Mighty Marketing Mojo

Tag: content marketing

5 Evergreen Content Ideas for any Solopreneur Niche
If You’re Feeling Stuck for Content Ideas Pick One of These to Use for Any Small Business Type or Niche

Summer is in full swing and the heat could be zapping your energy, fogging your brain, or melting your mojo. Or maybe you’re stuck inside on another cold day and the icy temperatures have your good ideas frozen in your brain. While I can’t give you ice cream treats or a nice warm cup of cocoa, I can share 5 evergreen content ideas to get you unstuck in your business. These topics will work for blog posts (original or go curate some content), live videos on any platform (please, if you do an interpretive dance on TikTok, let me know – it would be reason enough for me to get the app!), as a series of images and short videos in stories on IG or FB, as FB posts, as emails …

OR HEY … mix it up – create a piece of content using one of the topics in one content format and then repurpose it to at least 2 others. Recycling is good for business AND the environment.

Content Suggestions Fit Every Type of Solopreneur Business

These 5 content ideas will work if you are …
- a parenting coach or someone helping mompreneurs
- teaching on mindset shifts for new business owners
- a writer or book coach
- in the health/wellness niches
- talking marketing to other businesses (like me!).
No matter your niche and audience of customers, you can add your own stories or examples and adapt each idea to suit your business and your audience. And you can do so over and over again.

Strategic Content Topics That Lead to Next Steps and Offers

Plus each of these content topics naturally leads to other topics and to opportunities to offer a next step of help as an email opt-in gift, or a low-cost product, or even as a way to lead to your courses or coaching. That makes for more harder-working, more strategic content and less fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants efforts. Remember, content marketing is to educate and inform while inspiring your audience to take a specific action.

Use the given headlines as blog post titles, video titles, or email subject lines – and just tweak or fill-in-the-blanks with your audience where appropriate. Don’t overthink it, just take the ideas and run!

5 Boredom Busting Content Ideas

How to Stop Feeling Stuck and Move Forward

This topic could be adapted to talk about moving forward with your business structure (LLCs vs Sole Proprietor, etc) or how to move forward with creating and launching your next course.

If you’re in the moms or parents space, it could be on moving forward with getting kids ready for back to school (especially after some weird virtual/hybrid learning times) or moving forward with aiding elderly parents.

For fitness and wellness coaches, talk to your people about moving forward with an improved diet at the end of summer fun or how to stop feeling stuck with the same old at-home fitness routines.

Try these 5 points under the main topic:
- what’s the roadblock or crippling belief behind why your clients say they are stuck (with recipes, fitness, kids, course creation, etc)
- what’s one small step you can recommend to get out of comfort zone
- name one new piece of positive self-talk
- how to ask for outside help
- Then of course recommend they go ask for help – and get a trusted coach – AHEM THAT’S YOU!
See, ANY topic or niche can work here!

Easy ____ Essentials to Boost Your _____

Time to play content creation Mad Libs! Fill in the blanks with your favorite easy tips and ways to boost to get a particular result.
- ‘easy mindset essentials to boost your sales success’
- ‘easy 3-ingredient recipe essentials to boost your morning energy’
- ‘easy hip stretch essentials to boost your flexibility’ [wow, I really need those right now!]
- ‘easy social media essential tips to boost your post engagement’
You aren’t solving all their sales issues or fixing all flexibility – you’re giving them a few easy tips where they can see some fast “aha! moments” and come to see you as a trusted resource with valuable info.

Now also add in what you offer that can also help them Boost X …

Do you have a workbook on sales success tips for biz owners who hate sales?

Can you offer a VIP day – maybe a wellness coach could offer flexibility and core stretch days?

Maybe you have a self-study course on 90-days to greater mobility?

Share a free video about creating more engaging Facebook posts? Have you shared your podcast yet?

Tons of opportunities here to show and tell them where they can get more valuable tips just like the ones you shared in your blog post, video or email.

7 Questions Every _____ Should Ask Before Hiring a ______

Yes, more great fill-in-the-blanks! These are the questions a client or customer should ask before hiring someone like you! But they are often the questions our prospects are afraid to ask, forget to ask, or only think of later on. Be transparent and helpful by showing them how to make a more informed hiring decision.

