Are Organizational Silos Keeping Your Content Marketing Team From Success?

Simplifying the process is a primary concern for content marketers. As organizations get larger and more complex, they switch from having one person who handles social and PR to hiring whole teams to handle different aspects of the content marketing process. These might include search teams, SEO teams, and PR teams.

The problem arises when these teams get tunnel vision, focusing on what their metrics are without understanding and contributing to the whole vision of the marketing department. Silos develop, creating a domino effect of increasing complexity. In my role at Adobe, one of my major initiatives focuses on breaking down these silos.

How do we knock down silos to simplify content marketing?

The key to begin crumbling silos within your company is to get your whole team on the same page with a clear definition of the overall company marketing goal. This way, you can determine what the priorities should be within the company and put other initiatives on the back burner if need be. To understand this, we can turn to mathematics.

Get your marketers to think like a team

My son has been working hard to learn how to add fractions. The other night, he asked me to help him with a problem and I had an epiphany. Admittedly, it’s been a while since I learned this stuff in my elementary school math course. When I looked at the problem for the first time, it seemed impossible (just like it did years ago). The three numbers were so unlike each other. How could they possibly end up being one number?

Of course, I had to consult with Google and conjure up my vague memories of school math lessons. And, I discovered one concept that, while useful in helping my son, was much more useful for solving the silo problems that plague many cross-functional relationships.

Contrary to my stated beliefs when I first learned this stuff, I finally understood how fractions could be used in the real world. The key to breaking down silos lies in the concept of a common denominator. With a common denominator, these three numbers could work together more easily to create one number. Here’s the problem my son had to solve:

Bear with me while I walk through finding the common denominator. To figure this out, I had to find a common denominator into which all denominators could divide. In this case, the numbers 2, 3, and 7 all divide into 42. So, by changing the denominator to 42 and adjusting the numerators proportionately, we created three numbers that could all work together to create one number:

Here, all the numbers now work together because they all represent a part of one denominator. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “What the heck does this have to do with content marketing?”

What do fractions have to do with content marketing?

Well, I’ve realized that, in dealing with Adobe marketing functions, we talk to each other about metrics that are important to our sub-teams, but we don’t understand the common ground, making it difficult for us to work together as the marketing team.

Let me tell you what I mean. I work with PR, social, and search teams at Adobe. For PR, a primary goal is to place articles in high-tier journals. For social, it’s engagement. For search, it’s increased traffic through high Google rankings. Our “problem” might look something like this:

While looking at this problem, I realized that we couldn’t just add the three numbers without a common denominator. In other words, we needed to create a common metric to get us all working and thinking together. Only in this way can we break down silos among the teams.

I went on a quest to determine our common denominator and how our parts contribute to it. With such different goals, how can these teams work together as one? Instead of individual team goals we must align with a much deeper vision or metric. Only in this way, with one common vision, can your company break down the silos that hinder content marketing success. It’s all about finding common ground from which to work.

Common denominator makes it easier

Like converting to a new denominator so all the numbers can be added together, aligning your individual team metrics with your overall marketing goal often means creating a new metric to which all teams can align. At Adobe, one of our unifying metrics is “quality content.” Even if the social team’s goal is increased engagement, PR’s is getting journal mentions, and SEO’s is gaining high rankings on Google, when we come together and strategize, it is with the purpose of increasing the output of quality content to our audience.

By focusing on this common denominator, we can communicate marketing’s core objectives clearly. We also know that in producing higher-quality content, each team’s individual goals can be met: The social team will garner increased engagement, the PR team will generate more journal placements, and the SEO team will increase its traffic due to higher rankings.

Thus our aligned “problem” looks much simpler:

How to identify your common denominator

Tip: Create a common denominator by throwing out your metrics and focusing on the end result.

To determine your company’s common denominator, it’s best to analyze if and how your team metrics contribute to the marketing department’s final goal. For example, if your goal is to increase positive brand awareness to contribute to the bottom line, what is the one thing you can do to reach that goal? Produce quality content. All of those other metrics should be parts of reaching that company goal.

To this end, Eliyahu Goldratt of The Goal writes:

I have come to the conclusion that productivity is the act of bringing a company closer to its goal. Every action that brings a company closer to its goal is productive. Every action that does not bring a company closer to its goal is not productive.

If your teams’ metrics aren’t bringing your company closer to its goal, it is definitely time to reassess your metrics.

Silos go away when all sub-teams are on the same page

For Adobe, we realized that producing quality content was our overall company goal. With this in mind, a team discussion can happen when a company meeting is held. Instead of the PR sub-team coming to the meeting only to address its concerns about journal mentions, it comes with the understanding that the ultimate goal is to produce quality company content. That way, when the meeting focuses on producing quality content, PR won’t feel that its needs aren’t being addressed. After all, creating quality content is now PR’s overriding metric or goal, as it is for every other sub-team in the room. The other metrics are merely a means to an end.

When all teams can work from a common ground, you will find that the silos that once divided your teams are broken. And, until they’re knocked down, you will feel the tension. For example, if the SEO sub-team still comes to marketing meetings to share the metrics of pushing too many keywords, it is still too focused on its individual denominators. After all, what is quality content? We all know that it’s not keyword-stuffed articles.

On the contrary, as silos are broken, a company team spirit will develop. In the end, you’ve simplified the process because sub-teams no longer crash against each other at each meeting, but instead talk about the common denominator.

My challenge to you: Take a look at your company marketing team and identify your sub-team’s denominators. This first step is important. After all, you can’t find a common denominator without knowing what your original denominators were. Then, develop a common denominator based on a combined definition of your sub-team’s goals.

Does your team need to tackle a major content marketing initiative but lack the expertise to make it happen? CMI can help. Our Online Training & Certification Program provides you with must-know strategies, tactics, and best practices to build a strong foundation for your projects.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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Latest Must-Reads: Summertime Books for Content Marketers on the Go (or on Vacation)

It’s that time again, time for my third annual mid-year roundup of recommended recently published books for content marketers. Self-education never ends for content marketers … even when vacations roll around.

As always, one of my goals is to highlight the latest must-reads from within the content marketing community. And, several of the following were written by familiar content marketing all-stars.

But, in a larger sense, my goal is to draw attention to equally important books from beyond the content marketing community. Paradoxically, often the most productive content marketing ideas originate outside the content marketing world, in books on traditional advertising, creativity, personal branding, and psychology.

Either way, because of their hybrid origins and each author’s unique perspective, the following books have something for everyone, from entrepreneurs and freelancers to top-tier corporate marketers and consultants. And, they can turn rainy days or delayed flights into career-enhancing learning opportunities.

An added bonus: The following provide inspiring examples of the types of books that are popular today in terms of content structure, length, and style.

The Advertising Concept Book: A Complete Guide to Creative Ideas, Strategies and Campaigns by Pete Barry

One of the reasons I’m a big fan of Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose’s weekly This Old Marketing podcast is that they take a thoughtful approach to traditional advertising. They acknowledge the lessons to be learned from advertising, and that there is a time and a place for it within content marketing.

The Advertising Concept Book is an excellent example of learning from history. It offers content marketers a valuable source of content and design inspiration based on the best examples from the past.

I’ve been reading advertising books since Gutenberg printed the original edition of David Ogilvy’s Confessions of an Advertising Man, but I’ve never encountered a book like The Advertising Concept Book.

It’s certainly not for everyone. It’s larger, thicker, heavier, and a bit more expensive than most of the books that follow. (It’s definitely not a book to read on the plane to Content Marketing World in September.) But, in return, your investment will be repaid in depth and reading pleasure. You won’t find this much content and design analysis and detail in one volume anywhere else.

