Rnordman

The campaign to win an Oscar in serious business--it takes months and costs somewhere around $20 million. But the rewards are sweet. Here's what you can learn from the marketing masterminds behind the Best Picture nominees.

If you think the Oscars are swank, look at the size of the campaigns movies launch to win them: an estimated $10 million to $20 million. Each. It's serious business. Films nominated for best picture pulled a fifth of their revenue in the month between nomination and awards and winners see 12 percent after getting the gold. What can you learn from Hollywood's master marketers? Plenty.--Erik Sherman

Timing Is Everything American Hustle and Wolf of Wall Street got released late in the calendar year for a double benefit: They're fresher in the minds of Academy voters and all the attention boosts box office sales. American Hustle made $40 million out of $144 million domestically since the nomination; Wolf got a 36 percent post-nomination bump.

Avoid Bad Press with a Light Hand Virtually every Oscar season sees at least one whisper campaign aiming to scuttle some picture's chance. Woody Allen's Blue Jasmine fell to the wayside in the wake of resurfaced child abuse charges. Allen and his proxies fought back hard. Maybe too hard. Both Wolf of Wall Street and Captain Phillips also faced challenges, but kept a lighter touch in response--and a spot on the roster.

The Slow Build Oscar campaigns are typically a six-month affair to create buzz and market support. The premier for 12 Years a Slave was in late August 2013 at the Telluride Film Festival. Official U.S. opening was 19 cinemas in October. By late January, it was in 1,231. Now the movie's billboard in Hollywood says, "It's time."

Take Feedback and Go Social It's easy to misstep during a long campaign. Some people were offended that Dallas Buyers Club star Matthew McConaughey didn't mention AIDS in his Golden Globes acceptance speech and that Jared Leto joked about waxing his legs to play a transsexual character. Right after, the film's Facebook page "paid tribute to Aids victims."

Put the Whole Team to Work Marketing becomes the responsibility of everyone in a company because all might have a chance to make a difference. In a recent blitz of visits, American Hustle star Bradley Cooper and director David O. Russell double-teamed The Tonight Show. Russell also stopped by The Daily Show to talk with John Stewart.

Use Smart Humor No one likes a salesperson who is too needy and grasping. Cooperating with some self-deprecating humor can offer relief and offer a humanizing face. June Squibb of Nebraska has received her first Oscar nomination at age 84 and cooperated with Jimmy Kimmel by doing a spoof on introductory videos circulated to Academy voters.

Understand the Decision Process Sometimes marketing has to navigate a complex decision process among a group. Understanding the dynamics can mean the difference between winning and losing. The Oscars use a process of preferential balloting. Although 12 Years a Slave has significant acclaim, it may not be well-loved, according to industry watchers. Second choice Gravity could walk away the winner.

Avoid the Pitfall of Generic Branding You'd have a hard time giving a movie a more generic name than Her. Search any article for the string and you'll wind up in the middle of "here", "there", and "everywhere." Literally. Using social media research to understand the success of the movie about a love affair with an operating system becomes next to impossible.

Guerrilla Marketing Still Works Philomena Lee, the basis for the movie Philomena, made a high-profile trip to Washington to discuss adoption reform halfway between best picture nominations and ceremonies. It was a guerrilla move from the father of indie Oscar campaigns, Harvey Weinstein, who started the approach in 1990 with a successful meet-and-greet campaign for My Left Foot.

Make the Most of Your SEO with Better Descriptions

The product descriptions on your website may seem like the most straightforward content you’ll do. How hard could it possibly be, right? Describe the product and done. Well, there’s a good chance you’re doing it all wrong, and that could be very detrimental to your business in quite a few ways. One of the biggest is, of course, your SEO. Just a few minor faux pas could keep you from being found in a search. So, what are you doing wrong, and how can you fix it?

1. Leaving Out Important Information

You may not think the product description is the place to include product numbers and other boring information, but you’d be wrong. Believe it or not, plenty of people will search for products by the numbers and not by keywords. If someone else carries the same products you do, they’re going to show up first in those searches. Not only should you include the product numbers, but you should make sure the style name, all colors, all sizes, and all models are included. If you really want to go above and beyond, include information for any matching products in case someone out there wants to complete their set.

2. Using Manufacturer Descriptions

You may be tempted to just copy and paste the manufacturer’s description when adding new products to your online catalog. Hey, that description probably includes all the necessary information, so why wouldn’t you do it the easy way? The problem is that other companies selling the same or similar products might post that manufacturer description, too. When someone’s searching Google, you’ll both be left out of the search results, because Google isn’t too fond of duplicate content.

3. Copying Your Own Product Descriptions

What do you do when you have ten different products in various colors? The easy thing to do would be to copy and paste the product description for each and just change the color name. If you’ve done this before, you’re messing up. Remember that Google hates duplicate content, and that means all your product descriptions are cancelling each other out.

4. Stuffing Descriptions with Keywords

Nothing makes for a more boring and awkward read than a product description stuffed to the brim with keywords. You’re wasting your time with this practice anyway, because keyword stuffing is a pretty big no-no in Google’s eyes. Sure, they want you to be found, but not by replacing quality content with the same words over and over. Not only do those keywords not really help you anymore, but you’ll also look pretty silly. Instead of trying to cram all those phrases in, try writing copy that really answers questions about the product while also entertaining the customers.

5. Plain Ol’ Boring Content

Even if you’ve managed to replace all the product descriptions with informative, non-keyword-stuffed content, you could still suffer bad results due to boring content. Your product descriptions are your one chance to convince buyers this is the product they’ve been looking for. By doing the bare minimum, you’re letting one opportunity after another pass you by. Instead, spend some serious time with your product descriptions. ModCloth is a paragon of delicious product descriptions, just like the one below:

If you can’t write, find a copywriter to help you out. Whatever you need to do, do it, so you can have entertaining, informative, helpful, useful content that drives sales.

With these tips, you can get your product descriptions in shape in no time. You deserve quality content people want to read, even if you have to work a bit harder to get it. The end result is copy your customers will love and Google will happily share in search results. Isn’t that worth the extra time and attention?

image credit: feelart/freedigitalphotos.net

What you need to to know to make the sale and not bust your budget.

This year’s Toy Industry Association annual Toy Fair in New York City attracted over 30,000 people, 1,200 companies and 13,000 buyers from across the globe, making it the largest toy industry trade show in the western hemisphere.

It can all be incredibly overwhelming for a small business.

After six years of attending the New York Toy Fair with my company, Wild Creations, I have learned that preparation alone makes the difference between a wildly successful show experience and a relentlessly stressful and unrewarding budget buster. Here are ten lessons (that I learned the hard way) to make it all worthwhile.

1. Be picky.

There are thousands of trade shows every year for every industry and occasion conceivable. When we started Wild Creations, we were attending up to thirty per year (too many). These days, we attend about five of the most important shows every year, and we make the best of each with methodic preparation.

2. Set a goal.

Before you even register, ask yourself why you want to attend. The most obvious answer is to find new customers, but you may also want to network with other industry peers, set appointments with existing customers, attend seminars or simply walk the show yourself. Understanding what you want to accomplish will help you better plan.

3. Prioritize your time.

Trade shows like Toy Fair can be massive, while others are small events of a few hundred vendors. Regardless, they all typically have numerous and concurrent seminars and social events, in addition to the show itself, so prioritizing will help utilize your time.

4. Have a packing checklist.

Few things are more frustrating than forgetting sales sheets, business cards, a stapler or even pens (all of which I have personally forgotten at some point). The exuberant cost of last minute printing and overnight charges will cut into the shows success as well. To avoid this, make a detailed checklist of items to pack and bring. There are no shortage of checklists available online, but compile one for yourself with your own personal preferences. Be sure to include time for printing (brochures, sales sheets, etc.) and delivery, and always plan on comfortable shoes meant for long period of standing, such as Crocs.

5. Leverage social media.

Don't be shy about announcing your booth number and show specials regularly leading up to the show. During the show, be part of the ongoing chatter by effectively utilizing Twitter and Facebook, scheduling posts ahead of time with services such as Hootsuite and properly tagging with hashtags. See also these tips for boosting traffic while at the show.

6. Seek out other small businesses owners.

The vast majority of companies who attend trade shows are small businesses. Approach them as allies, not adversaries, and you will develop an incredible network of peers who are more willing to support you and share leads. The toy industry, for instance, is dominated by a handful of huge toy manufactures that account for seventy percent of all revenue. The rest of us share a mantra: Small Businesses Unite!

7. Network with industry professionals.

Trade shows offer unique opportunities to meet and network with ancillary service professionals, such as industry consultants, sales reps, public relations firms and other specialty services. While there are numerous to choose from, I suggest you network with companies that focus specifically on your industry. Lisa Orman of Kidstuff Public Relations and Richard Gottlieb of Global Toy Experts are two examples in the toy industry of smaller boutiques with incredibly deep relationships specific to our industry.

8. Stand up and make eye contact.

If you want to have a successful show, you need to hustle. I am often shocked to see people sitting behind a table at a booth, checking email on the phone or otherwise ignoring buyers that walk by. With hundreds of companies showing, you can’t expect attendees to notice you right away and, more important, to remember you after they leave.

9. Follow up on leads.

After the show ends, the real work begins. If you have effectively kept track of your sales leads, it is now time for follow up. Avoid generic email blasts to everyone, and remember that the contacts you are reaching out to have just spent several days at the show and have met hundreds of other businesses. Taylor your follow up to a conversation you had. Better yet, make a greater impression by sending a handwritten card.

10. Have fun.

Entrepreneurs rarely (or never) take vacations, so a trade shows can offer a break from the regular monotony. Sure, you are going to work, probably harder than most days, but take time to indulge and enjoy the show and the host city.

The right approach can make a trade show a true success for your business.

Do you have any trade show lessons or anecdotes to share with other entrepreneurs? Please share below in the comments.

Recently, our Sales Operations Manager filled me in on a super simple tip that prevents reps from stepping on each other’s toes.

No one will be calling the same accounts or wasting time investigating another rep’s leads accidentally.

Here it is in action:

You can see a range of information including: name, title, company, email, lead status, and owner in order to easily manage a multitude of leads. When there are several reps involved in managing leads within the same company, it’s absolutely invaluable.

Think that’s powerful?

You’re absolutely right. But just how do you add it? Watch the clip below or take a look at the step-by-step instructions:

Here’s the play-by-play on installation:

1. Log in to Salesforce.com
2. Click Setup
3. Click the “Leads” tab under “Build”
4. Click on “Buttons/Links/Actions”
5. Select “New Button/Link”
6. Type button name, in this case, “Who’s Working”
7. Select “Detail Page Button” for “Display Type”
8. Select “Display in New Window”
9. Select “url” as the “Context Source”
10. Paste this url:

    /_ui/search/ui/UnifiedSearchResults?searchType=2&str={!SUBSTITUTE(Lead.Email,
    LEFT(Lead.Email, FIND("@", Lead.Email)), NULL)}

It’s so simple, it will only take two minutes. Add your own Salesforce button and let us know what you think.

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Have any special tricks of your own? We’re always excited to learn more.

Think about your website. If you follow current web marketing practices, you probably have a homepage hero image that introduces who you are and your corporate mission, accompanied by a slideshow that gives an overview of each of your products or solutions. However, this one-size fits all experience does not address each visitor’s interests, needs, where they’re located, whether they’ve already downloaded your content, received an email campaign or whether they’ve already visited key pages of your site. In fact, your website, a key research tool used by consumers during their purchase decision process, remains always static – never helping to advance leads through the sales process. It’s pretty easy to see how conversions could suffer.

While marketers excel at providing quality personalized content relevant to each lead via email, the website is a critical piece of the sales process that often goes ignored. And, don’t forget, your website is a REALLY important piece of the consumer buying cycle. In Forrester’s most recent survey of business decision-makers, “68% cited the vendor’s website as an important source of information when researching and evaluating technologies and services to purchase. Only 64% said the vendor’s salesperson was important.”

So what’s a marketer to do to increase conversions and improve the visitor experience with your brand? It’s a lot easier than you think, plus you already own the assets you need to succeed:

1. Consumer Data

Your web analytics system of choice already aggregates performance analytics. It’s really easy to connect that behavioral insight to your website to better understand how visitors use your website  - the content and the engagement path that drives them to convert. We call this “adding intelligence to your website.” It is this customer intelligence that enables you to create a smarter website that dynamically serves content based on the visitor’s digital body language.

Each day you wait to connect performance data to your website is a day of behavioral data lost! So setting up tracking should be priority one regardless of whether or not you are ready to serve personalized content experiences based on that data.

2. Content

A common concern of marketers when they start thinking about conversion optimization and website personalization is content. If your first thought is, “I don’t have enough content or the resources to make new content,” STOP! Step one is removing the one-size-fits all experience to get your top performing existing content in front of the right person, rather than having them self-navigate through your content. Let’s face it, chances are, they won’t do it.  All it takes is a little audience segmentation and content reorganization.

