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How Today’s Pandemic Is Impacting Business & Marketing + 5 Ways to Keep Thriving

March 31, 2020/18 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

The past month has been one of the craziest in our collective memory.

I’m banking on the inevitability that NO ONE will forget March 2020, when a global outbreak known as COVID-19 wreaked havoc on public health, economies, jobs, livelihoods, and day-to-day living.

Business is NOT as usual. Instead, many of us in marketing are facing scary unknowns.

IRL marketing events got canceled, just like everything else. Those of us who rely on trade shows, conferences, speaking gigs, and other events suddenly have to adapt.

Digital marketing – and content in particular! – just got way more important.

This is huge, but it’s also dependent on the niche you’re in.

Since COVID-19 came on the scene, internet use in Europe has been up by almost 50%. If you think about the worldwide impact, Google searches went up from 3.5 billion/day to almost 6 billion! Streaming services saw a 20% rise in usage. Netflix has had to lower streaming quality for everyone just to handle the load.

That said, for many marketers, it’s not all doom and gloom. 🌤

Search traffic is UP for many industries. Niches reporting traffic gains include:

Health and wellness
Online grocery and meal/food retailers
Remote work, remote teams
Preparedness
Online dating
Online toy and puzzle makers (fun fact: puzzles are HOT right now! 🧩)

Let’s talk about it all – the impact of the pandemic on business and marketing, which niches are winning, which ones are losing, and which are holding steady despite the doom-and-gloom. The good news is, hope is here for many content and SEO marketers. 🙏

NO ONE will forget March 2020, when COVID-19 wreaked havoc on public health, economies, jobs, livelihoods, and day-to-day living. 🌎 Business is NOT as usual. On the Write Blog, @JuliaEMcCoy talks about the ups, downs, and ways to keep… Click To Tweet

How the Pandemic Impacts Business & Marketing: 3 Ways the Pandemic Is Impacting Business Search Traffic and Content

1. Who’s Winning Search Traffic During the Pandemic?

2. The Downside: Who’s Losing Search Traffic to Their Site and Content?

3. Companies Holding Strong During the Pandemic and Giving Back

How to Survive and Thrive in Business & Marketing During a Pandemic: 5 Important Tips

1. Don’t Panic

2. Lead with Empathy

3. Communicate Well (and Often) with Staff and Customers

4. Make a Plan

5. Be a Helper

How is the Pandemic Impacting Business Search Traffic and Content?

Here’s the gist of what’s happening in the world of search traffic, and what it might mean for your marketing, business, and content.

1. Who’s Winning Search Traffic During the Pandemic?

It’s not all doom and gloom out there! 🌤

Search traffic is UP for many industries. According to a recent survey Marie Haynes conducted on Twitter, niches reporting gains in traffic include:

Heath/wellness
Online grocery/food retailers
Remote work and remote teams
Preparedness
Online dating services
Online toy and puzzle retailers (puzzles are HUGE right now 🧩)

Source: GIPHY

Besides puzzling in their downtime, people are also furiously Googling anything to do with remote work, especially tools, methods, and ideas for collaboration.

Kevin Indig from G2 recently shared on LinkedIn how traffic to many of the site’s remote work-related categories is exploding:

Noticeably, the top categories include:

Audio conferencing
Telemedicine
Video conferencing
Webinar
Collaborative whiteboard

This holds on Google Trends, too. When you compare the search interest over time between the topics “work from home” and “coworking,” there’s a clear winner.

“Work from home” interest spiked as the pandemic took hold, while interest in “coworking” flat-lined.

What impact is the pandemic having on business and marketing? Search traffic is UP for many industries like health/wellness ♥, remote work/teams 💻, online dating 💑, and online puzzle retailers 🧩 (puzzles are HOT right now). Click To Tweet

Beyond industries related to remote work, who else may see gains during this time?

Mark Schaefer wrote a great post about the coronavirus’s implications for marketing. He made some predictions about which business niches have an opportunity right now:

Comfort foods like candy and baking
Nostalgia
Cozy wear like sweatpants and pajamas
Comedy
Old TV shows and movies
Hobbies (puzzles, knitting, sewing, crafting, reading)
Delivery of essentials like groceries and food
Small luxuries that can be home-delivered

[email protected] recommends looking for marketing opportunities in baking/cooking/comfort foods 🧁, nostalgia, comedy 🎭, blankets/pj's/comfy clothes, hobbies 🧶, food/grocery delivery, and more. Click To Tweet

2. The Downside: Who’s Losing Search Traffic to Their Site and Content?

Despite the gains for many niches, most are seeing a decline in traffic (as reported by Wordstream and SEO Roundtable).

Here’s Marie Hayne’s Twitter survey from March 23 that shows 59.6% of sites reporting a downturn, out of 726 responses:

Let’s do this again. How has COVID-19 affected your site’s organic traffic (or your clients’ sites)? We’ll keep running this poll weekly as a way to track what is happening. Results will be published and discussed in newsletter.

— Marie Haynes (@Marie_Haynes) March 23, 2020

Some of the affected niches include:

Travel
Motorsports
Ecommerce – fashion
Personal finance
Child care and daycare

Additionally, Yelp’s Coronavirus Economic Impact Report shows other struggling niches include:

Wineries
Bridal stores
Shopping centers
Tax services
Day spas

The takeaway: These trends aren’t surprising to anyone. Social distancing and quarantines are forcing people to cancel their weddings and big events, avoid services they previously frequented (hair salons, spas, massage therapy), and rethink where their paychecks are going.

Unless this pandemic wipes out the relevancy of your business right now, for struggling niches, it’s time to start thinking of creative ways to stay afloat. (More on that later.) 🏊‍♀️

What business/marketing niches are losing out during the pandemic? Travel ✈, motorsports, personal finance 💲, wineries, tax services, childcare 👶, and more, now on the Write Blog ➡ Click To Tweet

3. Companies Holding Strong During the Pandemic and Giving Back

Keeping the positivity going, let’s take a look at the many companies doing well despite mass unemployment, layoffs, and the stormy economic weather right now. Some are even using their power to do good in their communities.

Internet Service Providers (like Comcast, Verizon, Charter, and Sprint)

ISPs are doing very well right now – the internet has become a lifeline to keep us sane and connected to our social groups and entertainment.

To help those who may be struggling to make ends meet, the above ISPs have pledged to keep Americans internet-connected for 60 days, even for those who can’t pay their bills.

Distilleries

Distilleries around the country are using their excess, highly-concentrated alcohol to make hand sanitizer for their communities, including Dread River Distillery in Alabama and Caldonia Spirits in Vermont.

Fanatics (MLB Uniform Manufacturer)

Fanatics, a company that makes MLB uniforms, had the means to turn their Pennsylvania plant into a factory just for producing hospital masks and gowns.

We’re proud to partner with @MLB to support emergency personnel who are fighting against COVID-19 and face a need for masks and hospital gowns. We’re utilizing our manufacturing plant in Easton, PA to make masks and gowns out of the same jersey fabric that the players wear pic.twitter.com/5jEg1B2iUa

— Fanatics (@Fanatics) March 26, 2020

OneDine (Guest-Facing Restaurant Technology)

OneDine offers restaurants technology that allows guests to order and pay online. They’re offering free Tap & Pay touchless payment systems to help restaurants shift to stay in business.

Content Marketing

As I’ve mentioned, there is a HUGE opportunity for content marketing in this climate, where people are heading online in droves for much-needed entertainment, education, enrichment, and socialization.

According to eMarketer predictions, marketers will be looking to deliver even more personalized content so their audiences feel connected in the way they do at in-person events. Here’s an explanation:

Express Writers

I’m including EW as an example of a business holding strong despite the economy. We haven’t had to do ANY layoffs, and our numbers have held pretty steady over the month.

Over just one day of the shutdown, we had the most visitors we’ve ever seen in one day to my Content Strategy & Marketing Course site (130+ people online).

Income-wise, Express Writers did see a slight drop this month, but only by about 10-15%. Meanwhile, we’re still seeing between 2-4K visitors/day to the Write Blog and ExpressWriters.com.

SO many more positive examples exist if you just take the time to look. Here are 50 more businesses giving back during coronavirus, via Forbes.

Despite the downs, there ARE businesses continuing to survive and thrive 💪 despite #covid-19. Examples: @Fanatics, @Onedineapp, @GreenhouseCF, and even Express Writers. More on the Write Blog 👉 Click To Tweet

How to Survive and Thrive in Business & Marketing During a Pandemic: 5 Important Tips

As we’ve seen, the pandemic is impacting business and marketing in varied ways. For some of us, the outlook is good. For others, uncertainty may be clouding the future.

No matter your situation, keep these tips in mind to survive this global crisis:

1. Don’t Panic

Panicking will only lead to panic-driven decisions. Panic-driven decisions are based on fear – not logic, practicality, or insight.

Instead, think critically about your business right now. Get informed on coronavirus myths and facts. How does this situation position you to help amid the panic? How can you provide a measure of trust, security, and comfort to people right now in your unique way?

Mark Schaefer, a veteran marketer, talked about this on his blog (which I mentioned already) with great advice – here’s the link again in case you missed it: 7 Non-obvious coronavirus implications for marketing.

Think about businesses that are pivoting to include a wider reach for both their customers and their bottom line. How can you survive and add a touch of thriving by pivoting right now?

2. Lead with Empathy

Every single person you know is facing a different reality right now than the one they knew a month ago. We’re all worried and stressed to some degree.

Leading with empathy is a way to not only show people you care, but to mitigate that stress and worry.

Lots of people who previously went to an office every day are now working from home, many with small children to look after and help with schoolwork. Thanks to their living situation, some people may be isolated from all their friends and family and struggling. Others might face worries about a loved one who works in an essential industry and is exposed to the virus daily.

Be as understanding and accommodating as you can. Lead by example. Though some of us won’t get sick, none of us are immune to the effects of COVID-19.

A great example is Target’s empathetic response to the situation:

3. Communicate Well (and Often) with Staff and Customers

Communication is key for getting through this worldwide upheaval we’re confronting. Your employees, customers, peers, and coworkers are hungry for information right now. They probably have hundreds of questions running through their minds:

What’s going on?
Are you still open?
How are we approaching this situation?
What is expected of employees?
What are you doing to keep things running?
Will I be out of a job?
Now what?

As soon as uncertainty hits, it’s time to start being open and honest with your people. Send email updates about the state of your business. Reassure employees if you’re able, or, prepare them for the worst if necessary.

Send customers updates, too – even if it’s just to announce that you’re able to continue as normal, or to remind them you’re still open. Here’s an email Geico recently sent their customers letting them know how the company is responding to the pandemic:

Be sure to check out Really Good Emails for a trove of examples from businesses getting this crucial communication right.

On the other hand, you might be continually shifting your hours of operation, changing your policies, or transitioning into a new normal. Use social media and email to announce everything that affects customers as it happens. Post notices on your blog and website, too.

At times like these, it’s really important to remain transparent and open to retain that trust you’ve built.

4. Make a Plan

Lots of us have more time on our hands than ever. Now is a good time to revisit your disaster preparedness plan for your business (or your savings plan if you’re a marketer or freelancer).

Don’t have one? It’s okay – you’re not alone. Lots of people don’t realize they need to plan for stuff like this until it happens.

As long as you’re financially capable to weather the pandemic, think ahead to the future. Can you start putting small amounts of money away regularly to pad your emergency fund?

What else can you do right now to make you feel more secure in case the pandemic drags on? Make a list of small tasks you can complete in a day, tasks that will lead to a bigger goal.

This Pandemic Preparedness article from Harvard Business Review was published in 2006 amid concerns about avian flu, but it is totally relevant today. Definitely read the advice about being a leader during times of crisis, preparing your business for a pandemic, and how to communicate effectively.

We talked earlier about pivoting to include more services. Here’s a great example of that, from my hometown.

Greenhouse Craft Foods

One of my favorite farm-to-table restaurants right here in Round Rock, Texas, quickly pivoted their mostly (and always awesome) dine-in experience to the following: essentially a little grocery store with essentials taking over their front counter, punnily titled “Farmer’s Market” — a takeout service offering easy-to-enjoy family meal packs, and more. This was a great way to use their restaurant space for good and pivot without breaking themselves. They used Facebook to share this with their devoted fans.

Note: Don’t break it to make it. Don’t crush core services just for a short-term pivot. However, smart pivots like the one Greenhouse Kraft Foods did, to include much-needed services right now to the public, are worth considering.

@JuliaEMcCoy says: Don't break it to make it. Don't crush core services just for a short-term pivot. #COVID19pandemic However, smart pivots (example: @GreenhouseCF in-store farmer's market for takeout 👏🏻) are worth considering. Click To Tweet

5. Be a Helper

A well-known Mr. Rogers quote has been circulating recently in the news and on social media:

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.’”

Source: USA Today

Since this advice was intended for kids, let’s take it one step further: BE a helper.

Be the person providing comfort and stability during trying times. Be the person others look to for guidance, reassurance, and support. Be the one offering help in any way you can. Some ideas:

Be kind to grocery store clerks, healthcare workers, and others on the front lines.
Buy online gift cards to your favorite local businesses to use later. Help them stay running through the pandemic!
Tip your delivery person extra (the one bringing you groceries, dinner, packages from Amazon, etc.).
Donate money to charities that help needy families.
Donate extra supplies to food shelters and hospitals. Check out this Medical Supplies Index compiled by a RN, which lists options for where and how to donate.
If you have the skill, consider making face masks for hospitals with shortages.

What else can we do to be helpers? Leave your ideas in the comments. 🙂

In these trying times, don't just look for the helpers. BE a helper. ♥ #COVID19pandemic Click To Tweet

How Will the Pandemic Impact Your Business? It Depends.

Notice I didn’t ask will the pandemic impact your business – I asked how.

Even if your numbers are holding steady, the lives of your employees and customers are NOT the same.

It’s important right now to consider others, be empathetic, stay calm, make plans, and communicate well.

The response you have now will determine whether your business and marketing survive – and even thrive – in the future. So, let’s respond with kindness. Let’s be at our best when the world is at its worst. We’re all in this together. 🌎♥

The Modern-Day Content Creator: What They Do & Why You Need One

March 24, 2020/11 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

Content creators are kind of a big deal.

Without content creators, the internet wouldn’t exist. 🤯

Over half of all businesses do content marketing – and ALL of those employ content creators of some kind.

That said, for brands and businesses, not just any content will do – and not just any content creator will do.

The content you publish on your website, on social media, and everywhere else needs to be purposeful, targeted, and valuable.

It must be goal-oriented. It has to be search engine optimized.

Without those essentials, your content WILL fail.

😱😱😱

So, how do you make sure you hit all the right notes with content?

You need the right content creator.

But what IS a content creator, exactly? What makes them unique as professionals in the content marketing industry?

More importantly, WHY do you need one (or a whole team of them) for your content?

(Can’t you just DIY?

Spoiler alert: NO. 🚫)

That’s precisely what we’re exploring today: What a modern-day content creator looks like, what they do, why you need one, and the 5 indispensable habits every great content creator nurtures in their work life.

Let’s explore this modern-day profession that’s gaining in importance as we deal with content overload and the difficulty of standing out from the slush pile. 💩

How do you ensure you hit all the right notes with content? 🎵 You need the right content creator. But what IS a content creator, exactly? 👩‍💻 Learn it all on the Write Blog via @JuliaEMcCoy. Click To Tweet

The Modern Content Creator: Everything You Need to Know – Table of Contents

The Definition of a Modern-Day Content Creator

What Kinds of Digital Content Do They Create?
Freelance vs. In-House vs. Agency Content Creators
The Mega-Growth of the Content Creator Role

Why Do You Need a Content Creator?

Content That Gets Results Is Tough to DIY
Crafted Content Increases Traffic to Your Site & Generates High-Quality Leads
Targeted Content Reaches Your Audience Like Nothing Else

When Do You Need a Content Creation Agency or Team?

You Need ALL of Your Content Taken Care Of
You Need Multiple Content Formats Created, Not Just Blogs

5 Key Habits of Successful Content Creators

Use Skills to Improve Skills
Stay Current on Digital Trends, Including SEO Best-Practices
Make Researching an Instinct
Clearly and Effectively Communicate Ideas and Information
Read Up on the Best Industry Content Regularly

The Definition of a Modern-Day Content Creator

For a proper description of a content creator, we need to first define “content”.

As you know, content is simply information wrapped up and presented in a shiny package. That package can be physical (such as the content within a book, newspaper, or magazine) OR digital (such as the content you’ll find on a website, blog, or social media platform).

Thus, a content creator is the person responsible for creating that information.

And, when we talk about modern-day content creators, we mean anyone who creates content for the digital, online realm of information.

In general, content creators are always aware of 3 main elements when carrying out their jobs:

The combination of the audience and platform they’re creating content for (Who are they talking to? Where will the content be published?)
The point-of-view they’re representing in the content (Who’s speaking to the audience? A brand or company? An individual?)
The main idea or topic they’re trying to explain or get across (including target keywords when relevant)

#Contentcreators are always thinking about 3 elements: 1) Their audience + platform 🎙 2) The point-of-view they're representing 📣 3) The main idea or topic they're trying to get across 📝 Click To Tweet

What Kinds of Digital Content Do They Create?

Digital content spans a wide range of media types and platforms. In general, if you can read it or view it online, then a content creator probably created it.