Examples could be …
- the 7 things someone should ask before hiring a kitchen designers
- the 7 things to ask before hiring someone to design a logo
- the 7 things a new business owner should ask before hiring a lawyer (or a business mindset coach)
- the 7 things to know before hiring someone to help you with public speaking
- 7 things to know before you hire a VA (including what is a VA)
Ask yourself, what are the questions you wish your clients had asked or knew before you ever jumped on a first call? Or what are the common questions that come up in a first call?

If you don’t do 1:1 or group coaching – what about teaching? What things do you wish someone thought about before they jumped in and purchased a class? What are the most common questions that come up in your first lessons or about your core courses?

Another idea – Turn it around – tell them the 7 things you always ask in your first calls:
- what would reaching your goal look like?
- Where do you want to be in 5 years?
- How would 5 years in the future You describe X?
- What do you like most about where you are now in X situation?
- If you had a magic wand, what’s ONE thing you want to change this week?
I Practice What I Teach – Here’s a Video of Me Explaining the 5 Evergreen Content Ideas

5 _______ experts you shouldn’t ignore

This topic is for sharing the people and resources you turn to and introduce them to your audience. Think of this as a specific kind of round-up post. It’s both very valuable and a great place for affiliate links! Share the love time. Who do you follow on a topic in your niche that you think the rest of your people should know about?

Share 3-5 blogs you read all the time or 5 podcasts you always listen to – and most importantly share WHY. Why are these 5 experts in your overall niche that can help your community go further. Maybe they cover some aspect that you don’t. For example, I’m not an Instagram marketing expert – so tell my mighty pals to check out Jenn Herman at JennsTrends.com because she IS a bonafide IG expert and a voice I trust.

Pick one tidbit or best piece of advice you’ve gotten from each person you follow and share in the short paragraphs about each person.

You can repeat this type of content over and over by sharing different experts or different resources. One time it was bloggers, another time it was podcasts. One time you share your favorite recipe sources, another it’s quick videos for stretches. Easily repurpose into graphics for social media, or 5 social posts – one per person.

4 (or 5 or 7 or whatever number greater than 3 lol) ____ traps that could keep you stuck

Every niche has common pitfalls, mistakes, or possible traps that your audience could fall into – and you want to be the person to show them how to avoid those sneaky traps. You can also share how YOU hit a roadblock or trap and how YOU got out of it – be an example to follow.
- 4 common mindset/thinking traps that keep you stuck in a life rut
- 5 common exercise traps that keep you from making fitness progress (or get more specific – 5 common mistakes that keep your legs and hips weak; or 5 reasons you will never actually ‘blast your belly’)
- 6 common snacking traps that keep you low on energy
- 5 behavior traps that keep you and your kids in the fight zone
- 5 writing traps that are keeping you from getting the first draft of your book done
Reassure them that everyone in X Niche falls into one of these traps at times. Paint a picture of the story of how you failed and then how you got out of the trap. Give a tip on how to recognize the traps. Give a tip on getting out of one or two of the traps.

You do NOT have to go into detail on how to get out of every trap – you’re giving them a map of what to avoid and that in itself is very helpful. The logical next is showing in more depth HOW to get out of the traps and that comes in your course, your coaching, or even your email follow-up series after an opt-in.

Link to a freebie or a call where they can get more help getting past the other Z traps and the other hidden lurking traps of X Niche. Keep leading your people to more next steps to keep taking action and seeing even more results.

I love myth-busting and helping my biz pals to avoid tech and marketing mistakes so I’ve used variations on this topic multiple times. I advised on blogging mistakes to avoid; shared about the pros and cons and some mistakes made when I switched email marketing services; plus avoiding bad social media advice.

Pick One Evergreen Content Topic and Create Over the Next Month

These are all evergreen topics – you could come back, update them, or do them again later. They work in all content formats. Use a blog post, or an email – or BOTH! Make a good blog post on the topic, then share the highlights in an email.

Or go from blog post to video, or video then blog post (ahem, that’s what I did -the notes came then the video and both into a blog post). Start from your area of content creation strength.

AND all the topics can all lead to other content and offers. They help educate your audience – not just about X topics but about YOU and your expertise. They give some info on the WHAT and WHY ….

They start to hit on the HOW … but all need more … more HOW. More on HOW TO AVOID, HOW TO KEEP IMPROVING …. Hence, leading to OFFERS. An email opt-in, a webinar, a summit, a video, a course, your 1:1 offers, etc.