Each page is a visual treat. Classic ads have been redrawn to highlight the key ideas, free from distraction. This is a book to be read slowly on paper, giving your mind time for the ideas to digest.

Stand Out: How to Find Your Breakthrough Idea and Build a Following Around It by Dorie Clark

Stand Out is a companion, implementation guide for her first book, Reinventing You: Define Your Brand, Imagine Your Future. Her first book described the importance of reinvention. Stand Out describes a three-step process for:

1. Finding your breakthrough idea
2. Building a following around it
3. Making it happen

Stand Out covers the tasks and details involved with each step with examples, interviews, and tips. To help you begin your journey, each chapter ends with challenging questions. These are not “summary” questions; they are thought-provoking.

Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence by Daniel Goleman

This is the easy-to-read and immediately applicable development of the ideas he introduced 10 years ago in his best-selling Emotional Intelligence. It’s significantly shorter and focuses on career and workplace issues. The 21 chapters are organized in terms of activities, e.g., self-awareness, reading others, well-focused leaders. As a result, it’s less of a general textbook and more of a guide to best practices for day-to-day interactions when dealing with bosses, co-workers, and clients.

It’s an excellent example of psychological research boiled down to day-to-day acceptance, recognition, and self-management. (Note: Focus was originally published in 2013, but the much easier-to-read and take-to-the-beach paperback edition just appeared.)

Driven to Distraction at Work: How to Focus and Be More Productive by Edward M. Hallowell

Ultimately, distraction is probably content marketing’s biggest productivity killer. There’s distraction everywhere in today’s 24/7, always-connected world. I suspect content marketers are especially vulnerable because those whom I have met are truly passionate about creating, curating, and sharing ideas, words, and visual images.

Pioneering ADHD researcher Hallowell coined the phrase “attention deficit trait” to describe today’s growing workplace problem. In Part 1, he describes “The Six Most Common Distractions at Work — and How to Overcome Them.” For better or for worse, I recognized most of them, screen-sucking, multitasking, idea-hopping, etc. Part 2, “Training Your Attention,” shares seven specific ways to increase your focus. Imagine how much more productive you would be by January 2016 if you mastered just one technique a month starting now.

Subscription Marketing: Strategies for Nurturing Customers in a World of Churn by Anne H. Janzer

It’s not easy to position a new book in the content marketing sphere – there are a lot of books available and many are entrenched bestsellers.

One of the things I most appreciate about Subscription Marketing is the book’s positioning. By identifying a key concern faced by all content marketers, and sharing a system to address it, Anne Janzer has created a niche that she can dominate within the content marketing world.

Anne has also positioned her book in terms of length and value. In less than 150 pages (print version), Anne convincingly describes:

1. The problem (i.e., the symptoms and implications of the subscription shift)

2. The solution (i.e., an alternative, a series of value-nurturing strategies)

3. The implementation (i.e., putting the strategies into action)

I especially liked Chapter 10, “Help Customers Live Up to Their Values.” This provided a fresh insight into the opportunities highlighted by recent research.

Content Marketing Works: 8 Steps to Transform Your Business by Arnie and Brad Kuenn

Some books are so good that you want to buy the paperback version even after you’ve read the Kindle version. That’s how I feel about Content Marketing Works.

While reading the digital version, I found numerous ideas I wanted to underline, comment on, or reference in upcoming projects. (Yes, I realize Kindle offers a way to highlight and export key ideas and sentences, but I find there’s something tactilely pleasurable about marking up a book printed on paper.)

Content Marketing Works is an excellent one-stop guide for entrepreneurs, small business owners, and corporate managers who need to convince the powers that be to allow them to invest in content marketing.

The eight steps are well chosen and provide a useful framework for change. Each chapter contains enough detail to structure the tasks involved in each step. The cover and chapter title pages also provide a useful example of tasteful design and inside-page branding.

A Beautiful Constraint: How to Transform Your Limitations Into Advantages, and Why It’s Everyone’s Business by Adam Morgan and Mark Barden

I love constraints! They’re the limitations that can drive productivity, as I shared in an earlier blog post.

Constraints can play an important role in content marketing because not only are they everywhere, but they’re inevitable. Constraints, however, are often considered obstacles, rather than the drivers of creativity they can be.

A Beautiful Constraint offers a comprehensive, detailed, and tastefully designed description of the “opportunity power” of constraints. (If you liked Robert Cialdini’s landmark Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion, you’ll love this book. It builds on many of the same principles in a real-world corporate marketing environment.) Its 11 chapters outline different approaches to turning constraints into creativity using resonant examples you’ve inevitably encountered or read about in the business press.

My favorite example of turning constraints into opportunities appears in Chapter 3, “Ask Propelling Questions,” and its description of the four sources of unreasonableness.

Buyer Personas. How to Gain Insights Into Your Customer’s Expectations, Align Your Marketing Strategies, and Win More Business by Adele Revella

You may think you know all there is to know about buyer personas from Adele Revella’s frequent Content Marketing Institute blog posts and Content Marketing World presentations.

But no matter how much you already know, Revella’s book will show you how to take your buyer personas to the next level. It describes how to go deeper into the buyer personas in ways that your clients, co-workers, and C-level executives will appreciate.

And, if you’re self-employed, you’ll learn how to gain a better understanding of your own clients and prospects, and will be better able to align your content marketing to their needs.

Experiences: The 7th Era of Marketing by Robert Rose and Carla Johnson

To achieve their maximum career potential, today’s content marketers have to look beyond the present. They need to step back and broaden their horizon beyond what’s happening today. They need to analyze the long-term trends and project them into the probable future.

In Experiences: The 7^th Era of Marketing, Robert Rose, the Content Marketing Institute’s chief strategy officer, and Carla Johnson, a frequent Content Marketing Institute storyteller and contributor, offer an informed guide to what content marketers can do today to prepare for the future.

It outlines an action plan for serious marketers who want to escape the “copy and graphics business” and – instead – become mission-critical leaders and decision-makers for their firms. It’s an alternative to the frequently encountered dead end of creating great marketing without authority or responsibility for the customer experiences that follow.

Experiences is a manifesto for change. It’s a handbook for those who seek growing influence and responsibility at every touchpoint during the life of the buyer-seller experience. It can inspire a new enthusiasm for addressing the challenges you face every day.

The Content Code. Six Essential Strategies for Igniting Your Content, Your Marketing, and Your Business by Mark Schaefer

If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to sit next to Mark Schaefer on a coast-to-coast airplane ride, you’ll enjoy this book. A prolific blogger and multi-title author, Schaefer is a comfortable writer. His writing is full of “you” and “I” questions and suggestions.

The Content Code addresses the problem of “content density,” the tsunami of content competing for your prospect’s attention. It offers a simple but scalable six-step framework. It’s written in a conversational style, using colorful language like “content shock” and “ignition strategy.” I found Chapter 3, “Building Shareability Into Your Content,” and Chapter 4, “22 Practical Ways to Achieve Content Ignition,” especially helpful.

Hello, My Name Is Awesome: How to Create Brand Names That Stick by Alexandra Watkins

I’m a big fan of this book, even though it competes with my book about book titles (heresy!).

This is a slim, inexpensive book with a wealth of knowledge from the founder of a firm that specializes in developing product and business names for firms like Adobe, Disney, Dunkin’ Donuts, eHarmony, Hasbro, and Microsoft.

