I’m one of those online marketer types that tends to forge my own path, rather than follow the same paths that other Internet marketing “gurus” have trampled before. That probably stems from the fact that I’m also a search marketer, and we almost always forge our own paths. But one thing all smart search marketers agree on is that good content makes the marketing process much easier. At some point, I’m not sure when, the phrase “content marketing” began to be used, and perhaps even overused. For me, it was kind of silly to apply a name to it. Content marketing? Ok, whatever. I just believe that if you create great content, your marketing efforts become a much easier process. I’m not sure it needs it’s own name, but it has one, so let’s look at what some of the content marketing experts ’round the web have to say about it.
The Two Most Important Content Marketing Success Factors
Brands think that content marketing is about the clever usage of text, video and other channels to attract prospects to you. It has to be about something more than this. It has to be about solving your customers’ pain points
>> Follow Joe Pulizzi
Marketing Content Must Reach Beyond Two-Way Dialogue – Marketing Interactions
Your ideas and expertise can be shared by your prospects with their buying committees if your content is designed to inspire conversations.
>> Follow Ardath Albee
SXSW Live Blogging Tips for Content Marketing – Online Marketing Blog
A big part of my “mission” for SXSXi is to create content after all. I have several other goals like networking (reconnecting and especially new contacts), competitive research, recruiting and potential client prospecting. But content marketing is our bread and butter. It can be an effective tactic for you too, especially if you can learn to be highly efficient at liveblogging conferences.
>> Follow Lee Odden
I plan to delve more into this subject over the next few months. It’s a subject I feel strongly about, so it’s worth spending extra time on it. And as always, when I come across good advice from other smart people ’round the web, I’ll be sure to pass their words along to you as well. For now, I’ll just leave you with this simple message.
Create Great Content, Then Market It!
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Donna- I agree that great content trumps everything. To be honest, I don’t worry about search marketing like you do. I try to implement the basics, but don’t want to waste time trying to figure out how to please Google.
.-= Steve Scott Site ‘s last post ..Successful Info Product Creation and Marketing [Part 1] =-.
Search marketing isn’t necessarily about figuring out how to please Google. It can be as simple as making sure your content is presented in such a way that the search engines aren’t prevented from accessing and understanding that content. Even the basics can be powerful, but in many cases, sites have problems that the basics can’t cover. Even the largest, most well-known brands, often inadvertently create roadblocks that prevent the search engines from fully indexing their sites. Many times, even one small change to the backend can result in a massive difference in traffic because they’ve suddenly allowed more of that great content to be found and ranked by the search engines.