Here is a basic list of digital content types that content creators have a hand in:

Blogs and articles
Ebooks
Web pages (about pages, product pages, homepage copy)
Graphic design (infographics, branding, logos, and blog images)
Photos (photojournalism, Instagram posts, stock photos, and brand photography)
Social media copy (tweets, Facebook and LinkedIn posts, Instagram captions, etc.)
Videos
Email newsletters and promotional email copy

Blogs and articles 📝, web pages 💻, emails 📧, social media copy 💭, videos 📺, and more: If you can read it or view it online, then a content creator probably created it. 🔥 Click To Tweet

Freelance vs. In-House vs. Agency Content Creators

Beyond the type of content they specialize in creating, you also can distinguish content creators by the way they work. Here’s a quick rundown:

Freelance content creators are not tied to any single company or brand. Instead, they serve a wide range of clients across multiple industries. They are usually paid by the work they complete, though hourly pay isn’t uncommon. (Type and method of pay depend on the relationship between content creator and client.)

Where do they work? Freelance content creators tend to be remote workers.

In-house content creators, meanwhile, are employed by one specific company. These content creators get a salary, report to an office daily, and may work in a content marketing department (even with small teams of 1-3 people).

Where do they work? In-house content creators may work remotely, too, but a more common set-up is to work part-time in an office and part-time from home.

Content creators working for an agency represent the middle-ground between freelancers and in-house employees. They aren’t permanent staff, but they do have an investment in your content. If you work with one agency, you’ll get the same creators working on your content from project to project. This means they’ll have deeper insight and knowledge into your brand voice and guidelines than a one-off freelance hire. That consistency makes a HUGE difference in the end-product.

Where do they work? Most agencies will handle your content projects remotely. For an example of an agency workflow, check out our process at EW.

The Mega-Growth of the Content Creator Role

Content creators are more in-demand these days than ever before. 84% of marketers outsource content creation, and this area saw the biggest increase in content marketing spending over 2019.

Another startling stat: From 2018-2019, content marketing jobs skyrocketed, increasing by 112%, according to Conductor’s Inbound Marketing Job + Salary Guide.

From 2018-2019, content marketing jobs skyrocketed 🚀, increasing by 112%, according to @conductor 🤯 Click To Tweet

At the same time, the internet is exploding with content – 6 billion searches happen daily on Google, and 4.4 million blogs are published on the web.

However, much of that content isn’t worth a look, let alone a click.

If you have the ability to publish content that not only reaches your audience but also engages them and inspires them to action, you’re doing something incredible. More people are realizing the power of this kind of content, so adept content creators are high on many brands’ must-hire lists.

With that said, let’s get into some specific reasons why you may need a content creation expert on your side.

Why Do You Need a Content Creator?

1. Content That Gets Results Is Tough to DIY

Here’s the thing: Anybody can create content. Anyone can write a random, rambling blog post and hit “publish.” Anyone can tweet their random thoughts into the internet universe, post photos of their cat to Instagram, or rant on Facebook.

Purposeful, targeted content that gets results? The stuff that generates traffic, leads, and revenue? Not just anyone has the chops to pull it off.

Anyone can create random content. But purposeful, targeted, *profitable* content? The stuff that generates traffic, leads, REVENUE? 💸 You need a pro #contentcreator. 👩‍🎨 Click To Tweet

It takes hard work. It takes research, skill, knowledge, and strategy, because content creation is difficult as all get-out. 😖

Content Creation: Marketers’ Biggest Challenge

According to a recent SEMrush survey, 54% of marketers say their toughest challenge is “creating content that generates quality leads.” The second toughest challenge? “Creating content that attracts more traffic” (52%).

It goes further. The top 5 challenges marketers have all relate to content creation.

Whether it’s developing content that resonates with your target audience, improving the SEO of your content, or generating new content ideas, creation is hard to nail.

It’s not all doom-and-gloom out there, though. Guess who has all of the above moving parts down to a science? The content creator.

That’s why enlisting a pro content creator is so important.

Where did they get their acumen? There is no content creator degree out there – instead, this specialized knowledge and these content creation skills come from a unique mixture of practice and experience.

The wise creator of content seeks out learning opportunities outside of a college classroom (from content creator courses, books, podcasts, industry leaders, etc.) and looks for opportunities to hone their arsenal of tools.

That’s why you need a content creator. Because they’re uniquely equipped, and no one else can do what they can.

2. Crafted Content Increases Traffic to Your Site & Generates High-Quality Leads

A content creator is key when you need your site content to produce results. The right content – written on the right topic, to the right audience, with the right keywords and the right point-of-view + tone of voice – will do the following:

Rank better in Google
Grab more traffic from Google search (let’s not forget – the #1 result swipes 31.7% of the clicks away from the rest of the results page)

Pique people’s interest when shared on social media
Build trust with readers
Entice readers to sign up for your email list
Create followers from searchers, fans from followers, and customers from fans

If you’re tracking smart KPIs (key performance indicators), yes – all of these scenarios are probable results from amazing content.

It’s a snowball effect, and it begins with purposefully crafted and strategized content aligned to your business goals and audience.

The right content – crafted content – works miracles. Thus, the people who know how to create crafted content are the people you need on your team.

Want to learn to create crafted content? I have 5 words for you: Content Strategy & Marketing Course.

3. Targeted Content Reaches Your Audience Like Nothing Else

Targeted content – for both readers and search engines – is one of the secrets to content marketing ROI.

If you closely research your target audience plus keywords that match their search intent, THEN infuse both in your content, you have a winning combination. That type of content hits your audience in the heart and search engines in their algorithms.

The question is, do you have the knowledge, time, and skill to pull off this level of targeting?

Probably not. But a content creator does. 💡

When Do You Need a Content Creation Agency or Team?

Sometimes, one content creator isn’t enough. Sometimes, you have bigger content needs – more than one person could possibly handle. In that case, you need more powerful creation resources.

Here are the instances when investing in a content creation agency or team is a smart move:

1. You Need ALL of Your Content Taken Care Of

So, you don’t just want blogs in your content wheelhouse. You want to publish more in-depth content, too (like whitepapers or ebooks), plus specific content for your social media channels.

You also need a content creator for your website pages to improve engagement and SEO. On top of all that, you might want to start a YouTube channel but need some good video scripts, first.

Sound familiar?

If your content needs span across all of your current platforms, AND you need new content on a regular basis to score well with Google on freshness factors –

Yes. You need a dedicated content team.

2. You Need Multiple Content Formats Created, Not Just Blogs

In most cases, content creators will not be jacks-of-all-trades. Most creators will specialize in specific content formats, like emails, long-form blogs, ad copy, social media posts, case studies, or product descriptions.

That means, if you need the whole kit-and-caboodle taken care of, you need a content team to get it done.

5 Key Habits of Successful Content Creators

Now that we’ve discussed what a content creator is and why you need one, let’s get into the habits that lead to success in this line of work.

The best content creators take the time to nurture these 5 key habits. They:

1. Use Skills to Improve Skills

Good content creators constantly work on their craft.

If you’re a writer, that means you cultivate a writing habit, both in work and your personal life. When you’re not writing for clients, you’re writing for yourself and personal projects to stay sharp. You also read a TON (more on that later).

If you’re a photographer, that means you’re constantly refining your style, learning new techniques, and studying other photographers’ work that inspires you. The same goes for videographers, graphic designers, and every other type of content creator: They continually use their skills and focus on improving them.

2. Stay Current on Digital Trends, Including SEO Best-Practices

The digital realm is one of lightning-quick changes.

The popular social platform on Tuesday can be outdated by Thursday. Google can roll out major algorithm changes within 24 hours that transform the search landscape. New technology may take the world by storm over the course of a week or two.

The point is, the best content creators stay up on what’s happening. They monitor trends and keep abreast of algorithm changes and SEO best-practices. Since they create for the digital space, this is absolutely necessary to continue producing relevant content.

Source: Search Engine Journal

3. Make Researching an Instinct

Every successful content creator knows and understands the audience they’re targeting. This isn’t magic – it’s due to a combination of innate curiosity and good research.

Anybody can use Google to look up topics. The difference between everyday Googling and research lies in following links and leads down rabbit holes.

The content creators who push harder, who ask follow-up questions, who wonder “where is the original source for this statistic?”, who love picking people’s brains, who nerd out over gaining deeper insights into a topic, are the ones who create the best content.

4. Clearly and Effectively Communicate Ideas and Information

Have you ever read a blog where a tough concept was explained so clearly and accurately, the clouds parted and birds started singing because you FINALLY understood?

That’s the power of amazing content with effective, clear writing.

If you can explain a difficult concept on your audience’s level so they not only comprehend it, but totally GET it, that’s it. You win at content.

5. Read Up on the Best Industry Content Regularly

How can you stand head-and-shoulders with your peers and competitors if you have no idea what they’re up to? What will you aspire to if you don’t read the best content your industry has to offer?

Reading and digesting inspirational, educational, or aspirational content should be a regular habit for all content creators, no matter their industry or medium.

Don’t limit yourself to blogs, either. Go to the library or a bookstore. Watch the news. Listen to podcasts and audiobooks. Download ebooks, studies, and whitepapers. Read everything you can and expand your perspective in every way possible. Your content will be better for it.

5 key habits for successful #contentcreators via @JuliaEMcCoy: 1) Use skills to improve skills, 2) Stay current on digital trends, 3) Make research instinctual, 4) Communicate clearly, 5) Read obsessively 🔥🔥 Click To Tweet

Bottom Line: Content Creation Needs an Expert Touch to Succeed

Content creation is not for the faint of heart.

It’s not easy – far from it.

From the slush pile of crap content out there, you can see just how difficult it is to stand out and make an impact.

Luckily, the role of content creator exists. There are people out there who can craft not just amazing content, but content that gets tangible results.

You now know what these people look like, what they do, and the habits they form to grow in their profession.

Whether you aspire to be a great content creator or are considering hiring one, you know their worth. With that knowledge, go forth and conquer. 🏰

Why Does Content Work? Plus, 39 Reasons You Should Invest in Content

March 6, 2020/10 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

You’ve heard content being praised time and time again by marketers.

(Myself included.)

But, why does content work?

In today’s shifting business world, they say, content marketing is the way to go.

It beats paid ads and other forms of traditional marketing by a long shot.

(90% of consumers find custom content useful. Compare this to Facebook ad ROA, which sits at .66x. What kind of content works? Educational, useful, blog content. 3 out of 4 of internet users read blogs regularly.)

We know content works.

And although you believe what the experts are saying, you wonder: why?

Why does content work? What’s the science behind it? Should you start your own content marketing campaign?

Let’s dig into the data to find out!

Why Does Content Work? Plus, 39 Reasons You Should Invest in Content – Table of Contents

What Kind of Content Works?

1. Content with a Strategy

2. High-Quality Content

3. Consistent Content

Why Does Content Work? 40 Reasons to Invest in Content Marketing

Does Content Work? How to Move Forward with Your Marketing Goals

Why does content work? What’s the science behind it? 👩‍🔬 Should you start your own content marketing campaign? Dig into the data with @JuliaEMcCoy via the Write Blog 🔎 Click To Tweet

What Kind of Content Works?

Before we dive into why content marketing works, it’s important to point out that not all content works.

You can’t just get on your keyboard and type up a frenzy of random blogs to publish online. Doing this is a waste of time, energy, and even money.

So, what kind of content should you be producing? Here are three things to aim for.

1. Content with a Strategy

Approaching content marketing without content strategy is like going on a trip without a destination.

No matter how many miles you travel, you’ll never reach your goal because you don’t know exactly what your goal is.

To keep your content from going in circles, you need to develop a content strategy.

This is your master plan and blueprint. It’ll guide you on what type of content to create, the target audience to create it for, where to publish it and how often, and all the details that’ll make your content unique, purposeful, and powerful.

2. High-Quality Content

When publishing content, remember that quality trumps quantity every single time.

And when I say quality, it’s not just making sure your blogs are free of grammatical errors.

It’s superb content. Share-worthy content. Content that gets your audience hooked.

So, if you’re tempted to click publish on the mediocre blog you wrote, just stop. Publishing a day or two late is better than damaging your online authority with low-quality content.

3. Consistent Content

That being said, try your best to stick to a regular schedule.

Your readers will lose interest if you publish content randomly and inconsistently.

If you’re having trouble writing everything yourself, hiring an awesome content writer is a promising and profitable step.

What kind of content should you be producing? 3 things to aim for: 1) Content with a strategy 🗺 2) High-quality content 💯 3) Consistent content ⌚ Click To Tweet

Why Does Content Work? 40 Reasons to Invest in Content Marketing

Let’s start with exactly why content works, then explore statistics that’ll get you excited about content marketing.

1. Why Does Content Work?

Content works because of what the buyer’s journey is like today.

Buyers nowadays can’t be bullied into an old-fashioned sales funnel.

They don’t like feeling “sold,” or “closed.”

Instead, they want to feel powerful. They want to be in control during every step they take towards the solution they’re looking for.

So no, you can’t put your audience into a rigid, linear sales funnel.

What you can do is offer them value.

For instance, let’s say your potential client wants to feel attractive and confident with a flashy white smile.

If you’re selling teeth whitening products, you can do two things:

Bombard your prospect with paid ads, or
Teach your prospect how to whiten his teeth through quality content.

As you’ve guessed, your prospect will respond positively to your brand if you choose the second option.

He’ll see you as an authority in your industry. He’ll trust you. He’ll consider your expert advice and feel attracted to your product.

That’s how content marketing works.

Buyers nowadays can’t be bullied into an old-fashioned sales funnel. 📜 They don’t like feeling sold or closed. Instead, they want to feel powerful. 💪 Click To Tweet

2. Your Audience is Constantly Online

In the U.S. alone, 81% of people go online on a daily basis. Of this number, 28% are online constantly, and 45% go online more than once a day.

3. The Number of Internet Users is Growing Each Year

Today, there are 4.54 billion internet users worldwide. That’s more than half the total population of the world!

4. There Are Six Billion Searches on Google Per Day

That’s 230 million searches every hour, and two trillion searches per year.

5. Google Is the Number One Place People Go When Searching for a New Product or Brand

Every single day, hundreds of millions of people go to Google to perform shopping-related searches.

6. People Are Spending More and More Time on the Internet

Source: thenextweb.com

The Philippines leads the pack on total time spent on the internet with a whopping nine hours and forty-five minutes per day. Worldwide, it’s six hours and forty-three minutes per day (the same number with the U.S.).

7. 90% of B2B Marketers Use Content as Part of Their Strategy

The brands using content for marketing aren’t all small. In fact, hugely successful brands like Toshiba, Cisco, and Marriott all take advantage of content marketing.

8. A Huge Chunk of Marketers are Investing in Content Marketing

It’s not just B2B marketers, it’s B2C marketers as well. 70% of all marketers now invest in content marketing.

9. 3/4 of All People Who Use the Internet Read Blogs Regularly

That’s 3.4 billion people who’d potentially be interested in reading content you publish.

10. 55% of Marketers say Blogging is a Top Inbound Marketing Priority

While outbound marketing pushes your messages at people who aren’t interested in your brand, inbound marketing works like a magnet. It draws in prospects who are actively looking for your product or service.

Since more than half of marketers consider blogging a top inbound marketing priority, why not jump in?

11. If You Increase Your Blog Posts by 100%, You’ll Get a 300% Increase in Traffic

Let’s say you have 100 blogs and 2,000 daily visitors. If you increase the number of blogs on your website to 200, you’ll get a total of 6,000 daily visitors.

12. Companies with More than 400 Blog Posts Enjoy Three Times more Leads than Companies with Fewer than 100 Blog Posts

Consistent blogging with quality content and keywords improves your SERP ranking and brings in more leads. It also alerts Google’s web crawlers to your site and keeps your readers entertained and engaged.

13. Companies that Publish 16 or More Blog Posts Per Month Enjoy 3.5x More Traffic than Companies that Publish Less than Four Times a Month

If your goal is to increase organic traffic, publish as much optimized content as you can (sticking to amazing quality, of course).

If your goal is brand awareness, keep your content diverse, valuable, and useful while sticking to a consistent publishing schedule.

14. 70 Million New Blog Posts Appear on WordPress Blogs Every Month

These blog posts generate around 77 million comments from 409 million monthly internet users.

And that’s just WordPress! An alternative is Tumblr, which has 450 million blogs.

15. Longer Blog Posts Get More Shares

Blog posts above 3,000 words get the most online shares.

Source: neilpatel.com

16. Marketers Who Use Blogging as a Strategy are 13x More Likely to Enjoy Satisfying ROI

Blogging as a part of your overall strategy will drive more ROI – by an amazing 13x!

17. 40% of Your Traffic is Driven by Only 10% of Your Blogs

Not every one of your blogs helps generate traffic. If you can focus on what’s right in the blogs that fall within the 10% that bring in quality traffic, your website will quickly become a success.

18. 64% of B2B Marketers Outsource Their Blogging

Blogging consistently is tough, which is why it’s a great idea to invest in hiring skilled expert writers to create content for you.

19. Users Share Content They’re Impressed With

As an example, take this infographic from Demand Metric. It got 7, 937 shares and 452 pins.

20. 72% of Marketers Say Content Increases Engagement with Prospects

Successful content educates, entertains, and helps prospects gain their needs and desires. The more value they get from content, the deeper the connection they feel with a brand.

72% of marketers say content increases engagement with prospects, via @optinmonster. That's because successful content educates, entertains, and helps prospects gain their needs and desires. 🌟 Click To Tweet

21. 72% of Marketers Also Report Content Marketing Has Increased Leads

Content marketing, done consistently and with quality and a user-focus at heart, equals more leads. See our case study on ranking through content.