3. Website

One you align content with the different audience segments visiting your website by analyzing consumer behavioral patterns, the last step is to put personalization into action on your website, serving the right content to the right person at the right time. While these changes to your website may seem small, a relevant content experience delivered right upon visitor entrance returns not only massive improvements to conversion rates, but decreases bounce rate, increases pages per visit and increases average visit duration. And it makes sense. Studies show that on average, your website has less than 10 seconds to engage a visitor before they bounce. Make them count!

If you’re ready to put your data, content and website to work to improve web conversions and all other web performance metrics, we’d love to help you get started in the right direction! Drop us a note here!

As you develop your integrated marketing strategies for 2014 and beyond — whether your goal is better search results, lead generation, brand awareness, share of voice or a wide variety of other things, video is nothing less than imperative. Even my 8-year-old twins head straight to YouTube whether they want to learn how to up their skill sets with their Rainbow Looms or want to research Rockhopper Penguins for a school research paper. Video is, quite simply, where it’s at.

Don’t believe me? Take a quick gander at this infographic produced by Lou Bortone at The Future of Ink. Stats about the impact of video testimonials, habits of web visitors, impact of video in email and beyond all confirm that video is effective when it comes to influencing consumer behavior and purchasing decisions. Read that: attracting leads and converting them to sales.

Here are just a few highlights:

• Video testimonials increase sales by 600%
• Web visitors stay twice as long on pages with video
• Shoppers who view a video on a web page are 144% more likely to buy
• The use of video in e-mail results in a 96% increase in click through rates
• Explainer videos increase conversion rates by 20%

And one from Social Media Examiner that points the way to the future:

• 76% of marketers plan to add video to their sites, making it a higher priority than Facebook, Twitter and blog integration. Think that’s an accident? Not by a long shot.

If you’ve been here before then you’ll know that I don’t need any persuading about the importance of video as a critical component of an integrated marketing strategy, but we keep talking and writing about it because, in many cases, marketers just aren’t there yet. Hopefully, this information and the data in the infographic will help you move the needle with it comes to video as part of your marketing mix.

Where are you with regard to the integration of video? Are you using it? If so, what kind of results are you seeing? Are you a regular consumer of videos – if so we’d also love to hear your thoughts on the effectiveness of online video as it relates to you, personally.

photo credit: Shmector via photopin cc

How to (Accidentally) Destroy Everything You’ve Worked For

Inbound marketing requires a lot of juggling, and if you drop the ball, you lose a sale. The problem many inbound marketing companies or departments face is the fact that sabotage could happen without anyone even knowing. Obviously you’re not going to trash your own efforts on purpose, right? Still, you could be dropping the ball on a daily basis simply because you don’t know better.

If you think you might be sabotaging yourself, here are some of the mistakes you might be making.

1. Calling Everyone Who Visits Your Site

Yes, seeing traffic for your website is a very exciting thing. Those visitors wouldn’t be there if they weren’t potential customers, right? Why not call them right away to secure their business immediately?

Simple.

You’ll scare them away. The truth is 99% of website visitors aren’t there to buy on the first visit. The overwhelming majority of people who visit your site are there simply to gather information. If you ask for the sale, they’ll probably eventually give it…to your competitors.

2. Missing the Buyer Persona Mark

So, your website, blog, and social media are all bringing in plenty of leads, but when it comes time to convert those leads to sales, the numbers fizzle every time. There’s a good chance you’re hitting all the right notes with your buyer personas until the last minute. Make sure your sales department understands your target audience and knows how to reach them. If your buyer personas are younger, trendier professionals, a stuffy tone won’t fly. The same is true if you’re expecting young, hip sales guys to relate to older, wealthier customers. Hit that buyer persona just right, and you’ll see an increase in sales.

3. What’s Your Name Again?

Imagine a customer who’s been through your website with a fine-toothed comb, ordered several of your whitepapers and ebooks, and follows all your social media accounts. Say this customer is finally ready to buy, so you hit him with your sales pitch—a sales pitch that is dry, generic, and filled with questions this customer answered months ago through various data gathering channels.

This happens a lot, simply because companies don’t keep track of the customers who’ve been around for a while. You should know right away that the buyer you have on the line has been interacting with your company for months, have answers to some of the potential questions he’ll ask, and above all, thank him for his continued interaction with your company. Show you know that customer, that you haven’t forgotten him name moments after shaking hands.

4. Generic Messaging

While there is such thing as too personal, buyers generally want a relevant and personalized experience. If you’re not working hard to present dynamic content that takes your customers’ individual wants and needs into account, you’re probably going to lose them before the decide to buy.

Personalization can be anything from an email that greets them by name, a social media message that is returned within a day, or a welcome back banner on your website. If you’re really willing to dig in and do something special, you can even provide a one-of-a-kind experience on your website, wherein each customer receives information specifically tailored to their interests. That kind of personalization can really bring some generous returns on your investment.

5. Ignoring the Problem

Let’s face it: If marketing is doing their job, you’re going to end up with piles of leads. So many leads, in fact, that you might not know where to start. Some companies in this situation do the worst possible thing. They let those leads fall through the cracks, never to be seen again. If you’re not converting as many leads as you should, there’s a good chance you’re letting some go simply because you’re overwhelmed.

If you think this might be the case, it’s time to find a strategy that helps you vet those leads to determine who’s hot and who’s not. You don’t want to waste your time contacting customers who aren’t ready to buy while the hot leads are waiting, waiting, waiting for a return email or phone call, do you? If you have an automated platform that helps you keep track of the leads and where they are in the buying process, you may not feel so overwhelmed.

So, there you have it: 5 ways you might just be sabotaging your leads, from smothering them to ignoring them and everything in between. Take some time to devise a strategy that gives those leads the attention they deserve when they deserve it. If you can’t manage on your own, there’s no shame in that. Simply work with an automated system that helps you keep track of those leads as they move through the sales funnel. When you see those leads convert to sales, you’ll be glad you invested your time in money in a true solution.

image credit: photostock/freedigitalphotos.net

This is the second post in a two-part series on managing up for the modern marketer. (If you haven’t already read our interview with Tinu Abayomi-Paul, you can check it out here.) Today, Gini Dietrich has some advice for young marketers struggling to convince their bosses that content marketing is more than just a fad.

Gini is the founder and CEO of Arment Dietrich and the brains behind Spin Sucks Pro and its related blog, Spin Sucks. Gini has spoken at more than 100 conferences and workshops and has authored two books on PR and marketing. You can find out more about her here.

Many Generation Y marketers have challenges convincing their bosses to implement newer types of marketing (non-branded, social, mobile, etc.) What are some ways these lower-level employees can “manage up” to drive change within their organizations?
I don’t think this is a challenge for just Gen Y marketers. Many bosses don’t want to implement newer types of marketing, no matter who the ideas come from. That said, if you’re a young professional, there are two really good ways to manage up: 1) Show your bosses what your competitors are doing in the space; and 2) Show them what the companies they respect and admire are doing.

For the second one, if you don’t know who they admire, ask them! Some will say Apple and others will say the restaurant down the street. Find out where their interests lie and build the business case. If you can show them how other companies are using the tools you’d like to recommend, and you can show how doing so will generate leads and drive more sales, you’ll win. There is a ton of information on the web today about how to build the case for both. Find some case studies for your industry and go to town!

What will be the most important content marketing tool in 2014?
I’m really excited about brand journalism and all the possibilities it presents. We’re doing a series on Spin Sucks right now about everything that can be included from long-form content and videos to sponsored content and monetizing it in other ways.

What are some ways you’ve found to help convince organizations of the importance of content marketing?
The very best way is to show numbers you’ve collected from case studies or your own work. There are lots of statistics that show organizations that do content marketing really well have significantly higher leads than those that don’t. Based on our experience, I agree with what the research shows.

What specific advice would you give to young content marketers?
It’s not easy. You’re not going to make friends by uprooting the apple cart. But when executives begin to see the results, you’ll be a hero. Stick with it. Be consistent. Don’t waver. And be confident in your ability to deliver.

What key tactics best fit our Marketing Strategy?
What B2B marketing tactics are working now for others, and how well?
Where should we emphasize or deemphasize our marketing focus?

In working with leading global B2B companies, our Fusion Marketing team is extremely familiar with the cost/benefits of various lead generation programs. In fact we work closely with the management teams of numerous B2B product and services companies to build and help execute a marketing strategy that fits their industry and their sales model. Knowing the most effective tactics can help you refine or enhance your strategy.

While the right B2B marketing strategy will vary by type of product and industry, we do see distinct trends. The marketer’s challenge is to combine the right mix of programs to build market awareness and fill the sales funnel each month at a low blended cost per lead. With that in mind, we examined the recorded effectiveness of the many online lead generation options. Our experiences are summarized in this B2B marketing strategy infographic.

Effectiveness of B2B Marketing Tactics – Lead Generation Strategies

The FMP team operates under the doctrine of a consistent and predictable lead generation “engine.” The lead engine is an optimized, scalable set of people and processes that produce massive brand awareness, drive a planned volume of qualified leads, and result in revenue results that meet business goals.

When we work with clients to create their quarterly lead plan, we look at a variety of tactics that when integrated together, produce the volume of required leads at a low cost per lead. While we do occasionally find a highly productive, low cost lead source, the reality is that it’s more often a blended mix of tactics that yield results. And the mix changes as the strength of the brand, messaging and website grows.

But what tactics yield the best results? Referrals and email marketing to the house list are low cost ways to build lead flow. Even better, leads from these sources tend to have higher sales conversion rates. However, these tactics seldom fill the quarterly sales funnel. Content marketing and social media are increasingly important, but these tactics often require a sustained commitment and time to yield significant results. Higher cost push marketing programs such as Pay-Per-Click help supplement the lead flow. And in some markets, vigorous participation in trade shows and conferences remains an important tactic to maintain brand awareness in your market.

Pull (Inbound) B2B Marketing: The Increased Importance of Content Marketing & Social Media

There’s a reason that you see traditional, keyword-driven SEO shops desperately rebranding themselves as content marketing and social media experts: The old search engine-manipulating schemes and keyword games are becoming less effective by the day. While Google changes its search algorithm hundreds of times per year with Panda, Hummingbird, and Penguin rollouts, the overall trends place greater value on better-written, more relevant copy. High-quality content that helps your prospects meet their challenges, find better solutions, and do their jobs better has the benefit of attracting your market. Pull marketing strategies that attract through education rather than the hard sell or keyword packing are producing results and driving down cost per lead for the smart marketers who are riding this wave.

B2B Lead Generation Trends – Changes in Priorities

The balance of power is shifting and B2B buyers are taking more control of their purchasing process. With the explosion of information and social feedback available online, more buyers prefer to find solutions, choose vendors, and self-educate before engaging with sales. B2B Marketers must adapt to these changing dynamics by building online brand awareness and providing resources to support buyers’ needs.

Lead generation strategies that leverage content marketing and social media are increasingly effective in providing prospects the information they want to become viable sales prospects. By providing educational resources, sharing solution details, and offering insights, companies are attracting and engaging potential clients to fill their sales funnels.

The Right B2B Marketing Strategy for Your Business

There’s no question that the right marketing strategy for your business will depend on your brand, your business capabilities, your solutions, and most importantly, your market. But knowing the distinct trends can and should influence your marketing priorities.

Google AdWords are a powerful tool in online marketing. You can run incredibly complex highly-targeted, low cost, high conversion campaigns.

As a small business marketer, though, they may seem like a daunting venture.

Before you break out into a sweat, start with a bit of planning. Here’s 10 simple questions that will make your PPC advertising a success.

1. Who’s my target market?

It kind of goes without saying, but if you’re running highly targeted ad campaigns you need to know the customers you’re trying to reach.

List out a few demographics of your customers such as:

• Are they a local market?
• Are they businesses, individuals or families?
• Would they be searching for you on mobile, or from a laptop?
• What level of knowledge do they have about your products?
• What do they want right now, when they are searching for you?

For example, let’s say you’re a family-run Italian restaurant:

2. What’s my offer?

Like any good marketing campaign, you need to create or solve a problem. You also need to show why your business is the best at getting the desired results for your customer.

Answer these questions about your campaign:

• What makes your business unique, and different than your competitors?
• What are your key unique selling points (USP)?
• What are you offering right now to get your customer to click your ad?

For example, for the family-run Italian restaurant:

Of course, you can run multiple campaigns to market different offers and selling features.

3. What are my customers searching for?

Google AdWords is intent marketing. You are getting seen by potential customers exactly when they are searching for your offer, product or service.

Think like your customer. List out what you think they would be typing into Google when they want what you’ve got.

For the Italian restaurant, a few of your keyword phrases might be:

• pizza deals
• lunch catering in [location]
• pizza near me

Your keywords are one of the most important parts of your AdWords campaigns. They’re what gets your ads sorted through Google’s algorithms. Use the AdWord Keyword Planner to get keyword statistics, or if you’re stuck for ideas.

