It would be unusual indeed that your potential clients already know that your business exists. And unless they have been referred by others, it is unlikely that they will be entering your business name into a Google search box in order to find you.

Instead they will be entering terms like “Boston law firm”, “Sydney family lawyer” or “Georgia defense attorney”, and if your firm is not being delivered as one of the results in the first 3 pages, then you need to include content marketing and social media marketing as part of your overall law firm marketing plan.

Get The Basics Right

Analyse your practice

Identify your legal specialty. Is it family law, criminal law or intellectual property practice? Small law firms and solo practitioners often specialize in one field while medium to large law offices may have separate departments handling litigation, intellectual property and corporate practice. Determine your target clients: their location, ages, gender, etc; research and list their most common legal issues – drill down to very specific issues, e.g. DUI for commercial drivers. Try to identify what motivates them to engage one law firm over another.

Then research the online space they inhabit – individuals may be on Facebook and Twitter, businesses and business people may add or substitute LinkedIn to these. And stalk your competitors’ websites to help uncover the Internet marketing strategies, including the keywords and semantics they use that are working for them, and include these in your written content.

Domain names and website development

Buy a domain name containing relevant practice terms and the specific geographical location that you operate in such as “estateplanningsydney.com.au” or use your law firm name or initials such as “KPGLaw.com”.

SEO tip: Having a keyword in your domain (e.g. “estate planning”) will often improve your search engines results for that term.

Website development involves creating a website with all the basic pages such as the Home page, About, Privacy Policy, Services description, and Contact Page. Other important elements include social media sharing buttons and a well-designed logo headers.

With so many people now accessing the internet via mobile devices (some don’t even have computers!), it has become imperative that your website be mobile-friendly. If you are constructing your site in WordPress, be sure to choose a ‘responsive’ theme. These will automatically reconfigure to suit the device upon which they are being viewed. To see what I mean, look at this site KerryFinchWriting.com on a computer monitor, and then on a mobile phone. You will see that the elements are the same but are rearranged to be easily read by phone. It does not need to be ‘stretched’ to be readable.

Tip: Your website’s theme, logo, and overall presentation must be consistent with the law firm’s image.

Content creation

Law firm websites must be written for their ‘ideal’ clients; thus, articles must focus on legal solutions written in a language that non-lawyers can easily understand. Avoid legalese in headers and page titles. Use legal terms sparingly and only when necessary, taking care to provide a simple explanation and relevant examples of such terms.

Always include a blog section in your site. It may be labeled ‘News’or ‘Articles’, but having it will allow you the superb flexibility to a regular supply of written content (along with videos and images) to your site. The search engines, and your clients, look for new information on websites, and if they don’t find it, they stop visiting. Simple as that. If neither you nor a member of your team has the time or skill to write ongoing unique and relevant content for your site, seek out the services of a content writer who can provide this to you on an agreed regular basis.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

As mentioned earlier, ranking well in search results is vital for law marketing success. Make no mistake, your potential clients are using search engines such as Google and Yahoo! to find solutions to their problems and, ultimately, the right lawyer for their needs.

By employing ethical and transparent SEO practices, including content marketing strategies, the search engines will be able to find your website and all of its pages, and index and rank each one of them.

SEO tip: If appropriate to your practice, target a specific location and use appropriate geographical terms throughout your website’s page titles, headers, meta description, tags and page content. Don’t overuse one term though, and be sure to use variations e.g. ‘Boston law firm’, ‘law practice in Boston’, ‘lawyer in Boston’, ‘defense attorney in Boston’, ‘Boston divorce attorney’ etc. Targeting a specific segment of the market increases your chances of ranking well in search results, saving you time and valuable resources.

Social media

Social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn allow you to interact with existing and potential clients, building trust and relationships that motivate them to engage your law firm’s services. Be sure to synchronise your website, blog and social media profiles so that site visitors can follow and share your content readily and obtain regular updates of your website content.

Google Places and paid advertising

When searching for your business niche on Google you have probably seen your competitors businesses come up in a special section at the top of the results, with their location identified on a map. Is your practice there? If not then you should set up a Google account in your business name, and apply for a Business Listing in Google Places. Note, only 10 places are available for each niche in geographical area.