Although Watkins’ background is from the corporate world, her methodology can be applied by all. In Chapter 1, she shares her SMILE system, “The 5 Qualities of a Super Sticky Name.” In Chapter 2, she turns her attention to SCRATCH, “The 7 Deadly Sins.” Her corporate background also emerges in Chapter 6, “12 Rules for Building Consensus.”

Although less than 100 pages in length, Hello, My Name is Awesome covers all the bases, including tips for choosing the right domain names (while avoiding frequently encountered traps). There’s even a chapter comparing the pros and cons of name changes.

What are your recommendations for summer reading?

Have I omitted any of your favorite recently published content marketing books or books in adjacent areas like career management, creativity, or psychology? And, if you’ve read any of the mentioned books, please share your experiences, impressions, and key takeaways – including value.

Happy reading at the beach, at home, or while traveling to or from your favorite vacation destination.

Want to read a book in brief to help your content marketing programs? Check out CMI’s 16-page guide to creating a documented content marketing strategy.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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Aon Stops Shoveling Quicksand, Partners With Manchester United

Aon signed an eight-year, $240 million sponsorship of Manchester United in April 2013. The deal extended the relationship that Aon started in 2009 when it invested $130 million over four years to display its brand on Manchester United jerseys.

But Aon’s sponsorship of the famed British soccer club looks unlike any you’ve ever known. As part of the deal, Aon delivers solutions for Manchester United in 20-plus areas and played a key role in its initial public offering, providing advice on the best strategies and options for access to capital. Aon Benfield helped raise $233 million for Manchester United’s IPO and was a co-manager in syndicating the equity necessary to complete the transaction.

The relationship isn’t simply a put-a-logo-on-it sponsorship. Rather, Aon now can zoom in on the complex work it’s done for Manchester United, and in doing so, provide a noteworthy and memorable way to explain what Aon does.

Not your everyday play

In struggling for brand recognition, Aon realized that it needed a big partner to help with global recognition. “We have 78,000 employees all over the world but it’s hard to find more than 3,000 people in one place,” says Phil Clement, chief marketing officer for Aon. “We needed something that we could rally around internally and also engage clients in the conversations that we needed to have. But first they needed to know who we were.”

Clement got approval from his executive team by showing how the sponsorship supported the goals of the company. “When you show up with an idea that focuses on things the C-suite wants to accomplish, it’s easier. We had strategic uniformity between the Manchester United sponsorship and what we wanted to accomplish for the company,” he says. The three things that he hoped to accomplish included:

1. Brand awareness – The Manchester United sponsorship gave Aon an explosion of brand awareness. This proved particularly true in developing markets key to the company, such as Korea and Brazil. Once the market knew that Aon existed, it also made it easier to answer the question: What, exactly, does Aon do?

2. Common conversation – Aon used its sponsorship of Manchester United to get people to engage in the spirit of the company in ways that would have been hard without it. The sponsorship helped catalyze the energy of the company and the sport in many ways. In one effort, Aon took three balls from a game in Manchester and flew them to the southernmost points in the world where Aon has offices — the tip of South America, the tip of South Africa, and the southern side of Australia. The balls were passed from employee to employee all the way back to London. As the balls arrived in offices, employees created content about the journey and talked about how Aon was impacting the communities. It was engaging for clients to track, and brought together employees with a common challenge.

3. Direct client engagement – Aon’s six business areas – capital, data and analytics, health, retirement, risk, and talent – tie directly to the Manchester United team. It made it easy to tell the Aon story using Manchester United as an example. “As companies, we know that access to capital is a big part of performing. A big part of Manchester United’s strategy is how access to capital plays out on the field. For Aon to be able to tell that story through football is much more interesting,” Clement says.

As important as this high-profile partnership has been for Aon, it has proven equally important for Manchester United in its efforts to raise capital and use it effectively to improve its performance. Manchester United’s attractiveness to commercial partners stems from its unparalleled ability to reach global audiences that exceed other international sports clubs and brands. Its supporter base, alongside its rich history and tradition, makes it a unique organization that is highly attractive to sponsors. In turn, Manchester United has been able to help Aon connect and engage with supporters.

“Partnerships such as the one with Aon clearly demonstrate how Manchester United provides a powerful global platform that enables our partners to amplify their brand and grow their business,” says Richard Arnold, group managing director for Manchester United. “Solid risk-management advice and human-capital solutions provided by Aon free up capital for us to invest. As a result, our commercial segment has been growing at very fast rates, is highly profitable, and the revenue stream is highly predictable due to the long-term nature of our contracts. We remain convinced that there are huge commercial opportunities out there for Manchester United, both in terms of categories as well as countries, and we are excited about the growth opportunity that lies ahead.”

Redefining value

Clement notes that the difficulties of content marketing are really underestimated. “Any marketing organization that decides to move in this direction needs to focus first and foremost on understanding how they’re creating value. Content strategies don’t work when it’s ‘we have a solution, now write about it.’ It has to be at the core of the value-creation process.

“It’s important as a marketer and an enterprise to understand how you’re perceived, the strategic value that you add, and if you’re creating value for your company and your industry.”

Success also depends on the talent of the team, and Clement is still working to get this part where he would like it to be. To create great, compelling content, a company has to have people with a versatility of skills – not just B2B writing, but also television, magazines, and anywhere content needs to live. “We look for people who’ve been in places where content is important – places where they live and die by the quality rather than just writing to a project plan,” he says.

In it to win it

Does fortitude pay off? It certainly has for Aon. It has gone from an unknown, second-place runner to a well-known No. 1 in its industry. When it comes to dollars, it translates into almost doubling revenue from $6 billion to $11 billion and market cap from $13 billion to $28 billion.

“We’re in a completely different category of how the market perceives our brand than before,” Clement points out. “Where before we were in relative obscurity and firmly planted in second place in the heads of many clients, we’re now recognized by more people on the planet than not, and recognized as the most credible in our space by people who make those decisions.”

This article originally appeared in the June issue of Chief Content Officer. Sign up to receive your free subscription to our bi-monthly print magazine.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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This Week in Content Marketing: Who Didn’t Launch a Content Marketing Agency This Week?

PNR: This Old Marketing with Joe Pulizzi and Robert Rose can be found on both iTunes and Stitcher.

In this week’s episode, Robert and I marvel at the flurry of new content-based agencies announced this week at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. We talk about their business models and ponder the challenges they are likely to face. We admire commercial real estate giant CBRE’s new print magazine, which has some solid strategy behind it. We close with a discussion of television, which seems to be enjoying a renaissance of late, despite many predictions of its demise. Rants and raves include the messy and confusing Cannes awards program and what content marketers can learn from a millionaire’s advice (no, really!). We wrap up the show with a #ThisOldMarketing example from Tablespoon by General Mills.

This week’s show

(Recorded live June 29, 2015; Length: 1:02:02)

Download this week’s PNR This Old Marketing podcast.

If you enjoy our PNR podcasts, we would love if you would rate it, or post a review, on iTunes. 

1. Content marketing in the news

• Daily Mail, WPP, and Snapchat to launch native advertising agency: (4:50): The Daily Mail, ad agency giant WPP, and Snapchat plan to launch an agency to cash in on the rise of native advertising, according to The Guardian. It will not be tied to working with WPP’s advertising clients or with the Daily Mail as the sole media partner. Instead, it will be free to pursue its own clients across the media and ad industries. The new agency will be called Truffle Pig, a very odd moniker that doesn’t speak to what its strategic focus will be. Robert and I have our doubts about this new venture, which combines three very diverse partners with radically different cultures. This announcement is paired with the next two articles.

