Working with a client who needs to develop customer personas, I did some research and found a load of good articles on how to write a customer persona [links all at the bottom of this page].
So far so good.
but on closer reading it’s clear they are all copying each other.
Content Marketing needs quality control
As I read the articles – many by reputable brands like Buffer, Hubspot, Sprout Social – it was clear that when searching for illustrations they had all culled the same images off Google. Over and over.
The authority of the article was not in doubt. They write clearly and the instruction was good quality for beginner marketers who have never created a customer persona before.
More and more blogs and experts are recommending writing fewer articles and making them longer as well as more niche.
The medium evolves [as I shared this week about Instagram videos] and staying alert to new trends is important for B2B Marketers.
But surely brands could actually show some content images which they had created?
The articles looked “bitty” as a result as the templated personas were all laid out differently and were of varying image quality, never mind what the persona description actually was. I thought they were light in quality.
https://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Customer-personas.png9661812Rebecca Caroehttps://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/CAS_Logo_1line_RGB.jpgRebecca Caroe2021-08-10 17:03:182021-08-10 17:03:18Marketing personas lack one big thing
I have a good website and products. My social media marketing is not resulting in sales. Do I need a media expert?
Analyse past sales patterns
My view is that whether your social media drives sales or not depends on your industry and your target audience.
For the vast majority of businesses, social media does not result in direct sales. This is because customers are not in “buying mode” when browsing social sites.
And so here’s a quick check which you can do – share it here as well if you want more feedback.
List all the sales you made in the past month(s)
Rank them by value highest $ down to lowest
For the top 20% by value, write down against each one how the customer came to buy from you
Is there a pattern?
So for example in (3) above – you might say they came from your mailing list, they might be a previous customer, word of mouth recommendation, or walked into your shop or know a staff member.
It may pay to do some follow up calls if you can – or to ask every January 2021 customer how they found out about you and see if the pattern develops in the same way.
Know your customers
From this, you will begin to learn more about your existing customer base. What their patterns of behaviour are and how your business gets its sales.
Now, if you think this type of customer ALSO uses social and might be persuaded to buy from you via that channel, this is the time to review your marketing strategy and see if social media could bring you sales.
The Bigger Picture of Digital Marketing in 2021
Three things for you to check first
The vast majority of social “sales” come from paid advertising or retail shop listings on social sites. So you need to review your margins and your advertising budget for 2021 in your marketing strategy before deciding to launch into social media marketing in a big way. Can you afford to both hire a social media marketing expert and buy advertising on social? Or would your money be better spent on the channels you already have which bring in customers from your analysis in the steps 1-4 above.
Content marketing is more than just “social media”. The things you are posting on your social channels could also be put to use in newsletters, website blogs and in-store. So don’t only talk about social media – go broader to review whether content marketing is right for your business.
Consult experts to get yourself quickly up the learning curve. BUT be cautious about hiring people who have worked in big enterprise firms – a client of mine got badly burned using an expert who just spent a lot of money with only $800 return for their multi-month investment in their services. Yes they did take up references – and you should too. Become an expert in how to brief a marketing agency first – this will clarify what they do and set expectations. Below are links to articles which you should read first.
https://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/jon-tyson-GdczycaOnug-unsplash-scaled.jpg25601920Rebecca Caroehttps://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/CAS_Logo_1line_RGB.jpgRebecca Caroe2021-01-13 09:00:192021-01-12 10:20:53The Bigger Picture of Digital Marketing in 2021
March 1-2 – she’s hosting a table talk on podcasting and blogging for business.
This is a fantastic opportunity to invest in your business and for your own professional development. The conference is for Small business to corporates, from beginners to advanced. Imagine the connections you can make?
What will I learn?
There are 25 Speakers for #SMCNZ19 and topics cover everything Social Media.
Some topics include : Facebook advertising, Communities, LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, Content Strategy, Content Marketing, Branding, Campaigns, Video Marketing and of course Podcasting (with Rebecca).
The two International Speakers are ell worth the ROI alone if you take action on their talks.
If you get a group together, you can get further savings on groups of 4 and 8.
You can book here: https://events.toba.org.nz/events/social-media-conference-2019/
Podcasting is the new Content Marketing
Yes this is true. Like so many other forms of social that I’ve personally used (Blogging, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, G+, WhatsApp, Tumblr, Pinterest, WeChat, Telegram, Vero – yes, I have profiles on ALL these), they start getting used by individuals and then brands get on board.
