It’s Halloween, which means you’ll spend most of today wading through bad horror puns and references to ghosts and goblins. We’re not going to do that with today’s blog. Instead, we’ll give you a few useful, real world tips to help you create (serial)killer content marketing. We’ve broken them down into tricks and the treats you get if you use them. Okay, we’re allowed one or two bad puns, it is Halloween after all.
Trick:Infographics
Infographics are a great way to get lots of information across in a simple format. Any combination of statistics or information and illustrations qualify as an infographic. The great thing about them is that you don’t need to do a lot of work to add them to your content marketing output. Most Infographics are built by adding graphics to collated information. There are even tools available that help you to build your own.
Treat: More Sharable, Greater Visibility
There have been plenty of studies, and probably a few Infographics, that illustrate this point better, but the simple fact is people love Infographics. They’re easy to understand, they provide a lot of information and they provide it in an interesting and/or fun way. That’s a shareability hat trick that can’t be ignored. If you create and share good Infographics, they will get shares and increase your brand’s reach.
Trick: Blog in Lists
Blogs live a bit of a strange double-life. On the one hand they are the most powerful content marketing tool you could ask for. They give you content, help to build trust in your brand and they drive traffic. On the other hand, not many people are comfortable writing them and businesses rarely attribute much value to them. A great trick for improving the effectiveness of your blog, and making them easier to create is to blog in lists. Instead of trying to write a story about a topic, come up with a list of bullet points and then flesh them out. Once you have the list, the blog practically writes itself.
Treat: More Reads, more shares, easier to write
These blogs help cross the boundaries between the two lives of a blog. Not only are they easier to write, but they fit great with business thinking too. Lists of advice about your industry create an obvious value proposition for a potential client, giving them greater value in the eyes of the money men. These kinds of blogs are also more shareable because, as with Infographics, people like to take information in bite size pieces. If you want more proof that these blogs are popular, you’re reading one right now.
Trick: De-integrate Social Media
Conventional wisdom says that integrating all of your social channels is better. It allows you to spread the message across various networks in a single post. That tactic, and the use of tools like Tweetdeck and Hootsuite can be a real timesaver. But a better trick may be to go other way. Posting individually on each channel is more time-consuming, but will get you better results.
Treat: Increased Trust, Broader Appeal
Each social network is different; a single content marketing strategy won’t work for each one. The reason social channels like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn can all be successful is because they appeal to different markets. Posts that work on Twitter won’t necessarily work on LinkedIn and vice versa, by customizing each post you give your content marketing the best chance to be successful on both.
Trick: Take a Poll
One of the words that is often applied to a brand’s social media following is ‘community’. Many brands talk about engaging with the community and offering things to their community. One thing many brands don’t do is make use of the community. You can do this by creating an actual poll, or just asking questions.
Treat: Greater Engagement, Free Research and Content Marketing Ideas
If you let people know that you value their opinion, you’re more likely to get them to share it. By asking questions, and responding to answers, you create a real community of followers who want to talk to you. That’s especially true if you can then use the responses in a visible way. Online polls and social questions can be great research tools too. Want to know what your market thinks of a new product? Ask them. The answers might generate some new marketing content too.
Any one of these tricks has the ability to boost your online success. A content marketing strategy that includes all four will be more successful than a horror pun at Halloween.
Read how to plan, create, and publish online content that will engage your prospects.