• The Washington Post launches its own freelance talent service (6:51): The Washington Post has unveiled a new way for it to find freelancers: It has established its own data online job board where freelancers apply to be included. Called The Washington Post Talent Network, it enables freelancers to identify their area of expertise – breaking news, enterprise, or multimedia – and then apply to the Post.

• BBC Worldwide launches StoryWorks in-house creative agency (11:12): BBC Worldwide has overhauled its advertising offering to create an overarching division dedicated to content marketing partnerships for brands. The new arm, called StoryWorks, will be structured to function like an in-house creative agency, pulling in resources from existing areas of the media company as well as recruiting externally for roles such as account and project management. Robert hopes StoryWorks won’t fall into the trap that has challenged other internal media company/agency ventures: Treating content only as an extension of their existing advertising strategies.

• CBRE extends content marketing program to online magazine (20:10): CBRE Group, a $9 billion commercial real estate company, is extending its content marketing program with the launch of Blueprint, an online magazine that covers trends and issues affecting commercial real estate and the overall business climate. Robert loves CBRE’s focus on building brand equity and growing relationships; it’s not trying to solve every problem with content marketing. I’m a fan of CBRE’s commitment to using its employees in its 370 worldwide offices to help spread the word about Blueprint. This is an area that many brands forget to leverage.

• How television won the Internet (27:41): Television is enjoying one of its biggest growth periods in history, according to this op-ed article in The New York Times. How did this old technology accomplish such a remarkable feat? By producing outstanding content, adopting paid business models, and providing flexible access to its programming. Robert suggests that the concept of “television” is increasingly irrelevant in this age when we consume programming on multiple platforms. Successful content marketing strategies need to focus on content, audiences, and distribution, not devices, he recommends.

2. Sponsor (37:50)

• This Old Marketing is sponsored by Acrolinx, a platform that helps the world’s most recognized brands create more engaging, more readable, and more enjoyable content. It’s offering a new report called The Global Content Impact Index, which shares the results of its detailed analysis of the world’s content. Using a proprietary linguistic analytics engine, its software reviewed 150,000 individual, public-facing web pages from 340 companies around the world. That represents 20 million sentences and over 160 million words. The results were surprising. Learn more at http://bit.ly/acrolinx-global-index.

3. Rants and raves (40:51)

• Robert’s rant: For the second year, judges at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity didn’t award a grand prize, citing a lack of standout content and problems with accurately categorizing entries. Robert reviewed the judging criteria for branded content, as well as the three entries that were awarded Gold or Silver Lions. None of them are focused on content. Two were ad campaigns, and the third was a grassroots effort (the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge). It’s a mess. Robert also gives a shout-out to the funny, snarky Cannes You Please Shut Up Tumblr page, which pokes fun at agencies’ self-important tweets from the festival.

• Joe’s rave: I like this top 10 list from Business Insider, in which a millionaire gives advice on money and success, because two of his tips tie in with success in content marketing. First, “the fastest way to make money is to solve a problem.” To succeed in content marketing, you need to focus on a niche audience and solve a big problem it faces. The other tip I liked is “expect to make more money.” As with any growing business, you must have a content marketing mission. What can you create that’s truly unique, and that differentiates you as the leading informational expert in your niche? This article contains some great food for thought!

4. This Old Marketing example of the week (53:51)

• Tablespoon: Tablespoon is an online recipe database with a difference. Launched in 2009 by General Mills, its mission is to provide the perfect answer to the question, “What should I make?” It contains thousands of creative recipes that incorporate its food products, plus thousands of recipes contributed by everyday cooks. One feature that differentiates Tablespoon is how it enables you to search for recipes using unique but practical criteria – such as “I don’t like cilantro,” “I love chocolate,” or “I’m pressed for time.” It also provides tools for sharing recipes with others, adding them to a list of favorites, customizing them with your own ingredients, and much more. This article from Forbes provides an insider’s perspective on what has made this website successful, even though it has many competitors. Its primary measures of success are reach and engagement; General Mills is also using it as a platform to test and gather feedback on new ideas. Tablespoon is an excellent example of #ThisOldMarketing.

For a full list of PNR archives, go to the main This Old Marketing page.

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The State of Social Media: 4 Brand Marketers Speak

Since the first marketer uploaded that first Facebook brand post, there has been much discussion around social media, its role in content marketing, and ultimately how it benefits brands.

For those brands that have thoughtfully integrated their social into their content marketing strategy – and that understand the tactical capabilities of each social platform they use – the benefits have often proven to be game-changing.

I saw this in a big way as a member of the jury panel for the 2015 National Addy Awards. It was no surprise to me that many of the smartest, most inspired campaigns included or were led by a robust social media component.

This compelled me to ping some savvy brand marketers to ask about the use of social media in their marketing and hear where they believe social media stands in its evolution as a content marketing tool.

(Note: None of the marketers featured are clients of my agency.)

The intent of this outreach was to see if social media – in the eyes of brands – is delivering at a level that lives up to its potential. It also can illuminate for people on the agency side, what brand marketers perceive they are really getting from their social media efforts.

“What is the real benefit of social media in relation to your marketing efforts and what do you see as its potential?”

Dave Skena (@dsflna) whose background as a consultant at Accenture and vice president of marketing at PepsiCo’s Frito-Lay makes him one of the most insightful marketers I know:

“I have definitely seen the results of social media marketing show up in brand awareness and, by inference, in consumption. However, hard, quantitative data that correlates directly to sales is still hard to come by.

Until that evolves, the main benefit I’ve seen for brands, especially challenger brands, is how social media enables direct conversations with early, loyal consumers and gives the brand a forum to offer tools and information so those fans can spread the word.

The ability to measure social media efforts more effectively is coming soon and, I believe, this is when we’ll see brands invest even more heavily. This more confident investment will spur innovation and really explode the potential of social as a marketing tool.”

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Jay Barton, the founder and CEO who built fitness-apparel brand Aesthetic Revolution from the ground up:

“We have grown well past the point where we could do what we would really like to do – meet every customer face-to-face to share the passion and beliefs of our brand.

As a result, social media is a big solution for us on a number of levels.

First, I’ve never been a fan of traditional digital marketing. It has always felt invasive to me and I was not going to batter the people I care about – my customers – with spammy emails and pop-up ads.

Social media, when used authentically, respects the intelligence of the consumer – so it’s very on-brand for us. It allows a person to more thoughtfully decide if he or she identifies with a brand and, as we’ve seen time and again, this respect creates a much more invested and loyal customer base.

It also delivers what we desire most in our customer relationship — community. We know that the community is what has built our brand and we understand it will be the foundation for our ongoing success.”

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Sandy Rhyneer (@ppgnhi), director of marketing and communications for Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and Hawaii, views social media through the lens of a marketer who provides personal health-care services:

“While social media serves as an avenue to create a dialogue with supporters and potential patients in real time, what’s most important is the opportunity to interact with them on a more personal level in an effort to deepen their connection to our mission.

Social media provides a platform to talk to these audiences in an informal, conversational way and it has an important reciprocal effect because it enables immediate patient feedback.

For ensuring we deliver the highest levels of patient care, there is nothing more useful than the comments and suggestions we receive from patients.

The insights we glean from social media have led to positive changes in the way we offer and deliver services. It has definitely helped us become better at what we do and make our patients happier. That’s always the goal.

I’m looking forward to the next wave of platform innovations in this space and evaluating what we can leverage to be even more connected with current and potential patients.”