There’s a number of AdWords Tools, like Wishpond, that can optimize your keyword selections for you.

4. What do I want out of my ad campaigns?

Think about the results you need to achieve from your campaigns. List out your campaign objectives.

Do you want:

• Increased foot traffic
• Increased website traffic
• Online sales conversions
• Lead generation
• More coupon participants

The better you know what you want you need from your paid ads, the better results you’re going to get. You can fine tune your targeting, ad copy, and ad groups.

5. What do I want my customer to do?

Determine what it is you want your potential buyer to do when they see your ad. This will be based on what your business objectives are for your campaigns, but specifically what actions you want your customer to take when they see your ad.

Do you want interested consumers to:

• Click through to your coupon landing page
• Phone you
• Make a reservation online
• Like your Facebook Page
• Buy a specific product

6. How will I get my customer to take action?

So, how are your going to motivate your customer to take the action that you want? Before you write your ad copy, list out a number of results-oriented Call-to-Actions (CTA’s).

A good CTA is short, actionable, and simple. The clearer your ask, the higher your conversions will be.

In this example, Panago uses two CTA’s: “Order Online” and “Give Us A Call”

You can also motivate action by making time limited offers, exclusive discounts or other key USP’s with a sense of scarcity.

7. What are my competitors doing?

It’s always wise to keep attuned to the choices your customers have. Check out what your competition is doing with Google ads, or other advertising strategies too.

Research your competition by searching for the keywords you’ve chosen, or search for your competitors names directly in Google.

Put together a simple competitive analysis. Then list out the strengths and weaknesses of their campaigns. Determine how you can outsmart them, to win more customers.

Do you offer better service? Are you more value oriented? If they are on Google Places, are you? Are there different keywords you could be using? Can you make a clearer CTA? Do you have a phone number for increased mobile optimization?

By checking out your rivals, you gain a better understanding of what your business is up against – and you can act to optimize your campaigns.

8. What’s my budget?

Money, money, money. You need your PPC ads to give your business profits. Plan out your Google Ad budget, before you dive right in.

Google AdWords are costed on a per day basis. If you’ve never run online advertising, this could be something new to you, so make sure you understand how the pricing system works.

Google has a number of costing structures. The three main ones are (briefly):

• PPC/ CPC (pay per click/ cost per click) is what most small business marketers use. This allows you to set your ad spend based on the number of clicks your ad. It’s also the default costing you see when you make an ad. You can choose manual or automatic bidding.
• CPM (cost per impression) is best for branding, as you pay based on every one thousand views – not the actions taken.
• CPA (cost per acquisition) requires you to have conversion tracking. The cost is based on how many conversions you actually get on your website.

 

The bottom line is: you need to know your budget limits. Base your ad spend on the returns you need.

9. What’s my time frame?

How long are your ads going to run? The answer to this question may vary from one of your campaigns to the next. But you need to plan this out before your start your ads.

For example, you might be hosting a short term sweepstakes on your site. You need to get the word out, so you promote it through AdWords. Your ad campaign should stop when your sweepstakes ends.

You might be running a longer ad campaign for brand awareness, or ongoing traffic to your site.

Be sure to plan out your ad campaign duration, so that you’re not accidently paying for ads for eternity!

10. How am I going to measure my results?

With Google AdWords, there’s almost a limitless number of ways to track and measure your campaign metrics.

What you measure will depend largely on what you want out of your campaigns. List out the metrics you need to watch such as:

• Number of clicks to your contest landing page
• Number of email leads
• Number of sales
• Value of sales
• Return on Investment (ROI)

Then set up your results tracking system before your campaign starts. You might link up your Google AdWords account to your Google Analytics. Or you might use an AdWord Tool provider’s analytics to get real-time metric reporting.

By measuring your results, you can test variations of your ad and optimize them in real time. You also get to track (in detail) the most important business metric: your bottom line.

Conclusion

Once you’ve gone through the questions, you’re ready to make a better Google AdWords campaign. Draft out your ads. Make a few of them. Start small, and test as you go.

Want to learn more about Google AdWords for your small business? Check out these helpful articles:

• Why Does My Small Business Need Google AdWords? [Ultimate Guide]
• 10 Google AdWords Mistakes You Need to Avoid: Beginners Guide
• Google AdWords: 25 Glossary Terms You Need to Know

What do you think? Have you run a Google AdWords campaign? What were your results? Share your tips, below.

Are Google AdWords a mystery to you?

Check out our NEW Google AdWords Tool. Wishpond makes online marketing easy.

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Lead generation is the heart and soul of many business models, especially services firms and SaaS providers that rely on a steady flow of new customers for cash flow and growth. The tactics available for lead generation range from using appointment setting firms to hiring outside sales teams to improving your SEO and inbound marketing tactics. But a number of anecdotal experiences suggest that strategic outbound email marketing (and applying similar techniques to networking through platforms like LinkedIn) can help get you in front of the CEO (or your target prospect) quickly and effectively. The advantage of targeted emailing campaigns is that they let you control which companies and contacts you make and attract to your company. Here’s a closer look at one technique I’ve seen in play very successfully, specifically in B2B markets.

Source: Flickr

Step 1: Define your specific business goal

For companies that are hungry for leads, launching a lead generation campaign is a double edged sword. It’s easy to get excited about the potential of new leads, but suddenly everyone is trying to join in the action. “While you’re out trying to attract new leads for X product, could we try to generate interest in Y division?” However, it’s absolutely critical that the foundation of your campaign be built upon one very specific goal or agenda. The more narrow and specific your focus, the more success you will be. If you dilute your goals, there is a better than average chance that your program will fail to achieve any of the objectives you set out to accomplish.

So what makes an appropriate lead generation goal? Here are a few specific examples:

• An SaaS company with a portfolio of products focuses on developing leads for one specific software program.
• A services company launches a campaign to offer its services to a new vertical, such as SEO for accounting firms.
• A company developing content campaigns sets a target to connect with the Chief Marketing Officer of companies larger than $2 million per year in eight possible industries.

Don’t move forward until you’re able to articulate your goal in one sentence or less. Remember, as you get the hang of this, it’s possible to use the same process to push growth in other areas of your business.

Step 2: Develop a quality list

Lead gen professionals will often tell you that your best efforts will only yield results on par with the quality of your list. If your list contains any of the following, you’re likely to come up short:

• Out of date contact information
• Out of date names or titles
• Companies that are out of business
• Companies that are inactive in the space that you’re targeting
• Companies with a focus that’s shifted
• Bad geographic data
• Companies that don’t fit your target profile

There’s a range of ways you can get your lists, from creating your own to industry groups to list retailers. If you’re buying a list, it’s important to understand how active a list is, how frequently it’s updated, and what quality assurance techniques they use to vet their information. Where possible, I’d advocate targeting a smaller sample of dream companies that you’re interested in doing business with. Leverage the advantage of being in control of what companies you’re putting your message in front of. But for some verticals, lead gen is a numbers game. As long as you’re working off quality information, both in terms of recency and accuracy, that’s the most important aspect of a list.

Finally, consider the make-up of your companies and come up with four or five titles that you could target. For example, if you’re in the IT space, you might be writing to the Chief Technology Officer, the Director of IT, an IT consultant, or even the office manager. This varies widely depending on the size and type of company that you’re targeting, but create a cluster of job titles with this position in mind.

Step 3: Draft a short, tight sales pitch

I’ll caveat this by saying that there isn’t a single right approach here. For some people, long sales letters work well. For others, highly personalized prospecting messages that show a deep understanding of the company are what’s required. For purposes of this experience, however, I’m going to advocate that you write a very specific message.

Here are the basic guidelines to keep in mind when crafting your pitch:

• No more than 300 words; ideally, 250 words or less.
• Features a tightly crafted value proposition that’s written with your specific target in mind. The piece should be drafted to a company’s CMO or sourcing manager, for example. The more specific to the problems and challenges that person faces, the better.
• Spend significant time on your headlines and your opening. It’s critical that you capture the reader’s attention and keep them moving along.
• Take a copywriting approach that’s as benefits driven as possible.
• Leverage real customer data and examples, including client names, statistics and pull quotes.
• Avoid clichés.
• Write in a natural, friendly, conversational tone. Avoid jargon and formal business language.
• End on a strong call to action.

In a sense, this is copywriting 101. At the same time, delivering this in less than 300 words is a writing challenge of the highest order. If you achieve it, you’ll have a piece of copy that not only helps generates leads but can be used in multiple places.

Step 4: Choose entry points other than your target recipient

It’s possible, during the list building process, to identify a number of individuals that you could send your email to – other than the person you really want to target at the company you’re reaching out to. If you’re hoping to talk to IT, start with admin or sales. It’s counterintuitive, but what you’re asking for here is a referral. You’re going to take advantage of the power of great writing, professional presentation, and our overwhelming desire to get something off our plates to ask your ideal prospect’s colleague to make a simple email introduction.

Consider, for a moment, if you receive an email that begins with something like:

Hi Kate, Could you refer me to the person that’s responsible for your hiring process?

If I am Kate and I’m not the Hiring Director, I may ignore your email. But more often, I’ll respond to your message with a cc to the appropriate person or giving you their email address. You want to strategically try, over the course of a few weeks if needed, to follow up with a range of individuals at a company. You should also not be afraid to send a follow up message after a week or so, reiterating your request. One point that I’ve noticed is that this works particularly well with medium and larger companies.

Step 5: How to close

Where the process can fall apart is how you respond to the message with a cc to the appropriate person. When you have a window of opportunity, resist the urge to send a presentation or brochure, or a long email explaining why you’re getting in touch. Instead, you want to use this opening to make a personal contact with your ideal prospect. Ask to get them on the phone, even if it’s for 15 or 20 minutes. You’ve then moved them along in the funnel from cold contact to lukewarm lead, and can use your sales process to close the deal.

It’s not a fool-proof process. It doesn’t work all the time, and it depends on how effective your copy is, how targeted your message is to your prospect, and whether you’ve been persistent and focused in your outreach. But especially in the B2B markets, this email marketing approach can help you make new contacts and launch the conversation with potential clients.

What approaches are you using today in prospecting emails or lead generation outreach that are effective? Let me know in the comments below.

Most of the marketing professionals and business owners I talk to have the same problem:

They need more inbound leads.

After we discuss their inbound marketing strategy, I learn that one or more of the following crucial tactics is missing from their overall strategy.

1. Create Buyer Personas

If you’ve been blindly using inbound marketing in an attempt to grow your business, stop it. Get to know your potential customers with buyer personas.

Why?

Because nearly everything you do in your business—product development, sales, marketing, service—will be tied to your personas.

Buyer personas (most businesses will have 3 to 5) are your ideal customers. They are high-value descriptions that among other things identify your buyers’ demographics, goals, challenges (pain points), and possible objections to your products or services.

And as you’ll see with some of the examples below, everything you do with your inbound marketing will start with your buyer personas in mind.

2. Optimize for Search

Maybe you’ve just had a site redesign. It looks slick. The colors pop. Your spouse thinks it’s beautiful. But you’re wondering why you’re not getting traffic.

When was the last time you audited your site? Don’t worry. It’s not as daunting as it sounds.

A basic audit involves simply helping a search engine’s web crawler help you get found. And you do that by knocking out the basics of on-page SEO.

Optimizing your page titles, page URL, headers, and key phrases can mean the difference between showing up on page 10 of a SERP and page 1.

Another aspect of search is mobile optimization, but we’ll save that for another article.

For now, check out our “Easy SEO Tactics.”

3. Optimize for User Experience

Your website is your store, inside and out. How it’s perceived from the second a visitor lands on a page to the next few clicks will determine whether they stay or bounce.

Try to follow the Don’t Make Me Think philosophy when it comes to design.

When it comes to your pages, are you providing the right information? If one of your personas is a first-time buyer they will need to be educated, especially if your product/service is complicated.

Will they know where to go on your site to learn the basics? Even more important, are the basics (definitions, guides, FAQs, etc.) even on your site?

Ask what is the goal of each page? Then jump into the mind of each of your personas to see if that goal is being achieved.

4. Give em’ what they want

I’m always perusing Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Without fail a few days after a search, Amazon will send an email that goes something like this: Are you looking for something in our History books department? If so, you might be interested in these items.

A list of books on the topic I was searching on appears with some good and most important, relevant suggestions.

I love Barnes and Noble, but I can’t recall a time they’ve sent an email based on my searches. The weekly emails I receive are generic—everything but the kitchen sink approach—that rarely piques my interest.

Guess who gets more of my business?

Know who your potential or current customers are. Know where they are in their buyer’s journey. And give em’ what they want whether it’s with your lead nurturing, calls-to-action, or blog posts.

If you don’t know what they want, complete step #1.

5. Create Content Regularly

There are loads of statistics that show more content equals more visitors, leads and sales. In general, more is better. But I’m not advocating that you blog every day and Tweet 10x a day. Not even close (unless you’re the Beibs).

