Marketing Best Practices

Marketing 2.0: Think like a Publisher
By Bernie Borges
Published: January / February 2009

A successful online marketing strategy requires a strong content strategy. It’s not enough to have a good search engine marketing plan and a good website. A content strategy on the web is all about getting intimate with your customers, long before they become your customers.

Let’s examine the types of content we can produce to capture our customers’ intimacy before they even talk with us. Enter a marketing 2.0 mentality.

Build your content strategy by impersonating your prospective customers. Discover the content they find when searching popular keywords in your industry. This research will enable you to learn what content they will and won’t find. Consider some of these content strategies.

Blogging
Build your own blog around a focused topic and staff it with a subject matter expert(s) who is committed to keeping it chock full of good content. Also track other blogs in your industry which cover your topic. Regularly leave comments on other blogs to develop links back to your website on these topics.

Forum
People sometimes confuse blogs and forums. In a forum, the community can create their own “threads” around any relevant topic. Others who join the forum can join the threads and contribute to the conversation. The main value of a forum is providing a platform for the community to engage with each other around relevant content.

FAQ
A frequently asked question section on a website is not a new idea. Keeping your FAQ section up-to-date is important. Another aspect of FAQ is using it as feeder content into a blog.

Newsletter
A newsletter using a marketing 2.0 strategy provides a platform to link to your other content platforms. It can link to the blog, the forum, the website, news releases, etc. If the newsletter is hosted on the website it’s a great way for it to contribute to your SEO strategy when it shows up in search engine rankings.

News Releases
News releases should be distributed online about anything that is of interest to your prospective customers. You don’t need to wait until you ink a big deal to send a news release. Create news releases about the value of your services to your market.

Website
Your company website should have great content that informs your community. Focus your content around the most popular topics in your domain of expertise. Consider building a dedicated website on a popular topic that complements your company website. Co-brand this website, but focus the main theme of the website around the topic. For example, Tampa-based GCA Technology Services has a dedicated website focusing on identity management called www.actionidentity.com.

Video
My favorite form of marketing 2.0 content is video because it allows us to get creative and craft our message in a completely different way that is not possible in the written word. The most effective videos entertain us. Some of the most entertaining videos cover topics that would not otherwise be considered humorous topics. By adding some creative thinking, videos can communicate a message very effectively.

Podcasts
Podcasting is a very effective way to either create new content or re-purpose content into an audio (or video/audio) format.

Photos
Posting photos to your website or social media sites such as Flickr can accomplish several purposes. While it’s not traditional content, it can provide a strong sense of culture and a human element to your company.

White Papers
You can use white papers on the social web by saving them to PDF format and optimizing them. Additionally, discussing the content of white papers in a blog or forum with links to them also help promote the content.

PowerPoint Presentations
Many organizations have a library of PowerPoint (PPT) presentations developed over the years. Many PPT files have content which can be shared with your online community. Slideshare.net is a popular and free social media platform for PPT content. Simply upload your PPT files and Slideshare converts it to a URL which you can share with your community.

An effective marketing 2.0 strategy requires a strong content strategy. However, there are two factors needed to be successful. First, the CEO must buy into the “think like a publisher” way of thinking. Secondly, the team to execute this strategy must embrace it enthusiastically. Content marketing strategies require some out-of-the-box thinking and creativity. Those who do it well seem to have a lot of fun doing it and enjoy their success. They set themselves apart from their competitors and develop trust and credibility with their communities on the social web. They embrace the social web for its best attribute – the ability to deliver relevant content and build intimate relationships with customers before they even contact them, and long after they buy.

Bernie Borges is the founder and president of Find and Convert, an Internet Marketing firm specializing in search engine optimization and social media marketing strategies. Bernie is a frequent speaker, blogger and podcaster on these topics and is currently writing a book on social media marketing business strategies. Bernie can be reached at 727-234-0952 and bernie@findandconvert.com. Follow Bernie on Twitter: http://twitter.com/berniebay.

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