I attended a powerful presentation from Andrew Davis, Tippingpoint Labs at the American Business Media annual meeting yesterday. Although the presentation was geared toward publishers, it’s amazing how many of Andrew’s points need to be executed by non-publishing brands. Here are four key takeaways you can implement now:
- Find the hidden players. Search and find those independent bloggers and thought leaders in the industry and get them involved in your brand. It’s possible that you have assets to offer that would be useful to them. Likewise, it’s probable you can offer a platform to give that blogger additional exposure. Find them, partner with them, and enlist them to help tell your story.
- Make rock stars out of your rock stars. You know who your experts are. Help them set up their blogs and social media sites. Teach them how to tell their story (which will, in turn, tell your company’s story). Take a page from Indium. Look at how they are showcasing their stars. Very powerful.
- Where’s your editor? Yes, your company experts have the knowledge, but it’s likely not all of them can write well or communicate clearly. Hire an outside editor work with them and their content to position them like the pros they are. If you are asking your company experts to share content, you need to give them the tools to be successful…editor included.
- More is better (as long as it’s great and relevant to your customers and business). No matter how much online content you create, it’s probably not enough. More content pages lead to more Google indexed pages equals more ways that buyers and prospects can find you. It’s not rocket science. And, the more content you have being shared by more people will drive more interest in your products, as long as the content is relevant to your business (don’t forget this last point).
Make doing the above a budget priority for this year and into 2011.
3 Comments
Joe,
Thanks so much for taking the time to write this article. I’m such a believer in great content and content marketing and I’m glad you could help re-contextualize some of the salient points from the presentation for your audience.
I posted the presentation and a quote from you on the website today. I also posted the promised ten-things list.
Thanks again for your support.
Here’s the link to the presentation:
http://prezi.com/yo7ziu82whsz/100503_abmparadox/
- Drew
Great summary Joe.
I particularly like point 1. It is so important to make sure you can bundle your content in small packets: images on Flickr, videos on Youtube etc. so that people can grab what they need and use what suits their platform or audience best.
And I’m partial to your point 3. I often think marketers need a good editor. But maybe I just think that way because I am an editor. Your point is clear–at least to me!