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Chris Cashbaugh (@SOGKnives), director of marketing for specialty knives and tools company SOG, has leveraged social media as a way to optimize product development and customer support:

“The biggest benefit SOG sees from social media is that we get one-on-one, almost real-time access to our core, most vocal customers and fans. We get to hear what they love, hate, and think we should be doing.

All of this allows us to gauge, earlier than ever, how our new products are received. As a result, we’re able to speed up product development cycles and get improvements into the pipeline sooner than ever before.

Negative feedback helps us as much as positive interaction, if not more, by identifying potential issues that we can address to ensure happier customers.

The challenging part about being a highly social brand is in finding that balance between addressing customer needs without overreacting to every question and comment. However, that’s a small price to pay for the privilege of having a very engaged fan base that, because of social media, can be highly vocal about its passion for our products.

Because of social media, our customers and fans are always sharing with us ways to use and enjoy our products that we never imagined.

They’re also spreading the word to others in the form of authentic, third-party endorsements. As a marketer, you have to be thrilled with that.”

So, as a marketer or an agency professional, what are the primary benefits you’ve been deriving from the use of social media in your content marketing?

Where, in your estimation, has the channel delivered and where has it lagged? What do you see as its greatest, untapped potential? What do you believe is next (and most exciting) on the innovation front?

Let’s keep the conversation going and, as a community, continue to share our knowledge and stories. This will provide the kind of real-life perspectives required to innovate across this channel, drive more measurable success, and lift the boats of everyone in the marketing community.

To expand your social media and insight, read more at Content Marketing Institute’s social media content hub.

Cover image by Jeff Sheldon, Unsplash, via pixabay.com

The post The State of Social Media: 4 Brand Marketers Speak appeared first on Content Marketing Institute.

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3 Content Strategy Practices That Will Make You a Better Content Marketer

My recent revelation: When I write, my audience is always top of mind. However, when I look across all of CMI’s websites and channels, I worry that we’re not providing an exceptional experience for our community at all points. For instance, we may have answers to people’s questions, but can people find what they need? Is every point in their experience a good one?

While I continue to refine my content marketing skills, I also am turning more of my attention to content strategy.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU: How Content Strategy and Content Marketing Are Separate But Connected

Don’t get me wrong: I believe in the power of (good) content marketing. I believe that marketers must create and promote content that educates. But, if we truly are to put customers at the center of our marketing – and get the most possible value from our efforts – we need to look beyond conversions and measurements and apply the kind of strategic thinking that can transform our organizations’ content into well-managed business assets.

Content marketers have a lot to learn from content strategists. Here are the strategy-related topics I will be prioritizing over the coming months. These topics aren’t traditionally considered part of content marketing, but we need to consider them if we want our content – and the experiences it offers – to be as exceptional as possible.

Have a plan to manage your content after it is published

I’m guessing you have a plan to publish and promote your content, but do you have a plan for what you’ll do with all that content once it’s out there? Do you want it to exist indefinitely? If not, when will it be deleted and by whom? As for the content you want to keep, how do you envision it serving as an ongoing asset? In other words, how will it be kept current and relevant? How will it be reused over time, across various deliverables, and throughout your organization’s departments?

Consider every page on your website as a potential landing page. You don’t want people entering where your best foot is not forward – where information is redundant, outdated, or trivial (ROT).

Consider this story Gerry McGovern told at Confab. When Columbia College in Chicago drastically reduced the number of pages on its website – 36,000 to 944 – student inquiries rose from 477 per month to 855. Think of it! They deleted 35,000 web pages, and the response rate doubled. Why? Chances are visitors now are entering the website on pages that are current, relevant, and organized.

As we heard often at the Intelligent Content Conference, content needs to be managed as a product, not a project. In short, you need a plan to manage all of the content after it’s published, which is part of digital governance.

Something to try: Track the pages that get the most traffic on your website, and make a plan for their governance.

To find your high-traffic pages, open Google Analytics for your site, and go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages. (If you publish a blog, ignore the newer posts, which are likely getting traffic because they are recent.)

After you identify the high-traffic pages, review them for accuracy and currency. While I’ve done this sporadically in the past, I recently asked Jodi Harris, CMI’s Director of Curation, to review all of our high-traffic pages and then develop a plan for how we want to manage them.

We list those pages in Trello and track which ones have been updated and which we want to update next. We also have a checklist for each page or post to check for this.

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Consider the tone across all of your content

I’m guessing you have the tone you want your editorial content to have nailed down, but do you have a plan on what tone your content should have across your site? Does your audience read one tone on your blog and in your e-books, then get hit with corporate speak on the rest of your website?

It’s time to start thinking about your tone and style across all of your content. Yes, this is a mammoth challenge, as different people own different content and you only have so much control, but think about the impact it has when you start to think about all of your content as supporting the customer experience.

Something to try: Look at your website from the perspective of a new visitor. Is it approachable? Is it clear how you help people or do you sound like the competition? Would you want  to read this?

If you don’t love what you see, study brands that have exceptional tone. For instance, I’m a big fan of MailChimp’s tone and style guide – and its content across the board.

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Bookmark the brands whose tone you admire and study them – and start to update your pages to have the tone you desire. (HINT: Focus on the high-traffic pages you’ve identified.)

Design your website so users can find what they need

Sure, you create a lot of content, but can your readers find what is going to help them?

If your site is like many, people are stumbling across what’s recent – or the top pages that get the bulk of your traffic. (Are you seeing the importance of these pages?)

What can you do to help the right person get the right content at the right place, at the right time, in the right format, in the right language, on the right device? This is the kind of thing content marketers are aspiring to do, but to get there we need the help of content strategists – or at least strategic thinking. As Rahel Anne Bailie explains:

The reason people hire content strategists is that people can’t find anything.

I have studied the website for This American Life, as it excels at providing an experience that helps readers or listeners find the “right” content or discover something they didn’t even know they wanted. Learn more with Put Users at the Center of Your Content Strategy: A Look at This American Life.

Something to try: One of the keys to findability is having the right categories/taxonomy in place. In two recent articles, Marcia Riefer Johnston, Managing Editor for Intelligent Content, explains what semantic categories are and why marketers should care, and follows up with some specifics on how to use semantic categories for your blog.

Where we go from here

I am not suggesting that you become an expert on all of these practices, but rather I encourage you to start learning about these things – and find the right content strategist to help if you are struggling in any of these places.

I’d love to hear from you: Are you considering these types of things in your content marketing plan? If so, how are you making progress? If not, what’s stopping you?

To learn more about content strategy – as it applies to content marketing – visit our Intelligent Content blog and sign up for our weekly email newsletter. Not only will you get an exclusive article from our Chief Strategy Officer Robert Rose, but you’ll also learn about content strategy, which, I guarantee you, will help you think about your content in a more customer-centric way.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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How to Get Guest Posts Published on Top Sites

Guest blogging is an amazing way to get traffic, grow your email list, and increase your ranking on search engines.

Attracting a relevant audience has become harder now that everyone and their dog has a blog. But by guest blogging on a site that already has your target audience, you can quickly reap the benefits of that site’s hard work.

Guest blogging earns you backlinks – one of the most significant factors in Google’s ranking algorithm because you can link to your site – and it instantly puts you in front of an existing audience.

Sometimes it’s nice to start and get a few guest posts published on some small, but relevant sites. But, if you really want to make big strides, you eventually need to get on a top site, and it’s not as hard as you might think if you know the steps to take.

Getting published on large sites can work wonders in both the short and long term. I’ve watched it happen with my own blog when I’ve been published on sites like Entrepreneur, The Huffington Post, and The Next Web.

