feature images for your blog, that tell a story. Custom designed in Adobe Illustrator and InDesign by our lead designer, they are geared to creatively “tell the story” of your blog post. You’ll receive one header and one inset image, designed with the topic and your logo.
Here’s an example:
Step 4
Choose your quantity for a final per-month amount and price:
You’re done configuring your custom blog package! You can now click Add to Cart, and checkout to secure your package!
Not sure what you need? Here’s some examples of pre-built carts with blog packages.
General Writer Packages:
Starter Package: 4/month (1/week) on general, 750w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See pre-built cart. $280.
Long-Form General Package: 4/month (1/week) on general, 1000-1500w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See pre-built cart. $500.
Long-Form Content, 2/Week Package: 8/month (2/week) on general, 1000-1500w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See cart. $500.
Expert Writer Packages:
Long-Form Content, Weekly Expert Package: 4/month (1/week) on expert, 1000-1500w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See cart. $980
Long-Form 2/Week Expert Package: 8/month (2/week) on expert, 1000-1500w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See cart. $1960.
Authority Writer Package:
Authority Weekly Package: 4/month (1/week) on authority, 2000w, includes all the basics (stock images, posting, etc): See cart. $1900.
Our team can build a package for you! Talk to us today. Also, we have custom coupon codes for our packages, with discounts starting around $500! Talk to us and see if you’re eligible to get a blog plan with a discount.
3. Content Planning Updates
Our Content Planning service now includes additions to the Editorial Calendar report: a Topic Scoring section. We’ll use the AMI Headline Analyzer and the CoSchedule headline tool to make sure the topic is proven to work well and rank highly!
For example, here’s a “highly-scored” headline with the AMI Headline tool (~40% means success): Content planning is the perfect service for those who want to get the most out of planning blog content. Our Content Strategists build monthly editorial calendars that correspond to a month of blogging, with keywords, topic and an entire strategy planned for the month. Each Content Planning block includes:
An editorial calendar with full blog topics and details planned and dated out for a month
In-depth, up-to-date SEO keyword research with a list of keywords and an opportunity report
BuzzSumo content analysis overview report, revealing most recent top-trending content in your industry
2017 Is Busy, Exciting & Dynamic: More Changes Ahead!
So far, 2017 has been one exciting ride of a year.
We had the best and busiest month we’ve ever had since inception in 2011, this January.
Already, we’ve had tons of updates and upgrades (some major updates came out in February, too): and that’s just the tip of the iceberg, with self-funded, slow-but-steady new development in the works and launching around summer.
We’re excited to share these changes with you! Let us know what you think or if you have any questions in the comments below.