22. 61% of Buyers Are More Likely to Purchase from a Brand after Reading its Unique Content

In fact, prospects read 3 to 5 blogs before approaching a company’s sales personnel. Create more blogs, brands! You may not have to “sell” as hard.

Prospects read 3 to 5 blogs before approaching a company’s sales personnel. 👩‍💻 Create more blogs, brands! ✏ You may not have to sell as hard. Click To Tweet

23. 34% of Consumers Will Make an Unplanned Purchase When They Read Personalized Content from a Brand

Personalized content is content that’s created around specific needs, beliefs, and desires. It also addresses a prospect based on where he is on the buyer’s journey.

Personalized content is extremely effective. In fact…

24. …90% of Consumers Appreciate Personalized Content

Creating generic content is one of the biggest reasons brands don’t get conversions.

25. Traditional Advertising Is No Longer Working Like It Used To

Direct mail and TV advertisements used to work wonders for brands. Today, they’re largely ignored.

Source: demandmetric.com

One of the major reasons content works: Direct mail and TV ads are largely ignored today. Gaining trust is more important than grabbing attention. ✅ Click To Tweet

26. Although Online Advertising is More Successful than Offline Advertising, Businesses Using Paid Advertising Are Struggling Because of Ad Blockers

Globally, 47% of people use ad blockers.

27. $35 Billion Worth of Paid Ads is Lost Every Year Because People No Longer See Ads

Users cite diverse reasons for using ad blockers. Some say they don’t want to be annoyed with irrelevant ads. Others say ads drain the battery life of their phones.

The result is a huge loss per year on money spent for paid ads.

28. Ad Blockers Will Soon Include Paid Video Ads

The Chromium Blog recently announced that it will soon remove disruptive ads from videos to ensure Google Chrome users enjoy a better online experience.

These ads include non-skippable ads that play before video content, mid-roll ads that interrupt a viewer’s enjoyment of content, and ads that partially block a video.

29. Branded Video Content is Becoming the Powerful Alternative to Paid Video Ads

In fact, 87% of content marketers use video for marketing.

30. Video Content in Emails Can Channel Traffic to Your Website

When you create compelling video and add it to your email content, you’ll increase your click-through rate by 300%.

31. Video Content about Products Increases Purchase Intent by 144%…

32. …Which is Why Video Content is the Number One Form of Content Used by Content Marketers

Source: Source: hubspot.com

33. Of All the Content Activities Online, 90% is Spent on Video

Check out this graph from Hootsuite that shows what’s going on with video content consumption.

source: blog.hootsuite.com

34. An Attractive Website with Unique Content Will Increase Your Chances of Getting Recommendations from Users

On the other hand, an unattractive website will turn people away. 57% of internet users say they won’t recommend a brand that gave them a bad user experience online.

35. Email Content Helps with Customer Retention

91% of shoppers who buy from a brand say they want to hear from the company via email.

36. No, Email is Not Dying

Think social media is for the young and email is for the older generation?

Nope.

Actually, 73% of millennials say they want to read email content from brands.

73% of millennials say they want to read email content from brands, via @hubspot. Email is not dying! 📧♥ Click To Tweet

37. Content Marketing is Cheaper than Paid Advertising

Even if you pay for content creation, you’ll still save up to 62% compared to paying for ads.

Source: demandmetric.com

38. But, Although It’s Cheaper than Paid Ads, Content Marketing is More Effective

For the same amount you pay for ads, you can get 3x more leads when you do content marketing.

Source: demandmetric.com

39. The Number of People Listening to Podcast Content is Growing

If you don’t have a podcast yet, here’s great incentive to start one. Podcast listening has grown by 200%!

Also, Google recently announced its intention to index podcast content. This means your podcasts can turn up in the search engine results, leading users to your blog or website.

40. B2B Marketers Are Becoming More Successful in Content Marketing

Source: contentmarketinginstitute.com

A majority of B2B marketers rate their content marketing success higher today than one year ago, via @contentmarketinginstitute. Content works because we're FINALLY figuring out how to do it successfully. 🎉🎉🎉 Click To Tweet

Why Does Content Work? 39 Reasons to Invest in Content from Julia McCoy

Does Content Work? How to Move Forward with Your Marketing Goals

There’s a huge chasm between marketing the way it was 50 years ago and marketing today.

Today, buyers are in control. They make the rules, and oftentimes break them. Their resistance to the traditional sales funnel is sky high.

So, does content work to break down your prospect’s walls? Absolutely. Content works because instead of asking, you’re giving. Instead of pushing advertisements into people’s faces, you’re building value-rich material and attracting people to your brand.

Want to get premium content that maximizes growth for your brand? Visit our content shop to learn more.

The 9 Most Useful Content Marketing Services You Need to Get This Year

February 18, 2020/15 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

This year, content marketing is a non-optional activity for any brand that wants to be successful.

Facts: 84% of consumers now expect brands to create content.

And if you think you can just get in front of them with ads… think again.

Today, 80% of users ignore sponsored search results in Google.

Organic is where you’ll win.

However, if you’re thinking about content marketing services (such as hiring an agency to manage your content marketing campaign from start to finish — something we don’t do, we only write great content) — it can be a little overwhelming trying to figure out what services to choose, and from whom. Should you go with strategic content services from a digital marketing agency? Or should you go with content development and marketing services from a creative agency?

Or should you just go renegade and do it all yourself?

You have a lot of options, so I’ve put this guide of the most quintessential content marketing services that you need. It’s got advice for whichever route you choose, so if you’re going to take that dive (and you absolutely should!) … start here.

Thinking about content marketing services? 🤔 It's overwhelming figuring out what to choose. 💻 ...Or should you just go renegade? 👩‍🎤 Learn everything you need to know in this guide on the Write Blog. Click To Tweet

A Quick Guide: Content Marketing Services You Need This Year – Table of Contents

What Goes Into Content Marketing?

9 Content Marketing Services You Need to Grow Your Brand in 2020 and Beyond

1. A Rock-Solid Content Strategy

2. The Creation of Mind-Blowing Content

3. Frank, Thoughtful Video Creation

4. Captivating Infographics & Visual Assets

5. A Kicka$$ WordPress Site

6. Flawlessly Branded Social Media

7. Next-Level Email Marketing

8. A Fresh, Modern Maintenance Routine

9. The Right Tools to Measure Success

So, Exactly What Does Content Marketing Entail?

If you asked me to pick the top 10 buzzwords in the online writing industry, content marketing would definitely be near the top of the list.

It’s difficult to tell when the term content marketing first came around. It appears in a few marketing textbooks (available on Google Books) from the late 1990s, but internet results all seem to indicate that digital marketers first adopted the term in the mid-2000s.

Now, it’s everywhere. But what does it mean?

In short, content marketing is the strategic planning, creation, and distribution of content to engage audiences and drive revenue. (CMI wrote a wonderful guide on it that’s worth reading.)

In 2020, content marketing is all but a necessity for any company looking to market itself effectively. Consumers were fed up with in-your-face advertising and slimy sales tactics a LONG time ago.

In contrast, content marketing takes a different approach. It emphasizes the delivery of engaging, helpful, useful content to audiences rather than convincing them outright to buy a service.

It’s helpful to think of content marketing like a chain-reaction. Each step builds on the previous to create a working system to build an audience and generate leads. In general, you’ll see six steps:

Strategy: Content strategy is the foundation of content marketing. It’s your road map and blueprint to build your content engine.
Creation: Content marketing relies on the creation of superb content that’s been developed with your audience’s needs and the customer journey in mind.
Optimization: With optimization, it’s time to get technical. Here, you make sure that search engines see you, your site works on mobile, and all the details are perfect.
Distribution: Also called promotion in some resources, this is the release of your content on platforms like your blog or social media.
Maintenance: Keeping the momentum going is important. In the maintenance stage, you apply the sensibilities of marketing to keep your content and presence fresh.
Metrics: In 2020, everything is data-driven. To maximize success, you need to know how your content is performing.

It’s helpful to think of content marketing like a chain-reaction. ⛓ Each step builds on the previous, leading to growth. 📈 There are 6 steps: 1) Strategy 2) Creation 3) Optimization 4) Distribution 5) Maintenance 6) Metrics 📋 Click To Tweet

Content marketing involves a lot! It’s no surprise that 84% of companies outsource at least one of those elements (usually content creation) – even if they have a dedicated content marketing team (which according to CMI, most do).

So, what all goes into content marketing? Here are nine content marketing services you should absolutely consider if you want to grow your brand this year.

9 Content Marketing Services You Need to Grow Your Brand

This year, you’ve got abundant options for content marketing services and packages. As the marketing approach finally goes mainstream, there’s no shortage of agencies and independents offering tricks, tools, and services.

However, not all content marketing services are created equal. It takes a discerning eye to decide which option is best for you.

If you’re looking around and feeling overwhelmed, I totally feel you! It’s a big, big world.

Here’s a guide to the top nine services for content development and marketing that you definitely should consider this year.

1. A Rock-Solid Content Strategy

First and foremost, don’t go anywhere without a road map! Content strategy is the framework for your content marketing. It’s what will inform things like what content you create and where you’ll distribute it.

In many ways, developing your content strategy is front-loading your content marketing. With a solid content strategy as your foundation, you’re already halfway to a comprehensive content marketing engine.

Strongly consider documenting your overarching strategy. According to CMI’s 2020 B2B Content Marketing Report, only 41% of surveyed businesses had one – but that included a whopping two-thirds of the most successful businesses who reported. Likewise, only 16% of the least well-performing companies surveyed had a content strategy that was written down.

Many marketing agencies and even freelance writers offer content strategy. When shopping for a service, make sure that it’s got a few quintessential items:

Trending topics research: Don’t let your content strategist rely on what’s already on your site! A good one takes the initiative by researching topics in your industry.
SEO or keyword research and analysis: SEO remains a backbone of content development, even if emphasis lies on delivering good exceptional content.
Brand awareness: At the end of the day, content strategy is still about promoting your brand. Choose a strategist who can effectively reflect this in the content plan and creation.
Content planning: A list of titles and some keywords isn’t enough! Look for strategic content services that deliver a comprehensive plan for creating, publishing, and maintaining your content (like using an editorial calendar).

Don’t move forward without a road map! 🗺 Content strategy is the framework for your content marketing. 🏗 It’s what informs the content you create and where you’ll distribute it. Click To Tweet

2. The Creation of Mind-Blowing Content

You can have the best strategy and the best delivery but if your content falls flat? No bueno.

What does it mean to have MIND-BLOWING content in 2020? It’s:

Authoritative: You know what you’re talking about and it shows.
Results-driven: Either furthering a reader along the customer journey or solving a problem for a reader (no strings attached).
Beyond well done: It’s well-written, well-designed, and all-around a tantalizing piece of content that causes readers to crave more.

This is where your chosen agency’s portfolio and website come in handy. It’s a smart idea to work with one agency (or team) to centralize your content marketing. (CMI reports that 44% of the most successful companies do this, compared to just 14% of the least successful companies).

Likely, that agency already has writers or other content creators on hand. One of the advantages of this route is that those creators are already vetted and will deliver quality.

Of course, if you’re building your internal team, the same advice applies. Take a look through the individual’s portfolio and see if their work is authoritative, results-driven, and beyond well done.

One word of warning: You get what you pay for when it comes to content writing. While it might be tempting to go for cheap services or packages, content marketing is a skill that frequently demands a premium. The smart move is to hire the quality content services agency the first time around.

You get what you pay for with content writing. 💰 While it might be tempting to go for cheap services, content marketing is a skill that frequently demands a premium. [email protected] on THE essential content marketing services🎯 Click To Tweet

Pro Tip: Do You Have a Blog? You Need One.

Spend enough time online and you’ll come across all sorts of innovative, novel content ideas. However, none of them have remained such a staple in the internet realm as blogging.

The first blog was created in 1994. 20-something years later, blogs remain the number one way readers access information. Yet, it’s still routinely underestimated. That’s an amateurish mistake that can cost you.

According to CMI’s report, 89% of companies’ content marketing efforts involved publishing blogs. And HubSpot has found that marketers who prioritize blogging in their content marketing are 13 times more likely to see a positive ROI.

Do you have a blog chock full of authoritative, well-researched, in-depth posts? If not, you need to get on that right now.

3. Frank, Thoughtful Video Creation

One of the biggest content marketing trends this year is video – and I’m not the only one saying that!

According to HubSpot, 54% of consumers want more video content. According to OptinMonster, videos generate two-thirds more qualified leads than other forms of media.

However, it’s not enough to simply create enthralling video content. Sure, it’s easier to consume – especially on the go. Instead, video became popular as a branding tool for another reason entirely:

Audiences perceive video content as an authentic, raw glimpse into a brand.

Pictures can be doctored. Statistics can be manipulated. And of course, anyone can say anything on the web.

Video, on the other hand, comes with the natural perception that it’s real. According to Convince and Convert, at least 40% of viewers regard video as more credible than other forms of content – even if they’re obviously ads. When developing brand authenticity is crucial to success, that’s too valuable to pass up.

Think about how your brand incorporates video. You want it.

4. Captivating Infographics & Visual Assets

Infographics are awesome. They’re one of the best eyeball traps out there because they harness our innate curiosity – especially if you’re a data junkie like me.

Although video content has become the new darling of the content world, visual assets still play a major role in content marketing.

According to CMI, at least 65% of content marketers use infographics to convey information. Likewise, according to marketing researcher Demand Gen Reports, infographics not only increase traffic to a site by 12% but also assist significantly with information retainment.

Although great copy absolutely matters, visuals have a few advantages that text doesn’t. These include:

Most people (65%) are visual learners, and infographics cater to them.
Infographics are easier to share on social media (which might be why they increase traffic).
They can deliver a LOAD of information very quickly.
Through careful design, color, and content curation, they can reinforce branding.

As I said, infographics are awesome. Use them.

Great copy absolutely matters, but visuals have a few advantages: 1) Most people are visual learners. 📷 2) Infographics are easier to share. 🔁 3) They deliver TONS of info quickly. 🚀 4) They reinforce your branding. 💯 Click To Tweet

(Want to take it up a notch? Use infographic videos for extra WOW.)

One of the world’s first infographics. It was published in 1821 and depicts the history of wheat prices. It even came in color! Source: Gizmodo.

5. A Kicka$$ WordPress Site

Did you know that WordPress powers 35% of the web? There’s a really good reason for that.

WordPress has everything you need to launch a full-fledged professional web presence in a single afternoon.

But how does having a WordPress site relate to content marketing? Simple. At a minimum, to support your content marketing efforts, you need:

A blog.
Landing pages.
Static pages with thoughtful copy for products or services.
A contact form or e-commerce site to funnel all those warm, happy leads.

WordPress makes setting up each of those easy. However, WordPress is also awesome because you can do other things with it, too. For instance, you can support content marketing with:

Membership portals and communities.
Comments and discussions on your blog posts (⬅ great for conversational marketing!).
Integration with social media accounts.
Advanced SEO tools and metrics plugins.

Most guides that talk about content marketing emphasize the planning, creation, and distribution of content. I’d like to advance the idea that there’s an infrastructural element to content marketing, too.

You need a great business website.

WordPress has many powerful tools, like Yoast SEO, which can enhance your content marketing efforts.

6. Flawlessly Branded Social Media

Does your business have a social media account? If you’re like most businesses, you’ve got somewhere between four and 10 of them (according to Hootsuite).

Social media remained the number one channel for content marketers in 2019, according to CMI, and that’s not going to change. Almost every business (95%) surveyed in their 2020 report indicated that their social media was a quintessential element of their content marketing.

If you’ve been struggling to keep up with social media, it’s time to get on that. There are two things you can do:

Concentrate your social media presence: It’s better to consistently distribute content on just a couple of platforms than posting sporadically on several. Close those unused accounts.
Bring a dedicated social media manager on board: There should be someone on your content marketing team that manages social media. Or, the agency you select should offer management packages.

Need a refresher on how to rock social media like a boss? Check out this guide.

7. Next-Level Email Marketing

It seems like blogging’s been around forever, but email has been around for a lot longer (1971!).

It’s still a valuable distribution channel that isn’t going away any time soon. According to CMI’s report, 89% of businesses used email campaigns to warm leads and keep readers informed. When done right, email marketing has an ROI of $44 for every dollar spent.

Email is a vital piece of content marketing. According to CMI’s 2020 report, 89% of businesses used email campaigns to warm leads and keep readers informed. 📧❤ When done right, email marketing has an ROI of $44 for every dollar spent. 🤩 Click To Tweet

Definitely include email marketing in your content marketing but be smart about it. I recommend the 3:1 Rule, which I consider a Golden Ratio of email marketing:

For every sales-focused email, send three value-focused emails first.

What are value-focused emails? They’re emails that provide your readers with informative, useful, helpful content WITHOUT (!) pitching sales.

Whether that means providing exclusive resources like white papers or ebooks or linking them to your latest (or best) articles, view email marketing as yet another way to deliver value to your readers.

Remember, 91% of customers want to receive emails from brands they like. So, get started right now leveraging that to create a rich conversation with them about your brand.

8. A Fresh, Modern Maintenance Routine

Content marketing relies on consistently providing fresh, useful content to readers. Many people assume this means unique, new content that hasn’t been posted yet.

That isn’t always true.

Having stale, outdated, or worse – inaccurate – content on your site can hurt you worse than having no content at all. One of the things that Google looks at when determining page rank is timeliness.

