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| Simplify Your Inbound Marketing Process: Focus on Content Assets Posted: 10 Dec 2013 03:14 PM PST Posted by kaiserthesage Content ties everything in the digital marketing realm togetherâ€"that's why it is king. Content creation has been the core part of my blog/business' inbound marketing strategy this year, which was around 70% of my entire marketing effort. The other 30% was allocated to content promotion/distribution, relationship building, site optimization, and analytics. So this post is basically a case study of how I simplified a very complex process by only focusing on one integral part of inbound marketing (content), and how that led to hundreds of service leads for our company this year. On content strategyContent assets help brands communicate their messages to their target audiences. These may come in the form of visual guides, web-based tools, extensive resources and many more (as also listed by Cyrus Shepard on his recent Moz post). In my case, I aim for every blog post I publish to be an asset that I can continuously optimize and improve. So in order for my overall campaign to be really scalable (and for me to be able to easily integrate other inbound marketing practices), I based my content development efforts on these core principles:
And as for the content formats, I mostly focused on creating:
If in case you're wondering about the content assets I've repurposed, here are few samples: 2 months ago, I released a 4 part newsletter series that talks about 12 different scalable link building tactics. After a couple of weeks, I decided to publish the entire series as a long-form blog post here on Moz. Another sample is with one of my most popular guides this year (that was also featured on Moz's top-10 monthly newsletter) entitled 22 link building tips from @xightph, which I just recently turned into a SlideShare presentation: Perhaps this approach of allocating the majority of my efforts into content development is easier for me to accomplish because I established my blog's readership 2 years before I tried it, and also given that I've already built relationships with other online marketers who habitually share my new blog posts. I still believe that this exact process is replicable for those who haven't yet established themselves. Since it always comes down to what you can provide to your industry and finding ways to let others know you have it. Content = linksContent assets are able to attract and build links over time, knowing that it is in the nature of content to be genuinely linkable. Link building becomes automatic when you focus on creating useful and actionable content on a regular basis (and, of course, letting other people who're interested in your content's topic know that your content exists). Your content won't stand on its own and be linkable by itself, so it's also important to make an effort for it to be more visible to your target audience. Here are a few things you can do to ensure it'll get to your audience:
Further reading:
Content = relationshipsProviding high-value content assets on a regular basis will also help you easily connect and engage other content publishers in your industry. This can somehow impact how other people perceive your brand as a publisher, especially when other thought leaders are sharing your content, interacting with your brand, and inviting you to contribute to their websites (which is quite similar to what Moz has done in past years). Relationships, partnerships, and alliances are vital in this age of marketing, as they can help increase your readership and follower base, and can particularly help improve the shareability of your site's content. Here are a few pointers on how to engage and build relationships with industry influencers:
Content = social activityWith the right push, a well-thought-out piece of content will almost always do well in terms of social sharing. Most content assets are designed to be share-worthy, and the common factors that make most content assets shareable are:
Making your linkable assets timeless or evergreen can also amplify its social activity, given that every time it gets a new visitor the content remains relevant, which can continuously increase the amount of social shares it is getting. And the more you create content assets on your website, the more you can grow your following base and network. Which is why content plays a big role in social media - because it's what people are sharing. For more actionable tips on increasing your content assets' social activity, you might want to also check the post I wrote a few weeks ago at Hit Reach on how to get more social shares for your site. Content = search rankingsThe ways in which search engines determine web pages' importance (and whether they really deserve to be prominently visible in search results) have evolved over the years. Major factors such as relevance (which can be measured through usage/page activity) and authority (measured through social, links, domain authority, brand signals, etc.), though, still play a huge role in terms of search rankings. These metrics are also elements that most successful content assets embody. Great content generates rankings. A couple of pointers on making the most out of your site's content pool to boost your SEO:
Further reading: Content = email subscribersEmail marketing is an essential part of inbound marketing, because it's a marketing platform that many businesses have full control of (owned media). Growing your email list is a whole lot easier when you're consistently putting new content up on your site (and especially when you consider every piece of content you launch as an asset). The more content you publish, the more people get to discover your brand, which can ultimately increase your chances of getting them to subscribe or sign up for your email newsletter. Tips on how to increase email sign-ups:
Content = conversionsContent assets can definitely lift conversions, mainly because they can strongly demonstrate the brand's domain expertise and authority. If you've planted a lot of useful and actionable content on your site, then these things are influencing your site's ability to convert visitors. More on improving your content assets' conversions:
Becoming a better inbound marketerBefore I became an SEO in 2010, I was a freelance writer. It never occurred to me that I'd be doing both in the futureâ€"and actually more. But I guess knowing how to get the right traffic and having a better grasp of the kinds of content that my audience needs and wants to read made me a better inbound marketer. I would love to hear your ideas about this approach to inbound marketing, or if you have questions, I'd also love to see them in the comments section. You can also follow me on Twitter @jasonacidre. Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!  |
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