Paid advertising is a next-level online marketing strategy, and this needs to be managed by experts if you want to ensure you are not throwing your money to the wind. It can be in the form of Google Advertising (those results at the top of and to the side of search results), Facebook Ads or LinkedIn ads. You may choose to focus on one, or invest in all – drop me an email if you’d like me to refer you to my colleagues who have the expertise and accreditation to provide these services.

Finally, if you are concerned that your online presence is not delivering you the clients you want, I’d be happy to review the content on your website. A top-line review is complimentary (enter your details on the box to the right), or learn more about having me prepare a complete Website Content Survey.

Has this post helped you? I’m happy for you to share it with your colleagues and friends!

Kerry

The post Key Elements of An Online Marketing Plan for Law Firms appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Its a sad fact that although (or perhaps because) we can publish online in the blink of an eye, the planning and implementation of content strategies for a businesses’ online presence in many cases is a lot less formal. Most businesses tend to get around to blogging when they can, posting on social media when they can, and producing a video or two for YouTube – yes, when they can.

Online business owners know that they need to have a content marketing strategy – all the experts tell them so – in order to:

- deliver value to, and engage, their site visitors
- establish a position as thought leaders
- stand out as industry experts or niche authorities
- broaden their online footprint for key terms
- have a website that the search engines keep visiting
- establish a focus for social media posts

Setting up an editorial calendar can help you achieve your content marketing goals.

Set Your Goals

Most businesses and companies have some sort of business plan – one that’s based on a series of goals to be achieved over different times. The Five Year Plan is an old favorite, but in today’s dynamic online world – well, things can change a lot in five years! So most business, particularly those with an online presence, will look at goals to be achieved, by the business and the individuals within that business, over the next 12 months. Many large companies base annual salary reviews and bonuses on the achievement of agreed goals.

When it comes to the content marketing elements of a business plan, achieving those goals is easier when you take the time to set up an editorial calendar.

So whether your goal is to increase the number of Twitter followers, subscribers or blog readers you have, or conversions/sales from lead generation activities, start by matching these to a list of achievable content creation/publication goals.

An example might be: 1 authority blog post/week, 1 general article/week, 10 Tweets/week, 10 Facebook Shares or posts/week.

Your editorial calendar should be dynamic, allowing you to increase the amount of content that you publish over time. As your system falls into place and you begin to see the benefits, you will introduce strategies to ramp things up so that your content marketing becomes more efficient, and easier. If not already doing so, this will probably involve engaging a content writer to help you to meet those content objectives.

Look Beyond The Obvious With Your Content Calendar

It would be unusual for two content calendar months to look exactly the same if you look beyond your own business, and incorporate what’s happening in the world around you. Plan to include extra content that relate to, for instance:

• Seasons
• Events (local, national or global)
• Holidays
• Product Launches

If possible, check back on previous analytics and sales figures to see what topics or type of content was effective during each period, and invest more resources into ‘rinsing and repeating’ these.

TV current affairs shows do this all the time – they have a schedule for publishing ‘feel good mum’, ‘arguments with neighbor’, or ‘dangerous toys’ stories. I know when I’ve pitched a story in the past I’ve been told “no we won’t be running an xyz story for another 3 months…!”.

While including elements of your own market intelligence of ’what’s hot and when’, always be prepared to be flexible with your calendar should a breaking news story or a hot product launch needs to be covered.

Team-Share Your Calendar

Source: Basecamp.com/calendar

Not only will sharing your content marketing calendar keep all stakeholders in touch with goals and milestones, but this will help all stakeholders to more connected to them, and accountable to achieving them.

There are a number of tools available to help you create an editorial calendar, and it could be as simple as creating a spreadsheet in Google Drive that you can share with others in your team. I choose to use my Basecamp project management system, which helps me to see at a glance we’re I’m at and where I’m going with not only my own content, but my team and clients as well. The ability to link projects and milestones to my Google Calendar means that I can monitor projects wherever I am, on my iPhone or iPad if necessary (there’s an App for that!).

I love liaising with my clients to create the ideal content package for their business and their budgets – often starting out small and growing as opportunities are presented. Email me directly if you’d like to learn more!