Content maintenance is, therefore, an important element of content marketing. It’s the process of going through a site and identifying:

Poorly performing content: These pieces need to be updated or removed.
Old, outdated content: Maybe something was accurate once and times (or tech) have changed. Update these pieces or remove them.
Content that was hit by an algorithm update: Many people saw this with the release of Google BERT in October. This update changed the way search engines interpreted certain keywords, which caused some businesses to drop in rank as their content was no longer as relevant.
Content that once performed well but no longer does: Since timeliness matters, refreshing these pages can return them to their former glory.
Content that’s no longer relevant to the company: Brands pivot all the time. Don’t muddle your rebranding attempts by retaining a semblance of your old identity.

Google loves fresh content, but that content doesn’t need to be totally unique. Perform content maintenance on a regular schedule and keep your entire site fresh.

9. The Right Tools to Measure Success

Finally, CMI’s 2020 report had an especially fascinating insight into something that the top content marketing performers do that mid-ranked and least well-performing brands don’t…

They use metrics.

According to the report, 95% of the top performers used metrics and data to make informed decisions regarding their content marketing. That was compared to only 62% of the least successful companies in the survey.

Further, 83% of the top performers used KPIs to measure their content’s success – compared to just 30% by the other group.

The key takeaway from these numbers is painfully obvious: use metrics.

What metrics? That depends. Everyone tracks ROI, conversion rates, and page views. However, that might not always be right for you.

For example, if your pages typically contain in-depth, long-form content, consider tracking scroll depth.

Likewise, if you’re pursuing a conversational marketing approach in your content marketing, track things like comments, conversations with your chatbots, and backlinks.

There’s a whole world of content marketing metrics, KPIs, and tools out there. Follow the lead of the successful and implement them ASAP.

The final piece of content marketing you need? The right tools to measure those all-important metrics. 📏 Of course, the metrics YOU track will be personal to your goals and content. 💕🔥 More on the Write Blog ➡ Click To Tweet

Build a Strong Content Marketing Plan With Express Writers

Phew – that was a lot! Hopefully, this comprehensive list of content marketing services has left you feeling a little more inspired at all the possibilities that are within your reach.

Your next step is to figure out how you’re going to secure these services. Marketing agency? Internal team? DIY…?

How about a leading content marketing specialist with top content quality creators already secured? When you partner with Express Writers, we make content strategy (and marketing!) easy – while delivering beautifully designed content written by rock star expert copywriters to boot.

Don’t wait! Take that dive. Get started with your best content marketing plan ever. Talk to us today.

How to Set Up Your SaaS Content Marketing Strategy: 6 Steps to Success

February 11, 2020/5 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

Do you have a SaaS business?

Are you publishing content as a way to bring in and nurture potential customers? 🚪⬅️

If so, you need a SaaS content marketing strategy.

To put it bluntly, content without a strategy is akin to a house without a foundation, support beams, walls, or a roof.

Instead of welcoming a constant flux of eager visitors to your beautiful abode, you’ll just be sitting alone on a pile of bricks.

The strategy gives your SaaS content marketing a purpose, structure, goals, and a strong foundation to build on.

Without it, you’ll flounder with content. You won’t nurture leads – you’ll lose them. 💀

The ONLY way to start seeing exponential, compounding online growth with SaaS content marketing is to outline your content strategy plan, fill in the blanks, and follow it to the letter.

Don’t believe me yet? Let’s look at the difference between content created & published without a strategy vs. WITH a strategy.

How to Build a SaaS Content Marketing Strategy: Table of Contents

Content Marketing with and Without a Strategy: What’s the Difference?

2 Years in, Without a Content Marketing Strategy

What Happens with a Content Strategy in Place?

What Do You Need for Successful SaaS Content Marketing? 6 Key, Strategic Pillars

1. Know the Base Levels of SaaS Content Strategy: Define Topic Areas, Goals, & More

Goals and Content Mission
Topic Area(s) of Focus
Content Differentiation Factor

2. Get to Know Your Audience for Solid SaaS Content Marketing

Find Your Ideal Target Buyer
Research, Research, Research
Know Your Customers’ Common Buying Journeys

3. Integrate SEO

Research Long-Tail Keywords and Connected Topics
Optimize Your Content

4. Build Your Content House

5. Understand How to Create Content for SaaS Marketing

Fill Your Audience’s Knowledge Gaps
Write to Engage
Kill the Fluff

6. Track, Measure, Update, & Maintain

Track and Measure
Update and Maintain

Your SaaS Content Marketing Strategy Is Covered

With all the offers out there, how can you make sure that your SaaS company and product stand out? 🦩 @JuliaEMcCoy tells how and why you should make SaaS content marketing strategy right now 🐱‍👤 Click To Tweet

Content Marketing with and Without a Strategy: What’s the Difference?

At Express Writers, we’re not selling SaaS, but our content plays the same roles as it would for a SaaS business: building audience trust in our brand, showing our expertise, and nurturing traffic and leads.

Unfortunately, without a content marketing strategy, our content didn’t have the impact we hoped it would. We weren’t meeting our goals at the beginning.

2 Years in, Without a Content Marketing Strategy

With 215 blogs published, we were only ranking for 141 keywords
Our monthly gross income never topped $29K
At most, we saw 500 visitors a day

On top of these lackluster numbers, I was suffering, too.

Hustling every day but not seeing any rewards (because I was misdirecting my energy)
Stressed and scrounging for leads
Working constantly to make ends meet

Then, in September 2016, I finally built and implemented a content marketing strategy.

What happened next?

What Happens with a Content Strategy in Place?

Life was never the same after our content marketing strategy hit the ground running.

A few months after executing the strategy, we hit our first, landmark $71K income month.
Our ranking keywords shot up from 3,900 to 6,000.

It didn’t stop there.

Within roughly one year, we were hitting records every month – January 2018 saw us hit our first-ever $120K income month.
We were ranking for over 12,800 keywords
My blogs were getting the highest number of shares I’d ever seen.
EW ranked #1 for hot keywords (e.g. “content writing outsourcing”)

Today, we’re still blowing our old records out of the water.

99% of our clients come to us from our content marketing
We rank for over 24,000 keywords in Google
We’ve earned over $4.5 million in agency sales
We see 90,000 to 100,000 organic visitors every month

As you can see, no content strategy = 💀🛑😖👎

If you say YES to a content strategy, however…

🌟🥂✔🥳

It’s true for SaaS and non-SaaS industries alike that invest in content.

For those of you tuning in from a SaaS background, stay with me. We’re about to get into how to build your SaaS content marketing strategy.

Do you need a SaaS content marketing strategy? 🤔 Don't think twice. @JuliaEMcCoy shows the HUGE difference in ROI between having none vs. using a well-planned strategy for @ExpWriters. Click To Tweet

What Do You Need for Successful SaaS Content Marketing? 6 Key, Strategic Pillars

So, you need a SaaS content marketing strategy.

That means it’s time to learn how to do SaaS marketing the right way.

The best SaaS marketing campaigns use these 6 pillars. They form the foundation for a working content marketing platform for your business.

1. Know the Base Levels of SaaS Content Strategy: Define Topic Areas, Goals, & More

Your SaaS content marketing plan needs a few basic factors defined before you can get into the nitty-gritty of audience research or content creation.

Goals and Content Mission

First, what is your main goal for your content marketing initiative? What do you hope to achieve? How will you build relationships with customers through content?

Outline the answers to those questions two ways:

As an overarching mission for your SaaS content marketing. Phrase it the way you would phrase your broad business mission and goals. The two should be tied together and complement each other!
Focused goals with measurable outcomes in the form of KPIs (key performance indicators). For example, Content Marketing Institute offers some solid KPIs tied to common goals for content marketing:
- Create brand awareness – Track and measure social shares
- Drive more traffic to your website or blog – Track total website visits monthly, the percentage of return visitors, or the time on site where the visitor was actively engaged
- Generate leads – Track the number of leads each piece of content earned, or track conversion rates for your landing pages
- Improve customer retention – Track percentage of repeat customers

Topic Area(s) of Focus

Defining your SaaS content marketing topic areas may seem straightforward, but it’s more complicated than simply copying-and-pasting your general industry niche.

For example, perhaps you sell creative software that helps customers edit and tweak photos. Your topic area might be “graphic design,” but it doesn’t end there. You also should define the intersection between your expertise AND what your audience wants to read.

Does your audience want to read blogs about graphic design principles? Or would they be more interested in guides that help them retouch family photos?

There’s a huge difference between these types of content and who they’ll interest. To get at the exact right topic area of focus for your SaaS, take your audience into consideration as well as what you can write about with authority (more on that in point #2).

Content Differentiation Factor

Another important point to define in your content strategy is your content differentiation factor.

This is the fresh spin you’ll put on your content. It’s the unique angle that will make your pieces stand out from the millions of others on the web.

In other words, how will you help your audience with content differently or better than your competitors?

For more depth on these topics, I teach an intensive course, the Content Strategy & Marketing Course, that will take you through these concepts step-by-step.

2. Get to Know Your Audience for Solid SaaS Content Marketing

It turns out your audience is the lynchpin in this whole content marketing thing. If you “get” your audience on a deep level, you’re going places.

Find Your Ideal Target Buyer

Who is the main type of person who needs, wants, and will use the heck out of your software to improve their life? Describe this avatar all the way down to their hobbies and likes/dislikes.

Research, Research, Research

Interview real people who might fit your target buyer persona. Collect data with surveys and questionnaires. Do social listening, poke around on Reddit and Quora, mine tools like Facebook Audience Insights and Survey Monkey, and record everything you discover.

Image: Facebook

Know Your Customers’ Common Buying Journeys

(You’ll find this out doing research.) Meet them at each stage with tailored, useful content that helps them move closer to trust and/or a sale.

Getting to know your audience is one of the most important steps of creating and executing B2B SaaS content. Without audience knowledge and understanding, you will not publish targeted content that earns results and ROI.

Instead, your content will die a slow death in obscurity. 😬 Yikes.

3. Integrate SEO

Defining your audience helps you write targeted content that speaks to their needs and engages, but using SEO is how that content gets discovered.

Without proper content optimization for search engines, your traffic numbers will be much, much lower. You’ll draw in fewer people who are already interested in what you have to say.

Creating online content MUST include search engine optimization, otherwise, you’ll miss out on the whopping 70.6% of browsing sessions that begin with a search.

SEO is about NOT missing out on this giant source of traffic. Furthermore, it’s not about drawing in any web visitor you can, but rather about targeting only those who have the potential to buy what you’re selling. Targeted, interested traffic >> random traffic.

Research Long-Tail Keywords and Connected Topics

At the bottom of the SEO for your B2B, SaaS content should be long-tail keywords tied to engaging, useful topics in your area of expertise.

The only way to find these is through keyword research using paid tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, KWFinder, or Moz Keyword Explorer.

It’s not as simple as plugging an industry term into a tool and using whatever it spits out, though. You need to be intentional about looking up keyword data and analyzing the results.

Your content strategy should outline a keyword research workflow, including:

Which tools you’ll invest in and budget for
How often you’ll look for profitable keywords
Which metrics you’ll prioritize in the keywords you target
Identifying the search intent of keywords
After you land on a keyword, doing topic research to discover subjects that will most appeal to your audience

Optimize Your Content

Once you have the topic and corresponding keywords for a content piece laid out, you need a process for optimizing that content for search.

What content writing standards will you set for formatting, headers, and links?
Will you use any tools or apps to check SEO?
Will you hire out SEO? What will the budget be?

Once your SEO plan is in place as part of your SaaS content strategy, you can move on to establishing your content house – the platform you’ll use to publish and promote content, not to mention build your brand presence.

4. Build Your Content House

Where will the majority of your content live? When you promote your content on social media, where will your links point? When people link to you, what domain will they associate with your name?

This is your content house, the hub of your content activity and your main focus for publishing.

For an example of a SaaS brand with an established, trusted content house, let’s look at the SEMrush blog.

This is SEMrush’s main platform for publishing content. It includes blogs, webinars, podcasts, and ebooks:

It’s housed on their own domain (not on a proprietary platform).

Since SEMrush is in total control of what does (and doesn’t) appear on their site, they can focus on building trust with readers and converting them. On proprietary platforms (where your content is ultimately controlled by a third party like Facebook or Instagram), you have far less influence – the focus is always on the larger platform because that suits their agenda.

For instance, SEMrush wouldn’t be able to promote their 24-hour online conference in such a noticeable way anywhere else but their own site:

This is exactly why your SaaS content marketing strategy should focus on your owned domain as the hub of activity. All other channels (guest blogs, social media, etc.) should come second.

Of course, building your content house requires populating your pages with content consistently. To this end, part of your strategy should include determining when and how often you’ll post, and what types of content you’ll prioritize.

5. Understand How to Create Content for SaaS Marketing

SaaS content writing is unique. It’s arguably the most important piece of a SaaS content marketing strategy.

That’s because, generally, you’re dealing with a tech-focused industry with highly educated audiences well-versed in web tools. What’s more, these tools may be downright complicated for the average layperson.

It’s a tricky audience to target and write for on the correct level.

And, as a rule, content creation is getting more limelight these days. People are starting to understand what it takes to produce incredible, engaging content, and they’re investing as such. (Content creation was the #1 investment for marketers in 2018-2019.)

So, what does strategic content creation look like for SaaS marketing?

The golden rule is to understand what your audience already knows, then address what they DON’T know.

Fill Your Audience’s Knowledge Gaps

According to George Reith, an expert SaaS industry writer,

“By understanding what your audience knows and what you need to tell them, you can create a tighter, more engaging and much more compelling piece of content.”

Most likely, your audience already has an awareness of SaaS and what it entails. The key is to figure out where they need additional knowledge to fill in the gaps. Reith continues:

“Here’s the thing most SaaS vendors forget: this stuff isn’t new anymore. Everyone knows what SaaS is. Even if you’ve never heard the specific term, you get the concept.

So, if you spend a whole paragraph explaining what a subscription model is and how it works, you’re just wasting valuable space on your page.”

As you can see, your audience research will be monumentally helpful for SaaS content writing. Audience knowledge gaps should naturally show up once you start digging into who these people are and what problems you can solve for them in your content.

Write to Engage

High-ROI content is written to engage the reader. It should pull them in, speak to their problems or needs, and help them come to some new understanding as simply as possible.

What works for SaaS audiences won’t work elsewhere. That’s why knowing their knowledge level on the topic at hand is so important. Tell them what they already know, and they’ll tune out.

For instance, both a business owner and an IT professional represent two kinds of SaaS audiences. Both have wildly different tech knowledge levels. The writing style that engages one will bore the other.

Kill the Fluff

Also of importance: clear, simple, zero-fluff copy. Get to the point and teach/guide without talking down to your reader (because they’re usually highly educated and intelligent!)

Avoid needless fluff in your writing because it’s repetitive. SaaS audiences want to see the value from reading your content immediately – they don’t have time to read extraneous details.

6. Track, Measure, Update, & Maintain

How will you keep up your SaaS content marketing momentum? That’s exactly what this pillar of a content strategy does – it keeps everything going like the Energizer Bunny.

Track and Measure

How is your content performing? If you’re not tracking and measuring, you won’t have anything to show for your efforts.

Using measurement tools and analyzing the data will help you track how close you are to your goals, too. (Remember those KPIs we talked about?)

Update and Maintain

Updating and maintaining your content involves:

Sticking to your consistent content schedule
Promoting your content on social media to reach more people
Auditing your older pieces to make sure they’re up-to-date and accurate
Killing old content that isn’t serving your brand or hurts your rankings

The 6 key pillars for successful SaaS content marketing include: 📑 define topic areas and goals, 🧑🏾‍🤝‍🧑🏿 know your audience, 💬 integrate SEO, 🏠 build your content house, ✍🏿 create content, and 📐 measure and maintain! Click To Tweet

Your SaaS Content Marketing Strategy Is Covered

With SaaS content marketing, it’s possible to create an engagement and conversion machine. Your business is conducted almost entirely online, so it makes sense to use mainly digital content marketing to pull in new customers.

The map to use to reach that magical place is your SaaS content strategy.

Your content strategy and content marketing should tell you how to:

Establish your brand voice and style in your content
Show your customer solutions to their problems
Demonstrate your expert knowledge in your industry
Drive brand awareness and pique interest in your message and what you sell
Bring in more qualified traffic and leads
Build customer loyalty and relationships

And, lucky for you, the compounding interest of all of the above amounts to more revenue, in the end.

Now, isn’t that something?

In the Spotlight: 5 Promising Content Marketing Trends for 2020

January 21, 2020/38 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

It’s 2020 already! Are you ready to seize the new decade by the horns?

I sure am! We’re just a few short weeks into the year, and it’s already shaping up to be an exciting one in the world of writing.

If you’ve been paying attention to what’s happening in content marketing, then you’re already a step ahead of the curve.

Several ideas and innovations are maturing, bringing us more possibilities when it comes to writing and distributing our most magnetic content.

Wondering what the future of content marketing looks like? Check it out. I’ve rounded up my best predictions for the 2020 trends in content marketing.

This year is already roaring along at full speed, so we’d better get started!