There’s a simple process I’ve used to get published on these and several other sites. Here’s what’s worked for me:

1. Create a prospect list

To get good returns with guest blogging, you need to go where a large volume of your target audiences are, and, in order to get your content in front of those audiences, you need to go to sites that publish content like yours. Below are a few strategies you can use to figure out what sites are likely to provide the best results.

First, you have to ask yourself, “Who are my potential customers?” You can’t decide how to target your guest post unless you know who you’re trying to reach.

Then, you’ve got to think about where your potential customers are. What sites do they visit frequently? What blogs do they read?

Figure this out by conducting customer development interviews, searching on Google for words and phrases your customers are likely to use, and researching with audience intelligence tools such as analytics.twitter.com.

Lastly, you have to make sure that these sites accept guest posts. If they don’t have a page for guest submissions (see No. 6 on how to find this), browse their archives and see if there have been any guest posts published.

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Your prospect list can look much like a CRM, a comprehensive list of places for which you want to write with the ability to track your communication with the site (getting published can sometimes require many follow-ups).

2. Create awesome content

As you might expect, any blog worthy of your time is going to want to publish high-quality content. In a world where everyone is a blogger, it’s more important than ever to create content that truly provides value.

To make sure I’m producing content that people find valuable, I apply lean start-up principles and customer-development tactics to create content. I use customer-development tactics to learn about people’s problems and how I can provide value in solving them. I apply lean by running experiments and producing content iteratively so I don’t spend too much time and money on something my customers won’t find valuable.

Here are some specific strategies for determining content topics that are more likely to deliver results:

• Field questions from readers.
• Take note of content your competition is producing that performs well.
• Use keyword research to find out what people are searching for.
• Look at platforms such as Amazon to see what content is performing well.
• Write blog posts about given topics, and gain feedback as you go, before writing an entire book.

Listen to the questions frequently asked of you. Questions are requests for information. So if a question comes up often, it’s an indication that there’s demand for information on that topic.

Another way to create awesome content is to browse on Quora – a social question-and-answer network. If people ask or follow a question on Quora, it’s an indication that they could use more information on that topic.

Browse questions within your topic area, industry, or on the problem you are solving. Write blog posts to answer the questions with the most followers, or answer the questions on Quora itself.

3. Pitch, fail, repeat until success

Some people recommend pitching an idea or a title before sending the post, but I’ve had better reception when I send a draft of the post. I recommend experimenting with this, and of course following the guidelines of each site.

Here’s an example of an email I sent to an editor:

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The key elements are:

• Make a clear ask at the beginning and end.
• Introduce yourself and state some accomplishments to build authority, social proof, and rapport.
• Mention the article, what it’s about, and why you think it’s valuable.
• Link to the complete post in Google Drive.

If and when you get published, be sure to share it on your social channels and reply to any comments, as this may make the site more inclined to have additional work published there. Once you’ve been published on a few smaller blogs it can be easier to reach out to bigger names. The more bylines you have, the more leverage you have to be chosen by a bigger site.

4. Network like a champion

Sometimes it’s not just how well you write but who you know. Having a referral from someone an editor trusts can be a great way to motivate the site to publish your content.

I became a regular contributor to The Huffington Post as a result of a long chain of networking events, connections, and follow-ups.

It started with a workshop that I wasn’t even sure would be good. The teacher seemed underqualified, and I thought of a million other things I could be doing. It turned out to be a great workshop. I followed up with the teacher, who happened to be the best networker I had met. He inspired me to really make networking a priority and informed some of my strategies. We became and still are good friends.

The teacher invited me to an event a few months later. Though I wasn’t sure what it would be, I went because I trusted his judgment. It turned out to be a private party for Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, to launch his new book, The Startup of You. It was hosted by former New York Mayor, Michael Bloomberg. I met the president of MTV and some start-up founders.

I was talking to an entrepreneur I had met that night when he said, “Hey, there’s Arianna Huffington, let’s go talk to her.” My initial reaction was anxiety. But I turned off my brain, reminded myself of how important it was to get out there, and I talked to her.

I don’t even remember what we talked about, but eventually she offered to have me contribute to her site and I got her email address. The next day I emailed her, even though I was still nervous. She responded by introducing me to an editor.

This interaction has led to more business and guest-blogging opportunities. The backlinks and traffic received from Huffington Post definitely made the networking worthwhile.

5. Climb the ladder

It sounds so rad to get published on the biggest sites in your industry. And don’t get me wrong, it can deliver some incredible results, but smaller, highly relevant sites, can produce great results too. In addition, getting published on smaller sites can help you build your reputation, social proof, and track record.

If a post’s good performance is reflected publicly (i.e., by a notation of shares on the page), an editor may be more inclined to publish you. If your content has produced traffic in the past, there’s less guesswork for the editor in evaluating your potential.

6. Follow instructions

One surefire way to start off on the wrong foot with editors is to fail to follow their instructions for pitching. Every site has preferences or guidelines for potential guest bloggers. Look for this information on a Contact or Contribute page.

Or search the “site name + write for us.” For example, I searched “Social Media Explorer write for us” and found its how-to-pitch page. You also can search “site name + contribute.”

7. Be persistent

I thought business was all about “vision” and “creativity.” It turns out much of it is about follow-up. I can’t tell you how much money I’ve made from simply sending follow-up emails. It’s annoying. But it works.

It took months of following up with Entrepreneur before I got a couple posts published. Now that I’ve proven myself, I’m able to get published there more easily.

Don’t get discouraged if you get a response that looks like this:

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Be patient because eventually you’ll get a response that looks like this:

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Want to grow your content marketing knowledge? Start with two free e-courses – part of CMI’s comprehensive Online Training & Certification Program, which contains over 19 hours of must-know strategies, tactics, and best practices, delivered by leading experts. Sign up now.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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SlideShare Secrets to Stack the Decks in Your Favor

SlideShare is a popular, business-friendly social site – one that you probably already use to enhance the life span of your company’s PowerPoint slide decks and other presentation materials. But could you be overlooking some of the most powerful features and functionalities the platform offers for greater content marketing success? 

Acquired by LinkedIn in 2012, SlideShare has expanded its capabilities to incorporate additional design options, functionality, and media formats – such as audio, HD video, and more. Content marketers who understand how to take full advantage of these enhancements can tap into a world of possibilities for creating engaging multi-platform experiences and lasting brand value.

If you are looking to expand your use of SlideShare beyond the basic slide deck, or you just want to get stronger results from any presentation you create, check out CMI’s latest e-book, How to Get More From SlideShare: Super-Simple Tips for Content Marketing.

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How To Get More From SlideShare – Super-Simple Tips For Content Marketing from Content Marketing Institute

Here are a few ideas and examples to start you off:

Plan your use of SlideShare wisely

Before you create content on SlideShare, make sure your presentations will be aligned with your overall content marketing strategy. This will help you ensure that each presentation you publish will support your marketing goals and contribute to the business results you want to achieve.

The easiest way to do this is to be intentional with your audience and your content marketing objectives:

• Know whom you intend to target with your content, as well as what their relevant needs and interests are.

• Be able to identify where that audience will likely be in their purchase process as they engage with your content.

• Know what action you want them to take after they read your SlideShare content.

RECOMMENDED FOR YOU: Don’t have a documented content marketing strategy to work off of? Learn how to create one.