Kerry

The post Supercharge Your Content Marketing With An Editorial Calendar appeared first on Kerry Finch.

You should no longer be looking at tools to churn out multiple, poor quality rewrites of content (often ‘borrowed’ from others!) to add to low ranking websites (or systems) that have been created solely for the purpose of backlinking.

Putting in the effort to obtain natural links from genuine online properties, sites that contain unique content, is what its all about.

What Are ‘Natural’ Links?

‘Natural’ links are those which – as the name suggests – are obtained without overt interference or manipulation. They are created  by having valid users follow links from third party websites to yours (such as through organic search, forum posts, or social media). And the best way to get people to come to your site is through the creation and wise distribution of unique content that is relevant to your target audience.

Linkable Content For New Websites

There’s no question that it can be difficult to get started in online business, but there are things that you can do to gain some quality links right off of the bat. One of the best ways to gain traction in the online world is to write guest posts and articles for industry websites and blogs, and to provide worthwhile and interesting comments on blog posts written by others.

Why are guest articles so essential to your new business?

It’s really just common sense: you’re reaching out to a clearly defined group that already has an affinity with your industry or your niche, and your are providing them with information they can use. You’re essentially funnelling traffic from that industry-focused site right back to your own website. It’s a win-win situation.

Not only that, but many of these groups will have members with a social media presence, so there is the added opportunity for  your guest posts to be added to, for example, their Facebook or Twitter stream, thereby broadening your reach. I know that I often share links from Australian Marketing Magazine and other industry-focused sites on my Kerry Finch Writing Facebook page.

Linkable Content For Veteran Websites

You can write and publish for days without having a single visitor to your site if you haven’t perfected the art of creating “linkable content”. This comprises  text, videos and infographics that really grab the attention of the viewer or the reader. Your content must be relevant to your audience, and your titles must entice that audience to read on – it must promise value. Some suggestions:

• One on one interviews with relevant and respected industry leaders
• Controversial material that will inspire debate without alienation
• Short, easily digestible ‘list’ posts (“3 Ways To xya Today”)
• Highlight niche-relevant news and developments – ride the wave of a hot news topic.

Spy On Your Competitors

The online world is a competitive one, and, as in the offline world, it makes smart business sense to keep an eye on what your competitors are doing. There are tools available (like SEMRush) that allow you to see where your competitors’ backlinks are coming from. Identify these and add them to your overall content marketing plan – consider how you can tap into those sites as well. Competitor analysis such as this can provide invaluable insight into the content marketing strategies of others in your niche, and allows you to consider how to do it better!

Content Marketing – Two words to help you keep it real

When creating your content marketing plan, I suggest that you put these two reminders at the very top of the page:

Uniqueness – ensure that only original content is published on your website

Relevance – your content should engage your ‘ideal customer’ and make a seamlessly connection between him or her and your business.

By all means leverage your unique, relevant content by having it rewritten and passed through Copyscape, and then use those rewrites on other properties – just resist the urge to use spinning software or writers with a poor command of English to create your rewrites.  Keep in mind that everything you publish online that contains links to your website, can come under search engine scrutiny. Keep it real.

If writing original and relevant content is a challenge for you, perhaps I can help. You can email me directly – and I (the real me, not a robot or outsourcer!) will respond.

Kerry

The post Content Marketing and Competitor Espionage For Meaningful Backlinks appeared first on Kerry Finch.

* better understand their legal issues,
* learn how retaining an attorney is in their best interests, and
* discover the areas of law in which their attorney practices.

Legal copy that is written by a specialist may also explain, in everyday language, complex legal issues – and this in turn adds value to the site, and engages prospective clients.

When an attorney provides quality web content, that content reaches people locally, nationally, and internationally. The international relevance of a website should not be ignored in an age where people are increasingly transacting business online: many seek destination-country legal representation in addition to their at-home law firm.

How Great Website Content Generates Leads for Attorneys

Quality website content – copy that has been specially written for criminal defense lawyers – is an investment that continues to work for you indefinitely. By having a site that is delivered to potential clients when they search for specific terms (keywords and key phrases), you will have a much better chance of engaging warm leads, the people who are actually looking for your services.