Just create regular content that speaks to your buyer personas. So before you even write a blog post, refer to your buyer personas. What topics are they interested in? What gaps in knowledge can you close? What pains can you alleviate?

And yes, the regularly part in content creation can be a challenge. A few quick ideas: talk with everyone in your company; you’ll be surprised with the ideas you get.

Push away from the desk, go out into the world and observe—even better ask questions from people you encounter. Read a magazine or book that’s not in your industry. Call a friend and ask them about their job.

Don’t forget to jot your ideas down.

For more ways to get a handle on business’ inbound marketing strategy, download our “Work Smarter, Not Harder” e-book.

Every high-quality piece of content you publish, whether it’s a blog or press release, becomes a powerful asset for achieving marketing goals. It’s important that you don’t waste the opportunity by letting a piece of content rot in the back end of your website or unseen by curious readers (i.e. potential customers).

The act of managing content is called curation, or when a marketer/writer keeps a piece alive by linking it into other resources, posting it in alternative ways through social media, or repurposing snippets for future publications.

There are two common ways that marketers curate content:

1. Utilize already written content for inclusion in a new article. Old content becomes linked in to increase traffic and to keep it active.
2. Curating also means keeping a piece of content alive. It’s disheartening when you’re best in show blog gets blown off on social media and doesn’t generate the hype it deserves.

Curating with Links

The first strategy is pretty straightforward. To start with, keep a running list of everything you’ve published on your site’s blog (or, for social media, what you’ve posted on Facebook/Twitter). Depending on the platform you use, you should be able to implement keyword tags that sort your content into searchable chunks.

For a workable example, say you’ve been working on a 10-part blog series about promoting blog posts and press releases. Your final piece is a comprehensive rundown on everything else you’ve written, which means you should make links to previous articles so readers can easily track them down. This helps with cross-linking, too, which we’ll touch on another day.

Another way to curate with links is to farm associated articles and resources from the Web. Never go blind into a topic, whether you’re writing about your niche manufacturing facility, art gallery, or restaurant. Use outside resources and link them in — the original writers will be thankful as long as you attribute them.

You should also go back and revise/freshen up old, relevant content by adding new links, making corrections, and answering any comments left by readers. Once you’ve made major changes and enough time has passed, feel free to re-post the link on social media to encourage a new wave of readers.

Curating with Promotion

One of the most effective ways to keep a piece of content active and alive is to slowly introduce it to your readers. Put simply? Don’t blow your load.

Once a piece is done, start with a simple tweet with a short, sub-140 character description and a link. Wait to see how it reacts, encourage people to re-tweet, and use your site’s hashtag to tie it in with a Facebook post a few hours (or even days) later. It’s crucial to space out your postings so you don’t overwhelm your followers since most of them are likely following you on both platforms. Don’t choke the newsfeed!

You can also organize your website’s homepage to display the big hitter content that you are most proud of. Some of the most successful blogs and articles, in fact, are ones that are compilations of resources, lists, short snippets, and contain multimedia. People use the Web to find answers and what better way to do this than to funnel all of the best information into a single post?

Making a blog post work for you is something the team at Grammar Chic specializes in. Stop by at www.grammarchic.net or gives us a call at 803-831-7444 to learn more about content curating, blogging, and social marketing.

In complex B2B sales, it can be difficult for even the most veteran of salespeople not to walk into a meeting or conduct a call with a new prospect and immediately start discussing the greatest features of their latest product or software plan. Many salespeople will make this mistake right after their sales kickoff, enticed by this year’s new offerings.

Remember, the cornerstone to effective sales messaging is the customer.

Keep these five things about your customer at the forefront of your conversation.

1. Customer Problems

Uncover their critical business problem with effective discovery. Once you find the problem that’s having a significant business impact, focus on how your solutions can effectively solve that problem.

2. Customer Value

There is no value without a customer problem. After uncovering the problem, you need to articulate the value your solution can bring to your customer’s critical issues. What’s the business impact of the value you provide? How can you impact that solution?

3. Customer Requirements

Your customer should have a set of required capabilities for whatever solution they’re considering. If they don’t, help your customer establish them! Throughout your sales conversations, be sure to ask the Trap-Setting Questions that will leverage your differentiation into those requirements.

4. Customer Proof

We say it over and over again at Force Management. Leverage your proof points to help your customer see the value of doing business with you. Provide tangible evidence that you can do what you say you can do and how you do it better than the competition. When you do, a great proof point will often seal the deal.

5. Customer Relationship

Once you close the opportunity, your value-based conversation doesn’t stop. Continually check with your customer to make sure you are delivering on your promises. If you had a Champion in the opportunity, consider writing a “Champion Letter.” Maintaining the customer relationship is one of the key components to repeat business. Gain trusted advisor status and ensure success with the account.

The post 7 Creative Proofreading Tips To Transform Your Jaggedy Draft into a Polished Post appeared first on Copyblogger.

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Vice President Underwood might know how to manipulate everyone from the president on down, but he doesn't seem to know that deleting a text message doesn't guarantee that it's gone forever.

(Credit: Netflix)

The second season of "House of Cards" starring Kevin Spacey as ruthless politician Francis Underwood arrived in one big batch of 13 episodes exactly two weeks ago, and we've all been binge-watching since. By the way, if you haven't yet made it all the way through season 2, this is about as far as you should read without risking spoilers. I'll say that again in all caps for you skim-readers out there -- SPOILER ALERT!!! That's better.

The web of intertwined intrigue and drama this season also introduced a new plotline in which fictional Washington Herald deputy editor Lucas Goodwin becomes ensnared in a plot to gain access to an AT&T server farm with the assistance of shadowy hacker Gavin Orsay. Goodwin believes Orsay is assisting him in tracking down evidence of Underwood's murderous habits. Unbeknownst to Goodwin, however, Orsay is a grudging informant for the FBI, which is entrapping Goodwin to send him off to prison and out of Underwood's hair.

With so much tech and hacker content in the storyline, and "House of Cards" more or less a production of the Hollywood establishment (albeit Spacey and the awesome wing of said establishment), there were inevitably going ... [Read more]

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Social media is a space that is continually changing and moving forward, which means you must do the same. This is why this simple list was created to help you stay in-the-know. Read on to find out if you’ve missed anything.

Twitter

When you are on Twitter, you need to compare it to being at a social gathering. Would you immediately walk up to a stranger and start selling your products? Would you tell them about the great deals you could get them on your latest invention? Are you going to ask and expect them to pay attention to you and you only? Probably not, otherwise you may find yourself with no one to talk to. That is also how it works on Twitter. When you over-market, followers start to have a distaste for your brand. Instead, they are attracted to someone who appears intelligent, charming, witty and interested. Don’t treat conversations like monologues. They require more than one individual, which means that instead of doing all the talking, you should listen, as well. Here are some other twitter tips:

• 125 or fewer characters with catchy phrases gives you more bang for the buck.
• Start your replies with a period, so that everyone can view your conversations.
• Use pictures more often, they’re priceless.
• Shorten all of your links.
• Follow your rival’s followers. You may be able to get them to follow you.

Facebook

It’s difficult to believe that Facebook has already been around for a decade. It seems like just yesterday when MySpace and Friendster were all the rage. Although those days are long gone, in today’s market, it no longer makes sense not to have a business page on Facebook. You should also leverage it to your advantage. For instance, use coupons and discounts to lure customers into being your Facebook “friends.” Another way to use Facebook is to ask customers for ideas or suggestions. You’ll gain their interest, and some of their thoughts might happily surprise you.

Tools

Your goal should be to stand out from the crowd, increase your number of followers, along with their responses and boost efficiency. You can do that manually or save time using the right tools. As an illustration, you can find out how many people have unfollowed you using Qwitter. You’re thinking; there are already tons of apps that do that for you. Well, that’s not all; Qwitter even goes as far as showing you the tweets that might have prompted followers to leave your feed. Another app, called Feedly, allows you to view all of your favorite sites from one organized location. Whether you enjoy tech, travel, food or finance, you no longer have to move from site to site.

Interact

Wasn’t social media created so that you can converse with individuals locally as well as those all over the world? So, why is it that some of the world’s largest companies still fail to do that one simple task? A study completed by Simply Measured showed that, in 2013, out of Interbrand’s top 100 global brands, only 54% of these companies send less than one reply each day; however, they do spend a lot of time with promotion. If the game is about customer engagement, then self-promotion is hardly engaging. On the other hand, the study did show that Pizza Hut was the most responsive by sending 68,000 replies. Sure, you may not have the time to respond to every mention, but you should absolutely respond to some of them.

Audit

One of the ways to keep your social media strategies up-to-date is by taking an audit. Make a list of all of your social media accounts including the name, URL and pertinent information. Take a look at any revisions you may need to make. These items might be:

• Descriptions.
• Cover photos.
• Logos.
• Profile photos.
• Videos.
• Product information.
• Service data.

Also, make sure that your business information, such as phone numbers and addresses all have the same spelling, punctuation and abbreviations on each of your sites. Taking an audit once or several times a year keeps your sites current, polished and grammatically consistent.

Instagram

Instagram allows you to digitalize your marketing materials while giving a “face” to your brand. However, you want your images to come across as natural looking. Try not to make them feel overtly staged. Quirky garners more interest over something that appears fake. If possible, post customer-taken photos or videos. This gives viewers a sense of experience with your brand. Seek to inspire your community. For instance, if your company specializes in custom art, you may want to start the hashtag #funwithartday, or something along those lines. This encourages viewers to participate and possibly spread the word about your business.

Focus on Transparency

While consumers don’t expect to know every single detail of your day, they do appreciate learning more about you. It is no longer acceptable to be this large, indifferent and aloof corporation. Social media allows you to lift the curtains, and convey some of your secrets. A few ways to incorporate transparency include:

• Posting successes that are meaningful to you.
• Open up about your passions (sports, the environment, volunteering, pets, etc…).
• Discuss your company’s culture.
• Apologize quickly, and admit it when you’ve made mistakes.
• Instead of coming across as sales-y, share your expertise with humility.

YouTube

Everyone wants a viral video, but the statistics don’t allow that to happen. Millions of videos are uploaded on YouTube every day, but only a small percentage of those actually go viral. Why is that? Well, there are several reasons; the first one has to do with where your focus lies. If all you’re determined to do is create a viral video, then you may come up short. First of all, are you even considering your target audience when making your video? Furthermore, if you try to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. So, if you want a hit video, here are some things to consider:

• Have a distinctive goal or objective.
• Target a specific audience.
• Use background music.
• Maintain a professional look.
• Feature useful, engaging and informative content.
• Ensure the look and messaging is consistent with your company’s brand.
• Make the information easy-to-understand.
• Use a short and descriptive title.

Which methods will you be using to increase your social influence this year? Let us know in the comments section below.

A study by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation reported that the highest rate of entrepreneurial activity over the last few years is not Gen-Y upstarts, but Baby Boomers in the 55-64 year age group. In fact, Boomers are actually driving a new entrepreneurship boom as they retire from their traditional corporate jobs and seek more meaningful sources of work.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 60 percent of the country’s workforce is currently made up of senior employees, but long-term employment has fallen dramatically for people ages 35-64. Since the first Internet-era recession, transaction costs and barriers to entry have fallen for entrepreneurs of every age. And with longer life expectancies and greater health in later life, older generations are starting new firms and mentoring young entrepreneurs in record numbers.

According to Jeff Mariola, the Boomer CEO of online marketing firm Digital Brandworks, Boomers are also more likely to succeed as entrepreneurs. When I asked Jeff why this was the case, he provided four compelling reasons.

Greater emotional intelligence

The rapid growth and constant change environment inherent in a start-up business requires steady and consistent leadership. Boomer CEOs have worked through countless change management initiatives over the years. They can provide their coworkers with the guidance, inspiration and motivation required to get everyone focused on the vision of the business while acknowledging that the road to get there will naturally be filled with anxiety, fear and exhilaration.

Savvy talent management

The long term success of a start-up relies heavily on the recruitment of the best talent. Boomer CEOs have learned through painful trial and error the artful process of finding the right people. Having made a few bad hires in their time, they understand who to bring on and who to pass on – and why. They have also learned how to get the best work out of existing talent.

Networking that’s finally paying off

Experienced CEOs have a better understanding of how to manage critical external relationships with banks, investors and board members. Credibility is key in these relationships, and the fact that Boomer CEOs have “been there and done that” is reassuring to outside stakeholders. Also, most Boomers simply have bigger networks and thousands of valuable dormant ties as a result of decades of networking.

Financial experience and extra capital

Most start-ups fail because they run out of cash. Boomer CEOs fully understand the significance of cash flow and how to manage and protect it. They have a more accurate picture of what things will cost and how long it will take to turn a profit. Also, most Boomers have more savings to safely invest as capital in their business to give it the best fighting chance. In general, this is how the rich get richer in business.