Cover the SlideShare basics

Though there are plenty of bells, whistles, and creative enhancements to tap into to make your presentations unique, let’s start with some simple best practices to ensure that your SlideShare posts communicate in a clear, meaningful, and strategically sound way:

Fit the format: Like a PowerPoint slide deck, SlideShare’s default layout is in landscape view, so make sure you size and format your content accordingly.

Grab attention right off the bat: The SlideShare home page is a sea of headlines and cover thumbnails. If you want to catch visitors’ eyes as they scan the goods and get them to click on your content, you better have a compelling cover image and powerful headline.

Headline helpers

What can you do to help your headlines stand out? Try a few of these tips:

• Ask, “Would my target audience want to read this?” If you don’t focus on your readers, it will be nearly impossible to grab their attention.

• Entice, but don’t exaggerate. It’s better to offer useful, honest information with real value than risk angering readers because your presentation doesn’t deliver on the promise of its headline.

• It’s OK to be a bit of a tease: If you give away all the important information in the headline, people won’t feel the need to read more.

• Use numbers and lists: Using numbers in your headline gives the audience an idea of how quickly they’ll get the information they want.

• Check out the competition: Get a sense for how other businesses are positioning their SlideShare offerings, so you can identify potential opportunities to distinguish your content.

• Ask and you shall receive: Use titles that take the form of a question to pique readers’ curiosity (and ignite their desire to satisfy it).

• Take advantage of headline optimization tools, like CoSchedule or KingSumo.

Present a simple discussion: Often, the best SlideShare presentations are those that create interesting conversations and do so in a way that’s easy for viewers to understand and follow. Keep your story simple and concise so readers don’t lose interest before they reach the last page.

Appeal visually: Memorable presentations often tell a compelling story in a few words. Whenever possible, emphasize imagery over text by incorporating video, infographics, photos, and other static images.

• Tip: SlideShare has partnered with Haiku Deck to help users create eye-catching visual decks – even if they don’t have a professional designer. You can access this directly in your SlideShare account by connecting to Haiku Deck in your User Settings under Apps.

Include a call to action: Insert a clickable link in your slides to make it easy for the user to take the next desired step. For example, we used the final page of one of our recent SlideShare presentations to draw attention to our upcoming Content Marketing World conference.

Publish consistently: SlideShare rewards presentations that are recently created and uploaded. The more often you post, the greater your chance of getting featured on the SlideShare home page and on its Top Content lists.

Share every presentation: It won’t be enough to just grab people as they pass through the SlideShare home page. You will want to share your presentations as far and wide as possible – including posting them on your social media pages, embedding them in your site content, and linking to them within your other content efforts. And don’t forget to enable others to help you spread the word so that the presentation trends and gains viral visibility.

Proof it for perfection: No matter what content you publish on SlideShare, you will want to make sure it shines a positive light on your business. This means it should have error-free copy and a well-designed look; feel consistent with your branding; and have hyperlinks, videos, and lead forms that are working properly.

• Tip: In his post, 22 To-dos for SlideShare Success, Roger C. Parker shares a handy proofreading checklist you can use to make sure your presentations uphold your company values and quality standards.

Take your efforts to the next level

Once you’ve mastered the basics, a wide range of options can help make your SlideShare content more immersive and engaging, and extend the platform’s practical value as a content marketing tool.

Here are just a few ideas:

Insert a YouTube video: SlideShare is no longer a static, text-only medium, it now enables users to insert HD video in presentations. This can be handy when you want to add detail, explanations, or demonstrations to the stories you craft in SlideShare.

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Add audio narration: Record and embed audio in your presentations to enable them to function as a slidecast. (Check out this tutorial to see the full technical process.)

Incorporate third-party apps: Apps can enhance your use of SlideShare for content marketing – for example, you can synchronize your SlideShare presentations with videos using Zentation, or share your decks in-screen with the participants of your video conferences using Tokbox. And, if you have developer skills, you can even build your own apps using SlideShare’s API.

Use it for content repurposing: Extend the value of your existing content – such as Twitter chats, archived webinars, infographics, or your favorite blog posts – by curating them into anthologies or visual scrapbooks of topic-specific information.

Image source: The Cartoon Agency

Use it as an education tool: The SlideShare platform is well-suited for creating step-by-step product demos, team training exercises, or tutorials on specific processes and procedures. And because you can make your SlideShare presentations private, you can control who has access to this content.

Image source: Simona Opris

For more tips, read the complete e-book, How to Get More From SlideShare: Super-Simple Tips for Content Marketing.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

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The One Ingredient Your Content Marketing Program Is Missing

Through keynote talks, workshops, and webinars, I’ve had the opportunity to present on the topic of content marketing more than 200 times in the past four years. In almost every one of those presentations, I relayed the following information:

“Content marketing doesn’t usually fail because of content quality. The main reason is because it’s inconsistent or it stops.”

Most marketers simply don’t want to hear this. With all the exuberance around content marketing, they want to hear that if they execute against a reasonable strategy, success will come in six months or less. This is hardly ever the case.

To the patient companies go the spoils

In the last couple weeks, the mattress e-commerce company Casper launched a content brand called Van Winkle’s, dedicated entirely to sleep culture. This type of move is not surprising. Content brands are the new skinny pants, with Airbnb launching Pineapple, Uber launching Momentum, and Intel launching IQ … adding to Coca-Cola’s Journey, and American Express’ Open Forum (and the list goes on).

What is different about Casper’s launch is … patience. Casper co-founder Luke Sherwin told New York Business Journal, “… When you look at (start-up publications), typically they cut themselves off below the knee before they let it breathe and make money.” That means that Casper’s content site will not advertise any of Casper’s products or link to e-commerce offers of any kind. Even crazier, the site is funded outside of marketing, with the ultimate goal of creating a sustainable publication long term.

Monetization comes after you build a loyal audience.

Whether you agree with this strategy or not isn’t the point. The key is that Casper is giving the editorial product time to breath before mandating results.

We’re seeing similar moves within our CMI advisory client base. In an interview, one enterprise told Robert Rose, CMI’s Chief Strategy Officer, that it has been given an 18-month runway before having to show a return of any kind.

I know what you’re thinking … impossible (but true).

Can countless content marketing successes be wrong?

If you are a regular reader at CMI, you know the story. We started the CMI content marketing blog in 2007. It took three years before we successfully monetized it. Shortly thereafter, we launched the magazine Chief Content Officer, and then the Content Marketing World event.

Three years. Did we do something wrong at CMI that made it take so long to show substantial results from our content marketing?

About a year ago, we started interviewing some of the most successful businesses in the world that employed a content-driven approach. We talked to them for my fourth book, Content Inc. (to be released in September at Content Marketing World). These companies ONLY launched content-focused blogs, podcasts, events, or e-newsletters to start and grow a business. These companies came from a variety of industries, including food, fashion, technology, manufacturing, and more.

In every case, it took more than 12 months to build a loyal audience and see return. On average, it took between 15 and 17 months until the platforms could actively show revenue gains because of the approach.

The majority of these companies were start-ups or solo entrepreneurs. Other than their current content-focused approach, they had no marketing, advertising, or public relations budget. Their only choice was to be patient and slowly, over time, build a loyal audience (something Brian Clark calls a minimum viable audience [MVA]). Only when this MVA was established could success be shown.

But there’s something else …

Let’s go back to the Casper scenario. It’s not just that it is taking a long-term approach to success with the platform, it isn’t even trying to monetize the platform yet.

Brian’s Copyblogger Media, the holding company behind one of the fastest-growing software-as-a-service organizations, blogged for 19 months without actively trying to generate revenue. Obviously, this has worked for Brian and his growing team.