Creating your main website pages with the client in mind (rather than just extolling your competencies!) is a vital first step. However, having a schedule for adding ongoing content, ideally in a News or Blog section, will give your website a boost in several ways, including:

1. Your website will grow = search engine tick of approval! The search engines, like Google, love sites that grow over time with quality, relevant information. By simply adding one post (preferably two) to your site, the search engine spiders will visit your site more often – they will detect that new material is being added regularly, and they will want to index those pages. If a site is built and then left to languish, they will simply stop visiting.

2. You will establish authority in your area of expertise – the defense of your clients. If your content is constructed in a way that leads visitors on a journey to the different pages of your site, they will become more engaged with, and trusting of, your practice.

3. The more different topics you can cover within your niche, the more likely it is that your future clients will find you for a variety of search terms that they may type into a search box.

4. You are able to deliver more options and detailed solutions to those who are in need of a criminal defense attorney, without cluttering your main Services pages.

People are now relying on the internet to give them the answers to their problems, minor or major – including legal issues. When they are facing trouble with the law, only well-written copy on your criminal defense attorney website will successfully illustrate your, and your firm’s, experience and commitment to your clients best interests.

If you are unsure of the direction to take for the content on your law firm’s website, I’m happy to discuss the different options that may be just right for you. For a top-line review of your site, without obligation, simply complete the form to the right!

>> Contact Kerry Finch directly

The post Website Copy For Criminal Defense Attorneys appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Obtaining a contract to supply coal, oil, gas, and other mining and exploration companies can be worth millions of dollars to providers of equipment, manpower and maintenance to these industry sectors. If your website does not target them specifically with quality graphical and written content, then you a leaving money on the table.

Website Content and the Search Engines

Search engines, such as Google, index and rank web pages according to an algorithm or formula for measuring relevance, popularity and authority – and these algorithms constantly change. Various factors can lead to top rankings in search results but the ranking criteria is closely guarded by the search engines.

Google, however, has clearly identified some guidelines which can improve search rankings or search engine optimisation (SEO). The SEO guidelines mention technical elements that Google looks for in search results, such as technical website elements and website content qualities. And it is the latter that we will focus on here.

Understanding search engines

Google and other search engines strive to provide the most relevant search results and the best user site experience for their users. Thus, web pages that rank well must be fresh, unique and responsive to the search query.

Keywords and Semantics

Keyword usage is an important indicator of relevance as search engines ordinarily display web pages containing exact matches of words or phrases entered in the search query box. A web page must have the right keywords incorporated in the best places where search engines tend to crawl such as the title tag, headers, links and alt attributes of images.

Website pages and blog/news posts should also contain a keyword, but, importantly, should contain other relevant terms (the semantics) that a person might expect to find in relation to the industry being targeted.

For instance, if you sell generators or conveyors, and you are targeting mining companies, then you would not just talk about generators or conveyors in general: specifications, models etc. Rather, you would have terms like ‘generators for coal mines’ or ‘conveyors that have been used in iron ore loading facilities’, and ‘conveyors to speed up loading at port facilities’.

Quality content

With ongoing algorithm modifications that are programmed to demote rankings of web pages containing duplicate content and content farms, the first step for a small business website to compete online is through developing quality, original written content that is unique and useful to Internet users.

Experienced content writers will know how to weave targeted keywords and semantics into well researched and well-written articles. The more professional providers (like us!) go even further by checking for duplicate wordings that may result in poor SEO – ensuring the delivery of all-original content.

Written content is an ideal first step to ensuring that ongoing material is feeding your website, blogs and social sites with fresh, unique and relevant content. A great start is for a website to have at least one news-based or authority post published weekly, along with two nich-related shorter articles which may be leveraged further through social – Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Website Reviews

If your business is attempting to land supply or service contracts to shipping, mining, oil or gas companies, then you really need to take a good hard look at your website. Does your website copy make it quite clear that you supply to these industries?

I’m happy to take a quick look at your site to see if this is so, and to point out if improvements are needed. Just fill in your details in the box to the right.

If you already know that your website does not meet these content requirements, then I can also provide a complete website site content review that will outline exactly the changes I think are needed – fully costed.

