Curation Revolution

Great Conent Marketing
We've discussed why lawyers and real estate agents must create content and social marketing. We haven't discussed WHAT kind of content they should create. Since we are speaking with lawyers let's stipulate a few important conclusions:

* Content marketing must generate social shares and links to matter.

* Cause marketing, since it is highly emotional, generates great social shares and links.
* The best content marketing you can WIN is UGC (User Generated Content) since it brings social shares and links along with it.
* Content marketing is expensive and takes time, but it can give any business that gets good at it an unprecedented market advantage.

That last bullet may be a little "trust me" for some, but trust me ANYTHING you do now must be supported by content marketing OR your assets will be stolen and/or be worth less.

Now that we have agreement on the base stipulations for our content marketing what kind of marketing should we create? A: Communal and cause.

Cause marketing like the IndyWeek Give Guide mashup is brilliant because you do almost NO WORK and achieve a huge benefit even as you help others (so win, win, win).

IndyWeek.com found a handful of local nonprofits across a variety of segments, asked them to submit an application and then formed their profile page out of that application (could have automated it all and they will next year). Cost = CHEAP, amount of new content = 27 pages. Amount of new social links, shares and SEO? HUGE.

Lawyers & Real Estate Agents
Divorce attorneys could gather 20 or 30 nonprofits probably easily out of their rolodex. Each nonprofit should be aligned so women's shelters, Ronald McDonald House and other community support reinforce the office's business.

Real Estate agents are really community content gatekeepers. They know the best restaurants, schools and stores because that knowledge helps them sell houses. Great content and social marketing real estate agents like my friend Bill Gassett know all the great local charities too so create a Give Guide to share that knowledge.

I can't remember when I've seen such a clear content and social marketing homerun that costs so LITTLE especially since my friends at WTE Solutions know how to set up a Give Guide now, so I bet total costs don't exceed $5k. Benefit, on the other hand, has to run into the millions (done right).

Become storytellers: Modern marketing is less about selling and more about creating brand experiences fueled by brand storytelling. You only have about eight seconds to catch consumers’ attention. To make those seconds count, thoroughly investigate your customers.

Some ways to do this: Start with exhaustive persona profiles to build buyer paths from high-level awareness down to purchase so that you’re creating the right types of offers to deliver the appropriate content at every stage of the buying process.

Persona research should include: raw data (surveys, internal sales, and analytics data), interviews with sales and support teams, and discussions with or polls sent to existing customers. Add Interest to Email. Despite news of its demise, email is still a marketing workhorse.

However, businesses must stop the “spray and pray” method in lieu of incorporating smarter strategies driven by automation to get the most out of the medium. Ways to standout in... keep reading

Wrote these tips after Marketing Hits scooped a great piece: In Content Marketing The Title Is The Thing.

The piece blew up with several hundred shares so clearly a HOT topic.