Get off the fly-by-seat-of-your-pants content creation treadmill or just throwing any old content up on your blog, start from solid topics that address key, ongoing concerns of your audience. This makes for mightier content. 😁
July 26, 2021
Walking My Marketing Talk – the 2019 Stretch Yourself Challenge on Content Marketing
It’s Always a Good Time to Stretch Myself
and Re-find Marketing Mojo

Sometimes, we who teach, aren’t so great at the doing and following of our own advice. Like when your parents yelled “do what I say, not what I do!”. Yeah, that was bogus. 😄 Still is! But life and business happens and sometimes we need a nudge to take it up a notch in our own niches. It doesn’t matter that my knowledge and expertise on marketing goes back 25 years if I’m NOT walking my own content marketing talk and fully embracing my own marketing mojo. There’s always room to stretch and get outside our comfort zones. Good thing it’s time for the 2019 Stretch Yourself Challenge!

So, don’t we stretch ALL the time? How could I misplace my marketing mojo?

Life is busy. Summer was busy (and fun). Other priorities come up – that’s kind of a big part of why we are solopreneur biz owners, take on those other things! The other side/half of my business wants attention as I have 5 in-person workshops (in two states, months apart, but still) to work on. The nonprofit I’m the founding president for is in the middle of its first strategic plan and making plans for the next two years of conferences (oh and we’re ramping up things for this year’s event in November!). I’ve been setting up new software and website tech for Mighty Marketing Mojo. I’m emailing you awesome goodness for #ThursdayTips. I’m planning courses and coaching and I’m still doing Borrow My Brain sessions with solopreneur clients.

But …

If I’m totally honest … I’m still laying low, hiding, and not out there walking all my marketing talk all the time. I can do more. I believe my community NEEDS me to do more.

And …

Growth in our businesses (and lives) comes from stretching, pushing, and experimenting with new ideas and tactics.

Isn’t it ironic that we – solopreneurs who went out on our own to launch a business all by ourselves – can be risk-shy and let fear and doubt creep in?! We don’t venture out of the comfort zone.

“Everyone’s already written tons of blog posts about that, why would they read mine?”

“Everyone’s already done webinars to death. Webinars aren’t a hot marketing tool anymore. No one will show up.”

“I’m not a trained or licensed coach! Who am I to market and launch a coaching program?”

“I can’t speak at a live event! I’m not a famous public speaker, why would they want me?”

“There’s 1 BILLION hours of video watched on YouTube everyday. How will anyone ever see my video and why do they want to?”

EXCUSES! Your ego is trying to protect you, keep you safe in the comfort zone, play where you know how. And makes excuses for you.

There are tons more excuses for why we’re not stepping up and stretching ourselves in our content marketing. But that’s all they are – EXCUSES. And crappy whiny ones at that! 😄 We can do better. Our communities and audiences NEED us to do better.

We do better by challenging that voice inside us, by pushing ourselves out of the comfort zone by sharing and promoting our businesses MORE not less.

Good thing I’ve got just the right nudge and kick in the pants to put those excuses away!

September, with back-to-school time all over the U.S., is perfect for learning for all ages. There’s still time to make tremendous progress in our business before the end of the year. Winter hasn’t sapped our energy yet. We’re primed to learn and try new things thanks to all those years of school. That must be why Kelly McCausey has now put her annual Stretch Yourself Challenge for Content Marketing during September! Boy am I ready to stretch out of the comfort zone I’ve fallen into lately with my marketing.

Yes, even marketing coaches fall in to marketing bogs! I’ve made good plans, had consistency in parts of my marketing but even I don’t promote like I know is optimal. Time for the marketing coach to get coached! 😁 This challenge will pull us all out and get us powered up for the rest of the year and beyond.

The 2019 Stretch Yourself Challenge can help YOU smash all those excuses with:
- The packed action guide of 15 choose-your-own-adventure style content marketing challenges
- 16 live training/Q&A sessions (and yeah, replays of everything) including surprise pop-up guest experts
- An online group (FB) for support and accountability
- AND for this year – teams! Yes, you’ll be put on a team who is all stretching together, sharing together, growing together, and kicking those excuses to the curb.
The fact that this challenge is all about sharing, going through it together, getting group accountability and cheering is HUGE. I’ve tackled tons of projects on my own. I’ve learned the past 3 or so years that I do more, am more, when I do that growing, those projects, in a group.

