Given the popularity and effectiveness of visual content for marketing, it’s no surprise that today’s marketers are creating more and more infographics. They’re a more enjoyable way of digesting statistics, data sets, and timelines, and they can drive more traffic and engagement than plain text.
Even though there are a lot of good infographics out there, there are still a ton of bad infographics out there, too.
Inbound marketers are constantly on alert for changes in Google’s ever-evolving algorithm … but that doesn’t mean we don’t miss one every now and then. The combination of frequent algorithm updates and a busy workload means that sometimes a critical update gets lost in the sauce.
To make sure you’re fully up to date on the latest major changes in SEO, we’ve compiled a full list of the most important Google algorithm updates from 2014.
We marketers seem to like rules. (And when none exist, we’ll settle for guidelines.) Those of us who write about the marketing space appear to recognize this tendency, which is why you’ll find so many benchmarking reports, how-to articles, and definitive lists for marketers.
Some challenges, however, are too nuanced for a binary best practice.
As I interview new candidates for content marketing positions on my team, there is one question I feel necessary to ask: “How will you handle writing for B2B accounts?” What I am really asking is, “Are you OK writing for what may be considered boring topics, and how will you make each piece interesting?”
The truth is, I don’t want to hire someone who will become bored or overwhelmed by the topics we most often write about and jump ship just months after joining the team. The candidates I gravitate toward are the ones who have answers like, “To me, there are no boring topics. It is all about understanding what type of content the audience wants and giving it to them. I know how to sniff out a story, which makes any topic interesting.” Agreed!
There’s no doubt that content marketing can boost your brand awareness and improve public sentiment towards your company and its product offerings. But for you to really make an impact on your business, you need to know whether you’re getting a good bang for your marketing buck — and that means you need to figure out how much you’re affecting the business’ bottom line.
Stock photos are tricky. When chosen or used poorly, they can look forced, fake, or just plain silly. (Just look at the photo to the right to see what I mean.)
But when chosen and used well, stock photos can complement the content on your website, in your ebooks, and in your social media posts.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year for content marketers. This time of year is when you measure your impact on this year’s company goals and uncover opportunities for moving the needle on next year’s.
But when most people run these analyses and calculate next year’s predictions, they forget
There’s no doubt that interviewing experts and releasing the resulting clips can be a powerful strategy for generating traffic and building brand awareness. But just because interviews can be powerful doesn’t mean they always turn out that way. Without some direction, it’s very easy for interviews to fall into the latter camp.
What do you say when a prospective student asks, “What makes (insert your college or university here) different?” It’s easy to tout the low faculty to student ratio or list off a long inventory of degree programs. While these are important, most higher education institutions can proclaim the same thing. How do you show what makes you, well … you?
Have you ever run into an error message that made you smile? Or a website prompt that was particularly clever or helpful?
Every time I read microcopy that shows personality, it reminds me there are real humans behind a website’s or product’s design. It kinda feels like I just shared a private
When you think of all the things that make up a good design, what elements come to mind? Color? Layout? Photography?
Most people often forget that typography plays a crucial role in the success of a new design. With so many choices, choosing the “right” one can feel overwhelming.
The great thing about marketing content that’s mostly text (like this blog post, for instance) is that you can put in a few links here and there if you think your readers would find them helpful.
Did you know that companies with 30 or more landing pages generate 7x more leads than those with fewer than ten? But landing pages don’t convert visitors to leads all by themselves — without attractive and compelling offers behind them, they won’t generate the tonnes of leads for your sales team that you
When I first started to blog for a living, I found it hard. Like, really hard. I always felt like I had writer’s block. It took me forever to write my first article that was over 1,000 words.
And I certainly didn’t feel validated after I hit publish — the posts would rack up a handful of shares and views, usually from my wonderful
