Twelve ways to turn your products and services into compelling content…

…whilst simultaneously simplifying your social media, blog, e-mail and direct marketing strategies

Why do this?

In business to business marketing you need to:

• attract and engage prospects,
• capture their interest,
• build long term relationships

Let me show you 12 ways to turn information about your products and services into one well-structured piece of content, which can:

·    be used across multiple marketing channels,

·    grow and develop your social media following, and improve their engagement,

·    increase the number of likes and shares on your business social media,

·    organically grow and develop your e-mail strategy and your prospect list,

·    deliver more targeted and successful direct mail campaigns,

·    grow and develop your business blog.

All in all, this will simplify your marketing!

Step one - plan your attack

First, write down the main products and services that you offer.  Prioritise them by importance to you.  For example;

• Which will deliver the biggest or quickest return?
• What business area needs the most growth?
• What will attract the most interest from prospects?

If you have a number of target markets, focus on just one to start with.  Once you’re comfortable with the process you can replicate it accordingly.

Step two: find the compelling R2R

Whatever you write, it needs a compelling reason-to-read (R2R). If the reader’s response to your piece could be “so what?”, then look for a better topic. Your first thought was probably not worth writing about!

It always has to be worth the reader’s time (to read it). The knack is finding a way to position the content in a way that makes them feel they have received something of value.

Now, from your list, take the top, most important item.

• go through the list of the twelve approaches that follow, and find the one that gives your prospect the best R2R.  

In the examples that follow it’s done by sharing interesting and compelling content that should enrich the life of the prospect in some way.

The twelve approaches

1. Recent changes in legislation or law: Write about any recent or imminent legal changes affecting your product or service, if that has an important effect on your prospects. Position your business as the experts.

2. Relevant and interesting news: Research some interesting and relevant news relating to your particular product, service or industry and deliver it in a fun and creative way. Position yourselves as the people ‘in the know’.

3. How to choose which thing to buy: Help the prospect through the process (impartially) by providing a guide to selecting the right product or service you offer. Be balanced, let them decide, and position your business as giving good advice.

4. Show how to DIY: Empower the prospect to do it themselves (as this article does!). Give them enough information to have a go, chances are when they get stuck, it’s you they will call. Position yourself as approachable. 

5. Discuss “what’s right for you”: It‘s similar to (3), the ‘how to choose’ approach, but suitable when you face a range of competing channels. Discuss what product or service delivery channel is right for them personally. This can be done by size of business, location, industry type, etc. Position yourselves as confident, enough not to need to hard-sell.

6. Share a case study: Take a recent case study and use it to highlight particular features and benefits of the product or service.  Try not to be too ‘braggy’ but show how your approach delivers real value to customers. Position yourselves as caring about your customers and their businesses.

7. Give an expert overview:  Give your own views, comments or predictions on the choices in your marketplace.  Try not to be too forthcoming and always try to be balanced. Position yourself as a confident, individual expert.

8. Write an FAQ: Talk about the most frequently asked questions (FAQ) and provide good answers! If you’re brave, you can even ask for questions and run them as a side-note to your main article in future editions.  Position yourselves as resourceful.

9. Share your “top tips”: This could be top tips for buying or using your product or service, but it could equally be just general help about something you provide or do. Position yourselves as friendly and helpful.

10. Find a seasonal tie-in: This works best if there is a particular time of year when one of your products or services is in demand. Have fun, but try not to be too ‘salesy’. Position yourselves as ready for the rush!

11. Use a topical news story from the media: It’s probably best to avoid political or controversial stories, but, if there is something that relates to your products or services, use it. Try and find a fun and creative way to highlight a particular product or service, but if it’s serious, be gently authoritative. Position yourselves as ‘on the ball’.

12. Announce an important change to your products and services: If you are changing the way in which you do or sell something, AND it directly affects your customers, AND there is a genuine added value as a result, then highlight these changes and explain the additional benefits. Position yourselves as customer-focused.

It’s not about being an award-winning writer and it’s certainly not how much you
     write! Be passionate about what you do and communicate that to the reader.

Now…to use what you’ve written

First find the teasers: Pull out some headlines or intriguing statements that will catch the eye, here are some ideas taken from this one:

•         “Twelve ways to turn products and services into compelling content”

•         “Just one article can grow your social media following, and improve their engagement.”