Good luck with landing one of those lucrative mining, oil or gas projects!

Contact Kerry Finch directly.

The post Website Content Tips for Suppliers of Mining, Oil and Gas Companies appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Creating a content schedule is not difficult, nor does its execution need to become a chore, but once you see the results you will come to see just how effective it is. But you’ll never appreciate good content management until you actually get under way.

Many of my consultant clients already appreciate this, and it is reflected in the monthly recurring orders they have with me for a combination niche related general topic articles, blog posts and press releases.

Regular Content Gets You On Your Clients’ Radar

Website content – including general-topic articles, videos, podcast recordings, and authority blog posts – can be the easiest and least expensive ways to generate leads, engage customers and build a solid online presence.

Content marketing works because Internet users are increasingly looking online before making the decision to purchase, to pick up the phone, or to send an email for more information. If you’re feeding your website with quality, original and relevant content that includes the targeted search terms that your prospects are using, then your site will be delivered to them in search results.

And they are asking their peers for opinions on platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn.

As social media channels and mobile technology continue to develop, it’s important to review your content marketing strategy regularly and make any adjustments to ensure that you continue to deliver the type of content that your target consumers need, on the topics that interest them.

1. Know your audience: Identify your target audience and understand their needs, interests and motivations. Activate your social network by posing questions, links and photos. Read your fan or follower feedback and observe which posts receive the most number of Likes, comments and shares. Social media activity can indicate topics that are related to your business or product.
2. Create a content marketing plan: Writing the first few articles and developing the initial series of videos and podcasts are only the beginning, and any business must be prepared to develop fresh content regularly in order to build and sustain momentum in content marketing. This requires a well thought out, but not necessarily complex, plan for creating, publishing, distributing, sharing and linking. It should also include the ongoing mining of content ideas from social media properties, news sites and online forums. If you have a team to support you, inform its members of your plan and set content creation targets with them.
3. Maintain high quality: Poorly written or executed content can hurt your business reputation and lower search rankings. Hire a video editor or a content writer if you don’t have the time or skill to create quality videos and articles. Determine and use the appropriate tone for social media content, blogs and reports.
4. Develop content variety: Consider creating articles containing lists, a roundup of resourceful links, product comparisons and a Q and A on an important topic.
5. Share content: Devote regular time for updating social media properties and determine the best times for sharing content in each network. Tip: Create and share useful content rather than promotional and obvious sales copies.
6. Engage and listen: Online conversations taking place in social networks, forums, discussions, blog comment threads and product reviews provide valuable topic ideas for content marketing.

The attention span of Internet users is short and fleeting. Neglecting regular content marketing can turn your fans, followers and site visitors cold as they focus their attention on more current content elsewhere.

I believe that an effective content marketing plan should include a 4-month content creation schedule with a list of topics to be covered. This can be modified to include news-related posts and press releases that ride of current news stories.

Set delivery schedules for your team or obtain the services of a content writing specialist who can take care of creating articles specifically for content marketing.

Your content strategy does not need to be complex, it might be as simple as each month:

• Add 4 news/industry related posts to your blog.
• Rewrite these and publish to your Facebook or LinkedIn page (linking back to a relevant product/service you provide)
• Add 4 general, niche-relevant articles to your site
• Rewrite each of these and publish them to an article directory.
• Write and distribute an online press release.

Your might then decide upon further leverage:

• Create a PDF of the press release and publish it to a document sharing site.
• Add a PDF of the published press release to your website (blog or news room)
• Video yourself reading the news/industry related posts, publish to YouTube and embed this on your site.

By starting the process with a plan, and quality original content, the opportunities for further leverage, for minimal expenditure, are amazing.

If you need help creating a content marketing strategy for your business, contact me!

Kerry

The post Your Content Marketing Strategy: Start Simply, But Do Start! appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Creating your initial website copy (especially if you engaged a professional to do it!) was the first, somewhat easy step to take; however, you may eventually feel that you’ve come to a point where you’ve exhausted all possible sources for ongoing content creation. Over the years I’ve spent as a content writer, I have discovered ways to draw out new topics or angles to write about to keep the marketing content ideas flowing.