If you think about it, the qualities and seasoning that make Boomers great entrepreneurs make them great employees and intrapreneurs as well. I always jump at the chance to work with a Boomer because I know I will learn a ton. I have numerous Boomer mentors who I tap for advice periodically. I drink up their experience and perspective like a sweet cocktail, and my efforts are always better for it.

Boomers sometimes get a reputation for being stuck in their ways. But sometimes, it’s because those ways work. So the next time you are tempted to be ageist, recognize that the Boomers have advantages that you don’t and thus should be an essential component of every team.

Yes, you read the title right.

Salespeople should love opium. I do.  I can’t get enough opium.

It’s what helps me be successful.

Many of you are wondering if I’ve lost my mind due to opium, and I can say, “Yes I have! And opium helped me lose it!”

It’s interesting, but salespeople who are struggling are the same people who aren’t getting enough opium.   Conversely, the salespeople I see at the top of the chart are typically those who are doing opium on a daily basis and sometimes even hourly.

The more opium a person uses, the more successful they’re going to be and the reason is because they’re using other people’s minds.

You see opium is really OPiuM — I use it to describe the best asset anyone has and that is tapping into the knowledge of Other People’s Minds.

Whether they are doing it to gain insight in selling or to gain insight from a customer as to what they’re looking for, it’s all about using other people’s minds.

Problem is too many salespeople fail to use other people’s minds.  Due to their own ego and desire to be in control, they refuse to listen to others.

Where are you getting your opium?

By this I mean who are the people you are accessing the most?  What are the insights you’re getting and who are you getting them from?

Your objective should be to find ways to get opium in as many different places as you can.  In this way you’ll be learning from as many people as possible.

Your ability to access the minds of as many other people as possible very well could be the difference between being an average salesperson and a great one.

Go ahead get as much OPiuM as possible — Today and everyday.

Copyright 2014, Mark Hunter “The Sales Hunter.” Sales Motivation Blog. Mark Hunter is the author of High-Profit Selling: Win the Sale Without Compromising on Price.

Click on the below book cover for more info on boosting your profits!

Sales Dialogues – Provoking Needs, Can you do this?

When engaging in a sales dialogue with a prospect or client, it is important to acknowledge their current needs before approaching them with new needs. To provoke a need, sales reps can establish credibility by sharing insights and asking questions to better understand the client.

In this video blog post, Andrea Grodnitzky, Senior Vice President, Global Performance Solutions, explains how sales reps can avoid acting arrogant towards clients, and offers some sound advice for how to balance needs and insights.

If you are unable to see the video, please click here

Organizations invest substantially in sales training and development. This complimentary report from Training Industry and Richardson summarizes data and provides recommended strategies for maximizing the impact of sales training over time. Click here or on the image below to download this report.

The post Sales Dialogues – Provoking Needs, Can you do this? appeared first on The Richardson Sales Excellence Review™.

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Not content with voice, visual, or gestural input, Google cofounder Sergey Brin reportedly tried to buy a Toronto-based startup that makes a brainwave-tracking headband.

On Thursday, TechCrunch cited an unnamed source close to InteraXon, which makes the Muse headband. The source reported that Google approached the company, which said it was not interested in getting acquired.

Founded in 2009, InteraXon has already attracted $7.2 million in funding, including a Series A Round led by Horizon Ventures last summer that netted $6 million. An Indiegogo campaign through the end of last year pulled in almost $300,000.

Cofounder/chief executive Ariel Garten has said she wants to build a $500 million company within five years. Other companies, such as NeuroSky, are also working on brainwave interfaces.

The headband, expected to be released in May for about $300, uses six EEG sensors to monitor electrical activity in the brain, which the company compares to a heart-rate monitor detecting a pulse. Changes in five brainwave types are detected while a user focuses on specific tasks, and those changes are transmitted as digital signals to an app on a device.

InteraXon reports on its website that it has tested such a revolutionary peripheral in a variety of unconventional use cases: “Lighting up Niagara Falls while seated in Vancouver. Shooting bolts of lightning at a watermelon while trying to make it explode. Playing a [harmless] replica of the very game that almost doomed the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise.”

Brain-controlled beer

And pouring beer. By delivering either “focused” or “relaxed” brainwaves that exceed a specified threshold, an InteraXon-customized Beer Tap will pour beer if, and only if, your brain really, really wants to quench that thirst.

On its to-do list: using Muse to control music devices, play games, or change environmental settings in one’s home.

InteraXon’s Garten has said that people “keep trying to be smarter than [the Muse system], but it catches them every time.” Lines formed at the International CES tradeshow in January just to try the device.

Roger Kay, a technology analyst with industry research firm Endpoint Technologies Associates, told VentureBeat that it’s “not at all that surprising that an entrepreneur in the acceleration phase would turn Google down.”

He pointed out that InteraXon, like other startups, has already done “a lot of work to reduced the risk” that their mind-sensing technology will work and, until they are full-out marketing and distributing the product line, Google’s heft is not all that useful.

A pending question, Kay said, is whether this technology can be made to work 100 percent of the time. If not, he noted, it might be “cheap insurance” for Google but it would have limited appeal to a general market.

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Canadian Harley Finkelstein is only 30.

He was a student. Then a lawyer. Then a snowboarder who wanted to sell shirts on the web to pay for school.

Today, Finkelstein is the chief platform officer of Shopify, an IT powerhouse whose effective and easy-to-use software kits let customers design, create, deploy, and manage their own online retail stores. All in one box.

Shopify’s software now powers over 90,000 online storefronts in 122 countries. Those same virtual shops collectively pulled in $1.7 billion in 2013, according to the company.

Shopify’s client roster is rocking — and growing fast: Tesla, Google, Gatorade, the Los Angeles Lakers, the Beastie Boys. They have 375 employees with offices in Montreal, Toronto, and Ottawa. Shopify is a SaaS powered platform and they make money with subscription fees. Seventy percent of their clients reside in the U.S.

But don’t look for the Canadians to open up shop here anytime soon — if ever.

“We’re happy where we are,” Finkelstein said. “In the Valley, good people are always moving around. In Canada it’s all about employee loyalty. We have employee training programs. People like working for us.”

The software player has raised over $122 million in venture cash and may go in for more. But that’s unlikely. The ‘aging’ startup raked in approximately $40 million last year and 2014 promises to be much better, in the $80 plus million ballpark.

Shopify launched in 2006 as an e-commerce sit. The software code was written by Finkelstein’s pal Tobias Lutke, a fellow Canadian and German immigrant.

Today, Lutke, who founded Shopify, is chief executive.

The e-commerce space is crowded, but the duo seems to have figured it out. eBay, for one, is not a competitor, but, as Finkelstein puts it, they “now help our sales channels.” Square they don’t worry about. In Europe, they are dominating in the UK, Germany, and France.

Venture capitalist Amish Jani with First Mark Capital has invested $10 million into Shopify and has been there from the A round. He chalks up his investment’s success to a few factors: talent and luck.

“Toby (CEO) builds incredible products very quickly. There’s incredible demand for Shopify’s product. And they have the right timing. People are now comfortable transacting online.”

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Microsoft really wants to get Windows 8.1 in consumers’ hands.

To boost the number of folks using the operating system, Microsoft is reportedly considering giving it away for free or selling it at a very low cost, according to The Verge.

If it slashes the price tag of Windows (and Windows Phone OS) to zero, the Redmond-based company may look to service add-ons to pick up some of the slack – like additional OneDrive cloud storage. Microsoft is also positioning Bing as a platform it can monetize in the future.

It makes sense, then, that the SKU at the center of Microsoft’s monetization experiment is “Windows 8.1 with Bing,” a new version of the upcoming Windows 8.1 update revealed by Windows leaker WZor (and reported by ZDNet).

If Microsoft indeed chops its OS licensing fee for Windows device makers, as some recent reports have suggested it will, Microsoft will have to make a tough choice. It currently bundles a bunch of services with Windows: OneDrive, various Bing services, Xbox music streaming, the core Office apps (for RT users). Will it begin charging for those services to make up a more substantial amount of lost revenue for OS sales, or just eat the cost?

Either way, Microsoft’s Windows experiments reflect a change of thinking in Redmond. Its search platform is being perceived differently, as a sort of engine powering Windows and Windows Phone. That’s a bit less surprising when you consider that former Bing chief Satya Nadella is now heading the company.

A Microsoft spokesperson declined to comment on this story.

Over the past year, social selling has become one of the hottest topics. When combined with outbound prospecting, social selling can be a powerful selling method.  However, don’t be fooled by the phrase “social selling.” It is not a vehicle to get your sales pitch out into the world; that would completely shut you down.  It’s a method of selling through listening and thought leadership.  We are in an era where prospects choose most of their buying path, as they have so much information (on products and services) readily available to them without having to consult sales professionals.  Understand that social networks are not to be used as sales megaphones, but rather a means of listening and offering consultative advice to help others. Here are a few pointers when it comes to social selling.

1. Who are you selling to and where are they located?

Before you join every social network and try to be the next thought leader in all of them, I will spare you the disappointment now and tell you: don’t waste your time.  Review your buyer personas and find out what social platform is most popular with your buyers.  Invest your time wisely and join the networks that make most sense and where you know you can make the largest impact.

2. Connect to others in your industry and begin with listening.

Find other thought leaders in your industry and join their groups, follow them, and connect with them.  Start following discussions and listen to what others in your industry have to say. Keep an eye out for people who are looking for advice on products or services in your field.  I would be hesitant to jump right in and start a conversation, as you have to be mindful to whose group it is or what space you’re listening in.  When you find a discussion where you feel you could offer something of value – meaning not regurgitating your sales pitch but offering an altruistic piece of advice – that is a good time to chime in.

3. Consult and offer advice.

Once you gain your social feet persay and start adding valuable insights to conversations, don’t forget that you should have the mentality of a thought leader.  Display your knowledge within your industry by helping others, and that will not go unnoticed.  On the other hand, if you use social media as a megaphone to meet your sales quota, that will also not go unnoticed (in a bad way, a big no-no).  Therefore, when people have questions regarding the services or products that you’re knowledgeable about, they may begin to turn to you to help consult them on their options.  Through these types of conversations you can discover who would be a great fit for the product or service that you sell.

4. Don’t forget to monitor and pick up the phone.

Once you engage in “social selling” there are a few things to avoid.  Personally, my number one pet peeve is when someone forgets their manners!  If someone offers you advice or engages with you, don’t forget to say “Thank you.”  Is it really that hard to type those 9 characters?  I’ll answer that for you: NO, it’s not.  Also, try not to take long social vacations.  You want to remain a thought leader and someone for people to turn to for advice when they have questions, so if you’re absent for a week here, a week there, that will hurt your credibility.  Let’s face it, we’ve all grown to be socially and virtually impatient, so people will become grumpy if you take a week to answer them, and by that time they have most likely reached out to another contact for assistance, leaving you in the dust.  Therefore, always monitor your social presence and engage with people in a timely fashion. Oh, and don’t forget your P’s and Q’s!

Lastly, don’t forget to pick up the phone (it’s the thing you use to text but don’t use the letter keypad, use the numbers).  If someone seems to have a business challenge that your product or service can help solve, after you’ve engaged with them online, take the conversation offline.  This way, you’re not limited to 140 characters per response, and you don’t make people grumpy by dominating a discussion and having a full sales conversation between you and another person.  This is where “social selling” and outbound meet. Pick up the phone and work your magic. This is when you listen to the prospect and address your solutions, and viola, make a sale!

Now I am offering you pointers and this is not a straight line equation of starting at A and arriving at point B.  However, use these pointers to help your sales process and social presence, and if there is anything you would like to discuss further, please tweet me at @megan_marie_t. I’m always happy to engage with new people!

Happy “social listening!”

We just published a new Social Selling eBook to help B2B sales professionals use social networks to their advantage. See our new social selling eBook here. 

Are you using B2C email marketing to its fullest capacity? If you’re still doing batch-and-blast email – sending everyone in your database the same email – there’s a better way. As a matter of fact, here are three better ways:

You can personalize your email messages, calling each and every subscriber by name.

You can use segmentation in your database to support personalizing email beyond just the name, to address buying history, interests, and other factors.

You can use trigger emails to build engagement with individual subscribers at scale, automatically.

1. Personalization

Your goal is to build long-term and trust-based relationships with your buyers. Repeat buyers spend more and don’t incur acquisition costs, so they’re more profitable. You definitely don’t want to spam. By “spam” we mean obtrusive, unasked for, unwanted email advertising to those who haven’t requested to receive your emails. Life is too short; those emails get ignored or worse, get marked as spam, which will harm your deliverability. Your emails need to show your understanding of the buyer, which helps enhance customer loyalty and repeat sales.

To achieve a high level of email personalization, you need to:

• Analyze your client base. Look at the customer’s personal data and purchase history.
• Perform customer research. Get a detailed picture of preferred goods, average bill, frequency of purchases, etc.
• Analyze the efficiency of previous email campaign (opens, clickthroughs, conversion, etc.).