•         “Just one article can increase ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ on all your business’ social media.”

•         “Easily grow and develop your e-mail strategy and your prospect list”

•         “Develop your business blog, one article at a time.”

Next, recycle! Re-use those headlines as:

•      Posts for your Facebook business page

•      Updates for your LinkedIn profile

•      Tweets for your business’ Twitter page

•      Content for e-mail and direct mail campaigns

We’ll use this article as an example for what follows.

On Facebook

Discover twelve ways to turn your products and services into compelling content, whilst at the same time simplifying your social media marketing. (All of this text and any accompanying picture will link to the blog.)

Other examples:

There is a perception that you need to produce lots of individual and original pieces of content for your various social media, business pages and blogs, and keep it all fresh and up to date. Thankfully, that’s not quite true…

This week, I’m blogging about how one piece of well-constructed content can work across all of your marketing channels.

Struggling with your social media strategy?  Today I’m sharing twelve ways to improve social media, blog and direct marketing engagement, whilst actually simplifying your marketing, all at the same time!

Note: While they’re on your blog they’re not distracted by Facebook features!

On LinkedIn

Improve your LinkedIn strategy: here are twelve ways to turn your products and services into compelling content for all your social media profiles and business pages. Find out how…

Are you struggling to find enough interesting things to post, tweet and blog about? Today I’m explaining how to easily write compelling content for any product or service.

Keep your marketing strategy simple! This is essential to its longevity – the easier it is to manage the more likely it will continue. Today, I’m talking about how to do it successfully.

Note: adding a time element (“today”) implies a stream of useful knowledge. If they don’t bite at this one, they’ll watch this space for something they like!

On Twitter

Twelve ways to grow and develop your social media following and improve engagement… [Shortened link to blog]

Discover twelve ways to develop your e-mail marketing strategy and grow your prospect list organically… [Shortened link to blog]

Turn your products and service info into compelling content: twelve easy ways to do it… [Shortened link to blog]

Note: Twitter can be tough to get right. Don’t try to cram too much into one tweet!

“Recycling” for e-mail and direct mail

Rather than use a generic sales e-mail or letter, send them your latest compelling piece of content and merely encourage engagement through your blog or social media channels. No pressure often works better!

Here’s how I’ve adapted my article to run as a direct mail campaign;

Dear ,

As a business with a presence on social media I thought you might benefit from a recent article I have written on how to simplify your social media, blog, e-mail and direct marketing strategies.

Whilst I would welcome the opportunity to talk or meet with you, the purpose of this letter is simply to introduce you to my local marketing blog.

Here, I share interesting and useful information aimed at helping local business take control of their marketing, empowering you to have a go yourself, if you have the time (patience) and resource to do so.

I’ve enclosed a copy of my recent article which I hope will be of use.  You can see previous articles which cover a number of local marketing topics on my website via the blog page – here you can also sign up to my monthly marketing e-mail;  www.thelocalmarketingbusiness.co.uk

If you would like to connect on social media then please feel free to drop me an invitation, I often post links to other articles which share local marketing expertise aimed at helping local business market themselves better.

I do hope this helps you in some way.

Sincerely,
Paul Kurnyta

aul Kurnyta
ard.s, on the limited number of occasions I used your services I always found them to be extremely professional and

Here’s how I’ve adapted my article to run as an e-mail campaign

See it here 

Final Thoughts

This approach does take a bit of thought and preparation. One great article won’t do much, but a string of great articles will work wonders.

Don’t worry about duplication. If your customers see the same thing advertised in several places, say LinkedIn and Facebook, they’ll assume it’s important. That works in your favour.

Get into the habit of doing this month in, month out.  As long as you share compelling and engaging content you can’t help but see growth and success from your efforts.

Remember: to succeed in Business to Business marketing you need to attract and engage prospects, capture their interest and build relationships over time.

Get this strategy right and you’ll do just that.

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Paul

P.S. Please do share any comments or feedback as I welcome your input.  If you feel that this article helped, please tell me.  If you think it may benefit a colleague or contact, then I would only encourage you to share it with them! Thanks.

Marketing a local business in 2013

I recently gave a presentation to a Bristol based networking group, The Interactive Business Club (IBC), where I provided an introduction and a brief overview on marketing a local business in 2013.