Here are some of the strategies that I use, which might to help you generate an ongoing supply fresh website content to use in on your authority site, or for publishing on third party sites.

Listen to your niche community

• When writing for a specific audience, going straight to your clients or potential customers is the quickest way to learn about what they want to read or learn from you.
• Activate your email list and start sending emails asking for feedback from your email readers. If you have not created a way to collect the names of the visitors to your website/shop/practice/business, its time you did (ask me about this now, or wait for a forthcoming post!).
• Start new conversations on your social media properties and take note of the comments and questions of your fans and followers. Keep the conversation flowing by engaging your readers with interesting responses and addressing them by their first names (which, depending on their settings, will alert them to the reply).
• Contribute to the conversations on other people’s relevant sites and social media pages, and see what is creating a buzz.
• Go offline and talk to your customers or clients at the office or sales floor.
• If you have a customer service/help desk – they know first hand where people’s problems may be with your product/service – so ensure that you get regular reports from them on why people are calling or emailing.
• Ask for feedback: a quick email after a purchase or service provision will without doubt tell you where improvements can be made. If the comments returned are positive, then they can become, with the client’s permission, a testimonial (or the impetus to ask for one) to add to your website (grab a photo if you can!).
• Compare feedback obtained from clients with the opinion of your family and friends. By engaging in conversations, you’ll most likely pick up a common question or problem that you can address in an article or series of articles.

Repurpose your content

Existing content in print and electronic formats can also provide fresh ideas for social media posts and website content.

• Take another look at your printed brochures, advertisements or reports, and pull out an interesting photo and caption that you can post on Twitter, Pinterest or Facebook to generate comments, replies, Likes and Shares.
• Review your blog archives and pick several popular articles that you can incorporate and reformat into an eBook.
• Look at those same blog posts and extract a single element that there is value in expanding upon.
• You can also convert a blog post into a video email.
• Other potential sources of content to be repurposes are the About and FAQ pages of your business website – expand on elements worthy of more detail.

Another way to keep fresh content ideas flowing is to have a swipe file of articles that you admire. Draw inspiration from the points raised in the articles, expand on them with your own thoughts and findings – but don’t copy! If you particularly like something in the article, put it in quote marks and attribute the author.

Google Alerts and Google Trends

Without doubt, one of the best sources of content ideas for me is the information received through Google Alerts – on specific, relevant topics (for both my own business and for my clients’). Read what’s new in the industry and see if you can write about important updates that can affect your business or your readers’ – its also a great way to monitor any activity from your competitors (in fact set up a Google Alert for their business name as well!).

To discover what is trending in online searches in your field, look to Google Trends and target a search term/industry/niche – the results are sure to inspire your content writing ideas. Note these ideas down! If you don’t have time to write, get someone else to do it for you! Just don’t let them lie in limbo.

Outsourcing your content writing

Finally, if you don’t have the time to implement these strategies, to put great ideas into words to support your online business activities, then include the outsourcing of them in your monthly marketing budget.

Perhaps you are wondering how much this type of service may cost?

For me to write 10 articles for posting to third party sites e.g. article directories, would be around $220*, for an authority blog post from your existing material, from $80*; for an more detailed, authority blog post, created from my own research, fully referenced (i.e. you do nothing!), then we are looking at around $180*.

*Depends on the niche (legal/medical/very detailed topics attract a surcharge), and the length of the article/post.

And remember, once you have quality written content to start with, you are able to repurpose it (we can do human rewrites for you) for further leverage.

For a limited time I am offering a free website content review – so why not allow me to take a quick no-obligation look at your website and suggest improvements where I can see they’d be worthwhile?  Simply fill out the request (top right) to get this under way.

If you know what content you need, you may complete my > Brief < (again, no obligation!), and I will send through a costing for you.

Kerry Finch

The post Ideas for Creating Fresh Content for Your Website appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Recently, Jonathan Mildenhall (pictured left), Coca-Cola’s Vice President of Global Advertising Strategy and Content Excellence, spoke at Circus Festival of Commercial Creativity. In his presentation he revealed the company’s philosophy on content, which, in Coca-Cola’s case, includes higher end media like TV shows and movies.