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Easier said than done. I know, I know. This type of mentality is almost impossible to find in larger organizations. Many content programs are funded by product marketing around campaigns that last no longer than 12 months. Two things happen with this:

1. Because the funding is 12 months or less, there is an immediate pressure to show return or the project could (and does) get cut.

2. From Day One, companies are actively trying to sell against the content, be that in the form of leads or direct sales.

Point 2 is critical. It was in our case. It was in Brian’s case. It will be in Casper’s case. Heck, it took TD Ameritrade two years to show the impact its magazine, thinkmoney, was making on its audience (it found active readers traded five times more than nonreaders).

Giving the content marketing platform time to focus requires every second of attention to be on the needs of the audience, especially at the beginning stages – that’s what builds a loyal audience. That focus leads to success. When the majority of brands start out so focused on their own revenue goals, it’s easy to see why the patient, who are focused on audience outcomes, ultimately win.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t actively drive revenue from your platform. I don’t think it’s a black-and-white situation. But I do think that those who are patient and have a timetable longer than a year are more apt to win. Your job as a content marketer is to set reasonable expectations from the beginning. Focus on building a loyal audience. Highlight what your readers are accomplishing because of the communication you are delivering and share that with your executive team.

Basically, beg, borrow, and steal until you can get to a point where you can monetize your audience. It’s not the only way, but I do believe it’s the best way to ultimately see success with your content marketing.

Want to get the support you need for successful content marketing. Check out CMI’s starter kit, Mastering the Buy-in Conversation on Content Marketing for stats, tips, and essential talking points. And don’t forget to include a copy of this post.

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‘Will It Blend?’ Company Embarks on New Influencer Marketing Program

Anyone who has watched a “Will It Blend?” video knows the answer to that question is, “Of course.” iPhone? Yes. iPad? Yep. Golf balls? You betcha.

Created by Blendtec’s Founder Tom Dickson to demonstrate the power of his blenders, “Will It Blend?” is the stuff of viral marketing legends. Since 2006, Dickson has starred in more than 140 videos that have a combined 256 million views on YouTube.

“Will It Blend?” was a wonderfully successful experiment, says Rick Galan, Blendtec’s director of digital marketing. The videos have been a powerful (and fun) awareness engine for the brand. But while the campy “don’t-try-this-at-home” campaign has made millions aware of the brand, the audience is so broad it’s safe to say many are more interested in destruction than in nutrition.

Seeking depth

“We sell an aspirational product,” says Senior Content Marketing Manager Mike Jensen. With many models priced in the $400 to $600 range, a Blendtec blender isn’t one of those kitchen gadgets someone uses a few times and relegates to the back of a cabinet. To sell blenders, Blendtec needs to reach the right people – people who see a high-end blender as an important part of their lifestyle.

For Blendtec, this means complementing the breadth of the original “Will It Blend?” campaign with the depth afforded by influencer marketing. By creating more relevant and targeted content, the company’s influencers help Blendtec reach and build credibility with prospective customers – not only in the consumer market, but also with retailers and business owners.

Identifying influencers

To help build relationships with a diverse group of brand ambassadors, Blendtec representatives attend a variety of events, from blogger conferences to Crossfit competitions. They set up a booth, hang out, and hand out smoothies. “The biggest tactic is just to be one of them,” says Galan.

As a result, Blendtec doesn’t need to do much prospecting to find bloggers and Instagrammers – there’s a waiting list of content creators who want to partner with Blendtec, often in exchange for a product giveaway that helps them grow their own audience. Giveaways help both parties expand their reach. “Our influencers are excited. As content marketers, it’s a dream,” Jensen says.

But partnering with Blendtec is about much more than writing a blog post in exchange for a blender or putting the company logo on a team jersey in exchange for sponsorship, according to Jensen. Blendtec vets prospective brand ambassadors by focusing on people with whom it can have lasting relationships. “We follow and engage with people who care about what we care about,” says Jensen. “We are proud of the people who are proud of our product.”

One of Blendtec’s less obvious brand ambassadors is Billy DeCola, a tattoo artist familiar to viewers of TLC’s reality show NY Ink. The tattoo artist reached out to the company, telling Blendtec that he often makes smoothies for his young daughter. Blendtec and DeCola partnered for a designer blender that features an original cherry blossom watercolor design by DeCola. The tattoo design has inspired other custom collaborations, including a berry design for a California Giant Berry Farms blender giveaway and a graffiti blender created for the Dew Tour sports event.

Image source

Defining the Strategy

Blendtec’s content marketing strategy focuses on the customer journey in three different categories – fuel, nurture, and create – and the company partners with experts and thought leaders in each of these areas.

Fuel

Content in the fuel category demonstrates how Blendtec complements a lifestyle for athletes and those passionate about nutrition. From the Seattle Seahawks (the NFL team even has its own Seahawks Stealth Smoothie) to local cycling teams, Blendtec shows how its products help professional, semi-pro, and amateur athletes achieve their goals. Content is created by dietitians, nutritionists, and the athletes themselves.

Nurture

A key audience for nurture content is, as one might expect, parents. The parent-generated content is focused on making real food at home and ensuring kids are getting their vitamins through smoothies and other healthy foods. Nurture content also comes from among the large community of food bloggers, for whom taking pictures of their food – and the tools they use to prepare it – is second nature.

Create

Blendtec’s create content comes from chefs, artists, and small business owners. Instead of reaching out to producers to get Blendtec’s products placed on cooking shows, Blendtec prefers to work directly with the chefs who can inspire others to create better food. Blendtec has partnered with culinary institutes, as well as spas and estheticians who use Blendtec blenders to produce their products.

Working with online personalities happened organically at first, Jensen says. But the company’s decision to support and invest in influencer marketing was intentional. Partnering with people who create content about food, health, and nutrition was a natural fit for the brand. Blendtec itself has a nutritionist on staff and the company creates a range of recipes for its website, email newsletter, and social media channels.

Managing growth

While the Orem, Utah-based company has been in business since 1989, historically the focus has been on engineering blenders, not content. As Blendtec has grown, so have the company’s digital, creative, and product-marketing teams, enabling Blendtec to produce more content including blog posts, videos, recipes, and infographics. (A recent infographic featuring Buffalo Wild Wings copycat recipes was especially popular, and helped expand Blendtec’s reach beyond the smoothie audience.) The digital team is exploring Vine, Facebook video, and Instagram.

Analytics help drive content creation: Video views, social engagement, and website traffic are all taken into account when it comes to planning ahead. Like other content marketers, Jensen is interested in getting more sophisticated with Blendtec’s data, refining the metrics that help the company connect influencer marketing with sales figures and measure lifetime acquisition.

Despite the company’s recent growth, Galan says, “We can’t generate content at the kind of scale we need to engage with our audience.” Therefore, bringing on new brand ambassadors as well as supporting ongoing relationships with influencers remains a priority.

So does finding and curating compelling stories among the many customer reactions shared with Blendtec every day through its website and social media. One such story comes from a customer who uses her Blendtec blender to make smoothies for her child who relies on a feeding tube – a touching story that fits squarely into Blendtec’s nurture category.

And while Blendtec looks to the future, the company has no plans to leave “Will It Blend?” behind. There’s a long list of items waiting to be blended, and fans submit new suggestions every day.

This article originally appeared in the June issue of Chief Content Officer. Sign up to receive your free subscription to our bi-monthly print magazine.

Cover image by Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

The post ‘Will It Blend?’ Company Embarks on New Influencer Marketing Program appeared first on Content Marketing Institute.

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