3 Hacks for Building a Successful Content Marketing Program

The old saying goes that you are entitled to your opinions, but not your own facts. Well, the facts are in and one thing is abundantly clear modern B2B marketing budgets are allocating more and more time and resources toward content marketing efforts. For these organizations, content marketing is an effective, economically viable path to achieving sales goals. Why? Because content marketing is marketing.

The most obvious element of developing a content marketing program is creating great content. But often overshadowed by the importance of developing great content is successfully laying out the following three foundational elements of a content marketing program  1) developing an editorial calendar, 2) defining your editorial voice and 3) setting and tracking clearly defined/achievable goals.

“Tick-tock, tick-tock”

Developing A Content Marketing Editorial Calendar
A content marketing editorial calendar serves as a day-by-day roadmap that ensures your efforts are organized, optimized and ready to reach the right stakeholders. Beyond the topic of the content itself, here is what a good calendar should contain. (H/T to Andy Raskin for insight on this topic):

  • Persona – Which buyer persona are you targeting with your content?
  • Stage – In what stage is the development of the content?
  • Content Type – Is it a blog? A podcast? A video?
  • Distribution Channel – Via which channel will you be distributing it? (company blog, Youtube, Medium, etc.)
  • Publication Date – When is each piece of content scheduled to go live?
  • Desired Impact – What is the desired impact of the content?
  • Industry Target – What sector are you trying to reach with your content? (Key when marketing a B2B product/service.)
  • Impact Metric – How will the effectiveness of the content be measured? (More on this later in the post…)  

Defining Your Editorial Voice
An inconsistent editorial voice is a major faux pas for any organization. In my experience, this issue tends to impact SMEs and large enterprises as opposed to startups and SMBs, which often benefit from less fragmented communication across internal teams. Your number one goal in defining your editorial voice is to achieve stylistic cohesion across all of your content marketing efforts. Getting to this point requires lots of listening, internal research and consensus/approval from the brass. Below are several questions to help get you get started on defining your editorial voice:

  • Can the style of your editorial voice be summed up in 3-5 words?
  • Who are your editorial voice “heroes?” What organizations would you like to model your efforts after?
  • What are you sure you do not want your editorial voice to sound like?
  • What is your goal/reasoning for adopting the voice you eventually settle upon?  

Setting Your Metrics and Goals
Establishing goals for your program is an absolute necessity. Key to reaching these objectives, however, is matching the right metrics to be tracked for each established goal in an effort to ensure success. Below is a quick guide to get you thinking:

  • Your Goal: Brand Awareness & Engagement
    • Metrics to Measure:
      • Direct Views
      • Social Shares
      • Subscribers and Followers
      • Click-throughs
      • Comments
  • Your Goal: Lead Generation
    • Metrics to Measure:
      • Click-throughs (which lead directly to landing pages, sign-up pages, form downloads, etc.)
      • Conversion Rates
  • Your Goal: Sales Enablement
    • Metrics to Measure:
      • Conversion Rates
      • Length of Sales Cycle
      • Size of Contract

With an arsenal of relevant and compelling content and the aforementioned foundational elements in place, your content marketing program will be primed for success. Your company’s bottom line? If it were human, I’m sure it would thank you. You might just have to settle, though, for a show of appreciation from your CMO. ?

The One Question You Should Ask Everyone You Meet

At the risk of dating myself, who else remembers “The Sunscreen Song?” The track was put to wax by Baz Lurhmann during the summer of 1999 and features lyrics taken from a hypothetical commencement speech penned by Chicago Tribune Columnist Mary Schmich. The tune features some great pieces of advice. Specifically, though, it features the following advice about advice:

“Advice is a form of nostalgia. Dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it’s worth.”

I love that line. Dispensing advice is a way of fishing from the past, taking the best parts and reusing it. While this line and the majority of the song was written with the personal aspects of life in mind, I’ve found it applies to the professional aspects of life as well.

I mean, it makes sense, right? The best way to learn is to take on advice from those you respect and those in places you aspire to reach. Whenever possible, I ask the business owners, marketers, and entrepreneurs I meet to share with me the best advice they have ever received. You’d be surprised how much insight such a simple question can yield.

As it relates to PR/marketing, here are a few of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever received in no particular order. Hopefully, they will help you on your own journey.

  • If it’s going to take two minutes, do it now.
  • Be strategic in everything you do. Moving forward with an idea? Vetoing an idea? Shifting direction? Have a reason why.
  • Take complete ownership of both your victories and failures.
  • Think big – every time – and scale it back to meet your needs.
  • Learn how to write (yes, this needs to be said).

Oh, and one more piece of advice. Remember cool songs written during the years before you were of legal age to vote. They might help you write a blog post one day!

(This post has been updated since its original publication in February 2016.)  

9 New Media/PR Lessons from the Experts at Boston University

I recently had the pleasure of sitting in on a Boston University College of Communication course titled, “New Media and Public Relations.”

Taught by the PR veteran/thought leader/dragon slayer, Todd Van Hoosear, the 300-level course aims to explore the effects of new media on the fundamental theories, models and practices of public relations. It also covers and uses the interactive tools that are currently redefining the practice of public relations.

Below, I’ve shared nine key take-aways from my audit of the course. These — along with several others — were shared during my live-Tweeting of the lecture. I think even the most seasoned professional can pick up something new, here:

  1. Filter bubbles = dangerous. Our info is being filtered by our friends as well as Google and FB. | #BUNewMedia
  2. Key elements of a successful viral video: brevity, humor and appealing subject matter. | #BUNewMedia
  3. You can’t guarantee a viral video. But, you can maximize its likelihood. | #BUNewMedia
  4. Videos are filmed with 1st, 2nd and 3rd screens in mind — TV, computer and mobile screen. | #BUNewMedia
  5. Pinterest and copyrighting – major concerns emerging as businesses incorporate service into marketing strategy. | #BUNewMedia
  6. Blog comment activity has plummeted in last two years. Convo has moved to social media platforms — where it’s owned by FB, etc. #BUNewMedia
  7. Blogs — really referred to as websites and news sites these days. “Blog” now really refers to content management systems. | #BUNewMedia
  8. Facebook “Like-gating” proven to be a negative engagement tactic. | #BUNewMedia
  9. PR is about telling stories. New official definition [from PRSA] does not get an A+. | #BUNewMedia

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Note: Some Tweets listed above were slightly altered from their original form for the purpose of this blog post.