Podcasts are being started by brands and businesses – I knew they were going mainstream when in 2018 I saw the Economist Intelligence Unit, CapGemini and McKinsey had launched podcasts. I’ve been podcasting since 2013 on RowingChat.
And so if you are doing content marketing and want to learn the 5 pre-requisites for brand podcasting to be successful, come to SMCNZ19.
See you there!
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https://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Newsletter-Banner-Wanita-SMCNZ19-1.png350800Rebecca Caroehttps://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/CAS_Logo_1line_RGB.jpgRebecca Caroe2019-02-16 10:54:362020-01-24 01:45:12Ready to learn Social Media in 2019?
I was reading my Facebook feed and a US based content marketer of my acquaintance posted this request.
“OK, we write blog posts every month for a beach client. We’ve been writing for him for several years and the team is getting a little brain dead trying to drum up fresh ideas. Would love your help. They are a family-friendly vacation rental company (houses for a week, no weekends). Please leave your brilliant suggestions below & thanks!”
I couldn’t resist the challenge – but first, I started to read the answers she’d already garnered from her community.
What did I find out?
That there are a ton of creative folks whose minds are happy to help out when asked.
And so instead of stunning you with my amazing insight, I’m going to reproduce below the long list of suggestions made about what content to write about for a beach client. And show you how you can adapt and learn from this list for your own business content marketing.
How to use this content insight for your business
First, print out this article onto paper (old-fashioned, but helpful for this exercise).
Pick up a writing instrument (mine’s a fountain pen with liquid ink).
Draw two columns alongside the list of articles.
Go though the list and in the first column write down the underlying theme of the article title.
Then in the second column write down what an equivalent theme would be for your business.
Lastly, brainstorm 3-5 topic titles for each theme you write down for your business.
Have you got over one year’s worth of content already?
Here’s how to make the most of your archive and to lock good content into strong keywords and hashtags that convert.
The goal of content marketing is to get your website found, your brand recognised and aligned with the reasons people buy from you. Creative Agency Secrets does local marketing. I have many local marketing keyword phrase-laden articles on our website. So when the local “grease monkey” in Pukekohe (don’t try to pronounce that if you’re not fluent in Maori) searched online for a local marketing agency, we showed up in the list, he called us; we’re meeting on Friday. This is a marketing tactic that works and starts dialogue. And you can do it.
But if you think that ‘build-it-and-they-will-come’ is the tactic, you’re wrong.
You must understand why people buy, what attracts them and then double down on the tactics and topics that already work for you.
Get canny with advanced content marketing
Make a keyword theme map with a few hundred keywords you’re probably not targeting. The keywords should dictate the content you write. Use an independent, non-Google, non-Bing keyword discovery tool like SBI (we have an account and can do this for you).
Now you have that keyword theme map, which of the keywords are on page 2 of search results that could benefit from relevant, internal backlinks on your site?
Also, does your business-model actually need new content? What does any single, new piece of content do for the business? Instead, how about focusing on the 20% of content that is already producing results and instead of writing more – promote that content more aggressively?
Re-purpose the content that converts and share each piece more often also put it into every format (i.e. image square, image rectangle, video, audio, cinemagraph, infographic, ebook, slideshow, podcast guest) to maximise both its impact and its re-useability.
If the location is a very small place that is not overly commercial use the social content which is already being shared by visitors by searching “nearby” or local name hashtags. The smart folks at from Socialize.co.nz demonstrated this to the Paeroa Chamber of Commerce members. They brought up content on social media that tourists and visitors were sharing. This already had the place name tagged on photos and other socially shared content. If local business owners re-shared that content, while tagging each other, they could build up some serious momentum around the town name on social media. And all this without creating any original content at all.
So thanks to Karen, she has helped us write your masterclass on advanced content marketing.
46 Content Article Suggestions for a Beach Client
What to pack (by season, by age of child, when Grandma is staying)
Activities for road trips
Kid friendly restaurants/ attractions
Road trip checklist to make sure your vehicle is road ready
Beach fashion
What to do when the weather is less than perfect
First aid tips
Disaster relief while on vacation at the beach
Books to read on a beach
Local beach walks
Easy meals
Meals using local ingredients and where to buy them
Newest spots to check out this year… There are always new restaurants opening
A feature on Oregon inlet fishing charters… My next door neighbor will be on the newest edition of wicked tuna, on fishin’ frenzy.