2. Segmentation

Once you’ve analyzed your database, it’s time to segment it according to the factors that count. This has long been known as a B2B tactic, but it works even better for B2C. As the DMA reports in its “National Client Email Report” (2013), “B2C organizations have been particularly successful at moving beyond generic, broadcast email, with less than 20% of email revenue coming from unsegmented email to the whole list.” What you want to build are segments that are specific enough so you can send email that feels personal, but large enough and profitable enough that they warrant the resources to send email to them as a target group.

As an example, if you’re in women’s fashion, you could segment your mailing list by size (plus or petite), interest (athletic wear, resort wear, lingerie, bridal, maternity, etc.), frequency of purchase, average order size, and so on.

3. Triggered email messages

Triggered emails are automated response messages sent in response to an action taken by a person. Examples include “Thank you” messages after a purchase and “Welcome” messages sent to new subscribers as soon as they join your list. Such emails position your company as being caring and responsible, and help engender engagement and loyalty. Transactional messages sent to customers for any monetary transaction on a site (e.g. checkout completed, purchase is made, delivery transaction effected, etc.) are also automated messages triggered by an action.

Trigger email open rates were 70.5% higher than business as usual (BAU), and triggered click rates are reported as 101.8% higher than BAU, indicating significant customer response. Most significantly, trigger emails can produce a significant return: Activity- and lifecycle-based triggers produced 22% of total email marketing revenue, says the DMA report.

Despite being so powerful, trigger emails are underused. As MarketingSherpa research reveals, companies are using automated response for welcome, thank you, and transactional emails (such as receipts). However, only 24% use them for date-activated trigger messages (such as renewal dates or birthdays), and only 18% use them to acknowledge website behaviors. This is clearly an opportunity to differentiate yourself from your competitors.

Trigger emails always go to known people, so they’re a prime opportunity to personalize the message.

For example –

• “Thank you for registering! We’ll send your first newsletter…”

or

• “Dear Esmerelda, thank you for registering! We’ll send your first newsletter…”

Remember that old saying that the sweetest sound to anyone is his or her own name? It also applies to seeing their name in print. See how much friendlier a name makes this email opener?

Opportunities to send triggered messages:

• Your customer has a birthday or anniversary, or there is a significant holiday
• Your customer has a life event, such as when they change their status from “Single” to “Married” in social media (if you have the ability to track such activities)
• Your customer has been upgraded to VIP, participated in a customer loyalty program, or received a bonus card
• When you ask a customer to leave feedback or to share a link in social media
• When you want to thank a customer for leaving feedback or being active in social media
• When you want to thank a customer for placing a 5^th or 10^th order
• When you want to send a reply to a price-cutting query on certain goods
• When a customer regularly checks a specific product page but doesn’t complete the order
• When a customer hasn’t visited your site for a long period of time

You can also use trigger marketing for upselling; your goal would be to increase the average bill. For example, after the payment clears when a user makes a purchase, he or she receives an email confirmation. This could include standard information about the product purchased; it could also offer complementary or additional goods that may be of interest. Someone who just bought a bicycle online might decide to get a new air pump for bicycle tires. You might use language such as:

• “People who bought (personalize this with the item they purchased) also bought (item). Buy this today, and we’ll ship it with your (item they purchased) for free!”
• “What other VIP clients choose”
• “You’re almost there! Just one more order, and you’ll have Platinum status”

If you decide to do upsell in your transaction trigger messages, test it before deploying widely. There is a risk of being a bit annoying, but when well-done, this is a quite simple and cost-effective way to increase the order size.

Tell me: What B2C email personalization strategy has worked best for you? Have you tried putting the name in the subject line?

Photo of the three-finger sustainability symbol (www.sustainabilitysymbol.com) by Philip McMaster, used under a Creative Commons 2.0 license.

When done right, webinars can be an effective and engaging marketing strategy that can achieve a range of goals: everything from establishing topic authority to lead generation and customer acquisition. Here at VerticalResponse, we highly recommend them and conduct a variety of free webinars every month on topics from content marketing, email design, search engine optimization to leadership and more.

Shelby Britton, senior product marketing manager at Adobe Systems is also a webinar guru and has been running them since 2007. She’s responsible for Adobe’s webinar solution and runs the company’s Webinar Best Practices blog. She’s completed hundreds of webinars and seen some consistent mistakes. Thinking of conducting your own webinar? Avoid the following five foibles and you’ll be well on your way to webinar marketing success.

Mistake #1: Promoting a webinar the wrong way.

Promoting your webinar isn’t just like any other lead generation program. Banner ads or search marketing is typically not as effective with live events.

“The best way to promote a webinar is a very targeted specific email invitation. Really, traditional email works the best,” she says.

Partnering up with another company or expert is also another great way to expand your audience. Have your partner send emails to their own audience and double up your promotion.

Mistake #2: Doing too little preparation before the webinar.

Take the time to learn the technology you’ll be using in advance. You wouldn’t show up to a physical venue to present without first making sure you’ve properly set up your microphones, video and so forth. Make sure to log into your webinar platform, set up your audio ahead of time and rehearse using the technology in advance of the time you’re presenting.

Mistake #3: Presenting the wrong content for the buying cycle.

Although webinars can be used effectively both as acquisition tools and for sales, the proper timing is crucial. Everyone should deliver the right content to the right people at the right time, no matter what the medium is.

“For instance, you wouldn’t do a demo webinar at the top of your sales funnel, because that’s just not the right messaging you need to give people as a first touch. When you don’t know them and are introducing yourself to prospects, you don’t want to demo because that’s just too hard of a sales pitch,” says Britton. That’s the time for thought leadership or best practice topics that educate the audience. A demo belongs at the bottom of the funnel, after a relationship with contacts is established and a purchase is being considered.

Mistake #4: Making little use of interactive tools.

The reason to host a webinar is to boost engagement and conversation. If a dynamic, interactive experience isn’t a necessary element you’re looking for, creating a video or writing a blog post or guide may be a better solution than delivering live content.

Otherwise, make your webinar interactive and engaging. “It’s not the same thing as presenting at a live event where everyone can see the presenter. It has to be visually stimulating, and you have to plan interactivity into the webinar,” Britton says, so make sure to embed polls, interactive exercises in the chat room and activities every five minutes or so.

This begins the moment your webinar begins—or even before, when participants are gathering. “Let them know you see them and acknowledge their presence, so they know they’re not the only person in the room,” says Britton. This can be as simple as asking them to share their name and location when they ask a question, or having the presenter acknowledge and read out some names.

Mistake #5: Not using the information collected during the webinar.

“I think a lot of people miss the boat when they don’t use all the information they collect during a webinar to qualify leads,” says Britton. “You can use all of that rich data, beyond whether someone attended or didn’t attend and how long they attended. There’s so much more information you can collect.” This includes using polls as a way to qualify leads or collect more information on attendees beyond what was collected in the registration process.

Do you conduct webinars of your own? Let us know your thoughts about these mistakes.

Want more marketing tips and tactics? Sign up for the free VR Buzz.

This post contributed by guest author, Yael Grauer. Grauer is a Minneapolis-based freelance writer and editor. Find her online at Yaelwrites.com.

The Online Marketing Institute’s Annual List of Top Digital Strategists Share Their Best Advice for Driving ROI in the New Year.

Welcome to part-two of the top digital strategists series. This part is focused on B2B marketing and how to use content to improve your digital strategy. If you missed part-one, read about what top OMI educators had to say about the future of social media in 2014.

To help marketers discover new opportunities for driving ROI, the Online Marketing Institute identified the top 40+ digital strategists, and asked them for their best advice for 2014. These OMI online learning center digital educators were selected because they are:

1. Embracing the latest integrated digital strategies and technologies
2. Advancing the industry through education — speaking, blogging, and teaching
3. Driving game-changing results for their clients and organization

B2B MARKETING INSIGHTS

In the second installment of this three-part series, 17 digital strategists well-versed in the area of B2B marketing share their best practices, predictions for the future of business to business marketing, evaluation of industry trends and share the know-how to deliver thought provoking insight that will lay the groundwork for you to build an effective, holistic digital marketing strategy in 2014.

9. Rediscover the humanity in your digital communication

“Rediscover the humanity in your digital communication and make sure your team is listening, paying close attention, and taking action to build a relationship between your brand and your consumers. Whether you’re on the front lines of consumer service or in the boardroom making company-wide decisions, whether you’re online or face-to-face, listening and responding accordingly is paramount to success. Sometimes that means engaging with the consumer, sometimes it means delivering what they’re really after. But it always means responding with exceptional service and creating an unparalleled experience with your brand at every touchpoint.”

- Susan Baroncini-Moe

Susan Baroncini-Moe is the author of the bestselling, Business in Blue Jeans: How to Have a Successful Business on Your Own Terms, in Your Own Style. She is an executive coach and a marketing consultant for B2B and the wellness and hospitality industries. She regularly speaks to audiences of all sizes and has shared the stage with business giants like Michael E. Gerber, Bob Burg, and Larry Winget, among others. Susan and her businesses have been featured in Redbook Magazine, USA Today, MSN Living, Investor’s Business Daily, Yahoo Finance, and American Express Open Forum, and she is a Guinness World Records® titleholder.

10. Deliver more contextual content

“Content management will become increasingly valuable to marketers who are looking to ramp up their efforts to deliver more contextual content offers. By establishing a strategy to conceptualize, produce, launch, and measure content, organizations can optimized content delivery and programs. Marketers also should embrace new metrics to quantify engagement. Understanding content consumption and sharing habits enables marketers to segment audiences. This strategy helps improve internal effectiveness and integrated planning; deliver contextual content offers; and understand which key performance indicators matter to content marketing. A shared process for content management also helps other marketing stakeholders to collaboratively support development and maximize launch initiatives.”

- Amanda Batista

As part of the Oracle Eloqua Marketing organization, Amanda Batista, drives Eloqua’s major content initiatives to support thought leadership, team enablement, and educate customer communities. She also manages the award-winning ‘It’s All About Revenue’ Blog, crafting content that helps marketers and salespeople bridge their gaps and rethink technology to meaningfully engage with their communities. Amanda also is a freelance music writer, and her passion is helping modern marketers find inspiration in engaging pop culture. Follow Amanda on Twitter @AmandaF_Batista.

11. Take a journalistic approach to content

It’s an editorialized and blended world of owned, earned and paid! Brands that take on a journalistic approach to content and treat their blogs and social networks like individual publications will build strong communities and ever lasting relationships; ultimately converting into business.

- Lisa Buyer

Lisa Buyer is President and CEO of The Buyer Group, an interactive public relations and social agency located in Celebration, Florida and editor for Social #PR Chat covering trends in Social PR, Mobile PR, Brand PR and SEO PR. Lisa writes for several industry publications covering how public relations influences search and social and is a regular speaker with PubCon, SMX, ClickZLive (formerly SES), OMI and an instructor of the University of San Francisco’s online Advanced Social Media certificate program. Lisa graduated from the University of Florida’s College of Journalism. Go Gators! Her favorite hashtags are #yoga, #sunsets and #surfing. Follow @lisabuyer for more.

12. Start acting as publishers

“Businesses everywhere will start acting as publishers. Instead of using content just for lead generation, companies will start creating more specific, targeted content pieces to be used as a sales tool. B2B companies, in particular, will up their targeted and niche content marketing campaigns to assist buyers during the decision making process. Companies need to focus on creating original and branded content that they can push our to both their potential and current clients in order to build thought leadership in their respective industries.”

- Alessandra Ceresa

Alessandra Ceresa is the Director of Marketing at GreenRope. With an iPhone, MacBook and iPad on hand at all times, Alessandra’s enthusiasm for marketing and social media landed her the position as the Director of Marketing for a leading software company, GreenRope. After graduating from the University of Southern California, Alessandra gained years of experience as a Public Relations executive in both San Diego and Los Angeles. She was responsible for developing and executing marketing campaigns, both online and offline, for numerous companies across multiple industries. Her passion for small business and online marketing led her to her current position, Director of Marketing for GreenRope, and as a freelance marketing consultant, content creator, and overall marketing strategist. Alessandra has since developed her expertise to include CRM, marketing automation, and email marketing.

13. Create content that means something

“Touch people. Get it out of your head that what you’re doing is “digital” and never treat anyone as a number. Create content that means something to them. Understand them. Help them. Invoke emotion. You don’t want followers, fans, users, or any such frigid thing. You want new friends. Sure, your relationship might exist largely on a rectangular piece of glass. Aim to “kiss their glass.””

- Barry Feldman

Barry Feldman of Feldman Creative is a veteran copywriter, creative director and content marketing strategist. He works with clients of all sizes to create effective online marketing programs. In addition to publishing his tips and tactics at the “The Point,” www.feldmancreative.com/blog, Barry contributes articles to many of the web’s leading publishers of marketing and social media advice.

14. Customer is the King or Queen

“We marketers are in the throws of finalizing our yearly plans. Here are three predictions for 2014.