The 5 Biggest Content Marketing Trends for 2020 You Must Embrace

1. “Good” Is Not Enough! Readers E-A-T Only the Best Content

Topic-Focused Content Builds Authority
Results-Focused Copy Builds Relevance
Customer-Focused Marketing Builds Trust

2. Pictures Become Worth 1 Million Words – If They’re Living

Visual Media Is Becoming Interactive

3. An Emphasis on Lasting Relationships

4. Brand Authenticity Approaches New Dimensions

Authenticity, Storytelling, and Story Creation
Conversational Marketing

5. We Cannot Ignore the New Ways to Search

Excited to start the new year with fresh ideas to boost your content marketing to the next level? 🧨 @JuliaEMcCoy shares the best content marketing trends in 2020 you should start following right now. 📈 Click To Tweet

The 5 Biggest Content Marketing Trends for 2020 You Must Embrace

While 2019 was all about refining what worked, the energy of 2020 signals that it’s all about seizing the day – or year. We’ve practiced, honed, experimented…

Now it’s time to put all that newfound knowledge to work to build those dreams as you’ve never built before.

Without further ado, here are the five content marketing trends for 2020 you must absolutely watch.

1. “Good” Is Not Enough! Readers E-A-T Only the BEST Content

The phrase “content is king” has been floating around the internet now for almost a quarter of a century. (Thanks, Bill.)

It’s a deceptively simple statement. Yet, 24 years later, we’re still discovering exactly what it means.

2020 may be the year that we (collectively) finally get it.

An emphasis on good content has existed for a while now, largely spurred on by Google’s constant (and often revolutionary) updates to its search engine algorithms. Last decade, we saw several seismic updates that completely altered the nature of search.

Google has a knack for doing that.

However, the last several core updates such as Google BERT and the January Core Update have been relatively unique. Not only have they continued to tailor their algorithms to the human element, but they’ve now begun sending a pretty clear message to the content creation (and SEO) community with every update:

Google really, really, REALLY wants you to stop overanalyzing the SEO situation every time it updates its algorithms.

Why? Because in 2020 SEO has ONE main rule:

Focus on delivering the best possible content to your readers.

Oh look, another deceptively simple statement.

In 2020, content and search engine ranking are fusing. It’s no longer going to be about either optimizing for people or optimizing for search engines. By crafting exceptional content, you’re now doing both.

If there’s anything you take away, it’s these three points for content trends in 2020. (Which are so important, we made an image for you.)

1. Topic-Focused Content Builds Authority

To establish authority in the search engines, you’ll need to prove to Google that you know something about a topic. That doesn’t mean posting one or two articles on the subject and calling it good. The average content pillar has been 2,000 and 10,000 words with 6-8 sub-topics (or pages) linked.

2. Results-Focused Copy Builds Relevance

Craft content with a purpose. People use search engines to find answers to problems, but only 21% of searches lead to more than one result getting clicked. If your copy isn’t laser-focused on achieving a specific result (like solving the problem that person searched for), you won’t make it to the top of the list.

3. Customer-Focused Marketing Builds Trust

In 2020, the primary means you’ll build trust with your readers is by delivering helpful, useful content. Such content indicates a willingness to be helpful, to give without expectation of monetary returns. Turns out it works. According to research by Conductor, customers are up to 131% more likely to purchase from brands that provide early-stage, educational content.

Don't settle for good this 2020, go for GREAT! How? Focus on these three important points: 🧭 the right topics (to build authority), 🗃️ results (to build relevance), and 🤝 customers (to build trust). Click To Tweet

Take a moment to absorb these three points. They’re what underlie the rest of the content marketing trends for 2020.

BTW – Google is setting a high bar for what is considered quality content. And unsurprisingly, Content Marketing Institute found that 84% of brands outsource their content creation to pros. If you’re concerned about quality, this is the route to take.

Did you know? @cmicontent found that 84% of brands outsource their content creation to pros. Stressed for time? Maybe it's time to trust a pro writing partner. ✍️ Click To Tweet

2. Visuals Become Worth 1 Million Words – If They’re Live

Remember the first infographic ever made? (Probably not – it was published in 1821.) It rocked everyone’s world.

Today, infographics and visuals remain incredibly powerful. We’re going to keep seeing them – but they’re getting a refresh. How?

Visual Media Is Becoming Interactive

Infographics are neat, but unless they’re designed and optimized for social media sharing (like Pinterest, Instagram, or Facebook), they’re surprisingly limited. They can pique our interest for a few minutes or flash across our social media feed… but they can’t do much else.

In contrast, live video content is an experience. When something is real-time, we’re primed to think it’s unique. Plus, the real-time nature of the media amplifies the exclusivity and sense of connection with the brand.

🤩 Got eye-catching infographics? Make sure they're all optimized for social media sharing. 📹 Want to work on video content? Try going live to connect to your audience in real-time. Know the other content marketing trends for 2020. Click To Tweet

Don’t believe me? Check out these stats.

80% of individuals would choose to watch a live video from a brand over reading an article
87% of people will choose to watch a live video if it means more behind-the-scenes or exclusive looks at a brand.
56% of individuals want “breaking news” live content over other forms.
67% of live video viewers go on to purchase tickets or seats to similar events.

Live video content is also unique because it blends user experience with one of the ultimate tools of content marketing: storytelling.

It gives brands a chance to apply classic storytelling techniques – in a way that includes the viewer.

Now, you aren’t just telling your story to your customers. You’re involving them in the creation of your story.

How’s that for being customer-focused?

Which brings us to our next major content marketing trend for 2020…

3. An Emphasis on Lasting Relationships

Make no mistake, your readers are smart. If you’re just out to make a quick buck, they’ll spot you coming from a mile away and vanish.

In 2020, they’re getting even smarter.

Possibly it’s because we’re now totally empowered with the ability to find information quickly, easily, and on-demand.

Some 60% of all searches are done on a mobile device – doubling from just 5 years ago.

This trend of instant consumption on the go is a mixed blessing. On one hand, it means readers will gravitate towards quick, bite-sized nuggets of information that won’t disrupt their life.

On the other hand, it means readers are also exposing themselves much more frequently to our content marketing efforts.

It’s that second feature on which we should focus. Our challenge isn’t finding and selling to customers (they’re already looking for us constantly). It’s keeping them.

This year, the prevailing trends will force us to really dive deep into what it means to build relationships and rapport with our readership.

According to the folks at the CMI, almost everyone (79%) is successful at educating their audiences and building credibility or trust (75%).

Fewer people manage to successfully meet goals associated with generating sales (53%) or building loyalty with existing customers (63%).

In other words, they’re putting out quality, helpful content but they’re failing to support their readers in further interactions with their brands. Their copy isn’t results-focused.

According to CMI, there’s a growing disparity between what successful content marketers are focusing on and what everyone else is doing. Successful content marketers nurture long-term relationships with specifics, while everyone else focuses on general (but still important!) goals:

What Successful Content Marketers Focus On…

Responding to specific audience needs
Using metrics and KPIs to track content performance
Crafting content according to customer journey stages

What Everyone Else Is Focusing On…

Creating sales funnels/lead generation
Producing high-quality content
Building authority organically (vs. using paid distribution channels)

What successful content marketers focus on: a) specific audience needs b) metrics and real KPIs to track performance 📈 c) crafting content for customer stages. Everyone else: a) sales funnels b) content by itself. More: Click To Tweet

Remember: all relationships thrive with a healthy balance between giving and taking.

And – according to Sprout Social – some 70% of customers indicate that they feel closer to a brand after reading helpful, useful branded content.

When readers know you and like you, they’ll buy from you. Nurture that to create long-term relationships where you both thrive.

👋 Our challenge isn’t finding and selling to customers (they’re already looking for us constantly). It’s keeping them. This year's the time to start interacting with your audience. Start by replying to their comments! 💬 Click To Tweet

4. Brand Authenticity Approaches New Dimensions

Brand authenticity has been a really big deal for a while. It was a content marketing trend for 2019, and it remains a major trend in 2020 as well.

I’ve hinted a little so far at what brand authenticity for the new decade looks like, but let’s dive in much more deeply.

Authenticity, Storytelling, and Story Creation

In 2020, expect authenticity and interactivity to blend. Brands are increasingly opening the door for more engagement from their customers with their content to include them in the storytelling process.

We’re already seeing this in the case of live video content as I mentioned before. However, there are a few other examples of where it’s also happening:

Augmented reality. It hasn’t taken over the consumer world by storm, but it’s definitely here.
User-generated content. According to Convince and Convert, 85% of consumers think that brand-related content generated by other consumers is more influential than the content the brand itself puts out. Who are those users generating content related to your brand? They are your most avid fans.
Dynamic personalized content. What better way to include your reader in your story than to put them right in it with content tailored directly for them? We’ve mastered personalization. Now enter dynamic personalized content. It’s a form of hyper-personalization that ensures the content presented is both relevant to each specific reader, and fresh each time.

More brands are now opening their doors for more engagement. 🍹 You can see this through the popularity of live video content 🍿. It happens too through augmented reality and user-generated content from fans. 😍 Click To Tweet

What are the components of authenticity for 2020?

A real story: Create a genuine, relatable story.
The human element: Show off the human side. Give your readers a behind-the-scenes look.
Interactivity: Recast your brand as a conversation. Invite your readers to participate.

How can one be more authentic this 2020? Know these 3 components: 📖 share your real and relatable story, 🧍 show your human side, and ☕ interact with your readers! Click To Tweet

Conversational Marketing

Conversational marketing is a new marketing philosophy that spun out of the discussions around interactive content and the way social media has changed customer service. In conversational marketing, a brand crafts its experience through – you guessed it – conversations.

What do these conversations look like? That depends on your brand. Among the most common conversational marketing tools that leverage content include:

Email marketing: But not just any cold email spammed out to a list of thousands. Conversational email marketing actively seeks reader responses.
Chatbots: Only recently recognized as a potential marketing tool, the content in chatbots can prove just as valuable as the content on your pages or in your blog.
Messaging apps: It’s a non-obvious solution to keeping in touch with your users. Nonetheless, some 79% of customers indicate they’ll use them if it means faster access to the answers they seek.

Conversational marketing is IN. How do you start these conversations? Start with the most common tools like 📧 email marketing, 🤖 chatbots, and 💬 messaging apps. Click To Tweet

All of these tactics are already deployed by savvy content marketers. However, as these tactics have coalesced under a single term, it’s worth watching this year to see what ingenious ideas people implement around conversations and customer engagement.

5. We Cannot Ignore the New Ways to Search

Last but not least, we return to the state of search.

Not how machines are searching, but this time humans.

Over the past year, Google’s core updates have emphasized the increasingly diverse ways that users are now searching for content. In particular, voice search has made significant gains in popularity.

According to research by Adobe, some 48% of general web searches are done using voice assistants.

This is a direct result of the popularity of using mobile devices to find information. The study reveals that users overwhelmingly report voice search as easy to use and faster than fumbling with an onscreen keyboard.

Last year, voice search was an innovative curiosity. This year, it’s a new digital reality.

Content marketers can’t ignore it.

Are you ready?

Voice search has made significant gains in popularity. 🗣️ According to Adobe, 48% of general web searches are done using voice assistants. Don't ignore this and start optimizing content for voice search. 🗫 Click To Tweet

Seize the Year with Killer Content from Express Writers

Content marketing has become a sophisticated field… and that’s a good thing!

There are so many ways to plan, create, and distribute content to build an engaged readership. I’ve covered five of what I suspect will be the prevailing content marketing trends for 2020.

The future of content marketing is here. This year, the stars are aligning with one clear message: with everyone focused on putting out GOOD content, it’s time to set yourself apart with something EXCEPTIONAL.

Don’t leave that to chance. Secure top writing talent now and make 2020 a year to remember.

How are you setting yourself apart this year? Trust our team to craft content that caters to building and nurturing your audience.

7 Content Marketing Examples from Brands Killing It Online to Motivate & Inspire You

December 17, 2019/5 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

Content marketing is continually reaching new heights. The content marketing examples out there right now prove it.

Storytelling, imagination, deep research, creativity, innovation…

All of these elements and more are evident in today’s best content marketing. 💡

To see what I mean, just look at these seven stunning examples of content marketing prowess. It’s impossible to NOT get inspired by these top content publishers raising the bar to atmospheric heights.

Ready to climb the mountain and check out the view from the top? 🏔

7 Inspirational B2C & B2B Content Marketing Examples

Some of the best of the best in content marketing examples are right here. In fact, many of them were Content Marketing Awards finalists, and others won various industry accolades.

If you ever need to answer the question “what is content marketing?”, point to one of these outstanding specimens.

We've been always exposed to brilliant content marketing ideas that leave us feeling we've seen it all -- not really. Here are 7 stunning content marketing examples that should inspire you to level up your strategy skills! 🏋️ 🆙 Click To Tweet

1. San Diego Tourism Authority – Bliss Break

This content marketing example from 2018 shows what you can do with a tiny bit of video and a lot of ingenuity.

The San Diego Tourism Authority teamed up with MeringCarson to produce six 15-second clips of beautiful, classic, and surprising California scenery. Sometimes, a coffee cup or a wine glass is in the foreground of the shot, but each one is a peaceful, sweet reminder to appreciate what’s right in front of you.

Of course, the biggest draw is showcasing San Diego scenery like a beach at sunset, a cheerful theme park, calming ocean surf, or iconic palm trees swaying in the breeze next to an ice skating rink.

Some of the videos (like the one featured above, “Good Morning San Diego”) have up to 200,000 views. This campaign was a finalist in the Content Marketing Awards for the “B2C Branded Content Campaign of the Year.”

2. Cleveland Clinic – Health Essentials Blog

If you haven’t heard of Cleveland Clinic yet, well… why haven’t you?

This health center is killing it with content, mostly thanks to its content marketing team (with Amanda Todorovich, their Senior Director of Health Content, at the helm).

Currently, Cleveland Clinic’s Health Essentials blog draws in 6-7 million inbound visitors every month. That’s over 200,000 visitors per day!

They rank for millions of health-related long-tail keywords – over 3 million, to be precise.

How do they do it? Their content strategy is meticulous. They have it down to a science. 👩‍🔬

They publish 3-5 blogs daily with help from over 40 medical experts, who contribute interviews and review each piece.
The content marketing team meets up every single morning to “huddle” and ensure everyone’s on the same page.
The writers are on-point, too: The content is snappy and grabs your interest – even if you’re not researching a health problem.

To learn more about Cleveland Clinic’s strategy and content marketing team, check out our interview with Amanda Todorovich alongside three other industry experts.

3. Synchrony – State of Pay

Synchrony recently launched its content marketing platform, State of Pay, in 2018, but it’s already garnering notice in the best way.

Dedicated to exploring the ways people shop and pay for purchases, the content offers insights for businesses as well as news about the ecommerce world.

Trends, interviews, original research, and thought leadership are all evident here. In fact, the #1 resource cited on State of Pay articles is original studies conducted by Synchrony itself.

It’s not all blog articles, though. There are also videos, ebooks, and animated infographics posted on social media.

Say bye to billfolds. #StateOfPay delves into the future of mobile wallets. pic.twitter.com/CjRWMIk9m8

— Synchrony (@synchrony) September 4, 2019

It’s all targeted, cohesive, and ultra-relevant for their audience. Marketers, in general, agree – Synchrony’s State of Pay was another 2019 Content Marketing Awards finalist for B2B Branded Content Campaign of the Year.

4. YouTube – #TheYouTubeAd of the Year

Next on our list of the best content marketing examples from 2018 and 2019: a bit of crowdsourcing from YouTube.

Every year, the media giant holds #TheYouTubeAd of the Year, a campaign that lets anyone vote for their favorite commercials from the past 12 months.

Generally, YouTube keeps tabs on ad performance through their YouTube ads Leaderboard, which tracks the most-watched ads viewed on the platform.

At the end of the year, YouTube chooses categories based on the trends from that year, then culls the list to dozens of finalists. Viewers vote on their favorites, and the winners are announced after 8 days of voting.

This is a great example of giving content on YouTube a second life while also promoting viewership. People are motivated to watch the nominees and vote on their favorites, and more views is equal to more money from advertisers.

Here’s the 2018 winner for the category “#TheYouTubeAd That Deserves Best Picture” (it has over 17 million views as of this writing):

5. Semcon – Add Perspectives

Semcon, an international technology company, is all about innovation. With their content initiative, Add Perspectives, the company set out to feature women’s voices and minds and how they approach product development.

The result was an all-women product development team assembled to come up with a new concept for smart, user-friendly tow bars for hooking up cars to trailers. Semcon documented the process.

In other words, this content marketing example is unique and ah-mazing.

When using the standard tow bar (which hasn’t been redesigned since the 1930s!), most women admitted to feeling insecure. They couldn’t hook up their cars and trailers themselves easily, which made them self-conscious.

Thus, in pictures, text, and video, Semcon told the story of how a team of women tackled this flaw in product design and development.

This impactful content piece is engaging as well as demonstrative of Semcon’s values as a company. In short, it’s a fantastic exercise in trust and authority-building through exceptional content.

6. Western Union – One Year in the Dark

Another good marketing example using video is Western Union’s “One Year in the Dark” – a short, 2-minute clip that captured what it was like living in Puerto Rico without power after Hurricane Maria.

To produce the video, Western Union teamed up with CNN and did field research to find the story they wanted to tell:

“We identified an individual in Jonathan Sepulveda and his family, who had to learn how to live without power, while relying on the help of neighbors like Alana Feldman to bring normalcy to life. With no electricity and banks closed, they had to rely on cash to go through their daily endeavors. With their story, which gets to the heart of our business, we wanted to show how connection and support helped a community deal with the lasting impacts of Hurricane Maria.”

Here’s the 60-second version of the video:

As you can see, it highlights human stories and how Western Union’s services played a vital role in helping the community survive after a disaster. (Note, however, that the emphasis is on the people, not the company.)

