How Marketers Can Leverage Partnerships In The World Of Paid Fan Content

25Aug

by Forbes Agency Council | Expert Panel

With the creator economy exploding and social media fans becoming more aware of its lucrative potential, quality user-generated content may not be free for brands to use much longer. In the burgeoning world of paid fan content, merely having their work showcased by a brand online might not be enough of a draw for fans any longer.

As social media users come to realize how valuable the fan content they produce really is to the brands they follow, marketers must focus on building stronger partnerships with these content creators to retain access to what used to be considered “free” user-generated content.

Here, seven members of share tips to help marketers build more effective partnerships with creators to create and leverage paid fan content.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com, on August 25, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

Is Your Blog Terrible? Fix it in 5 Easy Steps

By Christopher Tompkins

24Aug

Content Creation

Look at your online marketing as a multi-layer, albeit unified machine. Your website, email blasts, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and even your Angie’s List page should all work together. But there’s something missing. A blog.

Blogs are what we like to call “semi-temporary content”, meaning that in 5 years one of your blogs could still be useful, but nobody is going to be studying them in high school English class 200 years from now. What they’re mostly useful for is establishing yourself as a thought leader and having a constant churn of content that will generate clicks to your website. In short: it ain’t that serious. But, that isn’t an excuse to have a bad blog.

Before you sign up and start fooling around with your layout, be wary of these 5 BIG mistakes even the most experienced bloggers may find themselves making:

Going in blind. One of the greatest sins in the world of blogging is leaving massive gaps of time between posts. It’s the best way to lose all your followers. The most common reason for this is a lack of strategy. You just don’t know what else to write! While that’s understandable, it’s not acceptable. Before you publish that first blog, get a calendar and plot out a few weeks to a month’s worth of content. Don’t run out!
Isolating your blog. Remember what I said about your brand’s online marketing being a multi-layer, albeit unified machine? Don’t forget to promote your blog on your other avenues. Post about your new blogs on Facebook and Twitter, have a link on your website and spread the word via email blasts. Also, why do double work? If planned correctly, your long-form blog can be broken up into a couple of shorter newsletters, which could then be broken up into several posts – all linking and leading back to your website!
Being a copycat. Yes, everyone needs a spark of inspiration at times and tends to find it by reading other people’s work. But do NOT plagiarize their info. It’s a good way to get into a whole mess of trouble. If you need to reference another article, do so in a courteous and professional fashion. All content is out there to be shared along with your thoughts on it—just be sure to give credit, where credit is due.
Sloppy writing. I’m not just talking about typos or grammatical errors. (although you should definitely check your work. Have you tried Grammarly yet?) Before you hit the keyboard, get your thoughts straight. Stick to a solid plan, get your point across, and keep your thoughts in order.
Readers won’t learn anything. After reading a blog or article, a person should have taken away something from the experience. Whether it’s a new tip or a grudge against the reader’s opinions, your blogs should have an impact. Share knowledge, tips, tricks, and facts. Data always dominates (but make sure it’s correct). Whether people realize it or not, a blog tends to have an educational element at its core.

Are you ready to start blogging? It’s an integral part of a company’s online presence. Not a big fan of writing? No worries! The Go! Agency’s experienced copywriters create powerful and knowledgeable articles for our clients every single day.

14 Key Customer Engagement Tools Startups Need In Their Martech Stack

By Christopher Tompkins

17Aug

Media Mentions

by Forbes Agency Council | Expert Panel

Every startup today needs to leverage marketing technology to be able to grow, scale, build strong customer relationships and keep up with competitors. However, not every startup has a huge marketing budget, and most can’t afford to spend those dollars on consulting fees and solutions that may not meet their needs in the end.

Curating the most useful martech stack for your startup is essential. With so many options available, though, knowing where to start can feel overwhelming if you’re not familiar with all of the different possibilities.

