by Elizabeth Hines | Jan 23, 2018 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing
Measuring the success of your content is important in evaluating your writing for SEO strategy. Here’s how to do that.
This week, we’re wrapping up our series on writing for SEO. In this series, we’ve explored how search engines are changing, how people are changing the way they search, and how to make use of topic clusters and pillar content. Now, with a better understanding of the changing SEO landscape, it’s time to think about how to measure the success of your content.
As with any marketing effort, having a documented strategy for your content’s search engine performance — and a plan for measuring the success of your strategy — is key. You might be asking yourself, “How do I measure the success of a piece of content?”
Should I measure the success of one post at a time?
When it comes to SEO, the answer to this question can be complicated, largely because it’s not a great idea to evaluate the success of your campaign on a post-by-post basis. It’s too narrow a definition of success to account for the complex network of direct and indirect benefits of effective SEO writing.
Take brand-driven content, for example. Your focus isn’t about generating individual sales, but rather about elevating your brand, raising wider awareness, attracting new talent, or generating backlinks. If you based the success of brand-driven content on the number leads it generated alone, you’d think it was performing terribly. But your post may, in fact, have generated hundreds of backlinks and be getting lots of traffic.
Evaluating by cluster topic
So how do you evaluate success? Rather than looking at your content on a post-by-post basis, consider how all the content under each cluster topic performs as a whole.
According to HubSpot, “Measuring the entire topic cluster against all of your core business metrics will enable you to include residual benefits coming from content that doesn’t align with direct conversion goals.”
As you look at the performance of your topic clusters, consider the following four questions:
- Which topics perform best at driving traffic to your website or other web presence?
- Which topics earn you the most leads?
- Which topics drive the most revenue for your business?
- Which topics earn the most backlinks/coverage?
It’s important to remember that at the end of the day, what you’re working toward — and what will work best for your search visibility — is creating content that people want to see. Writing for SEO is ultimately about creating better content, increasing search engine visibility, and providing the best possible experience for your site visitors.
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by Elizabeth Hines | May 2, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Social Media
YouTube creators focus on audience engagement, as opposed to branding, which helps them organically grow an authentic loyal following.
I recently watched a video from Truly Social President and Founder Tara Hunt about the genius of YouTube creators. She offers truly valuable insight into why people with little technology and resources have been more successful in growing a loyal audience with video than corporate campaigns with all the money and creativity in the world.
Perhaps it’s worth saying first: Yes, video can work for the supply chain. And YouTube, in particular, can be very worthwhile as part of your larger social marketing strategy. The decade-old video platform has over 1.3 billion users. 1.3 BILLION! And that’s not all: Users watch over 5 billion videos on YouTube every single day, and upload 300 hours of video every minute.
This presents a huge opportunity for your company to reach prospects in a new way. It also means that your videos really need to stand out to make an impact and avoid getting lost in the shuffle. After all, approximately 20% of people who start a video will leave after the first 10 seconds.
So how are creators attracting viewers while corporate brands aren’t?
5 ways creators are out-YouTubing brands
1. Consistency
Creators know the success behind their YouTube channels is a constant stream of content. This be can new content or simply responding to their followers, but they are active every day, around the clock. Brands tend to spend a lot of time and energy on content but are inconsistent in their posting, often abandoning their YouTube channels for days or weeks at a time. Their followers become bored with their lack of attention and move on.
2. Community
The foundation of YouTube — and most social media platforms, actually — is community and the resulting two-way dialogue between creators and their followers. The intent of a creator’s video is to engage their audience and build a relationship that is beneficial to both parties. On the other hand, brands tend to be overly focused on the attention their content stirs up, the “buzz” they are able to draw, neglecting the important process of creating and nurturing a relationship with their followers.
3. Interaction
Companies often focus on pushing their “messaging” on one (or just a few) social media platform(s). They spend an enormous amount of time and money perfecting content that reflects this messaging, hoping their followers will engage with it.
Contrarily, YouTube creators focus on interaction. They interact on multiple platforms, reaching out to their audience and taking full advantage of every opportunity to connect with their followers. What’s more, successful YouTubers don’t merely expect engagement — they ask for it. They promote hashtags, solicit video responses from viewers, and encourage feedback via social media interactions. Calls-to-action can stimulate subscriptions, shares and cross-pollination with other platforms.
4. Connection
Gone are the days of expensive and lengthy productions. Creators have captivated their audiences by creating organic, raw material that focuses on the emotional connect. The polished and professional content that brands create are void of vulnerability and lack the connection today’s followers are seeking.
5. Collaboration
Creators root for one another; they follow one another; they promote one another. YouTube creators seek the opportunity to expand their audience by collaborating with other creators who focus on the same topics and interests. Through the power of collaboration, creators expand the exposure of their content to different audiences, gaining subscribers and views.