The history of the area is also very interesting… And there are a wide array of topics, from casinos to shipwrecks, to boat building.
The different types of architecture you can find out here is neat, too… Flat top houses (there is a tour each year), nags head style cottages (what do each of the different ornamental elements on them mean?), life saving stations, etc
Beach nourishment is coming to the northernmost beaches this year, too. What is beach nourishment? They are dredging sand from the ocean and pumping it onto the beach to widen them.
Top reasons people didn’t go to the beach, but should have
How to make the best sand castles
Top 5 reasons not to bury a sibling in the sand
Food that goes best with sandy fingers
Beat the heat with these 3 things
How to avoid sand spurs
Top 3 things kids really want in a beach vacation
Top 3 things adults really want in a beach vacatio,
Don’t leave___ until you have eaten the____
What NOT to do when you’re at the beach (leave the work and technology at home)
What to do when you want to sit on the beach and your spouse doesn’t
Fun stuff off the beaten path
Volunteer options when you’re staying at the beach (relax and do good at the same time)
Best place to get coupons to save money on local attractions
Do this, not that (places to go, places to avoid, etc.)
Top movies to watch on netflix while you’re at the beach
How to tell if you shouldn’t wear a bikini or speedos
Top reasons to visit in seasons other than summer. There are lots of events in the spring and fall
Sea glass and shells are best found in the winter months
The Secret to finding the best shells and sea glass
Best places to take your kids out to eat
Which restaurants are best for a date night
Art projects for the beach
10 things to bring with if driving to save $$
What to do in the rain
Playing card games for 5-8 year olds
Camps or other activities they can do
Fun community activities if you want to meet others
Where to shop for food
Best source of local restaurant discounts
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https://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/light-bulb-984551_960_720.jpg540960Rebecca Caroehttps://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/CAS_Logo_1line_RGB.jpgRebecca Caroe2017-03-08 17:09:502017-03-10 15:19:02A Masterclass In Content Marketing - When You’re Out Of Ideas.
There are millions of people around the globe who want what you have.
They just don’t know you exist yet.
We just need to stand in front of them. Because it’s not always easy for a guy in Timbuktu, Kalamazoo, Ahipara or Middlemarch to just stumble upon you. But that doesn’t mean they aren’t pursuing their dreams and goals without you.
They have gathered with others, in clusters around the internet.
That’s why Audience Industries created their Clusters Marketing Plan.
Have you strategised the year plan for your business? Your niche topics, your challenges, your product launches? Have you coordinated your social media marketing around these ideas?
But most importantly have you structured your marketing so you’re always standing in front of the people who don’t know you exist now?
Chances are: no. Because we all get caught up in the daily activities that run our business. It’s time to get organized! Where do you even begin?
Start Here –> Audience Industries: Clusters
You need to get your editorial, sales, and marketing calendar all sorted so you can get ahead of new traffic for your business. So gather up your ideas, grab a pencil and your calendar, because with the Clusters curriculum we’re going to look at your business, evaluate who your audience is, how to grow it, and plan your path to success.
For marketing specialists, in-house marketing managers and marketing directors, public relations agencies, digital marketing agencies, full service agencies alike, together let’s etch out your plan, analyse the steps and plot the route. It all starts with you and your business.
Down to the details!
Here’s what Audience Industries will cover in the Clusters curriculum:
Start: What is your audience learning? Who are they and what are they focused on? Let’s mine this info, find partners, and learn new ways to do things.
Module 1: Locate the places and audiences where your message is welcome and put them on your marketing calendar
Module 2: Put all your notes and ideas you’ve made over the years, do the keyword research and trend analysis, and build your launch around them!
Module 3: Plan joint ventures into your schedule for the friends in your business niche and get both your audiences to grow.
Module 4: Find out what your audiences needs and wants, build it and work strategically through your marketing and editorial calendar.
Module 5: Don’t get wrapped up in the wrong keyword research tool. Go after the keywords you can win.
Module 6: 80% of your revenue stems from 20% of your efforts: find out what that 20% is and do more of it to increase your revenue.
Module 7: Plot the offers you’re going to make throughout the year against the demand and be smart about it-put it in your calendar!