If you could use some guidance in selecting the right mix of tech tools to strengthen your startup’s marketing efforts, the members of Forbes Agency Council shared their best tips to help you determine where to invest your precious resources.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com, on August 17, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

5 Ways to Leverage Social Media Analytics for Your Campaigns

By Christopher Tompkins

17Aug

Social Media

Are you the kind of marketer that posts and goes? Well, it’s probably a no-sweat lifestyle for you, but your strategy is probably plummeting! Here’s the thing: producing and posting the content is only the first half of your marketing campaign. Without any kind of data to tell you what posts are performing and which are sinking like lead, you’ve got no basis for your content.

Whether it is Hootsuite, Onlypult, or the internet insights many platforms offer, doing your research will really benefit your social media attempts. No doubt, this is one of the less glamorous sides of social media, but here at The Go! Agency, we love these tools that allow us to help our clients get the most out of every update, note, and blog we send out to cyberspace. Still need more convincing? Here is what you can expect to get if you decide to delve into the data.

Where? Are you big in Japan? Well, what about Dallas? The geographical demographic side of things is always interesting to study. Every now and again, you’ll find interesting trends, such as a spike of readers in Finland for some odd reason. Hopefully, you’ll be able to cater to the right region. If not, you can improve this by looking into trending topics in the target area and reinforcing them with local hashtags, news sources, etc.

When? Scheduling a post will always make you wonder when exactly is the right time to send out your material. Is your target demographic surfing social media in the afternoon? Maybe they’re night owls and are sharing and liking at 3 in the morning? With analytics from Hootsuite, Facebook, Google, and others, you’ll be able to play Father Time and hit them at the right moment.

How? Just because Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and the others have their own apps, it doesn’t mean people are using them. Instead, people may be using third party software like Hootsuite, Feedient, and Snowball that will allow users to really multitask. Just how they’re seeing your information can be helpful.
Which? Which posts are succeeding and which are failing? Does your audience like news stories over promotional posts? Perhaps they like videos more than pictures, or polls over quizzes? These questions are easily answered when researching your social media accounts.
Who? Are your posts reaching the people you want them to? By using one of the many avenues of analytics, you’ll be able to see who exactly is reading your stuff. This is where you’ll find interesting demographics. Do males or females read, like, share, and comment on your posts? What is their age range? As business professionals know, these are important questions to ask so their product is being presented to the right crowd.

While the most creative part of utilizing social media marketing is writing and designing, the dirty work of analysis can be a real lifesaver whenever you see a dip in followers, or want to see what material is really working.

Why do YOU use analytics? Comment below!

12 Good Reasons To Leverage More Traditional Advertising Outlets

By Christopher Tompkins

16Aug

Media Mentions

by Forbes Agency Council | Expert Panel

The options for reaching consumers through marketing and advertising increased dramatically with the rise of the internet. Subsequently, conventional advertising outlets such as print publications, newspapers and direct mail have fallen out of favor among many brands.

Although it is true that digital campaigns often allow companies to measure the effectiveness of their efforts more precisely, “old-fashioned” methods of advertising can still generate great results for a brand under the right circumstances. To ensure a strong return on investment, it’s key to understand the kinds of scenarios where advertising in more traditional outlets may work well, if not better, than digital.

Below, members of Forbes Agency Council explore 12 solid reasons why brands might consider turning to more traditional ad placements to get the word out.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com, on August 16, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

4 Things You Need (and One You Don’t) to Form Your Brand’s Digital Identity

By Christopher Tompkins

15Aug

Media Mentions

by Christopher Tompkins | ENTREPRENEUR LEADERSHIP NETWORK CONTRIBUTOR

The first thing you should do when you begin a new business enterprise is create your company’s digital identity. Essentially, think about all the places where you will want your future marketing campaigns to lead customers: your website, your Google Business listing and your social media. You’ll need to create all of these platforms before you start considering a marketing campaign.

So, to get started, here’s a shortlist of must-haves to set up before bringing on a marketing team. Look at it like a digital package that’s in your hands to complete. Here are the essentials.