But the strategy’s core concepts can be applied to smaller entities, and Mildenhall’s emphasis on ‘excellence’, is certainly one that should apply to all of the marketing content that a business creates.

Coca-Cola’s ‘Content 2020′ strategy (see video below), Mr Mildenhall says is to “move from creative excellence to content excellence” which he says will see them rely less on ad agencies and more on storytelling and content creation.

Mr Mildenhall’s comments reinforce Coca-Cola’s known advocacy of the shift to content marketing from traditional advertising.

Smaller Businesses Lead The Way

For years now, in the online marketing world, smaller businesses have been able to successfully compete with their big-budget brothers by using creative, yet inexpensive, content strategies. Having an online presence (website) with engaging website copy is not an expensive proposition (and if the prices you’ve been given for doing this are scary, then I suggest you contact me!).

Being disciplined about adding a regular supply of unique and interesting content to that site is also not expensive (again, contact me for indicative prices), and there are ways to leverage that content that costs often nothing but time. AND if that time takes you away from your core business, you can engage people to do this for you for not-much-money.

Even Coca-Cola is leveraging their content wherever possible, with Mr Mildenhall telling Marketing that “We’re building capabilities and understanding on how to leverage compelling content….”. Previously he has gone on record as saying:

“All advertisers need a lot more content so that they can keep the engagement with consumers fresh and relevant, because of the 24/7 connectivity. If you’re going to be successful around the world, you have to have fat and fertile ideas at the core.”

Recognising the need for creating quality, original content – written, audio and visual – thousands of small to medium businesses have captured a great slice of the online visibility pie.

If creating engaging written content is relegated to the ‘too hard’ basket, or ‘one day’ pile, I urge you to move it to the top. When you do, why not send me an email to see how I can assist, or visit my Content Services page to learn more about some options available to you.

I look forward to hearing from you.
Kerry Finch

Coca-Cola ‘Content 2020′ Part I

The post Coca Cola Focuses On Content Excellence appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Articles that provide answers to questions, and solutions to problems, when published on well-ranking sites, tend to deliver better search engine results than sales pages that aggressively promote products and services. So its important that businesses devise and implement website content and article creation strategies that focus creating information-rich articles on topics that will engage readers.

Identifying topics for web content

A key component in effective online business marketing is having an ongoing supply of informative content (written, visual and audio) that uses subtle language that

• shows your expertise in a particular field 

• demonstrates your authority on relevant topics 

• projects your credibility as a business owner, and/or

• creates trust in your business/product/service.

When online searchers arrive at your website after following an article link, they are pre-qualified as ‘warm’ prospects. They have demonstrated that they are already interested, and are now looking for more information on the specific topics included in the article. They may be looking to find out more about you and your business, how to do certain things, or where to buy what they need.

The Challenge of Writing Ongoing Content

Generating a continuous supply of informative content, I know, can be a challenge, particularly when the ultimate goal is to tie the content to a product or service being marketed.

Here are some tips – from my writer/marketer perspective – to help you with your article and content marketing.

Identify the general topic of a business:

Focus on the general subject of your business, product or service. Break it down into different components e.g. if you have a consulting business, identify the different services that you provide, and then the different components of that service. Each of those components may be able to be broken down further to reveal suitable topics for your articles. The articles don’t have to be just about you (in fact its best if they aren’t), but might revolve around the different types of industries that you service.

To learn more about what subjects most concern or interest to your targeted user, tune in and contribute to online conversations on social media sites and forums. Activate your own social media properties in Facebook and Twitter and pose the right questions in order to elicit responses from fans and followers.

Design a series of articles:

General topic articles, in my opinion, need to be only 400-500 words in length. Any more and you are probably providing too much information, and are not giving readers enough incentive to click on your link to learn more. You might consider creating a series of articles that will form a ‘how-to’ resource that discusses how to make the most of a product, or creative ways to use it (this could go on to become a free download report on your site as a lead gen tool).

Keep promotion in its place:

Article marketing yields the best results when it delivers solid information, one article at a time. Any mention of a product or service in the title is premature and will discourage readers from exploring the full article (we are not talking about ‘product reviews’ here). Where available, a resource box containing the name of the author, a short bio, and A REASON TO CLICK on your link for more information, will capture those lovely ‘warm’ prospects: your potential clients or customers. Consider a sweetener for your readers to follow the link in your resource box, by offering a free report, newsletter, coupon or other incentive.