Module 8: Put everything together in one place. Make room for lead time, pre-sales, pre-launch, follow-up, upsells and coordinate with your content, keywords, audience, hashtags and offers.
By the time you have completed the Clusters curriculum, you’ll have your editorial, sales, and marketing calendar set up for the whole year! You’ll be ahead of the game, just watching your new traffic take the route you pre-planned for them. Amazing!
If you haven’t been following the Audience Industries digital trail…
THE Audience Industries is coming to New Zealand and we’ve been writing all about it. They’ll be trailblazing their way across the north and south islands, spreading knowledge about how to turn your online business into a revenue generating machine. Four curricula in all, four cities, and eight days to learn how to kick your business into gear online:
Sequoia – the place to begin your website marketing. Suitable for website administrators, marketing staff and newcomers to online and digital communications. [1 May Auckland, 3 May Dunedin, 5 May Wellington]
Circles – audience engagement is the only way to keep visitors coming back to your website. What to do, how to do it and when to do it. Suitable for marketing communication managers, public relations, agency marketers and anyone who has done the Sequoia curriculum. [4 May Dunedin, 6 May Wellington, 9 May Auckland]
Clusters – once you know the techniques from Sequoia and Circles, put it into practice in a strategic year plan. Suitable for marketing specialists, in-house marketing managers and marketing directors, public relations agencies, digital marketing agencies, full service agencies. [10 May Auckland]
Escape Velocity – designed for entrepreneurs and startups, this course pulls together everything you need to drive revenue for your business from online/offline integration. Suitable for both bootstrapping startups and established enterprise who have a goal to grow and then sell their business. [29 April Auckland]
With these curricula combined you can be the CEO of your website. Get your tickets booked now.
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https://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Be-ahead-of-new-traffic-for-your-business-creative-agency-secrets-audience-industries-new-zealand.jpg321845Creative Agency Secrets Teamhttps://creativeagencysecrets.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/CAS_Logo_1line_RGB.jpgCreative Agency Secrets Team2016-04-06 10:00:002020-01-24 01:44:59Be ahead of new traffic for your business
PLEASE NOTE: Some of the details in this article have been rectified per recent conversations with Shuttlerock. These new details are noted below! Thanks for your feedback, Shuttlerock!
We’ve come across marketing software created by a business here in New Zealand called Shuttlerock. It sounds sort of science fiction-y and futuristic – something you might see in a Rae Bradbury novel. In a way, it could be next gen technology in content sharing and revolutionize how businesses aggregate and manage user content to their benefit.
What Shuttlerock does with user generated content…
If you’re a business and have social media channels, have you ever wanted to capture all your customer feedback and testimonials in one place? Sure, leaving it in the platform from which it originated is perfectly acceptable. But, what about putting it in the one place in which your put the majority of your efforts, i.e. your website. Right now, this information has to be collected manually and configured in an appealing way so that your traffic, your customers and followers, can see: Hey! Other people like this product and have gone so far as to say something about it on the internet!
Including content aggregation, Shuttlerock takes it a few steps further
Besides collecting user content for your team to sift through, sort, and put on display on your website, Shuttlerock also helps you promote your brand to get more user generated content. How? Contests and promotions, of course! We know that one of the best ways to get engagement online is to incentivize your followers to promote you and your brand. You can get them to share their visual content promoting your brand and reward them for doing it. If done right, you’ll get a flood of content that you can then share, directly on your site. Not only do you get to share their excitement with your other followers but they’ll also be excited to see that their content is being shared with the world. What better way to encourage and reward loyal followers!
Who is using it and how.
Shuttlerock operates in its home country of New Zealand and now Japan and the US. In recent Shuttlerock news, Lady Gaga used the program to allow her followers in Japan to upload their content to her website. These photos, directly from the source (her fandom), will be collected and used to create a poster for her Japanese ‘Cheek to Cheek’ album. Now, that’s innovative.
What I find interesting about it.
This program puts power into the hands of your marketing team in a way that can really make a difference for the brand. For one, your team can manage the content via apps, as well as share their own related content, which gives the brand a more approachable, human aspect that’s approachable. And, for two, they will have social proof of what is and is not working for the brand that can be shared with upper management. I find that extremely valuable for businesses to really make a dent in their market and bring exactly what their customers want based on their feedback.
The cost.