From this one video, Western Union received over 286,000 impressions through their social media channels and nearly 12 million from CNN’s. They also won the 2019 Gold Stevie Award for Marketing Campaign of the Year – Financial Products & Services.

7. Bank of America – Saving & Budgeting Blog

Last but not least, among the best B2C content marketing examples for 2019 is Bank of America’s Saving and Budgeting blog.

Helpful, guiding videos, infographics, and articles pinpoint topics the average consumer is worried about in their everyday lives:

How to budget
Easy ways to save money
Affording your next vacation
How to set up an emergency fund

All the content is engaging to read and demonstrably useful. Look at this infographic about budgeting for your next vacation. As you scroll down, little bits of the scenery animate next to relevant, actionable tips:

Every bit of content is super simple and clear. This is obviously a great content hub to rely on if you have financial questions for day-to-day living and planning.

Looking for content marketing inspiration? 🤔 @JuliaEMcCoy shares 7 brilliant, award-winning content marketing examples from brands like San Diego Tourism Authority and Western Union. 🏆 Click To Tweet

Follow from These Content Marketing Examples and Get Creative

If you’re like me, your brain gears immediately started turning after perusing these content marketing examples.

Creativity, strategy, planning, and imagination – serious inspiration, right here.

One more thing: As you looked through each of them, you may have seen a theme emerging:

Telling human stories is a clear-cut way to engage an audience.

And, as I predicted, storytelling is going to keep making waves in the content marketing world. (The possibilities are beyond exciting!)

Want even more inspiration? We served up a ton of it in our original research report of the Top 100 Content Marketers. This list is full of amazing content marketers who are innovating, creating, and leading the scene in fun, fresh ways.

Content Marketing KPIs: Which Ones Do I Track to Identify Real Success? (& How to Track Them)

December 10, 2019/2 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

How do you track your content marketing successes (or failures, to learn from and improve next time)?

It all boils down to tracking the right content marketing KPIs.

Note that we didn’t say all the content marketing KPIs – just the right ones.

You aren’t alone if you’re wondering why some content marketers succeed and others fail.

What makes the difference between the two? 🤔

Is it the volume of website traffic? The number of likes, comments, and shares? Revenue from unequivocal quality content?

All those are examples of content marketing KPIs (key performance indicators). Some matter more than others. If you want success, you need to know which content marketing KPIs to track.

Here are the top twelve that should be at the top of your list. Let’s dive in!

Content Marketing KPIs: Which Ones to Track & How to Track Them Correctly

Why Track Content Marketing KPIs?

The Top 12 Content Marketing KPIs to Track

Content Marketing KPIs for User Behavior

1. Bounce Rate

2. Scroll Depth

3. Time on Page

Content Marketing KPIs for User Engagement

4. Shares

5. Comments

6. Conversations

Content Marketing KPIs for SEO

7. Backlinks

8. Organic Traffic from Search Engines

9. Keyword Rankings

Content Marketing KPIs for Company Revenue

10. Leads

11. Conversion Rates

12. ROI

How Do You Track Content Marketing KPIs? Use These 6 Handy Tools

Content Marketing KPIs Measure Your Success

How do you define real success in the world of content marketing? 🗝️ @JuliaEMcCoy lists down the top 12 content marketing KPIs that you should keep track of to identify if your efforts are producing great results. ☝️ Click To Tweet

Why Track Content Marketing KPIs?

In sports, it’s easy to track success. For example, think of soccer. In soccer, your aim is to get the ball through the goal. One goal equals one point. The team with the most goals wins the match.

But content marketing isn’t that simple. It’s like playing soccer with a hundred goals instead of two. What’s more, when you shoot the ball into the goal, you aren’t sure what score you’ll get. Some goals give you a hundred points while others give you two points.

The key with this type of soccer is first to find out which goals give you the highest points. Then you start putting energy into shooting the ball into them.

This is what tracking content marketing KPIs is all about.

You need to find out which content marketing KPIs are important and give you the highest improvements (scores). Then, you set out to outperform yourself on them.

When you track the right content marketing KPIs, you’ll start winning in content marketing.

Why bother tracking content marketing KPIs? 🕵️ Getting to know which KPIs perform well gives you an idea of how you can further boost them. It's also good to know which ones badly need a strategy makeover. 🔨 Click To Tweet

The Top 12 Content Marketing KPIs to Track

These 12 content marketing KPIs are your safety net and formula for success. Let’s dive in!

Content Marketing KPIs for User Behavior

First of all, let’s look closely at content marketing KPIs that show you how users interact with your content.

1. Bounce Rate

Bounce rate refers to the number of visitors who view only one page of your site. It’s one of the top content marketing KPIs because it tells you what visitors feel about your content.

Here are 5 reasons visitors click on your site, scan it, and immediately click the back button.

Your content is boring.
Your paragraphs are too long.
Visitors can’t find what they’re looking for.
Your site isn’t user-friendly.
Your writing style doesn’t fit user needs.

For example, if you’re a user and you find this as the opening paragraph of a blog?

Source: Grammarly

You’ll most likely run for the hills with your go-to back button.

The more visitors click the back button without visiting any other pages on your site, the higher your bounce rate will be.

So what’s a good bounce rate? According to The Daily Egg, it depends on what industry you’re in. However, a good rule of thumb is to keep your bounce rate below 70%.

2. Scroll Depth

Scroll depth is one of the content marketing KPIs that’s closely related to bounce rate. Scroll depth indicates how far down the page your reader goes before leaving.

What causes a reader to leave your page halfway through reading it? Mostly, it’s when you don’t follow through with the promises you made in your headline.

For example, maybe your headline looks like this.

Source: Have The Relationship You Want from Rori Raye

This headline makes one promise: After you read the article, you’ll know the secret to winning the man of your dreams. Forever.

Now, what if you’ve reached the halfway mark and you’re nowhere near discovering this secret? You guessed it. You’re going to click back.

The point where you stopped reading is your scroll depth.

Keeping track of your readers’ scroll depth will help you figure out exactly where your content stops working. This is one of the content marketing KPIs you can rely on because it helps you measure the success of your content.

3. Time on Page

As the name suggests, time on page refers to how long users spend on your page. Using this valuable content marketing KPI, you can tell what your readers feel about your words.

According to Capitalize My Title, it takes an average of 1 minute to read 300 words.

Now, if your blog has 1,500 words and your reader spent only 2 minutes on it? That’s right. He didn’t read everything.

What you need to track is reader time on page corresponding to how many words your post has. If readers are clicking back after less than a minute but scrolling to the end of the page? They’re scanning your headings but not devouring your content.

As a valuable KPI for content marketing, time on page shows you if readers are loving your content or not.

Content marketing KPIs for user behavior include 🔙 bounce rate, 🖱️ scroll depth, and ⌛ time on page. Know what each KPIs are in this post by @JuliaEMcCoy 📝 Click To Tweet

Content Marketing KPIs for User Engagement

When anything is inspiring, controversial, or new, it will be talked about. This is why user engagement is one of the huge content marketing KPIs to keep track of.

4. Shares

You need to keep track of how often your content gets shared on sites like Facebook and Twitter. Shared content is one of the biggest content marketing KPIs in 2019 because of how big social media is.

To give you an idea, take a look at how popular social media is today.

You need to track this content marketing KPI religiously because, in social media, it’s plain difficult to stand out.

For example, take Facebook. Facebook users are bombarded daily with distractions. There’s instant messaging. Inspiring quotes from friends. Posts from an ex. Photos of a rival’s latest vacation. If your content can compete with all of these and get shares? That’s right. Your content is beyond juicy and delicious.

Here’s an example from Bright Side called 10 Things We Don’t Appreciate Until Life Slaps Us on the Face.

It’s easy to see why this post got 1,700 shares on Facebook. It’s innately human, relatable, and despite being sad, strangely hopeful.

Want to learn the 11 top skills for becoming a top-notch content marketer? Download our Profitable Content Marketer Cheat Sheet here!

5. Comments

Comments on your posts are huge content marketing KPIs because they show that users consider you worth their time.

Let’s take a look at this example from English Literature’s Facebook page.

Source: Facebook

As you can see, the post has only 381 comments compared with 27,000 reacts and 9,900 shares. Why is that?

It’s simple. Composing, editing, and posting a comment takes more time and energy than liking and sharing combined.

So if people are commenting on your posts, sharing their insights, and asking advice? You’ve nailed it with this huge content marketing KPI.

6. Conversations

In content marketing, conversations refer to how you talk to your prospective clients. This includes live calls, chat, discount coupons, and more.

Conversations are important content marketing KPIs because the buying process has drastically changed over time. Buyers are now more informed, skeptical, and careful. They can no longer be bullied into the traditional 4-stage sales funnel that worked wonders in the 20s.

Instead, they go through the marketing lifecycle. Part of this lifecycle is finding value in products and services, asking questions, and getting the right information. When you have experts standing by to talk to prospective clients, you can get a 60%-80% conversion rate!

If you carefully take care of your conversations as vital content marketing KPIs, you’ll win over brands still relying on the outdated sales funnel strategy.

Content marketing KPIs for user engagement include 📨 shares, 🗭 comments, and 🗣️ conversations. Know what each KPIs are in this post by @JuliaEMcCoy 📝 Click To Tweet

Content Marketing KPIs for SEO

7. Backlinks

Backlinks are essential content marketing KPIs.

To understand this, let’s look at what backlinks do. Check out this image from Moz.

As you can see, website A has a link to website B. There are a number of reasons why one website links to another.

It makes a site more valuable as a resource.
It encourages engagement with other sites.
It sends out trackable traffic.

So if other sites are linking to you, what does it mean? Simply, it means they trust you. You have vouch-worthy, high-quality content and a good standing online.

Backlinks are essential content marketing KPIs, but make sure yours are high-quality and not black hat SEO links.

8. Organic Traffic from Search Engines

Another great content marketing KPIs to watch is organic traffic. When you get a ton of traffic from search engines, you’re doing something right with your content.

Take a look at this pie chart from Conductor Spotlight.

Since 64% of traffic comes from organic search, it’s a good idea to keep your Google ranking high.

However, even if your content is good, it won’t obtain a high ranking on search engines if it isn’t optimized correctly. To pull traffic into your site from search engines, you need quality content plus cutting-edge search engine optimization (SEO) practices.

Want to learn how to rank highly on Google through stellar SEO writing? Download our SEO content writer cheat sheet here!

9. Keyword Rankings

Keyword rankings are content marketing KPIs closely related to organic traffic. What to look for is how many keywords your content is ranking for on Google. To do this, you can use great software like Google Analytics.

Content marketing KPIs for SEO include 🖇️ backlinks, ⛖ organic traffic, and 🏎️ keyword rankings. Know what each KPIs are in this post by @JuliaEMcCoy 📝 Click To Tweet

Content Marketing KPIs for Company Revenue

10. Leads

Leads are potential clients who come to you via a lead magnet. In short, users exchange their personal information and e-mail addresses for a freebie you offer.

Here’s a popular lead magnet from International Living.

Want to know the world’s top 10 havens for retirement? All you need to give is your e-mail address. Sounds like a good exchange! This magnet provides International Living with leads and a growing e-mail list.

The more leads you have, the bigger your chance of growing your brand. This is why you should track your leads as essential content marketing KPIs.

11. Conversion Rate

Conversion rate is one of the best KPIs for content marketing because it shows how compelling your content is. Conversion happens when you tell users what to do and how they do it.

Take a look at Great Escape Publishing’s homepage.

Source: Great Escape Publishing

Who doesn’t want to travel the world while creating a full-time income? Users are curious and click find out more. A percentage of them will buy a photography or travel program. This percentage is the conversion rate to watch out for when tracking content marketing KPIs.

12. ROI (Return on Investment)

ROI refers to the revenue you get minus your total investment. For content marketing, it’s how much you earn minus writer pay, the cost of hosting your website, and other expenses you incur in business.

Source: Business 2 Community

When tracking ROI, take into account the required expenses to get quality content. Then, note how such content is performing. Does it bring in higher revenue than expense?

For example, take a look at this chart.

Stellar content works like this. It builds momentum. As can be seen in the chart, the cost per lead dropped 80% in five months because of the high revenue the content brought in.

Content marketing KPIs for company revenue include 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 leads, 🛒 conversion rate, and 💰 return on investment. Know what each KPIs are in this post by @JuliaEMcCoy 📝 Click To Tweet

How Do You Track Content Marketing KPIs? Use These 6 Handy Tools

After learning about the essential content marketing KPIs that you need to keep track of, the question now is: how do you exactly find these?

It’s easy. You can rely on the tools already provided for free by Google and the social media platforms you’re using. You can also go for paid tools if you need some extra help to easily track and understand these data.

Here are six practical tools you can use:

1. Google Analytics

Checking Google Analytics is the fastest way to get an overview of your site’s performance – the blog posts that are getting the most traffic, page views, bounce rates, traffic sources, and more.

2. Facebook Page Insights

If you’re curious about the shares, likes, clicks, reactions, and comments your posts receive on Facebook, you can simply use its free Facebook analytics tool.

Besides measuring your Facebook page’s performance, you can use this tool to know more about your audience’s demographic data, which is important if you’re trying to build a new buyer persona for your content strategy.

3. Twitter Analytics

For those who are actively sharing content through Twitter, checking the social media channel’s analytics page is a must. Access Twitter’s activity dashboard, and you can find the detailed number of retweets, follows, replies, and link clicks on your Twitter page.

You can also easily check your page’s performance through mobile.

4. SEMrush

You may have already read about SEMrush several times in our blog as a highly recommended SEO tool for keyword research.

However, its usefulness doesn’t stop there. With SEMrush, you get to see updated metrics such as your site’s visits, unique visitors, bounce rate, visit duration (time on page), backlinks, traffic sources, traffic cost, top pages, keyword rankings, and more. Get to see most of the important content marketing KPIs in an instant – all in one place.

5. BuzzSumo

BtuzzSumo can monitor engagement across Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Reddit. With BuzzSumo’s Content Analyzer, you can get a list of your best-performing content in a certain period of time just by typing in your domain in the search box. It also lets you know the number of engagements for every major social media platform.

Moreover, BuzzSumo’s Monitoring feature is something you shouldn’t ignore. It can search for your brand’s linked and unlinked mentions, which shows you the brands and influencers that you should build relationships with.

6. The Content Marketing Trifecta Equation

If you are dealing with clients, executives, stakeholders, and business partners, you’ll know that sometimes it’s best to go straight to the point and provide them what matters most in the content marketing KPIs of company revenue: ROI. In this case, you’ll need to look for the average rates of earned traffic, leads, and sales. These three will serve as the benchmark numbers needed to compute the ROI associated with conversions from content marketing.

The Content Marketing Trifecta Equation helps you estimate how many leads and sales you can expect to see per month using content marketing. We actually used this equation in our own blogging ROI case study.

Monthly Visitors x 16% Organic Traffic to Lead Conversion Rate = X Leads/Month
X Leads/Month x 14% Lead to Sale Conversion Rate = X Sales/Month

Take note that the “16% Organic Traffic to Lead Conversion Rate” is the current average rate for converting organic traffic to leads across industries, based on a MarketingSherpa’s 2013 SEO Marketing Benchmark Survey. Moreover, studies show that leads generated from SEO have an average close rate of 14%, thus “14% Lead to Sale Conversion Rate” is used in the equation.

Learn more about how you can compute and explain the ROI of content marketing in this infographic.

How do you track content marketing KPIs? 🕵️‍♀️ Some of the most practical paid tools you can use include SEMrush and BuzzSumo. But there's also free to use tools like Google Analytics and your favorite social platform's analytics page! 🧮 Click To Tweet

Content Marketing KPIs Measure Your Success

Keeping track of these 12 KPIs will show you if you’re succeeding or failing in content marketing. Not getting good results from one or more indicates serious trouble for your brand.

On the other hand, if all 12 are performing well, you can sit back, relax, and celebrate a little. But don’t forget to get back to work tracking them once the party’s over.

You need content that converts to take your KPIs to the next level. Visit our content shop to get it.

The Top-Shared Content of 2019: 22 Pieces That Rose to the Top

December 3, 2019/6 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

To start off 2020 with a bang, we’re taking a deep, researched look at what went right in content in the past year.

We’re looking at…

Content pieces with huge engagement. 🦄

Beautiful, successful blogs. ✨

And we’re sharing a massive shoutout to the marketers, writers, and teams behind the effort and sweat put into these pieces.️ ♥

(Because content will never be taken over by the robots. It will always, first and foremost, be humanly driven. Humans are the real content MVPs.)

To compile our list, we used BuzzSumo’s powerful content analyzer and compiled the top-shared content in our topic category “content marketing.”

And after coming up with a list, we manually weeded out the spam.

The result? 22 pieces made of pure gold. We can’t wait to share them with you!

Ready to be inspired?

