SHAUN NESTOR

You write two blog posts a week, you send out a couple tweets. Your content strategy is good to go, right? Unfortunately, too many marketers confuse blogging with content strategy. While blogging is an important part, it is just one of many tactics that revolve around the planning, development, and long-term management of content. Here are four important parts of a content strategy: Collaboration Across the Company Like any successful marketing tactic, a strong content strategy comes when you work and align with different areas of your client’s company. For example, if you are working with a software company, you would need to collaborate with the product team to understand…

The big brands have it easy. They start a blog and boom: millions of people read their posts and share them with their friends. They instantly have a blog audience. Unfortunately, it doesn’t come that easy for all of us. Most of us have to build our blog audience from scratch through listening, experimenting, and dedication. And the first couple months of a new blog are usually the hardest. What do you write about when you have no audience? What do they like? How do you reach them? Here are three tips to starting a blog when you have absolutely no audience: Listen, Listen, Listen When you’re just starting out…

Marketers who prioritize blogging are 13 times more likely to enjoy positive ROI. Basically, if you consistently blog, you’re more likely to reap its benefits. But let’s say that’s old news to you. Let’s say you already knew that blogging is one of the best things you can do for your online business. The real questions is: how do you get your blog to the next level? Here are three tips for creating and achieving your blog writing goals this year: 1. Set Realistic Blog Writing Goals Start small and focus on what is possible. If you’re already running out of time in the day to respond to emails or…

We all remember the basics from elementary school: every story should have a beginning, middle, and end. Unfortunately, in today’s content-saturated market, that just won’t cut it. An amazing blog post needs to catch readers’ attention as they scroll through a newsfeed. It needs to keep their interest until the last paragraph. It needs to elicit some sort of action, whether that is sharing the post or signing up for your newsletter. How can one blog post accomplish all that? Here is our ultimate blog writing checklist so you can write an amazing blog post every time: Compelling Headline The headline is not only what will draw people in; sometimes,…

Eighty-eight percent of B2B marketers are currently using content marketing, according to the Content Marketing Institute. There’s no question that we all understand the value of content marketing, but not many of us truly understand what that value is worth; what the content marketing cost actually is. Content marketing is no small investment; it can easily cost thousands of dollars every month. And if you’re already on a tight marketing budget, you may be wondering if it’s even worth pursuing. [Tweet “Don’t get overwhelmed with the cost of content marketing. Instead, create a plan that works within your budget.”] Fortunately, you don’t need to shell out six figures every year to…

What do you think about writing 500-800 words every day? I’m not talking about sending 25 emails or dozens of tweets. I’m talking about cold, hard words on paper. If the idea of writing every day scares you, that’s totally normal. It’s hard to write every day! But the more you do it, the better you’ll become. And, eventually, you’ll be able to hammer out a quality blog post in under an hour. [Tweet “Like any skill, practice makes perfect. The key is committing to writing each day.”] Here are my tips for how to commit to writing every day: Be Strategic About When You Write Your creativity will ebb…

How many times have you inadvertently allowed technology to hurt your productivity, rather than help it? Do you subconsciously check social media every hour? Are you addicted to Google Calendar and find yourself scheduling back-to-back meetings for weeks on end? Do you type the same message over and over again? [Tweet “#Productivity is not about juggling a lot of tasks; it is using tools to work more efficiently”] It’s time to identify these productivity killers and use technology to our advantage. Here are 7 life hacks for freelancers to save time and help you work more efficiently: Set up meeting days and non-meeting days There’s only so much work you can…

As content creators, we’ve been ingrained to focus on web traffic. We write BuzzFeed-inspired titles in the hopes of getting more clicks and constantly bombard our social media following with messaging promoting our newest piece of content, all to get more visitors. However, if you’re giving away all your content for free in exchange for a couple thousand website views, you’re missing out on a serious opportunity: gated content. Gated content allows you to offer something of value (an e-book, white paper, or webinar) to a user only after he or she has filled out a form with some basic information (name, email address, etc). You get to leverage great content to attract potential…

Success in the world of online marketing is driven by hundreds of factors. But, if we boil them down, getting more people to your website is really about two things: Original, Consistent, High-Quality Content Links I’ve talked a lot about generating new content (here, here, here, here, and here). So today I’ll talk about the less glamorous topic of getting more links. Links (also referred to as hyperlinks or backlinks) connect pages on various sites to one another; they are how humans navigate around the web and how we find ourselves sucked into the black hole of YouTube watching videos of cats playing the piano. But links do more that just lead us to time-wasting…

With a strong social media and content strategy in place, getting visitors to a page can be simple. The tough part comes after that, when you want to subtly direct someone to perform a very specific action on that page. A landing page is all about one thing: conversions. The goal is to design a layout with the right copy and imagery to persuade someone to give you something (usually an email address). That is easier said than done, especially when we visit thousands of web pages each day and become immune to clever marketing. While you could spend hours reading about the must-have elements for the perfect landing page,…

Content marketing has had a great year. It was the most important digital marketing trend in 2015 and 70% of content marketers created more content last year than in 2014. You may have dabbled in content marketing with blog posts, videos, or infographics, but let’s make sure it’s a top priority this year. Here are five inspirational content ideas to implement to get out of the rut: 1. Design an Offer: Think outside of a blog post and create a gated piece of content that you can leverage for lead generation. You create something of value (an e-book, white paper, or webinar) and users have to fill out a form…