So, the only thing that I’m hung up on is this bit: the flat fee of $500 per month. For big businesses with marketing budgets that would make you swoon, $500 a month is a drop in the ocean. However we can’t forget about smaller businesses with much tighter marketing budgets – to whom $500 a month is completely unattainable. Shuttlerock, there’s nothing inherently wrong with your fees. I’m just suggesting you have a tiered option for businesses big and small. It could be based on company size, or social media following, even the amount of content that gets shared. Just saying.
UPDATE: From our recent contact with Shuttlerock we’ve been informed that the fees are $5,000 per month and are focusing on enterprises… BUT! they’re currently powering their way through some key partnerships with the goal to, eventually, have options for small and medium enterprises. Until then, we’ll look on Shuttlerock with starry eyes!!
But, way to go!
In a world where brands are continuously vying for attention from consumers, having visual, word-of-mouth content directly from other individuals on your website is amazing. And, as a consumer, seeing that other people just like you or from all the way across the globe also like this particular product, it just makes it more endearing! You want it, seeing and knowing that other people want it and are willing to share their opinions about it, all over the web.
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Return on Investment is incredibly important, and when it comes to soft marketing tools like Facebook and Twitter, it’s easy to think that putting up a link and a bit of text would get your followers from your page to your website and buying. But social media is, and has been, a marketing tool that requires just as much finesse as print, email, and other traditional marketing tools.
So, how can you get better engagement on Facebook and Twitter?
The latter half of this month we worked to promote an international conference held simultaneously in London and Sydney called the Change in the Age of Disruption. The conference was put on by the Change Management Institute, a global non-profit institute. The goal was: increase ticket sales using Twitter, Facebook, and email. Engagement was down and it was time to get them paying attention. Collectively, we came up with a marketing plan for post ideas. People love variety in their content and they love images. Your images should grab their attention enough for them to stop, read your copy (and make it short, because you don’t have a lot of time with them) and hopefully get them to click through to wherever you’re leading them.
For this particular conference, our one-two, one-two needed to have key elements to get followers to play along.
Ask questions to get the audience listening
Offer links to articles that related directly to them
Inform them about the conference, news from and about the speakers
Conference-adjacent information like local restaurants and hotels in the area
Ticket details
After having a bit of a soft start for the first week to make sure we had the right footing, we launched into putting this content up with images we felt could make the audience pause for a moment with us and, hopefully, be more aware of the brand. Once they were aware of the brand and felt connected to it, they would be more likely to want to buy tickets and attend the conference.
Within three weeks time, for Facebook and Twitter, followers increased by 7%
Below you’ll find the Twitter Analytics snapshot from September and October:
Our snapshot for a month-over-month view of Twitter Analytics reflects:
164% increase in tweet quantity
89% in tweet impressions (how many people saw the tweets)
189% increase in profile visits
128% increase in mentions (how many people were using the Twitter handle in their tweets)
94% increase in follower quantity from the followers gained the month before
Overall, the increase in posts and content type really helped to get people interacting, watching and paying attention. For Twitter, using applicable hashtags also helps to get new eyes on your content and this will help contribute to engagement increases in most cases.
Facebook Analytics are a little different and we’ll give a brief overview of just a couple of them. The below graph is a reflection of the increase in visits from September to October.
Visits translates to: someone goes directly to your page. This means whatever content you’re posting and is showing up in their feed (if they’re following you) is engaging enough to get them to come find you. Or, they come in from a Google search or from the social media buttons on your website.
With post reach, you would think that all your followers see your posts, which would be amazing, but in truth only a percentage actually do.
When you’re not boosting your posts, only your followers will see your content. So, when you follower base increases only a little at a time, you don’t see much of an ‘organic’ reach. Organic translates, simply, to the number of people you didn’t have to pay money to Facebook to get to see your content.
And as a quick overview, these were the statistics from Google Analytics for the conference website for September and October. As compared to the month prior, more visitors were returning to the site who had previously visited.
Whereas the sessions, or the length of time a visitor spends on a website, dramatically increased which meant people were finding the content there worth reading and decided to stay a while.
In the length of time spent for the conference, the overall engagement went up significantly!
Without having paid to reach more followers on Facebook or for Twitter ads, you can still see that the time spent creating more posts, using images and graphics, writing short copy and using hashtags with a well-laid plan can really get people paying attention to your brand. And if they’re paying attention to your brand, they very well may end up becoming a loyal, buying customer or advocate for it as well.
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