With other projects on my plate, changes still needed in my business, those workshops to work on – I nearly decided to lay low and skirt through the SYC this year even after I already paid to join. I nearly gave in to those whiny, crappy excuses. But the infectious energy and excitement of the group in just the first 48 hours reminded me why I’m doing this for at least the 4^th straight year – and why you should kick your excuses to the curb too and join us!

You don’t have to do all the challenges ( you really shouldn’t try in 1 month!) but you do need to commit yourself to working, stretching, asking for help, and growing your self and your business. This is a challenge I gladly pay for each year – it’s well worth the value with how much Kelly gives, but also worth it for how much I get done that boosts my business.

Stretching Your Content Marketing is Always a Path to Marketing Mojo

Even if you don’t join me in SYC2019 take time over the next 30 days to see where you’ve been hiding, playing small, or not stretching with your business’s content marketing. Commit to your own challenge! Contact 10 people to have conversations. Write an excellent, helpful, epic blog post and then plan out 90 days of sharing and re-sharing the epic wisdom from that post. Create some videos for Facebook, Instagram, or YouTube that show your expertise in a different way or give a sneak peek inside your business. Go stretch yourself and find some extra marketing mojo!

[Psst … want to know my commitments during SYC2019? Definitely starting up the Mighty Marketing Mojo YouTube channel (challenge #15) and because some solos asked for it, creating a new free gift (challenge #5) about blog post promotion, thinking about more … and I’m working with a pal and my team leader [go #TeamBold!] to create our own special, not-in-the-book-challenge! Gotta join us to find out what we’re up to!]

Here’s an impromptu video I made about the challenge over on my Mighty Marketing Mojo Facebook page – check it out and give the page a LIKE too if you’re a solopreneur who wants to get their marketing unstuck and move their business forward.

Note: If you’re seeing this after Friday, September 6, the live challenge is closed, but you can still join us as a self-study. You get the awesome guide, you will have videos of some of the pop-up training sessions, and you can always join the amazing Love People & Make Money Facebook Group. But you won’t have the live video meetings nor be eligible for prizes. You’ll still learn and grow though!
September 4, 2019
Smart Content Curation for Quick Solopreneur Marketing Wins

So, What IS Content Curation and How Does It Help for Easier Solopreneur Marketing?

Naturally, as trained library professional (once one, always one), curation is right up my alley. Without that degree I’d still be a natural, life-long learner and sharer of information. I consider it a core part of my business to go find smart, useful resources and share them here with you – that’s content curation in a nutshell.

Maybe it would be better if I SHOWED you what smart content curation is .. by curating from one of the masters. 😀 I’ll let my biz coach and content marketing master extraordinaire, Kelly McCausey tell you about content curation as a component of good, easy, quick content marketing that is PERFECT for us solopreneurs. When you have only a small chunk of time to work on some marketing, content curation is a perfect fit.

When you see something smart that another writer, blogger, biz owner has written and you want to share it – pause before you automatically drop it in to Facebook. Instead, go to your website, create a new post, add in a few paragraphs (100-150 words, 2 paragraphs at most! This is supposed to be quick) about WHY you think that thing you read is great and worth sharing (or why it got you hopping, blood boiling mad), and link to the original post. Take a screenshot of the original post, put that in YOUR post, along with making sure you note who the author of the original material is, and BOOM. You have curated content ready to share. NOW you go share YOUR post to Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn.

If you want to see some example posts I curated here at Mighty Marketing Mojo during Kelly’s most recent 5-day curation challenges, you could read my posts on: How Can Solopreneurs Beat Imposter Syndrome, the 5 Core Social Media Skills for All Solopreneurs, or one that amplifies a fave topic of mine, You CAN Grow Your Social Media Presence Without Tons of Time.

Join me and Kelly McCausey of LovePeopleandMakeMoney.com as we chat about content curation in marketing

To help reinforce how easy and natural it is for us to curate and share smart content – we already do it nearly every day on social media, let’s just take it back to our own home bases (our websites or blogs) – I invited Kelly to chat with me and my community during my 30in30 Mighty Marketing Challenge.