The presentation will take roughly 5 minutes to read through and it will give you an overview of what it takes to succeed in your marketing in 2013.

Page 5 is of particular interest - did you know just how many marketing options you have at your disposal?

I hope it helps you in some way.

See it here - 'Marketing a local business in 2013'Marketing a local business in 2013

The Key to Successful Marketing - Free Bread, Mushrooms and Mini Bruschetta

The Key to Successful Marketing - Free Bread, Mushrooms and Mini Bruschetta
Turning cold marketing into relationship building strategies

In recent articles, ‘The Beating Heart of Local Marketing’ and ‘Top Tips for Creating an Engaging Website’, I have discussed that the key to effective local marketing is about offering something of value to the prospect or the visitor.

I met a business last week that shows the reality of what happens when you don’t address this very real and current marketing trend; this is probably the result for many businesses who after much time and effort spent on their marketing are left wondering…why am I not seeing the returns?

On the surface they looked to be doing everything within their power to market and promote their business.  They had eight different marketing activities in the mix; all of their communications were professional, were scattered with the benefits of doing business with them and all were followed up through a consistent and professional marketing process.

The trouble was they were not seeing the return from what was a significant amount of time, effort and co-ordination; the results were average at best.

It was their e-mail marketing strategy that really highlighted the problem; they were sending tens of thousands of e-mails each month to a cold, bought marketing database.  Each e-mail had a sales-led theme on one of their many products and each listed all of the benefits of doing business with them as a local business.

Because none of these people had agreed to receive their e-mail communications in the first place, the open and click-through rate was low and not surprisingly the list hadn’t grown in almost nine months.

The method of swamping a market with sales-led communications will never generate you a consistent return; many resort to this approach because it is traditional and what they are used to, the same reason people normally resort to advertising as their first choice for trying to drive interest.

Build a warm list of prospects and the results are very different; not only will you see a higher readership of your communications (what you send) but you will see a higher click-through rate to your website and better returns.

The only way to do this is to offer something of value in your communications, stop selling all of the time and give the reader something of use, for free.  Yes this approach takes time like everything else does if you aim to do it properly, but there are very few, if any, quick wins in marketing that will bring extra-ordinary results.

Given that you all operate in very different industries it is impossible for me to give you all an individual idea for your type of business; the best way to approach this is to think about what you or your clients like to receive.

For me personally, I like to receive things that educate me (briefly and in small doses), things that I find interesting or useful in relation to the job that I do or the clients that I work for and things that make me smile, the fun and quirky stuff.

Don’t get me wrong, in all of these communications there are subtle sales messages, but I don’t feel the driving force of them sending me something is to sell to me.  I am being given a chance to sample their experience and expertise, I feel as if they are educating me and I feel kept up to date with the things that effect what I do. 

More importantly, I don’t feel like they have intruded on my time; how often has an unsolicited e-mail popped up in your in-box just at the wrong time?  You feel annoyed as it has distracted you; if you are like me it goes straight into the trash and I avoid them in the future because they have become an annoyance.

This type of approach where you share useful or valuable information is called ‘Content Marketing’.  You may have heard this term being mentioned a lot more lately as it has been the buzzword in marketing for some time now.

The beauty of this type of marketing is that if you do have a number of different marketing channels in place, this one single weekly or monthly message can be replicated across all of your platforms.

For example, you may host these pieces of free information on your website on a dedicated page and all of your other marketing channels simply funnel the recipient through to this part of your website.

Your communications therefore become consistent and with one key theme they are easy to put out across a number of platforms.

Because your communications are not merely sales driven, and as long as what you are sharing is compelling, educating or informative, you will see more of the recipients clicking through to your website and you will see more organic growth in your mailing list.  People will share what you send out.

Once they are on your website you are entitled to be a little more direct in your selling, in fact they would expect you to try and sell to them a bit more.  Granted you can’t then plaster the page with big sales driven messages but you can certainly position some of your products and services around the information you are offering for free.

The simplest example I can think of to demonstrate this type of approach would be when I was on holiday a few years back; the promenade for this particular town was a row of about a dozen restaurants side by side, each offering something similar in terms of cuisine, cost and atmosphere.