1. CONTENT IS NOT JUST KING OR QUEEN: It’s still all about content. But not just about the creation of it. We have to enhance content strategy into more than just demand generation campaigns and form fill outs. Excellent content is not the measure of success — but rather now the standard.

2. CUSTOMER IS THE KING OR QUEEN: 1000% agree — we need to take the same approach to our existing customer base as we have with net-new logo acquisition. It is not just about customer communication but more so about added revenue generation.

3. SOCIAL TECHNOLOGIES WILL IGNITE INTEGRATED MARKETING: And not just social media, but leveraging social behavior. How do we get things done more effectively by leveraging how people consume information and how people work? We will see a rise in more social-centric applications that connect desperate systems, functions and organizations.”

- Christelle Flahuax

Christelle Flahaux is the Senior Director of Global Demand Generation at Jive Software. A senior Marketing professional with over 15 years experience in various marketing management and sales operations roles. Expertise is in sales and marketing alignment for large enterprise software teams. Management of Telemarketing teams with a focus on generating highly qualified net new inquiries for the field and building programs post inquiry to nurture and warm leads that are not ready to purchase. Extreme focus on conversions to pipeline and revenue, not just inquiry creation. Responsibility for all marketing operations, proposals, sales forecasting, sales database maintenance, tracking and reporting. Performed market analysis on various industries as a basis for targeted sales programs and lead generation. Leading cross function teams to implement and manage customer satisfaction programs for key clients. Coordination of all external and internal communications, i.e., press releases, newsletters, e-mail blasts, event management for tradeshows, conferences, seminars, webinars, and corporate hospitality programs at sponsored events.

15. Collect social proof

“B2B buyers are spending more time educating themselves before they contact sales. Instead of sales pitches, they want social proof that your products and services deliver results. For example, technology buyers on a Spiceworks panel cited that they want to see unbiased reviews from people who have used your products. Meanwhile, a hawkeye study revealed that 71% of B2B buyers in the awareness stage and 77% in the evaluation stage cited testimonials and case studies as the most influential types of content. If you want to engage customers, then collecting testimonials, case studies and five-star product reviews should be at the top of your marketing “to-do” list this year.”

- Rachel Foster

Rachel Foster is a B2B copywriter who helps her clients improve their response rates, clearly communicate complex messages and generate high-quality leads. Rachel has shared her insights on B2B marketing in presentations for The Content Marketing Institute, MarketingProfs and Business 2 Community. You can connect with Rachel on LinkedIn, follow her on Twitter (@CopywriterTO) or check out her B2B marketing resources and blog.

16. Brand advocacy is the new digital marketing goalpost

“For the last two decades, much of digital marketing has focused on generating impressions, traffic, clicks, and conversions. The new goalposts for digital marketing are about building an army of Advocates for your brand and products. It’s not difficult to get more clicks. You can do this by slashing prices or running splashy promotions. But this is the “fast-food” approach to marketing.You may get filled up quickly but it’s not very nutritious. Even worse, this approach – if you rely on it too much – can ultimately damage your body (or your brand.) A more valuable and sustainable approach is to create and nurture relationships with Advocates, who will promote, support, and defend your brand and products for years. Apple, Amazon.com, Trader Joe’s, and USAA (a financial services company for the military and their family members) are among the world’s most recommended brands. These companies didn’t build their brands through price-cutting and short-term promotions. They delivered customer experiences worth talking about. And helped nurture relationships with Advocates, who then spread the word among their social networks. Are you still obsessing about yesterday’s goalposts and metrics? Or are you building a movement around your brand and products?”

- Rob Fuggetta

Rob Fuggetta is the Founder & CEO of Zuberance, a social media marketing company that manages and powers Brand Advocate programs for leading brands. Prior to founding Zuberance in 2008, Fuggetta was the Chief Marketing Officer at Genuity, a Verizon spin-out. He also was formerly a partner at Regis McKenna, Inc., the legendary high tech marketing and communications firm in Palo Alto, where he co-led the global Apple account. Fuggetta has spoken at dozens of industry conferences and seminars including events sponsored by the American Marketing Association (AMA), the Word of Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA), TedX, the Online Marketing Summit, the Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), and more. Fuggetta also has published articles about brand advocacy in AdAge, Forbes, iMedia, AMEX Open Forum, McKinsey’s Chief Marketing and Sales Officer Forum, and elsewhere. A resident of San Carlos, CA, Fuggetta is an avid tennis player, a rabid San Francisco Giants fan, and proud father.

17. Add social science to your marketing arsenal

“Add social science to your marketing arsenal: Today, terrific targeting, content and offers only get you so far. To increase your engagement and conversion rates, study the social scientists. They, along with behavioral economists, have proven that people take cognitive shortcuts when making decisions. And they’ve shown these shortcuts can be prompted – resulting in automatic behaviors. Now you can stack the deck every time you craft a subject line, write an email, lay out a landing page, design a call to action, etc. Tap into proven human behavior triggers like the Scarcity Principle, Cognitive Fluency, Loss Aversion and dozens more to prompt the behaviors you want.”

- Nancy Harhut

Nancy Harhut is Chief Creative Officer at Wilde Agency, where she combines marketing best practices with behavioral science in order to get people to act. She and her teams have won over 200 awards for digital and direct marketing effectiveness, including two 2013 International Echo Awards for Nationwide Insurance and TripAdvisor.com. A sought-after speaker at industry events, Harhut has shared her expertise with audiences ranging from Moscow, Russia to the US Department of Defense.

18. Test with new channels to build new audiences

“In 2014, it is all about distribution. We’ve all heard the quality or quantity debate for some time and now it is more important to market our marketing, in the words of Jay Baer. Digital marketers should opt to create stellar content and dedicate the same amount of resources, if not more, to ensure their target audience engages and acts upon the content. Test with new channels to build new audiences:
-Build relationships with internal and external influencers to extend your reach
-Experiment with paid campaigns to ensure your content is getting consumed
-Get close with demand generation to plan larger campaigns rather than one-off email blasts
-Repurpose existing content in new formats to help increase shareability on social channels”

- Amanda Maksymiw

Amanda Maksymiw is the content marketing manager for Lattice Engines, a Big Data for sales and marketing company in Boston, MA. She is responsible for setting and managing the Lattice’s content marketing and social media strategies including creating, producing, and publishing engaging content. Throughout her career, she has advised and worked with several technology startups on their content strategies. In 2012, Amanda was named Content Marketing Tactician of the Year by the Content Marketing Institute.

19. Create a balance of messaging across channels

“Don’t throw away the “exploration” broadcast messaging with the “targeted conversion” messaging. It’s the proverbial baby in the bath water. Advanced data management and campaign automation – coupled with the new marriage of content marketing and analytics — make targeted messaging – display, CRM retargeting, triggered email, social, mobile and even offline mail – so easy, multi-channel and powerful, that it’s tempting to ignore the power of the good old broadcast message. Consider the latter as a way to uncover new truths about various audiences, and to improve your segmentation. Often, the unexpected, generic message will reveal as much about a person’s habits and interests than the uber-targeted one. Create a balance of messaging across channels to make all your content marketing work harder.”

-Stephanie Miller

Stephanie Miller is a relentless customer advocate and a champion for marketers creating memorable online experiences. A digital marketing expert, she helps responsible data-driven marketers connect with the people, resources and ideas they need to optimize response and revenue. She speaks and writes regularly and leads many industry initiatives as VP and “Chief Listening Officer” at DMA.

20. Enter a branded content channel

“Branded Content will be a game changing for many businesses. Why? Does your businesses want more traffic, leads and thought leadership? Most businesses do and trying to generate these are some of the greatest challenges they face. Enter a branded content channel. It is one of the quickest ways to generate more traffic, leads and thought leadership by accessing a channel in which your target audience is already participating in droves. It generally costs a “reasonable” amount, but the value (i.e. cost for new leads) is generally in the ballpark of $5- $20. Would you pay that for a new lead?”

– Chris Muccio

Chris Muccio is the Chief Technologist at SFGI/Catapult Interactive Inc. He is a seasoned executive with a pattern of success in large businesses and start-up companies. Today, as a Hubspot Certified Partner, he has evolved with the digital world to be a leading voice in digital business development and branded content. Among his various achievements, he wrote one of the first books on LinkedIn that became an Amazon Best Seller.

21. Create content that solves business problems

“Just because we produce more content doesn’t mean we can digest more. In fact, we can’t digest any more information than we did 100 years ago. With the increase in content, the need for high relevancy is critical. Use Big Data to truly understand your audience and then create content that solves their business problems and reaches them on the channels they use. Stop selling and start helping. I’ll live by this in 2014 – will you?”

- Amanda Nelson

Amanda Nelson is manager of content for salesforce.com, leading a team of writers to create sales, service, marketing, and mobile content that’s helpful, relevant, and lead-driving. She has a background in account management from interactive and full service advertising agencies. Amanda has spoken at over a dozen conferences and has won awards from the Direct Marketing Association, Content Marketing Institute, Publicity Club of New England, American Banker Association, New England Direct Marketing, University of Hartford and the Advertising Club of Connecticut. Amanda is passionate about content marketing, community management and border collies.

22. Focus more resources on content quality

“Only 36 percent of content marketers feel they use content effectively. Why? Because most brands don’t have a substantive audience to consume it. Every minute of every day 100,000 tweets are shared, 571 new websites are created and over 347 blog posts get published. It’s noisy out there. So how do most marketers address this problem? By focusing more resources on content quality and/or quantity. Those marketers without existing prudent audiences who want to use their content effectively in 2014 must develop a content distribution and promotion plan backed by robust audience and media research. According to Ryan Skinner of Forrester, brands can actually step down content production and step up distribution to get better results. Truly converging owned media with paid and earned media empowers marketers to get their content in front of millions of eyeballs every day and expedite the growth of their own audience.”

– Chad Pollitt

Chad Pollitt is a decorated veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and former Army Commander; a member of a Forbes Top 100 List, and the Director of Marketing at DigitalRelevance. He’s a regular contributor to the Huffington Post and has been published in dozens of newspapers, magazines, and other websites throughout the world.

23. Choice your voice carefully

“Standing out amidst the escalating online noise and clutter is key. Ensure that the voice sharing your content rises above the din to create a connection. The voice is a combination of the person and the message. Who’s telling your story? Is he relatable? Is she the best choice or an easy solution? Does he or she have followers that will share your message on a wider basis? Is the message relevant and different? Does it translate as genuine and authentic—or, does it proffer thinly-veiled marketing speak? Will it compel others to share your story? Choose your voice carefully. It can mean the difference between rising to the top or disappearing into the fray.”

- Denise Roberts McKee

Denise Roberts McKee is the Chief Operating Officer at AboutFace Media, which creates branded documentary videos for the web. Denise’s decades of work within mobile media, gaming, and independent film industries includes teaming up with, and creating award-winning initiatives for, leading brands such as Time-Warner, NBC Universal, Bravo TV New Media, and Rachael Ray. Also a speaker, Denise brings her years of experience to conferences and seminars worldwide, with a focus on content development and marketing.

24. Create visual content for the best ROI

“2014 will see a rise in visual content, and a decrease in the reign of heavy text-based blog articles. Visual content is shared more, gets more engagement on social, communicates information quicker and easier than text, and, as a result, is worth more in SEO. Because of this, visual content has the best ROI currently available to content marketers. The top three types of content will be short-form videos, infographics and slideshares.”

- Nick Steeves

Nick Steeves, Chief Product Officer, Wishpond: Nick is Chief Product Officer at Wishpond. Wishpond makes it easy to run contests and promotions on social networks. He and his team discuss social media for small business at blog.wishpond.com

25. Make your message relevant

“Your message must be relevant to your buyers! All successful marketing programs have one thing in common: messages that speak directly to specific buyers. Why? Because relevant messaging establishes an important emotional connection between a business and its buyers, which, in turn, spurs future purchases. Messaging is a large part of the branding process and can drive visuals and campaign themes. Therefore, it is critical to carefully research and develop a thorough buyer profile prior to crafting marketing messages. It doesn’t matter if you’ve developed an amazing concept and launched via the latest digital or traditional marketing channels; if your message doesn’t speak to targeted buyers, your marketing is worthless!”

- Bonnie Taylor

Bonnie Taylor is the VP of Strategic Marketing with the Washington D.C. Metro based marketing firm, CCS Innovations, LLC. Her close to 20 years of experience spent growing companies and generating large-scale awareness has included working with some of the world’s biggest brands, such as Coca-Cola, Revlon, Deloitte, as well as countless mid-size and smaller companies in local, national, and international markets. Ms. Taylor has taken two companies from a single office without a marketing program to worldwide growth in just a few years, earning Inc. 500 and Business Journal ‘Fastest Growing Company’ awards along the way. Not one to always work behind the scenes, she is an internationally published authority on marketing, branding, and corporate growth and performs extensive work with nonprofit organizations.