Kelly is so smart and down to earth and fun that I can’t just keep that chat inside my community, I gotta share it with everyone! 😁
I especially need to share with all my pals who couldn’t make the chat live and begged me for replays. Click below to pop-up the video and watch our chat.

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And if you want to dive a little deeper in to refining your content curation skills as part of a smart content marketing strategy for your business – I’m happy to chat with you and definitely think you ought to check out Kelly’s Smart Curation Skills class that’s available for you to go through anytime.

Something we chatted about quite a bit in the video was how it’s ok, even necessary, for you to take a stand and share your opinions, even through your content curation. Of course, Kelly has a post about powering up your blog by being more opinionated. I think too many of us shy away from getting up on our soapboxes (you know you have one) and sharing our opinions (you know you have those too!) about what’s going in our niches, our industries, what we think is awesome and what just drives us bonkers. Check out Kelly’s 7 tips for sharing your opinion – and I’ll add that these tips work for those posts you’re curating too.

Now go do what you already do – share stuff you love with your audience of customers, clients, and prospects. Give them good, useful info and help build that KNOW-LIKE-TRUST factor that’s so important in growing and marketing a business. Come over to the Mighty Marketing Mojo Facebook Group and share with us what you curated in just 10 minutes!

April 23, 2019
The Greatest Lie of Content Marketing
What’s the greatest ‘lie’ of content marketing?

That we tell ourselves, as we’re creating, it’s for our customers, our audience.

<sigh> Sadly, that’s often wrong.

True content marketing SHOULD be about and for the audience – your reader, your prospect, customer, client, user, donor or patron. The first question about your content should be: ‘is it useful?’
But that doesn’t happen as often as it should. We’re lying to ourselves as we write, shoot, post and tweet.

What really happens is we write for ourselves.

Oh, we say it’s for ‘them’ and we mean it. But the way it comes out, it’s not truly for them. We, as an organization, are still controlling the message and the content. And the audience.

Not so different than ‘old’ marketing, eh? The reader ends up serving OUR needs or wants as an organization, instead of us really, truly serving THEM.

To really rise above the sea of information out there, all the other ‘content’ flooding in-boxes, screens and newsfeeds, you must be really, truly useful. Not just what YOU think is useful, but what your audience or target tells you is useful to them.

Ask yourself, ‘Will this piece of content save my audience time, money, or both?’

If not, it’s not useful.

Or at least, it’s not as likely to be seen as useful enough by your audience for them to give up their email and name at first glance.

So what is ‘really, truly useful content’?
- Content so awesome, so helpful, such a problem-solver that people would otherwise pay you to get it.
- Material that is invited in, welcomed, anticipated, demanded, eagerly awaited.
One of the rising new names of marketing experts (who maybe doesn’t always think of himself as a marketing expert – after all, he started out selling swimming pools) is Marcus Sheridan. He put it very well recently:

Content Marketing = ‘your company or organization’s ability to be the best teachers and problem solvers in the world at what you do, digitally speaking’

See yourself as a teacher – (you teach people about ___ )
[e.g. Sheridan teaches people about fiberglass swimming pools]

See yourself as problem solver -(if someone has any question about _______, you’re the source) Are you, or can you become, the go-to source for info on X problem?
[e.g. Sheridan is THE source on pools, pool problems, pool installs, pool designs, really, anything, pools]

Can you and your organization be helpful at every step in a process, decision making chain or buying decision? THAT’s where good content lies.

What does that kind of content look like?

Answer their questions

Everyone has questions, about nearly everything.

Any process, system, decision or purchase creates questions in people’s minds. They don’t ask all of them out loud or to someone on your staff. Doesn’t mean they aren’t important. Often the most important ones are the ones people are afraid to voice for fear of looking ‘silly’.

So be the hero and answer their questions.

Use text, visuals, graphs, charts, diagrams, audio, infographics, pictures, screen casts, video – whatever you have, whatever you can create within your means. Whatever is necessary to give clarity, greater understanding, and confidence to your audience. Help them solve problems and make decisions, and chances are much, much greater they will decide to choose you.

Solve their problems

Address the problems your audience may not even be completely sure they have!

Don’t let your audience flounder and drift! Throw them a line!

But you know your subject, the one your audience trusts you to be an expert on, and you know where are all the deep issues and problems come from. Your users may still be floundering a bit on the surface, drifting, just going along and experiencing these cramps, pangs or symptoms of their bigger problems.