All but one of these restaurants had two or three staff outside most of the day literally trying to drag you in; they would grab your arm, force a menu in your face and walk in front of you in a somewhat sheepherding motion trying to steer you towards the entrance, it was like running the gastronomy gauntlet.

The very last restaurant had only one member of staff outside and every evening, between 5:30pm and 6:30pm, they would stand behind a small, neatly laid table covered in a crisp, white tablecloth.  On the table were small samples of their food; it was adorned with freshly baked bread, garlic mushrooms and mini bruschetta and these were being freely offered, not forced, to anyone who approached the table to have a look.

Each time someone sampled some of the food the guy behind the table would mention where the ingredients had come from, in this instance it was from a local source and he took great pride in sharing this interesting information with people.

Guess which restaurant was full all night every night?

It was a pretty new development so I’m sure by now the others have cottoned on, but it’s a great and simple example of how you can re-think the way in which you present your business to prospects.

Sure, I get that this may not be as easy or as interesting for your type of industry or product and the appeal for what you offer may not be as far reaching as food is, but it is possible.

This is where the biggest challenge lies; irrespective of what tools you choose to get the message out there, if you can master the art of becoming a resource to prospects and clients, you will see steady and consistent growth in your marketing efforts.

In my own personal view this way of marketing is the way of the future, irrespective of how the marketing platforms may change, the premise of your marketing having to build relationships is here to stay and the sooner you can come to grips with it, the sooner you will reap the rewards.

Final Thoughts

Get to know your clients and you will get to know your prospects; understand what your clients want and respond to and you will understand what to start sharing in your marketing.

Your thoughts, comments and criticism are always welcome, after all this is a blog and everything is up for discussion and debate.

Next Article: Monday 13th August

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Top Tips for Creating an Engaging Website

Top Tips for Creating an Engaging Website

How to make visitors come back but more importantly, how to begin a ‘relationship’ with the visitor

Creating a great website isn’t about flashy graphics, whacky and cutting-edge design or the need to invest thousands of pounds into the development and build of the website.

For me, simple designs coupled with great content will win over complex, over-designed sites that offer an over-whelming amount of choice from the off.

Your website is probably the place where most of your future clients will begin their relationship with you, or not as the case may be, so how do you ensure that you convert more visitors than you lose?

Here are my ‘Top Ten Tips for Creating an Engaging Website’ that brings the visitor back and helps you begin more relationships with more prospects and potential clients.

Top Ten Tips for Creating Great Websites
In no particular order;

1)      Offer something of value to the visitor – This could be free information relating to your product, service or industry such as articles, tips, advice, resource or guides.  Whatever you choose it should make the visitor feel that they walked (surfed) away with something of value, something they never knew before, something that may help them.

2)      Make your site easy to navigate and easy to use – The desire to want a flashy, cutting-edge website with lots to see, interact with and choose from can often lead to an over-designed, complicated website.  Keep it simple and make sure the visitor can find what they want quickly and easily.  Keep the content to the point but offer more for those that like a little more ‘meat on the bone’. 

Use menus, sub headings and headlines; try and help the visitor find what they want in one or two clicks, if they want to read more from there they will click further.  Talk to your web person about dedicated landing pages, optimised pages, anchor links and CSS as these tools may help you.

3)      Avoid large graphics and slow loading video and audio – Whilst these are all great things to include on your site, make sure they are sized correctly or optimised for quick loading.  Slow loading web pages can be a huge turn off so talk to your web person/people and make sure that your website loads quickly.  Only use what you need or have to use and try and balance the look, functionality and content of the site.

4)      Use headlines and sub-menus – OK so I have already mentioned this but it is important; think of you website as a newspaper front page, use headlines and an appropriate number of sections to guide them from the home page deeper into the site.  Businesses often fall into the trap of trying to tell the visitor everything from the home page and we are left feeling confused and over-whelmed with the amount of information being thrown at us.

5)      Begin a relationship with the visitor – Forget about the statistics on how many visitors that visit your site are actual prospects, the fact remains that your website will get hits from prospects and potential clients.  When they get to your site, do they have an opportunity to engage with you, open or begin a relationship with you?  For most this will be done through some form of ‘Content Marketing’, such as e-mail articles, advice, newsletters, blogs, subscriptions, downloads, etc. 

All of these things are effective at opening the door to your visitors, engaging their interest and opening up a line of communication.  Of course you can’t just jump in and sell but more on this in future articles.