Brands see other brands as competition. In a time when audiences prefer engagement and social awareness, this competitive attitude hurts brands’ likability and ultimately diminishes their viewership.
If companies were to focus more on audience engagement in these ways, they would have a better chance at mimicking the wild success of YouTube creators who have amassed a loyal following.
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by Elizabeth Hines | Apr 11, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Social Media, Supply Chain
Create videos that provide answers and convey your mission, and viewers will come.
I know what you’re thinking: Videos are a great marketing tactic for certain niches, but not the supply chain. Who would want to watch my videos? What would I even make a video about?
Here’s the thing. Video is the most popular form of content being consumed online. As such, YouTube has become the second largest search engine in the world, with more than one billion users conducting over 3 billion searches per month. And YouTube isn’t just for funny cats and cover artists anymore. Businesses are using the video-sharing website and social media platform to engage customers and prospects.
Why? YouTube reaches more adults ages 18-34 in the U.S. than any cable network. Users browse the platform for entertainment purposes, but also for tips, information, and ideas. And anywhere people are seeking solutions, businesses should be providing answers.
Provide answers with video
Your first tendency when creating video content might be to promote your products. But if people wanted to watch commercials, they’d turn on the TV.
Instead, ask yourself: What are your customers’ pain points? What expertise and information do you have that is valuable to them? What industry topics interest you most, or what do you like best about working in your field?
YouTube has proven that ordinary people demonstrating and discussing their interests is of great value to a wide range of people. Consider formerly starving artist Leonardo Pereznieto, for example.
After struggling to make ends meet by selling his art, Perznieto began his YouTube channel Fine Art-Tips. Initially the goal was to make his drawings and sketches accessible to a wider audience. It was pretty unsuccessful.
Then Pereznieto began uploading sketching demonstrations to his channel, describing exactly what he was doing or how to get a certain effect. Fine Art-Tips grew like wildfire. To date, he has over 780,000 subscribers and more than two million views monthly. His step-by-step tutorial on how to draw a water drop has nearly 9 million views alone.
Aside from plenty of ad revenue to cover his living expenses, Pereznieto’s YouTube celebrity has advanced his reputation — and success — as an artist. His story is a testament to the power of informational video content in brand building.
Convey your mission
Video is a highly visual way to engage your audience. The combination of images, music, and narration can provoke emotion unlike any other media form. This makes it an ideal way to convey what you stand for — be it a safer workplace, higher quality components, or green living.
Chipotle’s 2013 integrity campaign offers a great example. The fast food chain partnered with Moonbot Studios to produce a video, The Scarecrow, which brought consumer awareness to issues within the food industry. Now with over 17.8 million views, the video has helped demonstrate Chipotle’s commitment to anti-factory farming and wholesome, sustainable food.
Videos are an excellent way to engage and enlighten customers and prospects without being overly promotional. Over one billion people are seeking answers and joining causes on YouTube — will your business create the content they’re looking for?
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by Elizabeth Hines | Mar 28, 2017 | Blog, Content Marketing, Marketing, Social Media, Strategy
Follow these four steps ahead of the show to ensure you’re getting the most out of your lead generation efforts.
This is the first installment of a three-part series about generating leads around a trade show.
As thousands of us prepare for our travels to Chicago to attend ProMat 2017, many are wondering: How can I maximize my time? What can I do to stand out? What will help me generate the most new business?
These are important questions — ones that deserve careful thought and strategy. So we created a three-part series to help you make the most of your next trade show.
In this first part, we will focus on the prep work you can do before heading to your trade show that will set you up for success.
Pre-show prep in 4 steps
With over 850 exhibitors attending ProMat this year, it is important to start the work of nurturing leads before you even leave your office. Strategically planning for this event can help you get the most out of your trade show experience, and get you the leads to grow your business and increase your sales.
Here are four tips to get you started on the right track.
1. Set clear goals
Why are you attending ProMat? What do you hope to gain from your attendance, in addition to leads? Understanding why you are attending a trade show is the foundation for creating what you want to achieve from your presence.
For example, if your goal is to boost your social media presence, make sure every handout, landing page, and face-to-face interaction includes a request to like your company on Facebook (or other social media sites). Or if you are hoping to educate potential customers on a new product, work on creating exciting new marketing handouts and presentations that can be displayed during the trade show.
2. Research your audience
Focusing on who will be attending the show can give you invaluable insight into the motivation behind their attendance and how you can best capture their attention.
Performing prospect research using the list of attendees — including anyone who has given you their contact information through social media, your landing page, or website — provides added awareness about your target audience. You can also go one step further and reach out to high-value prospects on your social media sites to step up a meeting time during the show.