So share what you know with them.

Show through examples, case studies, or stories your audience can relate to that you GET their problems, at all the levels. Show (more than tell) how you can educate them about these problems they maybe didn’t even know about. Show how you can address and solve problems – big or small.

You’re a teacher and a problem solver

And now you’ve got content marketing that brings your audience in, keeps them there and really matters to them.

You’ve beaten the greatest lie of content marketing.

The more you can plan and create content, in whatever format is best for you AND them, that meets the true needs of your audience, the bigger the win for your org AND your clients or users. They learn to see you as a really trusted resource, more than maybe before, and someone who gives more than they take. You’re in a better position to work with them either now, or in the future, because you have a trusted relationship.
July 15, 2014
What really needs to go in a Content Marketing plan?

#1 Rule of Content Marketing Plans – Always, always ask: What kind of content does YOUR audience even want?!

Then, take ideas and research answers to that question and work it into your plan, into all your content, into your persona development (for your target), into your promotion – everything centers on that question.

7 Parts of a Sound Content Marketing Plan

Goals –

How do your content goals dovetail with your larger organization goals?

What are the objectives for your content? Overall and at least an idea behind each piece of content – where does it fit, what are you trying to accomplish, what needle are hoping to move?

Strategy –

56% of businesses are doing CM without a clear strategy – recent European stats, but US research from CMI points to similar picture- for b2bs and for nonprofits.

They recognize the power of content marketing, but still don’t have a plan!

So just because you’re a small business, or a nonprofit (like a library) don’t skip the planning stages and especially not the strategy step.

It’s not ‘do as the big guys are doing’ – because they’re wrong! Get ahead of the curve and your competition, large or small, by creating a strategy before doing.

Audience –

Who are you talking to in your content? What language, style do they use and prefer

I.e. There’s a big difference in talking to urban teens vs rural teens, vs older adults, vs. small business owners (and is that small business a solopreneur or micro-business, a retailer or service provider, or a small firm with 20 employees?)

Timing –

Schedules, Calendars, Planners, Timelines –you need tools to help you keep your content on track, as well as to track who’s doing what.

Another thought with scheduling – do you have themes or topics to run throughout a content ‘campaign’? Your content will go further and do more for you if you can group it into relevant themes. It will also help you to come up with ideas that appeal to your audience. It keeps you from asking every week, ‘what will I talk about?’

What to think about for topics/themes in your content plan:

o   key topics or questions for your audience- what they want to read or hear about

o   what topics will best build your reputation and authority

o   KWs – still useful to do KW research, as best you can, to learn what your audience searches for on topics you can write about

o   Foundational themes – consider a theme for a month, do 1 chunk of that each week; or maybe 2 chunks per month

o   Add in the curated content to your own – don’t forget to schedule it in, put it in your planner/timeline

o   Build all your online efforts around those themes that month – blog, email, SM

Think about the best times for various channels as well – is your audience working professionals who most frequently check Twitter at night? Then post in the evening, not at 8am. Is your target a working mom who likes Pinterest? Maybe try 4pm, or after the kids are in bed, 10:30pm?

Look for the research or tools that exist on the preferences and recommendations for various channels and audiences.

Tactics –

Ok, what platform(s) do you use? What will you put there? How will you let people know and get them to come to the content? Or are you sending it out to them? That’s where the tactics come in to play in your plan.

Now is when you think about, and put down choices on paper (or your spreadsheet), for the formats, types and platforms for your content.

Visual or audio? If predominantly visual, does that mean infographics, images for Pinterest and Facebook sharing, or short videos? Written – blogs, articles, e-books and/or email newsletters?

Are you sharing and hosting everything on your website’s blog? Are you creating a Tumblr? Will you be promoting your content primarily via Twitter, or LinkedIn, SlideShare or Vimeo?

It’s a lot to think about – and we’ll hit on all the big tactical ideas as we go along. But for now – think first and foremost about your audience and y our goals. Who is this content for? Where do they hang out? Where will they find/see it? What types do they most want and like?