Inspiration, Lessons, and Insights from the 22 Most-Shared Content Pieces of 2019

The 22 Most Shared Content Pieces of 2019

1. 2019 Creative Trends Infographic – Shutterstock

2. 15 Content Marketing Tools for Success You Need in 2019

3. Interview with Neil Patel on Content Marketing with Awesome Rapid Fire

4. 18 Types of Content Marketing You Can Use to Grow Your Business

5. How Digital Marketing Will Change in 2019

6. The Death of Google Search Traffic and What It Means for Marketers

7. We Analyzed 912 Million Blog Posts. Here’s What We Learned About Content Marketing

8. The 2019 Ultimate Guide to Facebook Engagement

9. The Ultimate SEO Tool: Ubersuggest 3.0

10. 7 Steps to Create a Successful, Profitable Blog

11. 17 Charts That Show Where Content Marketing Is Heading

12. Why Local Businesses Will Need Websites More Than Ever in 2019

13. The Best Time to Post on Instagram (and the Worst)

14. 3 Ways Content Marketing Boosts Your SEO Rankings

15. Ubersuggest 4.0: The Ultimate Content Marketing Tool

16. Optimizing for Searcher Intent Explained in 7 Visuals

17. 3 Types of Social Video That Work for Any Business

18. Copywriting: The Definitive Guide (2019)

19. 26 Mobile and Desktop Tools for Marketers

20. 5 Freaking Genius Content Ideas You Can Steal from BuzzFeed

21. The Future of Content Marketing and How to Adapt

22. 5 Trends to Know in SEO & Content Marketing

Now as the year comes to a close, it's time to look back on the top-shared content of 2019 that gained the most engagements under 'content marketing' 🏅(⚡ Spoiler: @JuliaEMcCoy's SEJ post is in the 22nd spot!) See if your fave is here! 🤩 Click To Tweet

The 22 Top-Shared Content Pieces of 2019

1. Shutterstock: “2019 Creative Trends Infographic“

Number of engagements: 17,300

Shutterstock’s post pulses with color, music, and art. It features wild photos of duotone gradients, cutouts of stars and fish, and striking images of leopard prints, snakeskin patterns, and gold chains.

But reading the article is more than falling into a well of technicolor. Here are the key takeaways readers get from it:

The major trends based on increased user search are 80’s opulence, raw zine culture, and early-tech neon styles.
Rising trends include environmentally friendly products, childlike pastel Kawaii colors, rococo romance, prisms, and hypnotic patterns.
For the first time ever, a typography style takes a seat at the creative trends table. Think 3D text made sweet with sugar dusting, chocolate coating, and sprinkles!

Overall, this piece is a colorful adventure to read. Plus, it gives useful insights on styling trends in 2019.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring Shutterstock's '2019 Creative Trends Infographic' Click To Tweet

2. Dillenium: 15 Content Marketing Tools for Success You Need in 2019 by Hina Naz

Number of engagements: 8,000

You won’t be successful in content marketing without an array of fine tools. In this blog, Hina Naz lists everything you need to add to your toolkit in 2019.

What I love about this blog is it isn’t limited to tools for keyword research. Hina lists a tool for perfecting grammar (Grammarly) a headline analyzer (Sharethrough Analyzer), an organizer (Evernote), and more!

No wonder this post made it to number two of the top-shared content of 2019!

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @NazHina's '15 Content Marketing Tools for Success You Need in 2019' Click To Tweet

3. Sorav Jain: “Interview with Neil Patel on Content Marketing with Awesome Rapid Fire“

Number of engagements: 6,800

Ever wonder what Neil Patel does to stay fit?

Or how he built his gigantic digital marketing empire?

In this Youtube interview, Sorav Jain successfully mashes entertainment with serious questions about what it is to be an entrepreneur. It’s a mixture of laughter and heart-to-heart that’ll get you thoughtfully nodding your head.

Neil answers questions about:

His top three favorite marketing tools
The secret to how he built his empire
The biggest lie he ever told a client
His diet and exercise regime
His digital marketing predictions for 2019 and 2020

My favorite part? When Neil tries and fails to say “I love digital marketing and I cannot live without it,” in Gujarati.

The most inspiring thing he said? “Entrepreneurship is like a rollercoaster… there’s good moments, bad moments, scary moments, happy moments. You’ve just got to accept it all.”

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @SoravJain's 'Interview with Neil Patel on Content Marketing with Awesome Rapid Fire' Click To Tweet

4. Marketing Solved: “18 Types of Content Marketing You Can Use to Grow Your Business” by Kat Sullivan

Number of engagements: 6,100

Most posts will give you a list of the top five or ten types of content that’ll grow your business. Kat goes further and gives you 18.

Each section of Kat’s blog is carefully detailed. She doesn’t only tell you which types of content to post but also why it’ll work for you.

According to her, the big three of content marketing are blogging, social media, and email marketing. In fact, she used this secret trifecta to grow her business to six figures in under two years!

Start with Kat’s trifecta, and once you grow to cover all 18, your empire will be rock solid.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @MrktgSolved's @MrsKatSulli's '18 Types of Content Marketing You Can Use to Grow Your Business' Click To Tweet

5. Neil Patel: “How Digital Marketing Will Change in 2019” by Neil Patel

Number of engagements: 6,000

This post starts off making readers uncomfortable. In the beginning, Neil throws hints about the huge, unwanted changes coming to digital marketing in the (near) future.

The deeper you go into the blog, the more uneasy you feel. The changes Neil mentions will definitely rock your content marketing boat. Here are some of them:

In a few years, voice search will make all our current SEO strategies useless.
Algorithms will only grow more complex with time.
Blogging will become weaker as the web gets more saturated.

The good news? Neil ends the blog with powerful insights on how to confidently prepare for and meet these changes.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @neilpatel's 'How Digital Marketing Will Change in 2019' Click To Tweet

6. Social Media Examiner “The Death of Google Search Traffic and What It Means for Marketers” by Mike Stelzner

Number of engagements: 5,700

Ever seen a movie about the controversial issue of AI technology replacing humans? This post is like that.

But this time, it’s about the death of organic search as friendly AI systems like Alexa and Google make it their mission to answer users’ questions as quickly as possible.

That’s right. No more links, no more web pages, no more web as we know it today. Pretty scary stuff!

So what’s Michael Stelzner’s take on this? How is Social Media Examiner preparing to take these changes head-on?

Here are three things they’re doing to prepare for SEO Armageddon:

Working on their conversion rate optimization (CRO)
Upping their video and audio game
Writing expert opinion pieces

As a content marketer, you should be doing them too!

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @SMExaminer's @Mike_Stelzner's 'The Death of Google Search Traffic and What It Means for Marketers' Click To Tweet

7. Backlinko: “We Analyzed 912 Million Blog Posts. Here’s What We Learned About Content Marketing” by Brian Dean

Number of engagements: 5,700

The headline of this post is a huge attention-grabber. 912 million blog posts is a lot of content to go through!

But it’s not only the headline that’s great about this blog. It’s also the 11 key takeaways that should be part of every content marketer’s bible. Some of them include:

Long-form content gets around 77% more links than short content.
Long content outperforms short content in user engagement.
Headlines ending in question marks get around 23% more social shares.

The 11 findings in this blog can be mixed together as a recipe for producing successful content every time.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @Backlinko's 'We Analyzed 912 Million Blog Posts. Here’s What We Learned About Content Marketing' Click To Tweet

8. BuzzSumo: “The 2019 Ultimate Guide to Facebook Engagement” by Susan Moeller

Number of engagements: 5,700

According to this amazing guide by Susan Moeller, marketing on Facebook is entirely different from marketing on the web.

Facebook is about users engaging with family, friends, and pages they’re interested in.

So how can you compete for user attention in today’s biggest social network?

Here are four (of the many) facts Susan points out:

80% of marketing posts should be videos.
The best time to post on Facebook is Sunday.
Unlike on the web, shorter posts get more attention on Facebook. In fact, posts with less than 50 characters are the most successful!
The sweet spot for video length is between 3:00 to 3:20.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @BuzzSumo's 'The 2019 Ultimate Guide to Facebook Engagement' by @SusanCMoeller Click To Tweet

9. Neil Patel: “The Ultimate SEO Tool: Ubersuggest 3.0” by Neil Patel

Number of engagements: 4,900

This post by Neil Patel is all business. In it, he introduces his newly-updated SEO tool: Ubersuggest 3.0.

Here are four things the tool can do for you:

Find out how many keywords your site ranks for
Learn how much organic traffic would cost you if you were paying for it
Find out the most popular pages for a single domain
Search your competition and see how their pages are doing (so you can create better, more in-depth content to outrank them)

Of course, Neil stays true to his style and offers complete guidance on how to use his sparkling, newly updated tool.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @neilpatel's 'The Ultimate SEO Tool: Ubersuggest 3.0' Click To Tweet

10. BuzzSumo: “7 Steps to Create a Successful, Profitable Blog” by Mike Allton

Number of engagements: 4,700

This post is every beginner blogger’s ultimate guide to getting a successful blog started. It teaches how to find your unique blogging voice, how long your posts should be, how often to post, and more.

The blog’s structure is simple to digest and follow. It outlines the seven crucial steps you need to get your blog up and running.

Here are some cool tips from the post itself:

In the beginning, it’s not about how many blogs to post per week. It’s about how soon you want to generate sizeable traffic. For instance, you need around 50 posts to start getting traffic. If you’re okay with getting that in a year, you can post one blog a week. However, if you want to get it in 90 days, you need to boost your blogging strategy.
There are 16x more blog posts under 1,000 words than over it. However, blog posts over 1,000 words get more engagement because of their depth and expertise.
To find your unique blogging voice, take a moment to listen to the way you speak. Then, find out how your target market speaks. When writing your posts, blend these two voices together to discover your unique tone.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @BuzzSumo's '7 Steps to Create a Successful, Profitable Blog' by @mike_allton Click To Tweet

11. Neil Patel: “17 Charts That Show Where Content Marketing is Heading” by Neil Patel

Number of engagements: 4,700

Today, there are over a billion blogs vying for reader attention. How can your blog stand out, gain traffic, and give you the conversions you’re looking for?

With 17 useful charts, Neil Patel answers these questions. Here are the top things you learn from his findings.

Organic traffic through social media is going down.
You need at least two full-time employees dedicated to blogging.
60% of your site’s traffic comes from your blog.
In 2019, potential buyers will visit your blog 3.5 times over a 2-week period before they’re converted.

Other findings answer questions like how to convert blog readers into customers, how to boost your traffic up to 28%, and how long your average blog post should be.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @neilpatel's '17 Charts That Show Where Content Marketing is Heading' Click To Tweet

12. Moz: “Why Local Businesses Will Need Websites More Than Ever in 2019” by Miriam Ellis

Number of engagements: 4,700

In a world of zero-click SERPs and local ads, we no longer need websites. Right?

Wrong. In fact, we need them more than ever.

In this post, Miriam Ellis goes into careful detail about why we need strong websites in 2019. For instance, she points out that even though Google prioritizes local ads, 75% still goes to companies with strong organic search.

You can just feel the urgency of this post , especially in the last part where Miriam tells us to act fast while 43.9% of searches still go to organic SERPs.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @Moz's 'Why Local Businesses Will Need Websites More Than Ever in 2019' by @Miriam_Ellis_ Click To Tweet

13. Hootsuite: “The Best Time to Post on Instagram in 2019 (and the Worst)” by Shannon Tien

Number of engagements: 4,600

As you can guess from the title, this blog is a guide to the best time to post on Instagram for maximum engagement.

But it isn’t any generic guide with arbitrary guesswork on the best time to post.

It’s a study Shannon did by examining 258, 956 posts from 20 of the most popular Instagram accounts.

What did she find?

Here are some examples of when to post depending on your industry:

Food and beverage: Friday at 12PM (lunch time!)
Entertainment: 12PM to 3PM
Professional services: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday at 9AM or 10AM

As a bonus at the end of each section, Shannon mentions the times you should never post on Instagram (the no-no times to post are different for each industry as well!).

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @hootsuite's 'The Best Time to Post on Instagram in 2019 (and the Worst)' by @tien_spirit Click To Tweet

14. SEO Alien: “3 Ways Content Marketing Boosts Your SEO Rankings” by Lorenzo Gutierrez

Number of engagements: 4,200

The good news is if you rank highly on Google, you get tons of traffic to your site.

The bad news is Google keeps changing the rules for ranking.

But one thing doesn’t change: provide readers with value, and your site will be noticed.

Why? Simply because that’s Google’s number one goal.

In this swift, succinct blog, Lorenzo Gutierrez gives you three reasons why quality content marketing will keep your rank high on Google — no matter how algorithms change.

Hint: Number one is about gluing your readers to your blog so your bounce rate goes down.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @seoalien's '3 Ways Content Marketing Boosts Your SEO Rankings' by @LGutierrezSEO Click To Tweet

15. Neil Patel: “Ubersuggest 4.0: The Ultimate Content Marketing Tool” by Neil Patel

Number of engagements: 3,900

What could be better than Neil Patel’s amazing tool Ubersuggest 3.0?

Answer: Ubersuggest 4.0.

Ubersuggest 4.0 isn’t only about finding the best keywords to use in your blog. It’s about learning how to rank for these keywords.

Here are three (of many) cool things this tool can do for you:

Show you what topics are gaining success online
Help you select the right keywords for your blog
Reveal who’s linking to other successful blogs with similar keywords

Along with providing screenshots of his tool, Neil gives step-by-step guidance on how to use it to successfully rank for popular keywords.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @neilpatel's 'Ubersuggest 4.0: The Ultimate Content Marketing Tool' Click To Tweet

16. Moz: “Optimizing for Searcher Intent Explained in 7 Visuals” by Rand Fishkin

Number of engagements: 3,700

What’s Google’s main goal?

To find articles with the most keywords? The most links? Solid domain authority? Anchor text? Freshness?

The answer is no to all.

Google’s goal is to keep searchers on Google (instead of finding other search engines).

How does it do this? By providing users with value, of course.

And if you reward Google by providing value, Google will reward you by ranking your site highly on the search results.

I love everything Rand Fishkin provides in this blog: the humor, the surprising insights, the colorful visuals, and, of course, the “aha!” moments when he nailed crystal-clear explanations.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @Moz's 'Optimizing for Searcher Intent Explained in 7 Visuals' by @randfish Click To Tweet

17. Social Media Examiner: “3 Types of Social Video That Work for Any Business” by Melissa Burns

Number of engagements: 3,500

Video marketing is huge today. In fact, 87% of marketers see video as a crucial component in their campaigns.

But what kinds of videos work best?

According to Melissa, there are three:

How-to videos
Product videos outlining the benefits of a product
Customer review videos

After discussing how these videos work, Melissa then goes on to provide useful tips like:

The best platforms for video marketing
When to integrate a CTA into a video
How to make videos attractive and engagement-ready

Her post is a must-read for every marketer who doesn’t want to waste time producing videos that don’t convert.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @SMExaminer's '3 Types of Social Video That Work for Any Business' by @MelissaaBurns Click To Tweet

18. Backlinko: “Copywriting: The Definitive Guide” by Brian Dean

Number of engagements: 3,300

Brian Dean’s blog is a mini e-book in length. But that’s what makes it amazing.

It’s the ultimate, definitive guide to copywriting that gains more traffic, sales, and leads.

Plus, it’s entertaining to read, easy to digest, and packed with helpful images, charts, and examples.

Here’s what the table of contents looks like:

Chapter 1: Customer-Focused Copy

Chapter 2: Pro Copywriting Secrets

Chapter 3: How to Write Amazing Headlines

Chapter 4: Master the Lead

Chapter 5: How to Write Compelling Copy

Chapter 6: Proven Copywriting Formulas

Chapter 7: Advanced Copywriting Strategies

Don’t have time to read it all in one sitting? Have Brian Dean email it to you in handy PDF form so you can download it and take it in at your own pace.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @Backlinko's 'Copywriting: The Definitive Guide' Click To Tweet

19. Social Media Examiner: “26 Mobile and Desktop Tools for Marketers” by Erik Fisher

Number of engagements: 3,300

To stand out on social media, what you need is quality images, video, and audio. And today, creating these is less about being an expert photographer and more about having the right tools.

So, which are the best mobile and desktop tools marketers can use for crisp audio, stunning visuals, and crystal-clear videos?

In his post, Erik Fisher lists 26 you’ll love.

These include:

Video Resizer for IGTV and Frame (never have to worry about resizing videos for Instagram again)
Emoji Builder (create customized emojis to match your campaign!)
Lumen5 (convert your web page into a video in only 30 minutes!)
and 23 more

These tools are great if you’re a writer, video marketer, or anything in between!

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @SMExaminer's '26 Mobile and Desktop Tools for Marketers' by @ErikJFisher Click To Tweet

20. Search Engine Journal: “5 Freaking Genius Content Ideas You Can Steal from BuzzFeed” by Jessica Foster

Number of engagements: 3,300

BuzzFeed is criticized by many as lazy journalism. Its content is said to be shallow, short-lived, and packed with clickbait.

But no one can deny its success.

According to Jessica Foster, you can steal genius ideas from BuzzFeed that’ll make users gobble up your content.

Here are five ideas she lists:

Deeply understand your target audience (for instance, BuzzFeed caters to the nostalgic feelings of millennials).
Use smart quizzes and tools (The quiz doesn’t have to be a lot of nonsense like “What type of cheese are you?” Instead, it can be smart like: “Take this quiz to find the right home décor for you.”)
Go viral by speaking to your audience’s core. Find out their fears, desires, and hopes. Then address them in your writing.
Create roundup posts, asking multiple experts for pieces of advice.
Post timely content (content that’s related to the top trending events of today).

With every section, Jessica offers advice on exactly how to apply each one of her tips. No wonder her post created its own buzz as one of the top-shared content of 2019!

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @sejournal's '5 Freaking Genius Content Ideas You Can Steal from BuzzFeed' by @seocopychick Click To Tweet

21. Digital Marketer: “The Future of Content Marketing and How to Adapt: Trends, Tactics, and Tools” by Ann Smarty

Number of engagements: 3,300

90% of B2B and B2C marketers use content marketing.

In this saturated atmosphere, how can you stand out?

