Chart of the Day: How good is your use of campaign tracking codes?
As this post on campaign tracking in Google Analytics shows, Google's UTM tracking codes provide an excellent way to see which of your marketing channels and content is influencing site visits, leads and sales. This week we have launched a simple tracking code generator for Google Analytics marketing source codes to make it quicker for members to generate these.
Yet, when consulting or training I find that many businesses don't fully track their inbound marketing activities, especially their content marketing where content is shared by email or social. This chart, from joint research by Smart Insights and HubSpot of content marketers in Europe also suggests room for improvement in tracking of content marketing.
You can see that fewer than half of businesses are able to track ROI or track links to content from other…
Examples of content that gets results on social media
Content still remains the strongest element of any marketing strategy. In fact, about 70 percent B2B marketers plan to create more content in 2017 compared to 2016. Whether you are a B2B or B2C brand, staying current with the content marketing best practices will ensure you achieve your goals quickly and efficiently. A good way to stay updated with the latest trends is to see how the top brands are leveraging content and how they have benefited from them.
If you are a seasoned content marketer, you can get clues about which adjustments need to be made to your content strategies to get better results. If you are new to content marketing, you can learn from the big shots and get started with your content marketing endeavors.
Now let us see what the top brands are doing to get the desired attention:
1. Content…
Why You Should Use Bots to Supercharge Your MarTech Strategy this Year
How long do we have before AI-powered bots become the primary channel for us to read and share content on? From newspapers and magazines to social media and apps, what does the future of content have in store for us?
Unlike traditional media and the printed press which stayed stagnant for decades, it’s no secret that the digital marketplace as we know it changes drastically on a year to year basis.
With the evolution of how we create and consume content, however, staying in the game goes hand in hand with staying on top of the changing types and hacks of content marketing. After all, meeting audiences where they are and how they like it is what will make or break you.
For the past few months, marketing gurus like Rand Fishkin and Neil Patel have been emphasizing on how…
Chart of the Day: The vast majority of marketers are still using vanity metrics to assess content effectiveness, whilst only half are measuring the effect on sales.
A recent report by TrackMaven asked 200 marketing leaders across 19 different industries about how they measure the effectiveness of their marketing efforts. The results show that marketers are still relying on 'vanity metrics' such as likes, shares and views, rather than calculations of how the marketing has impacted the bottom line.
This needs to change if marketers are going to be able to justify future increases in budgets for new campaigns. It's no good going to the CFO with how many re-tweets you got. The only sustainable way to grow your marketing department is to be able to clearly demonstrate that is leading to increases in leads and sales, and thus contributing to the business growth.
Marketers need to invest in better analytics for measuring their success and…
Chart of the day: The majority of marketers say their content marketing strategy is effective and say their strategy is more effective than the previous year - but they also expect to produce more content next year than they are currently
The study showed that over 7 in 10 prioritised content delivery and distribution over the quality of content but 7 in 10 also focus on creating content with their audience in mind, rather than the brand. This highlights the pressure to deliver relevant content but produce as much content as possible and distribute it effectively, even if it means compromising on quality.
This is often a false economy. With so much content now available competition is extreme. Only by producing exceptional content can you cut through the noise.
The study also found that 7 in 10 marketers expect to produce more content next year…
What is headless CMS and how can it benefit marketers?
It’s a question that you may have either been asked or have asked yourself in the last few months—"what exactly is headless CMS and why should marketers care?" It's unproven. It's not ready to use. It's too technical. It's only for developers. All common concerns that I have heard to date. But that's not the whole story. The CMS marketplace is moving on and it’s important to understand how.
The Stuff of Nightmares
For many marketers technical advancements are a nightmare. Having to learn new technologies, keep up with the times, and figure out how to utilise them to their full potential—it's all very scary. But headless CMS doesn't need to invoke sleepless nights thinking of the four horsemen of the apocalypse approaching. The headless CMS architecture is still developing and as it evolves, it will become a useful tool for both developers and marketers…
6 Great Content Curation Tools
They say that content is King. If that’s the case then curation has to be, at the very least, a Baron or something. Actually, scratch that. Content curation, when it’s done right, can be king too.
One need only think of products and features like Reddit, Facebook Trending or Twitter Moments to see how important content curation is to the general public. Cutting through the noise of clickbait and subpar content marketing is extremely difficult, and that’s why effective content curation can be so valuable.
Short On Time? Curate!
If you have the time, creating your own content is a powerful way to drive traffic to your site. One need only look at the stats for proof of that:
Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates 3x as many leads
Year on year growth of site traffic is almost 8x higher for content marketing…
How to successfully combine your PR and Content Marketing efforts
Content marketing and public relations (PR) are very similar in nature. One can even say that they are two sides of the same coin. Most people thought that with the emergence of social media, public relations (PR) may become irrelevant. But it didn't. Instead, it started using different approaches than the age-old methods of engagement and publicity. This post offers tips on why you need to combine content marketing with PR and how to do it successfully.
Why Combine Content Marketing with PR and Vice Versa
As PR and content marketing share a common goal, there is a great deal to be gained by harnessing a hybrid approach. Here is why any PR firm should be combining PR and content marketing strategies.
Offers Consolidated Platform for Sharing Ideas
Whether you are a content marketer or a PR professional, it is your responsibility to keep track…
Chart of the day: social media marketing and content marketing budgets are expected to increase more than any other channel in 2017
Marketers were asked to indicate whether particular types of marketing would either stay the same, increase or decrease in a survey of over 3,000 client-side marketing professionals. The findings show the importance of social, content and personalisation within marketing strategies and budgets.
Personalisation and video marketing are also big priorities for marketers.
Display advertising and paid search are expected to have the biggest decreases (13% each) whilst affiliate marketing budgets are the most likely to stay the same.
Previously we might have expected content marketing to have been top, but social and content are the power duo. This isn't surprising as social media keeps pushing its way to the top of marketing plans. It's also good to see email marketing is at least maintaining…
Creating a Bigger and Better Blog for 2017
It’s no secret that the most, if not all, profitable niches in online marketing are already highly saturated. If you think you have an idea for a new blog topic, there are probably a thousand blogs that already published the same post. And in time, there'll be more content than humans can consume – resulting in “Content Shock."
Remember that the fundamental law of supply and demand affects everything. The price for any commodity falls when supply exceeds demand. But when it comes to content marketing, you end up paying your audience to consume your content because there’s no price for them to begin with.
In addition to time, thriving bloggers now need to invest in tools and resources that help with content creation. It’s also common for bloggers to bribe their audience into subscribing with free eBooks, discount coupons, and free trial periods.
Whether…