When you’re doing everything you can to generate conversions and revenue from your website, the last thing you think about is spending money to make money. If you just wait around and hope that your target demographic will stumble upon your website and magically convert, you’ll end up costing your business more money in the long run. Sure, there are many free strategies to attract website visitors, but none can guarantee the same results as paid advertising. Why should you use paid advertising? Here are the top three benefits: Immediate traffic: If you have a relatively young website or create a new landing page, it’ll take a long time to…

As I have said before, social media marketing is really relationship marketing. It stands to reason, of course, that it should be used for relationship-based businesses like real estate. When I first started researching the real estate industry, I was shocked at the fundamental lack of successful, prolific, and strategic use of social media (and inbound marketing, at all) by real estate professionals. Listen, folks, this is not rocket science. This is business science. Real estate professionals should be using inbound marketing, especially social media, to build relationships with people ready to make the largest buying decision of their lives. Why is this not happening more?! [Tweet “Real estate pros…

Twitter makes our lives easy. We know that our posts have to be 140 characters or less, and if we include a picture and a hashtag or two, we should be good. [Tweet “Effective long-form content is ~2,416 words. Daunting as it seems, it is achievable. “] If only content creation had the same parameters. Instead, we’re left wondering how many words our posts should be and if it’s worth spending hours of time on a long article rather than pumping out short, frequent posts. To help you find the best content mix, here are the benefits of both long-form and short-form content. The Benefits of Long Posts Long-form content…

Did you know that, according to HubSpot’s 2015 Marketing Benchmark Report, companies that blog 6-8 times per month generate over 2X more leads than companies that blog just twice a month? Valuable content is the meat that attracts visitors and leads to your company. Making the commitment to an increased blogging frequency should significantly increase your lead flow. [Tweet “Stuck for blog ideas? Consider taking an existing post and updating it with new information; then republish!”] Coming up with blogging ideas can be tough. If you need a little help finding blogging ideas, here is a list to inspire you: Read Industry News Because news is always, well, new, industry news sources…

We place a lot of importance on increasing website traffic and generating leads. We spend time on social media, pay for advertising, and maintain a blog all to get people to come to our site. We test button colors and landing pages to find the best way to convert those visitors into leads. You get a long list of email addresses. Then what do you do? Lead generation is only half the equation; how you nurture the relationship is equally important. Click To Tweet Lead generation is only half of the battle. Once you generate those leads, you need to figure out what to do with them. If you don’t communicate…

Content marketing is everywhere. Eighty-eight percent of B2B marketers use content marketing and it was the most important digital trend in 2015. However, there are still a lot of questions left unanswered. How often should you be blogging? Should you be producing more videos? How does a blog post really become viral? To help you improve your content marketing efforts in 2016, we’re debunking the biggest myths in content marketing: Myth #1: More Is Better Reality: With thousands of new blog posts published every day, marketers can feel pressure to keep up and post something on a daily basis. However, a successful blog has nothing to do with frequency. Quality…

This article was originally published in 2012. Amazingly, it is still accurate. Today’s consumer is bombarded with upwards of 3,000 advertising interruptions each day. Marketing and advertising budgets are being stretched and sales people are working harder. All this to generate a massive amount of noise within the population, but not a tremendous amount of return on investment (ROI). [Tweet “Traditional media is a one-way, one-message horse. Inbound marketing is a conversation.”] Finally, brands are starting to realize social media is a medium to communicate with their customers, but, often, the same traditional tactics are bring used on social media as have been used for decades in more traditional, one-way, methods…

I am hosting a free digital marketing question and answer session tomorrow. Register today to save your spot and remove roadblocks holding your marketing from hitting your goals.

Exercise more. Eat healthier. Take control of your finances. A New Year always signals the onslaught of personal resolutions (some kept, some quickly forgotten), but have you made the time to come up with some professional New Year’s resolutions? The beginning of the year is the best time to reevaluate your business, set new goals, and push yourself out of your comfort zone. It’s time to freshen up your blog, choose quality over quantity, and define success on social media. Here are five digital marketing resolutions for 2016: 1. I will stop using social media without establishing clear goals Many businesses fall into the trap of tweeting or posting on…

It’s easy to attribute increased web traffic or social shares to content marketing. The tricky part is connecting cold, hard sales with a blog post or e-book. It’s a common misconception that content marketing is only good for brand awareness or boosting traffic, but it can also have a powerful effect on the bottom line. Here are three ways that content marketing can generate more sales: Attracts a very specific, qualified prospect Different types of content attract different kinds of leads. For example, you could argue that a company blog is kind of a free-for-all. You may have a very focused blog (let’s say it’s about B2B public relations), but…

“Staying organized” is one of the most popular business resolutions. Whether it’s as simple as decluttering your workspace or as complex as revamping an existing process, improving organization can save you time, reduce stress, build confidence, and ultimately save money. Get a jumpstart on your New Year’s business resolution by creating a social media content calendar. One of the easiest ways to stay organized, a content calendar maps out all social media posts for the upcoming weeks and/or months so you can better align your overall marketing initiatives and help improve accountability by assigning writers and deadlines for the team. So where do you start? Here is our ultimate checklist…