6)      Spelling, grammar, broken links and out of date information – All of these are cardinal sins for websites but are so easily left unattended for long periods of time, normally because of the day to day running of the business that gets in the way.  I myself have been guilty, in fact I am currently guilty, of letting my website go for a long period of time without being updated, managed or worked upon.  Thankfully, Bristol IT Company have offered to take care of sorting it out for me so you can expect my new site very soon.   A website that is well written, up to date and accurate will convert more visitors than an out of date, over or under populated site with bad spelling and grammar.

7)      Give the business a personality – In my last article ‘TheBeating Heart of Local Marketing’ I discussed giving the business a personality and through your content, you can.  If you are a local business, give the business a voice and give it a human touch.  With so many online communities, the opportunities for a business to create a community around their own business are sizeable.  Try and engage with your visitors through your blog, articles or downloads; people still buy from people and so give people a chance to share opinion, views or comments and respond to them.  Don’t hide from the prospects!

8)      Track the performance of your website, change and improve it – Free tools like ‘Google Analytics’ are great to give you an overview of the performance of your site.  Whilst it is not an exact science as there are reasons why not every visit will show, it will give you a good enough overview of how people are interacting with your site. 

From this you will be able to see what people like and don’t like, where they come from, where you lose them on the site, how long they spend on the site, what content is of most interest and a whole lot more.  From this you can change, improve and adapt the content on the site until you reach the point that you are engaging and converting an appropriate amount of visitors.

If you are unsure on how to install and use this tool, or you need some help to interpret and analyse the information, then please feel free to drop me a note or pick up the phone and I can talk you through it.

9)      Bring them back – Make sure you have something to bring them back to you or stay in touch with you; this will normally be though your content marketing in the form of blogs, articles, news, events, guides, downloads, etc.  If, what you are writing is compelling and offers something of value to the visitor, chances are they will come back again in the future.  By using an e-mail sign-up box on your website you can capture the e-mail addresses from people who would like to engage with you, now you can control how often you bring them back to your site!  Clearly and as I have already mentioned, you can’t just jump in and sell but more on this in another article.

10)   Invest time and resource into your website – Your website is your most valuable sales tool, it works for you twenty-four hours a day and engages with prospects even whilst you sleep.  Leaving it unattended will soon give the impression that there is nothing of value to come back for and slowly but surely, your visitor numbers will drop off.  Invest some time each week to keep the content fresh, meaning the parts that you can and should update like; articles, blogs, news, events, gigs, promotions, offers, etc. 

If you simply don’t have the time, look to employ the help of an outside Marketing Consultant or Consultancy, or drop me a line.

Bonus Tips

1)      Once your website is live and ready to show off, share it – We all have a network of contacts that would happily post or share the things that you publish or promote on your website; use them where you can and where it is appropriate.  Share links to the free resource on your site through your blog and social media profiles, on your e-mail signatures, on quotes, proposals and wherever it is appropriate; keep them short and to the point and in some cases, subtle.

2)      Promote your site – Get involved in online discussions and through your social media profiles; start with one or two and see how they develop.  Like anything it will take an investment of time and these online relationships will need to be nurtured.

Linked-In is becoming more and more popular and offers a local business an opportunity to get involved with local discussions; regional, national and global discussions as well if this suits the business.  Once again don’t jump in and start to sell, you will need to share views, thoughts and comments and over time build relationships with the people in these groups and online communities.  This topic warrants an entire article so I’ll cover this in a future edition.

3)      Longevity and room for improvement – Once your site is complete and by that I mean it does everything you need it to do, it looks good and it works well, you will probably keep it for two or three years  before wanting to re-develop it.  That said, you may want to continually improve the site, add new features or functions or update some of the content so make sure you have the scope to do this.

Investing in a site with an adequate Content Management System will be a good investment and will pay for itself from the minute the site is live; they also don’t cost as much as you may think.

 

Final Thoughts

My personal over-riding principles for any website are that it is clean, crisp and easy to use.  Offer something of value, engage with the visitor, share something with them, guide them, explain to them and sell to them.  Bring them back.

Your thoughts, comments and criticism are always welcome, after all this is a blog and everything is up for discussion and debate.

Next Article: Monday 30th July

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