The Online Marketing Institute is honored to have the same industry experts leading various online learning center classes and crash course programs throughout the year, share their best advice on what to do in the ever-changing online marketing environment.

OMI is committed to bringing forth the insight of industry leaders. Look for the full list of courses from these top digital educators on the online learning center’s class topics page.

Stay Tuned for our next installment on overall digital marketing.

The other day I was speaking with a colleague who was complaining about lead generation. He was lamenting about how much time he spends chasing new business compared to the time he has to work on client projects.

I could feel his pain. Lead generation isn’t my favorite part of running a business either. I started asking around and heard the exasperated refrain of “Ugh – who has the time?” from many other business owners as well. In fact, it started to sound like whining.

Focus On Your Strengths

Business owners are happier and more successful when they spend their time doing what they’re best at—focusing on their core business and providing great service for their customers. Their secret? They understand the importance of delegating and they spend their marketing budgets on lead generation strategies that actually work.

Sounds simple, right? It is, but it also means giving up some control—which can be scary at first. Simple or scary, the vast majority of business owners who delegate their lead generation to an expert reap the benefits of—you guessed it—more and better prospects coming to them.

Improve Your Lead Generation

Content marketing is changing the game of lead generation. Costly, less effective outbound methods are (mercifully) being abandoned in favor of the proven benefits of content marketing.

In fact, research compiled by Kapost in partnership with Eloqua shows that online display ads have a click-through-rate of less than one-tenth of one percent. In stark contrast, per dollar, content marketing produces three times more leads.

The hard data and business testimonials supporting the performance of content marketing are seemingly endless (if you want more stats, just ask). More and more businesses are cashing in on the benefits of content marketing by providing their customers with valuable information they want and are looking for.

Benefits of Content Marketing Programs

Advantages of content marketing for businesses include:

• Building their brand and reputation as industry experts
• Driving more qualified prospects to their websites
• Improving their visibility in search results
• Creating positive engagement with customers
• Building trust and shortening the sales cycle

More and more business owners rely on the expertise of content marketing specialists to run their content marketing program. Why? They save precious time and reduce marketing costs, and they don’t have to worry about doing the work themselves—all while generating more and better leads.

Content marketing simplifies the entire lead generation process and makes prospecting a more engaging, effective, and enjoyable process. That means no more wasted time, money, and energy. And no more whining.

Ready to start a content marketing program for your business? Visit www.ContentMarketingProgram.com or call 310.792.8888 to learn more.

Are your salespeople actively engaged in social media as part of their lead generation efforts? If not, they (and your business) are missing out on great opportunities for researching potential B2B clients, building new networks and uncovering prospects by investigating their social media profiles.

Here are ways to encourage your sales team to embrace social media:

1. Direct your salespeople to refine their profiles

Start by making sure they have social media profiles on the appropriate channels. The marketing team can help determine where your customers and prospects those platforms. Their profile pages need to attract potential customers. While including the basics on an individual salesperson, the profile should mostly focus on your business and the solutions you offer to prospects. Also include videos, PDFs and links to your business website in these profiles.

2. Schedule time for focused social media activity

It takes discipline to use social media properly (and avoid wasting time watching cat videos!). Work with your sales team to plot out a schedule of focused activity on various social media networks, whether it’s a half-hour a day or 2-3 times a week.

3. Generate content your sales team can use

Back in the day, salespeople handed out brochures or fliers to interest prospects. Today, it’s all about customized content marketing. So it’s up to you to ensure your salespeople can refer prospects to first-rate, problem-solving content on your business website. Not only will this draw more traffic to your site, it also supports the sales team’s efforts to position your business as an industry and thought leader.

4. Promote sales blogging

It’s no longer enough to feature a blog post from your CEO or CMO. Members of your sales team should also be blogging and steadily building a rich network of followers. Encourage team members to think about new ways to focus on prospects’ needs and business challenges by answering common questions that prospects ask in their buyer journey. They should also think and blog more broadly about general industry issues, rather than shilling for your business. Again, focus on solutions your sales team can provide and that will draw more interest from prospects.

5. Keep an active LinkedIn presence

For sales of B2B products and services, LinkedIn is probably the most significant platform for your sales team’s activities. Your individual salespeople’s LinkedIn profiles are the first place a prospect will check out, so as noted above, be sure these are up-to-date and contain the right messaging.

Also, each salesperson should be gathering new LinkedIn connections as frequently as possible. Have them build their network by reaching out to past customers, colleagues in the industry, friends and family members. It’s important to have a robust network of connections as part of your LinkedIn profile.

By joining and participating in LinkedIn discussion groups, salespeople will come in contact with a wide range of potential customers — though it’s important to remember these discussion groups are about specific issues, not a venue for blatant self-promotion. Encourage your sales team to answer questions that demonstrate their problem-solving knowledge. An interested prospect will often follow up on his own.

6. Use Twitter to make connections and follow trends

The businesses and prospects you want to connect with may be tweeting. Shouldn’t you and your sales team be listening? Twitter offers a wealth of opportunities for staying abreast of industry trends, which can in turn help your team anticipate future sales opportunities. Once your salesperson has become comfortable on the platform, he or she can reply individually to a prospect’s tweet, thus initiating a one-on-one exchange which turns a cold lead into a warm one.

7. Have a vibrant Facebook presence

Your business should already have a Facebook page. From there, encourage members of your sales team to create a Facebook group that relates to your business offerings and invite people to join. Once the group starts talking, there’s always an opportunity to send targeted messages to individuals within the group and get the sales process moving forward.

Being active in social media isn’t a substitute for picking up the phone or firing off an email to prospects, but it represents a dramatically different way of cultivating leads and enriching your sales pipeline.

Blog posts without a call to action are like Facebook posts without images. Or Tweets without links. They work, but they’re a lot less effective than they could be.

It’s no secret that creating high-quality blog posts can be incredibly time-consuming. Once you’ve written, edited, formatted, and quality-checked it, do you want your efforts to generate results for your brand? Of course you do. Once your readers finish consuming your content, their thought should never be “well, what do I do now?” We live in a culture of information-saturation. Consumers today are highly-distracted, which is why you need to end your posts with a bang, by including enticing, well-written calls to action.

What are Calls to Action?

A call-to-action in it’s most basic form is an invitation for your readers to take a certain action. They can consist of beautifully-designed or simple buttons, or well-written lines of text at the bottom of your articles.

An effective call to action will act as a logical extension of your blog posts. After discussing the benefits of gaining blog subscribers, provide a link to relevant articles you’ve previously written on the topic. After sharing a customer success story, ask your readers to sign up for a free demo. Your call to actions should never seem abrupt, or you’ll struggle to get the reaction you’d hoped.

Blogging is a highly effective medium for reaching a wide array of marketing goals. As a result, there’s a ton of direction directions you can take your calls to action. We’ve created a list of both written and designed examples, and success tips for every kind of action you might want your blog posts to generate for your organization:

1. Facilitate Comments

One of the most effective ways to use your blog posts as a community-building tool is to invite your readers to leave a comment. Sometimes, asking an engaging question isn’t enough. You’ve got to take things a few steps further and directly ask your audience to share feedback.

Example: Do you use any of these productivity hacks in your daily workflow? Feel free to brag about your success in the comments!

2. Spark a Debate

Writing highly-controversial blog posts isn’t without risks, but it can be a way for your brand to gain new customers. If you’re adding a well thought-out, intelligent contribution to the dialogue around a hot topic, take full advantage of this opportunity to turn your comments into a heated debate. Let your readers know they’re welcome to share their opinion with an irresistible prompt, and be sure to moderate and respond once the comments start rolling in!

Example: Do you agree that direct mail marketing is dead forever? Share why (or why not!) in the comments!

3. Gain Blog Subscribers

The only thing better than dedicated blog readers are blog subscribers! When you convert your audience, you’re able to deliver your content straight into their inbox every time you publish a new article, increasing your chances of gaining views, social shares, comments, and leads. Don’t hesitate to be direct every once in a while, and let your readers know about their option to subscribe!

Example: Like what you’ve read? Subscribe to our blog by adding your email address to the form on the right. You’ll be the first to hear about our updates 5 times a week!

Since this may be a common call-to-action, you can invest in a designed button to include on your articles. While the following example is simple, it’s clear and straight-to-the-point:

For more hacks on growing your subscribership, check out 11 Blogging Experts’ Secrets on How to Get More Subscribers!

4. Place an Inquiry

Asking readers to buy today isn’t always the right option for brands. An estimated 96% of first time visitors to your website aren’t ready to buy. Using your call-to-action to generate leads can allow you to keep in contact with these prospects as they consider a purchase. Always provide something of value, which could be a free consultation or a custom quote.

Example: Curious how content marketing could help your organization reach its marketing goals? Call us today for a free consultation at 1-800-936-9623.

5. Learn More

Perhaps your readers aren’t quite ready to have a one-on-one conversation with a member of your sales team, or even think about how your pricing fits into their budget? Providing links to relevant content you’ve written can allow you to further educate your prospects and improve the time they spend on your website.

Example: Are you wondering how you can increase website traffic with smarter usage of social media? Check out How to Start a Blog: 8 Hacks to Skyrocket Traffic 1000% a Month.

6. Buy Services

Does your product or service lend itself well to impulse purchases? Have you written an article that’s designed to function as a tipping point, and push your current leads toward purchasing? By all means, don’t hesitate to ask for the sale by providing clear contact information!

Example: Are you ready to make the leap into content marketing? It’s easy to purchase blog posts today by visiting our product page!

7. Download an eBook

Call to actions promoting eBooks are a highly effective tool for generating leads, according to HubSpot’s research. If you’ve published a whitepaper, eBook, webinar, or any other form of premium content, provide a link in your call-to-action to entice lead conversions.

Example: Are you ready to blog? Download our free eBook, Blogging for Beginners!

Alternatively, we love the blend of detail and simplicity in following example of a CTA button to promote an eBook!

8. Join Your Mailing List

Many marketing thought leaders, including Tim Grahl, believe that an email list is the single most-important asset your marketing program can have. 25% of your email list will expire in a given year as your contacts switch jobs or abandon accounts, so it’s crucial to always be acquiring new prospects.

Example: Want the latest best practices delivered straight to your inbox? Click here to subscribe to our monthly content marketing newsletter!

While not every brand can get away with the sassy language in the following button, the call-to-action does a fantastic job of both managing expectations and making the offer seem irresistible:

9. Share on Social Media

Social media shares send a clear signal to major search engine that your content is relevant, high-quality, and valuable. Inviting your readers to share your blog posts on Twitter or Facebook can provide valuable exposure and an SEO boost.

To learn more, read Are Blogging and Social Media a Match Made in Heaven?

Example: Did you find our blog formatting checklist a helpful tool for content marketers? Feel free to share on Twitter or Facebook by using the super-easy share buttons on the left!

10. Follow You on Social Media

Convincing your first-time readers to become Twitter followers or Facebook fans can allow you to convert these prospects into members of your online community. Every brand should strive to have a tribe of dedicated fans who promote their products and services!

Example: Are you crazy for social media marketing? Check out our Facebook page for daily tips on how to improve your strategy!

11. Vote on a Poll

Getting feedback from your website visitors can only help you become a more effective content marketer. Don’t be afraid to ask for feedback, either by linking to a poll or asking for input in your comments.

Example: What kinds of marketing tactics do you feel like you need to improve? Social media? Content Marketing? Or something else? Vote in the comments, and we’ll be glad to deliver!

12. Sign Up for a Free Trial

Do you offer a 30-day free trial, product samples, or consultations? Offering your audience a no-obligation opportunity to try out being a customer could help your sales skyrocket.

Example: Did you know we offer 30 days of our product for free? Click here to sign up for your no-obligation trial – no credit card number required!

Here’s a well-designed, compelling button for a blog article that succinctly offers the option for a product trial:

13. Take a Product Tour

Demos, video tutorials, and case studies can be a highly effective form of lead-nurturing client. Your prospects are able to see your product in-action, and learn a bit more about how it works.

Example: Check out our latest video on how our real-life customers use our products to increase their sales!

Here’s a graphic call-to-action that promotes a travel itinerary for a cycling tours business that effectively offers a low-pressure chance to learn more:

14. Choose Your Own Adventure

What about allowing readers of your blog posts to segment themselves according to interests? It’s actually a fairly novel approach that’s just beginning to gain traction. You’ll win nothing but respect for providing options.

Example: Did you know we serve both businesses and families? Click here to learn about our business success stories, and here to discover more about how we work with people directly!

Here’s a brand that managed to effectively design a choose-your-own adventure option for their customers that would fit well at the bottom of a blog article:

15. Limited-Time Offers

People absolutely love the concept of exclusivity. As Brian Conlin of Vocus points out, giving the impression of a limited supply can only increase demand. One truly novel way to call readers of your blog posts into action is by presenting an offer or landing page before it’s released to the general public. It’s an idea that’s certainly worth testing out!

Do you utilize call to actions in your content marketing? What kinds of invitations have you find most effective?