My tips for managing a consistent content schedule

So we know that publishing articles to solid third party sites can bring qualified leads to your website. But what about new content for that site??

You see, it is imperative that your website grows, over time, with the addition of new material. If it doesn’t the search engines will cease to visit it and rank its pages (the more frequently a site changes, the more often the search engine’s will crawl it looking for changes).

After your website is up and populated with quality web page copy, coming up with new ideas for fresh written content can be difficult, even for the most seasoned content writers.

Here is what works really well for some of my top clients:

1. Identify and list your topics – create a mindmap if this works for you
2. Be aware of new, relevant topics, being discussed on social media, or in the news media, and add these to your list/mindmap
3. Write (or have written for you) a solid blog post on that topic – say 500-600 words – and publish it to your website. Use social media to promote this.
4. Write (ditto) several articles on that same topic, say 400 words, and publish them on third party/social media/feeder websites (e.g. article directories, your facebook/LinkedIn/G+ page)
5. Link from those articles back to page/s on your site* with a subtle call-to-action, that may or may not take the reader to a sales page.
6. Rewrite those articles (or have rewritten for you) and publish them on third party/social media/feeder websites that you’ve not used in Step 4.

* Depending on how you have set up your content marketing strategy you may link to a relevant page on a feeder site rather than your main money site – putting another step in the information delivery process/engagement process.

If you have other strategies for ensuring you have a constant supply of well written content, I’d love to include them in a future post.  You can email me your written content management ideas – email Kerry Finch.

The post Effective Content and Article Marketing appeared first on Kerry Finch.

Advances in technology directly shape online consumer behavior, prompting marketers to invest in continuing education which can teach new techniques and systems and sharpen digital marketing skills.

Identifying trends and challenges is an important first step for marketers to determine which direction to take in the year ahead.

Marketing trends in 2013

Increased focus on digital marketing

By now, businesses understand that Internet marketing can yield tangible results such as increased sales, profits and leads. A number of studies reveal that in 2013 companies are setting higher budgets for digital marketing.

Digital marketing branches

2012 saw the emergence of mobile marketing and increasing use of video for improving bottom lines. This year, video advertising remains strong and will continue to grow. However, video only forms part of a comprehensive strategy that includes other associated branches of digital marketing such as content marketing, email marketing (including video emails), subtle search engine optimization, social media marketing and paid search.

Tracking and analytic tools

Organizations want to measure the effectiveness of digital marketing strategies and want to go beyond tracking website traffic and measuring customer satisfaction and net promoter scoring. With increased marketing spend, companies as well want to quantify the return on their marketing investment. The focus now is on the use of different types of analytic tools giving digital marketing a more structured approach of strategy, promotion, management and analysis.

Importance of digital systems and skills

The popularity of mobile marketing and video advertising has created a demand for new systems and technical skills to cope with the new technology.

Challenges in digital marketing

While fresh opportunities in digital marketing arise out of new marketing technology and consumer behaviour, challenges related to the emerging trends also exist.

Companies may be setting budgets for digital marketing but they are often insufficient to maintain strategies in an ongoing basis. I see this often when clients ask me to create great website copy, but once their sites are live, they don’t grow the sites with the addition of fresh, unique, regular content.

Furthermore, a recent report The State of Digital Marketing in Australia (the findings of which correlate to other international studies) observes that the digital industry is plagued by a lack of technical skills which can slow down an organization’s marketing strategy.

Another obstacle is the lack of belief and support from senior management who can play a role in increasing budgets for marketing. Leaders in organizations tend to lack understanding of digital marketing and focus on traditional marketing channels. All too often they believe that the simple presence of a website is all that is required for them to meet any commitment to online marketing.

Measuring results and attributing them to specific marketing strategies can help improve the senior management culture and outlook.

To find out how to include a package of regular written content for your website, to help it grow organically, contact me, Kerry Finch, directly.

The post Digital Marketing Outlook for 2013 appeared first on Kerry Finch.