In her fast-moving, value-dense post, Ann Smarty lists three helpful ways you can do it.

Content collaboration. Your whole team should be working on content creation, not just your writers.
Question optimization. Because Google loves to answer questions, it’s a powerful strategy to humanize your writing by asking them.
Personalize. Use first names in email and personalize CTAs and banners.

With screenshots, bulleted points, and clear advice, Ann’s blog is a complete guide to lesser-known content marketing tips and tricks.

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @DigitalMktr's 'The Future of Content Marketing and How to Adapt: Trends, Tactics, and Tools' by @annsmarty Click To Tweet

22. Search Engine Journal: “5 Trends to Know in SEO & Content Marketing” by Julia McCoy

Number of engagements: 3,300

In this post, I share with you some secrets I learned on the best SEO and content marketing practices.

I explain why superficial blogs won’t work, and how to supercharge your own blog by creating depth (Hint: I give tips on how long your blog posts should be, plus tricks on how to pack them with value).
I show you where to invest in content creation, and why it’s a good idea.
I list the benefits of personalizing your content.

I also show you how to expand beyond blogging (think podcasts, webinars, Youtube videos, and more!).

See the top 22 content pieces of 2019 in @JuliaEMcCoy's original study 🔥 featuring @sejournal's '5 Trends to Know in SEO & Content Marketing' by @JuliaEMcCoy Click To Tweet

Insights from BuzzSumo’s Top-Engaged-With Content for “Content Marketing” in 2019

Reading the top-shared content of 2019 is amazing (as reading anything beautifully written is). Also, it’s a learning experience that teaches you the top tricks, tips, and secrets of content marketing in today’s age.

But it’s more than that.

It’s also a guide on how to create stellar content that goes viral.

So since I don’t want you to go back and comb through these articles again, I’ve pulled useful insights from the top-shared content of 2019 (again using BuzzSumo as my go-to data tool).

Here are four things I found out.

1. The Best Month for Posting Viral Content

We all know what January is like every year. Gyms are full of new registrants. People start buying organic bamboo toothbrushes. The world is new and ready for a fresh start.

It’s no different in the world of content marketing. In January, marketers are prepared to root out old practices, review what went right and wrong in the past year, and research statistic-based data that’ll give them a boost in the months ahead.

So, the best time to post viral-worthy content? January.

2. The Best Content Is Long Content

Content length is as important as the content subject.

While short blogs can entertain and amuse, they only scratch the surface of a topic. Long blogs, on the other hand, have more space to go in-depth with guidelines, statistics, images, and unique information.

So how long should your blogs be?

According to the chart above, a blog between 2,000 and 3,000 words will get you the highest engagement.

Want to get industry expert blogs that’ll boost your engagement? Visit our content shop to learn more.

3. The Best Day to Publish Content

What’s the best day to publish a blog post? Many people suggest weekends, as it’s when users are most active online.

However, according to this chart, the posts which got the highest engagements in 2019 were posted on Tuesday!

Also surprising: The next best time to publish is Monday. Maybe it’s because people are eager to start a new week with fresh minds and new ideas? 🤔

4. The Top Domains of 2019

One thing to note here: a number of these blogs made it to the top-shared content of 2019.

What does that say to you? The best way to achieve a blog that goes viral is to become an established expert in your field.

Know the best time, length, and day to post content based on 2019's top-shared content. 🥇 Also, get to know the top domains of this year that can inspire your next strategy. 🤩 Click To Tweet

Our Top-Shared Content for 2019: Trends on Express Writers

With 6,500 Write Blog readers and over 90,000 visitors a month, we’re definitely nowhere near the numbers of some of these hottest top-shared content of 2019.

Yet, I’m thankful to say that we’ve even earned this status — it’s awesome to pull in business through valuable content creation! 💥

And, it’s one of our quarterly habits to review our top-shared, top-read content to identify and see what topics and concepts our readers like. (As a marketer, you should do this too!)

So without further ado, here’s our own top-shared content of 2019 (Hint: The number-one most engaged is not even an SEO piece!).

1. Our Top Engaged: “How to Find Your Brand’s Unique Content Differentiation Factor and Use It to Your Advantage“*

This post is about finding that single unique aspect of your brand that’ll make you stand out in the sea of businesses today.

For content marketing, I call this your Content Differentiating Factor (CDF).

Once you find it, you’ll be able to answer potential buyers when they ask why they should pick you above other brands.

Want to learn about 11 skills that’ll help you nail your place in your industry? Download our profitable content marketing skills cheat sheet here.

2. Our Highest Two Traffic Posts for 2019 at Express Writers

“How to Write a Press Release“

In this guide, I give you 11 steps to writing a polished, professional press release. Plus, I give you great samples you can compare your work to – five of them, to be exact!

“How to Write a Business Case Study“

Case studies aren’t about stroking a company’s ego. They’re about showing potential clients what a business can do for them.

When you read this post, you’ll learn the five essential steps to creating a case study that’ll result in tons of engagements and conversions.

Will Your Post Be One of the Top-Shared of 2020?

In 2020, we all want to be the writer of a blog post that goes viral.

But creating such a post won’t happen by luck or magic.

Instead, it’ll happen when we do a careful study of what went right in the past and why it went right.

It’ll happen because of loads of creativity, hours of effort, and trustworthy expertise.

Where Should I Invest My Marketing Budget? How Inbound Content Beats PPC & Other Avenues

November 26, 2019/24 Comments/in Content Marketing /by Julia McCoy

Ever asked yourself, “Where should I invest my marketing budget?”

What about this followup question?

“How much do companies spend on marketing that doesn’t work?”

Because, let’s be real –

Are you seeing results from your PPC (pay-per-click) ads on Google?

How about your Facebook ads?

If you’re like most ad buyers, the answer is almost always a shrug, a sigh, and a reluctant, “Well… no.”

That’s no coincidence.

The ROI of PPC alone is lower than low. (Sadly low. Ridiculously, hopelessly low.)

How low is it?

That’s what we’ll discuss today: Why PPC ads and similar avenues aren’t worth it, why there are better options, and exactly where you should invest your marketing budget.

(Hint: It starts with an “i” and ends with “-nbound.”) 🤫

Where Should You Invest Your Marketing Budget? The Truth About PPC vs. Inbound ROI

1. Marketing Budget Breakdown: What’s the Real Cost of PPC?

2. Marketing Budget Reality: The Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) for PPC Ads vs. the ROI of Inbound Content Marketing

3. The Inbound Marketing Difference

3 MORE Reasons PPC Ads Don’t Pay Off

People Distrust Ads in General
PPC Has a Steep Learning Curve
Many PPC Experts Prioritize Numbers over Human Readers

Where Should I Invest My Marketing Budget? Inbound Is the Answer

💰 Been throwing out loads of cash for PPC ads? And was it worth it? 🤔 If the ads in 2018 brought only 0.66x return on ad spend, then it's a 100% NO 🙅‍♂️🙅‍♀️. Where should you invest your marketing budget then? A: Inbound Content 🍯 Click To Tweet

Where Should You Invest Your Marketing Budget? The Truth About PPC vs. Inbound ROI

If you looked at a chart of marketing budgets by industry for 2018 or 2019, you would probably see a fair amount spent a chunk of money on PPC ads. Many probably prioritized PPC above building their organic search rankings.

This is a big mistake, and I want to show you exactly why.

1. Marketing Budget Breakdown: What’s the Real Cost of PPC?

The cost of PPC is easy to break down in surface terms. You bid for the specific keyword you’re targeting – the maximum amount you’re willing to pay every time someone clicks your ad. If your bid is the highest (and your Ad Rank is equally up to snuff), you’ll appear at the top of search results.

Here’s a visual of that from Wordstream:

However, for many highly competitive keywords, bidding can get insane.

For example, to rank at the top of Google with a paid search ad for a competitive keyword like “content marketing,” you would need to shell out $18 per click.

However, before you decide that would be totally worth the cost, look more closely at the click data in Ahrefs.

Clicks are currently going to only 4% of paid “content marketing” search results. Meanwhile, almost all the clicks (96%!) are going to organic search.

Let’s put that into perspective.

“Content marketing” has a search volume of 31K.
48% of searches for this keyword ended in clicks (searchers clicked on one or more of the results).
That means about 14,880 people clicked a result in this SERP.
Only 4% clicked a paid search ad.
That means PPC ads are only getting about 595 clicks per month in this SERP. The lion’s share of the clicks (14,284!!) are going to organic search.

Very, very few people are clicking ads in search results like this one.

What's the real cost of PPC? So here's how it goes: you bid for your target keyword aka the max amount you'll pay per ad click. The highest bid gets to the top of search results. Easy. 🎰 BUT, its low ROI will shock you. 📉😧 Click To Tweet

To drive the point home, let’s look at another example of the low ROI of PPC ads.

A colleague recently sent me a case study from one of their clients with declining sales. Without naming names, my colleague looked at the client’s search data and conversion rates and found:

About 26% of their traffic was coming from paid search.
Roughly 17% was coming from organic search.
Their conversion rate for traffic from paid search was 0.27%.
Their conversion rate for organic search traffic was 51% – nearly 6x higher than paid search.

Imagine the ROI if this client switched gears and started focusing on improving their organic search rankings!

2. Marketing Budget Reality: The Return on Ad Spend (ROAS) for PPC Ads vs. the ROI of Inbound Content Marketing

The return on investment for paid search isn’t looking good.

But wait:

There’s more.

According to The Ad Strategist, the ROAS for Facebook ads (as part of a cold ad funnel, where cold leads are served ads based on their interests, etc.) has drastically dropped within the past 1-2 years.

In 2016, ROAS hovered at a decent 11.88x. In 2018, ROAS dipped to a dismal 0.66x.

Display ad conversion rates have plummeted. Across industries, the average is 0.72% on mobile.

That means, if you spend, say, $450 on ads, you’d only get back 0.0066% of what you put into your campaign. With a 0.72% conversion rate, you would actually lose money. Your small business marketing budget statistics would look horrible.

That’s why inbound and content marketing are incredible in comparison.

Return on ad spend (ROAS) went from 11.8x in 2016 sliding down to 0.66x in 2018. 😡 The average ad conversion rate for mobile is 0.72%. 😱 These are the signs that you should change where you invest your marketing budget RIGHT NOW. 🏃💨 Click To Tweet

3. The Inbound Marketing Difference

On average, across industries, organic traffic from search converts at a rate of 16%. Thus, when you target organic traffic with inbound marketing, the ROI speaks for itself.

When you create content of amazing quality consistently, the stuff that speaks deeply to your target reader’s pains and problems (and solves them!), you can’t help but win.

I came up with a formula for predicting content marketing ROI a few years ago. Let’s compare it to the ROAS we discussed earlier.

Start with your average monthly traffic numbers. For the sake of the example, let’s say you get roughly 5,000 visitors per month.
To find the average number of traffic-to-lead conversions you could expect from content marketing, grab that average 16% conversion rate and get multiplying:
- 5,000 x 16% = 800 leads/month
Now take your estimated leads and multiply by the average lead-to-sale conversion rate for content marketing, 14%, to estimate monthly sales:
- 800 x 14% = 112 sales/month

Now, let’s say your average sale is about $10. That means you could expect $1,120 monthly in new sales as a direct result of content marketing.

When you compare the cost of content marketing to the ROI, it all makes sense.

So if you're wasting money on PPC, where should you invest then? Go for inbound marketing. Creating useful content for your target readers can bring in 🧑🏾‍🤝‍🧑🏻🧑🏿‍🤝‍🧑🏽 traffic ➡️ leads ➡️ sales (with an average close rate of 14%!) 🥂 Click To Tweet

For example, a Level 3 Blogging package from our Content Shop costs $1,000/month for 8 expert blogs at 1,000 words each, produced by a subject-matter expert and posted bi-weekly.

It’s pretty easy to do the math and see that you would still come out ahead, even AFTER outsourcing the content creation part (which, by the way, most marketers [84%] do, according to Content Marketing Institute’s most recent B2B report).

*TV infomercial announcer voice* 🎤 But that’s not all!

Content marketing comes in clutch at every stage of the buying process. No matter how close your leads are to buying (or far away), content helps you do everything. It builds brand awareness and secures, nurtures, and converts leads:

Last but not least, let’s pull in a really fun example to go out with a bang: 💥

(Disclaimer: This is an extreme marketing budget example.)

How does the average cost of a Super Bowl ad compare with the cost of content creation for 2 years? (Hint: They’re not even close.)

The average Super Bowl ad costs $40,000 for 5 seconds of airtime. (Read: $5 million for one minute.)

For 2 years of expert blogging PLUS 1 year of EW’s social media plan, PLUS one written and designed ebook, PLUS four lattes from a coffee shop per week for 12 months (for this, you’ll have to rely on your local barista):

$37,000.

That’s 135x cheaper for nearly 200 blogs that will live on your site and compound in value over time. Many of them will still be relevant and draw in leads years from now. (Use that example in your marketing budget presentation if you want to get the boss’s attention!)

Meanwhile, in 2019, the Super Bowl drew in its fewest number of viewers in the past 11 years. If you watched, do you even remember any of the ads? 🤔

Me neither.

3 MORE Reasons PPC Ads Don’t Pay Off

If I’ve made my point clear, inbound content marketing is a better investment than PPC, hands-down.

“But PPC is faster,” you might object. “I want to see sales now, not later.”

Wait one minute, there, Speedy. PPC is NOT necessarily faster for bringing in traffic and revenue. Sure, it shoots you to the top of a SERP (IF you win a keyword bidding war), but your position at the top is shaky.

This is totally unlike if you earned your way to organic position #1 with solid, quality, user-satisfying content.

Why?

1. People Distrust Ads in General

Ad distrust (especially distrust of display ads) has been mounting in recent years. It’s something you can’t ignore if you’re considering ads for your marketing strategy.

According to Edelman’s Trust Barometer Report, 74% of consumers say they avoid ads completely.

That includes:

Using ad blockers on websites
Changing their habits to see fewer ads
Finding ways to avoid ads
Paying for streaming services to skip most commercials and TV ads

PPC might be faster but consider this: More people distrust and avoid ads. 🙈 They use ad blockers and pay for streaming services just not to see a glimpse of it. Know other reasons why PPC don't pay off in this post by @JuliaEMcCoy Click To Tweet

Ad avoidance is common. That behavior isn’t limited to display ads or commercials, either. According to a Sprout Social study, 27% of consumers have a more negative view of social media advertising than they did one year ago.

The reason? 58% said they saw too many social ads and were just plain sick of it.

The nail in the coffin? Most people simply view advertisers as morally and ethically bankrupt, according to a Gallup poll. The profession of “advertising practitioner” is rated among the lowest for honesty and ethical standards.

Behold the myriad of reasons why paid search gets ridiculously fewer clicks than organic search. (Remember that 4% vs. 96% example from earlier?)

Bottom line: IF you go for ads of any kind, think long and hard about WHO might pay attention to them and WHY. In most cases, a better long-term marketing investment (and better ROI!) comes from content marketing.

2. PPC Has a Steep Learning Curve

Every new concept you encounter has a learning curve, but PPC ads, in particular, are not for the uninitiated. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you’ll probably get it wrong and waste money.

For Google Ads, they must conform to specific quality standards, keep under a certain length, maintain clarity and honesty, and more.

If you’re a DIY marketer with no pay-per-click ad experience, learning to be successful with it will take lots and LOTS of time.

Sure, PPC can be interesting to study and use to boost your online traffic -- if you're lucky to grab the keyword and audience you want.🐙 But if you're a DIY marketer, learning all the rules and best practices will take lots of time. ⌛ Click To Tweet

If, however, you decide to spring for a PPC expert…

3. Many PPC Experts Prioritize Numbers over Human Readers

The problem with PPC experts is they are numbers-driven. They have to be because they’re paid to get results for their customers… but, it turns out that’s a problem in itself.

When you’re so numbers-focused, you forget about the real humans on the other side of the screen.

For example, if you pay for PPC ads and you’re not getting highly visible spots on a SERP (or you’re not getting clicks), your expert may just say you need to increase your PPC budget.

But the issue isn’t with your budget. It’s with your content.

It’s what your PPC ads SAY – the wording – that encourages clicks.

Furthermore, if a potential customer clicks and discovers your content doesn’t match their search intent – well, say goodbye.

Even if you own the top paid spot, without content that meets or exceeds the user’s need, you’ll go nowhere.

And, let’s not forget many searchers simply skip over the paid results and go straight to the organic results underneath.

The problem isn’t with your PPC bidding. The problem is you need better nurturing strategies to pull in customers.

Really, let’s call a spade a spade. Where should you invest your marketing budget, if not with ads?

You need inbound for your digital marketing budget plan. 🤯

PPC experts can surely help bring in the traffic you've been aiming for. 🏹 However, this could be a problem itself when the work becomes simply obsessing over getting high numbers. 🤪 A click doesn't convert to a sale in a snap. 🖱️ Click To Tweet

Where Should I Invest My Marketing Budget? Inbound Is the Answer

If PPC and/or Facebook ads have left you high and dry, it’s not wholly your fault.

The industry is working against you. Expectations vs. reality are drastically different because the ad landscape has changed across the board.

Over and over, users are showing us what they want. We have to stop leaning into marketing tactics that used to work in favor of embracing what works now.

Today, people are tired of ads. They avoid them at all costs.

Today, organic search draws in traffic and leads through information sharing, nailing user search intent, and building trust. We can literally build our customer bases through honest, expert, authentic content.

Isn’t that amazing?