Metrics, analytics –

Do you know what’s working and what isn’t? That’s what metrics are for – measure what you’re doing so you know if you keep it up, or change course.

o   Get a Google Analytics account – everyone probably needs one these days

o   Also get the simple measuring tools that are part of common blog/web plugins (like Jetpack for WP)

o   Test – test everything you can- on your site, in email, landing pages, on social media, etc

o   Use other tools to help you monitor metrics, analytics

Patience –

Content Marketing doesn’t necessarily pay off in 1 week, or 2 or even a month. And you’ll need to revise your content marketing plan a few times along the way – in fact, plan on it! Schedule time to review and revise every quarter, and again at the end of the year.

‘Investing in content creation is a long term investment in your organization and your brand.’

July 8, 2014
What are the goals of content marketing?
Do your content goals match your marketing goals?

Do they match your organization’s overall goals for the year?

Content needs to align – and it needs to help your organization while it helps your audience. Think of content as the missing puzzle piece – but you need all the other pieces too!

You may not have all the info or data you need to make decisions on goals and objectives – that’s probably true for your whole marketing plan. So make your best educated guesses based on all you DO know, what you can find out, what fits your bigger plans – and then test it.

That’s how marketing works – test, test, test. Tweak, tweak, tweak.

Ask yourself or your team (if you’re lucky to have one!) some serious questions before you get started – you’ll be more successful :
- Why are you communicating with your particular audience in the first place?
- What are you trying to do with your marketing communications overall?
- What are you trying to achieve with this specific piece of content, or format of content?
If you’re a nonprofit, for example, are you trying to build community? [and what does that really mean for you??]

Are you building your nonprofit organization’s brand?

Are you fundraising?

Are you trying to attract new volunteers?

Think about the specifics of what you’re shooting for in your organization and with your outreach and marketing efforts – then you can start thinking about what certain content platforms or pieces should aim to do for you.
- What does success look like for your organization?
- Have you determined your big picture success definition?
- What is your definition of successful marketing objectives?
- Now, think about what it would mean to be ‘successful’ with this particular piece of content?
Some goals are broader than others –

Engage

Educate

Inform

Entertain

Yes, all of those are potential goals for your content marketing strategy and may apply to different channels even (e.g. social media vs. a blog vs. video site). You will need to drill down a bit further and decide what ‘engagement’ looks like for you and your audience.

What might ‘educate’ mean?

3 ‘how-to’ posts w/ links and ~ 800 words per month? One 8 minute ‘how-to’ video? Only curating tweets that come from educational sources related to educating your audience about your given topic? Giving mini-courses on an aspect of your core topic(s)? Producing 1 purely educational video per month or per quarter?

And think about how you might know (or figure out) if your audience is actually becoming ‘educated’ about your topic

Common goals of content marketing:
Common goals among B2Bs [via CMI] –
You also need to decide on a key goal for each of the channels or platforms you are using to deliver your content.

For example:

On your website you are mostly informing potential customers or users, collecting information about them and their preferences.

On your blog you will post articles and videos with an educational goal.

On Twitter and Facebook you are engaging in community-building, having conversations, delivering customer service. And maybe you post video interviews or thought pieces on Vimeo to build your credibility and thought leadership.

Get specific – and appropriate – for each channel and how your audience/prospects use that channel. Make sure your tone of voice, personality, style and the content you share fits the parameters of that platform. Then keep up your focus as you use each platform. If it’s not working so well in 3 months, change.

Don’t try to do all things, be all styles, and hit all goals across all the different channels. Focus!

Eventually you may want to make, earn or raise money with your content – but that’s not the first goal of content marketing.
1. Bring your ideal audience to you.
2. Show them you like them and welcome them with good content.
3. Get them to come back again, and give you’re their info so you can stay in touch.
4. Now you can maybe start to suggest ways to take that relationship further – a related piece of in-depth content to buy, a course to enroll in, an event to come attend, a program to sign up for, a product to buy, your newest cause campaign to donate to, etc.
Deliver what your audience wants and needs to hear, in formats they prefer, easily digest and willingly share. That’s the prime goal of content marketing.

Deliver your content as a great gift.
June 24, 2014
Content Marketing 101 – 4 steps

Next Lesson in Content Marketing 101:

The great thing about content marketing, aside from the fact that it’s a relatively cheaper form of marketing, is that it’s a real investment in your business or organization that pays off over and over again, year after year. When you create content today, it will be working for you a year from now. [some of the best content is ‘Evergreen’ – think gardening terms – and we’ll talk about that more later!]