3. Advertise, advertise, advertise
Your company has spent valuable resources to attend the show, so make it known that you’ll be there. Reach out to customers, attendees, and contacts through your social media outlets. Most trade shows have event-specific hashtags (#ProMat) to help spread the word on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.
Make sure to include your booth number and location, if possible. Get creative with fun teaser videos to engage with potential customers and get them curious about your new products. Creating an event-specific landing page to channel your prospects into one location, giving you a place to answer questions, create a running list of leads, and continue to promote your presence at the trade show.
4. Create content to distribute
It’s imperative to have content (brochures, templates, etc.) that highlights your brand and products. You should create content that can be distributed during the show that supplements your booth staff, helping them to educate and answer questions.
For example, you can create copies of a presentation you are giving. This allows attendees that cannot attend the presentation to still obtain the valuable information and affords you the opportunity to expand upon the presentation. Preparing these handouts ahead of time allows you to skip the last-minute scramble and focus on being present at the show.
These four tips can get you started on your journey to a successful trade-show experience. Using inbound marketing and social media tools, you are already ahead of your competitors before you even arrive at the show.
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by Jennifer Hart Yim | Mar 22, 2017 | Blog, Leadership, Logistics, Supply Chain, Talent
By calling them “soft skills,” are we shortchanging competencies that are critical for supply chain and procurement professionals to succeed?
This guest post comes to us from Argentus Supply Chain Recruiting, a boutique recruitment firm specializing in Supply Chain Management and Procurement.
One of the biggest stories in the world of Supply Chain and Procurement talent over the past few years has been the emerging importance of Soft Skills. Time was, the business world saw Supply Chain and Procurement as highly analytical fields, where the ability to organize and interpret data was paramount. Analytical skills are still important, of course. But as the field has become more strategic — with a greater impact on wider areas of business — professionals in the field have had to become stronger at advocating for it. No senior Procurement professional is going to get very far into a Procurement transformation without being able to advocate for their Procurement method and what it can deliver. No one is going to transform their organization’s Supply Chain without being able to explain whatever insights they’ve gleaned from data to senior management.
When we say “Soft Skills,” we generally mean:
- Verbal communications
- Written communications
- Relationship-building skills
- Presentation ability
- The ever-elusive and hard-to-define-but-you-know-it-when-you-see-it “polish”
There’s no doubt they’re important, especially when it comes to moving into the senior ranks of leadership. But by calling them “soft skills,” are we really shortchanging them and treating them as ancillary to the “main,” “vocational” skills we ask for? Maybe it’s time to put them front and center.
They may be skills, but they’re not soft
Marketing guru and entrepreneur Seth Godin had an interesting post about the concept of “Soft Skills” and whether the way we think about them needs a revamp: “Let’s stop calling them ‘soft skills.’ They might be skills, but they’re not soft,” he says.
Godin’s basic point is that soft skills build a great workplace culture. And workplace culture isn’t an ancillary bonus to a business’s core function. It is a business’s core function. Godin doesn’t discount the importance of vocational skills. You can’t make a Supply Chain run without data. But for all the talk about strategy, a truly successful company succeeds not because of its strategy, but its culture — just like a truly successful career in business is often driven by soft skills rather than vocational skills.
His point is also that we don’t put as much effort into training soft skills as we do vocational skills, which might be because vocational skills are easier to measure. For example your typing speed (or for a Supply Chain role, your facility with SAP or JAD software) is much easier to measure than the kind of empathic awareness that makes a team sing. The result?
“Organizations hire and fire based on vocational skill output all the time, but practically need an act of the board to get rid of a negative thinker, a bully or a sloth (if he/she is good at something measurable).”
Rebranding soft skills as real skills
Godin’s suggestion is to rename soft skills “real skills” and break them down into new categories by which we might assess them:
- Self Control
- Productivity
- Wisdom
- Perception
- Influence
He breaks these categories down into an exhaustive list of skills (“diplomacy in difficult situations,” “etiquette”) that’s definitely worth checking out, and worth assessing in new hires. It gets a little abstract, but we couldn’t agree more with Godin’s core point: It’s time to put “soft skills” front and center.
In Supply Chain and Procurement, which are the areas we recruit for, soft skills are taking on more relevance as automation begins to handle the nuts and bolts of how products come to market, and how companies work with suppliers. The function is becoming more nimble and more strategic, and the future belongs to those who are able to be strategic advocates — and the companies that prize this in their hires.
Yet in a field that is, by its very nature, obsessed with efficiency, measurement, and data, soft skills sometimes take a back seat.
We think it’s time to change that.
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