After talking about, and defining, what content marketing is and some of what it’s not – let’s get into more details of how to do this thing!

No matter if you’re a big B2B like GE’s plane engines division (seriously, they have quite the Instagram account and they’re on Tumblr – ROI? Not sure!), a small solopreneur, a public library system or a local nonprofit – there are some basics to the steps of CM.

Here are 4 steps at the core of the content marketing process, which can lead to success:

1. Create a Website for Your Content

It’s important that your content has a home.

You want to drive [targeted!] traffic to that home. Your website (or blog) is your ‘home’ base. You don’t really want to drive traffic some place else. One of the reasons you can’t rely on an all-social-media platform or only having a Facebook page. You don’t own it. They own the traffic, you’re just renting.

Any content you share anywhere should drive traffic to your website. It doesn’t matter if you have a bricks and mortar business, operate out of your home office, sell cupcakes strictly online, coach in your pajamas or lead a multi-state, multi-site organization. Driving traffic to your website, like sheep to the pasture, will ultimately convert into customers, clients, patrons or users. Online or offline.

2. Create Optimized Content in Multiple Formats

The content that you create must be engaging, compelling and work to educate your audience about your products and/or services. What you deliver matters as much, or more, than HOW you deliver it.

There are many forms which this content can, and should, take. Not every member of your audience wants to interact with content in quite the same way. Some like to read, others to watch videos, executives may want to download a piece of original research and some folks want to listen to a podcast while at the gym. Sometimes the same member of your audience may try ALL formats or channels – depending on mood, context, environment, and what’s in the content.

Blog posts and articles, both on and off your website, short reports, white papers (very common in the business + B2B arena), eBooks, videos, podcasts and more are all types of content that can be part of your arsenal. They’re all potential distribution channels. Don’t worry about trying to create all of those types of content! Experiment and see what you feel good about creating, and what your audience likes consuming. And if you’re not sure – ASK them!

Remember – ideas and stories come before the container you put them in.

3. Build Your Email List

One of the lesser understood keys to using content marketing to grow successfully, is email. Use your content and lovely traffic to build your email list.

You create great content on topics that are highly relevant and useful to your audience, attracting your ideal target audience to your website. Then you ask them to sign up for your email list. You might offer them a goodie, a freebie, an opt-in gift to make it more worth their while.

Once they sign up for your email list, you can send them more content, educating and engaging with them and building a relationship.

No, email marketing is not dead. Yes, people still sign up and read emails. IF … you send helpful, useful, engaging stuff. Let them get to know your organization. Only then do you encourage them to purchase your products and/or services, make a donation, volunteer their time or come visit you. And all of this will be easier because they’ve given you permission to talk with them and you used that to create a relationship.

Don’t panic!

We’re going to cover email marketing details eventually! Don’t sweat about the freebies, lead magnets or opt-in pages. Just know for now that an email list is key, and people really will give you their email – if you promise and deliver really useful stuff. So go make sure you have a way of collecting those emails. [Outlook and Gmail don’t count!]

4. Promote/Share Content on Social Media

Social media is a great tool for promoting your organization. It has wide reach, it’s easy to create accounts, most of it is free, and chances are pretty darn good your ideal customer/client/user is on one of the big social platforms. Social media is an ideal way to encourage your audience to share your content with others.

Share all your content on social media, including your blog posts, articles, short reports, videos and more. Find the tools and plugins that make it easy to place buttons on your site to make sharing easy. Link your blog or website with your org’s social media accounts. Some of this can even be automated. [e.g. the Publicize module inside the Jetpack plugin for WP– LOVE it] Social media sharing gives you an opportunity to attract the friends of your audience so that you can build a larger following.

Now you know the tools and process – time for strategy and repeating it all

4 steps. Sounds simple, right? Sort of. If you have a solid plan, get your tools in place and then keep repeating the steps that work throughout the marketing cycle. [did you say ‘uh oh’?]

Not sure of the marketing cycle? Or strategy? Ok, we’ll go over that.

We’ll soon go over setting goals or objectives for your marketing (and content), learning to love planning and scheduling with editorial calendars, researching to create solid content and more. Strategy, plans, schedules and good tools all lead to content that is easier to create, educational, engaging and gets the results that you desire.

June 19, 2014