This article originally appeared on Entrepreneur.com, on August 15, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

15 Expert Tips For Creating Effective Explainer Videos In 2021

By Christopher Tompkins

10Aug

Media Mentions

by Forbes Agency Council | Expert Panel

An explainer video is an excellent way to introduce potential customers to your company or a new offering. The goal of an explainer is to explore a problem your product or service solves, then show viewers why they need it and why they should choose your brand over your competitors.

That’s a lot of heavy lifting for one short video to do, but if you approach it correctly, an explainer video can live on your website and social media pages, serving as a virtual elevator pitch for your company. Of course, as consumers become accustomed to seeing explainer videos, their expectations for what they communicate and how are evolving.

To help your explainer video stand out from the crowd, the key is to relay your value proposition in the most succinct and compelling way possible. Here, the members of Forbes Agency Council shared 15 ways to create an effective one that does what it is supposed to do in 2021.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com, on August 10, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

Why You Need to Go Back to Social Media School

By Christopher Tompkins

10Aug

Social Media

Lifelong learning is not necessarily a new trend. As a business owner, marketer, salesperson, whoever, in this fast-moving world it is impossible to survive unless you are able to be malleable and learn new things on a regular basis.

I find this attitude applicable with how a business views social media marketing. I’ve come across so many entrepreneurs, CEOs, CFOs, marketing, and sales professionals who have gone to one social media seminar, or read one social media marketing-themed book and thought they had the game down pat.

But little did they realize that within ten minutes of putting down that book or jumping into the car to ride back to the office after the event, that the information they had just learned was outdated.

Over the past 12 plus years of working in the social media space, I have seen many people and companies fall into this trap of “learning it once, and done.” They hit the social media information circuit hard for a month, and then vanish for life—utilizing all of the tips that they gleaned in that one month of information gathering.

If you want to be successful with social media marketing, you need to be constantly evolving your skills and organically changing your approach on at least a weekly basis.

I’m a huge proponent of ongoing social media marketing education. So much so that I actually created an online social media marketing school (The Social Marketing Academy) where students can log in and learn more about whatever topic they are interested in the most.

From this time I have spent with the students at The Social Marketing Academy I have truly seen a difference in how they approach their social media marketing, due to their exposure to ongoing education.

Whether you are a student of The Social Marketing Academy or not, there are ways for you to constantly stay abreast of the changes and advances that are constantly being made to market your business more effectively.

By focusing on constantly developing your social media marketing knowledge you can expect the following benefits overall:

Being Ahead of the Pack: There is nothing worse than logging into your Facebook Business Page and finding out that all of the image sizes have changed, resulting in your page looking ridiculous. Or how about finding out about the secret time saver on LinkedIn that no one is using…too late so that it is no longer effective. Keeping abreast of social media advances will keep you in a proactive mode, rather than a reactive— which is not ideal for social media marketing success.

Competitive: Allowing your competitors to be privy to effective social media information before you is doing your business a massive disservice. This is public information, that when you stay on-top of it you can implement it quickly. Oftentimes with these tools or tactics, the first-adapters get the highest return.
More Control: By having a clear understanding on an ongoing basis, you will have more control over the design and execution of your campaign. You will know what to anticipate, how to implement it, and how to organically change your campaign for greater success.
Tools and Metrics: As a lifelong social media learner you will get access to major time-saving or cost-saving tools that will help you take your social media campaign to the next level. Ever heard someone talking about a tool that they use that you have never heard of? If you are ignoring the social media news, it could have been around for years…and you could have been using it. Some tools can save hours a week!
Reporting: You will also be able to fine-tune your objectives to be more aligned with what each site can really offer your business. With this knowledge, you will be able to set more realistic objectives, measurements, and report on your results in a more informed manner.

And this is just scratching the surface. I urge you to take this to heart, especially if you dip in and out of following social media trends. Put some time aside every week to learn something new, check in on the trends, and check in with what your competition is doing. And, where would we suggest you start your learning? Sign up for our super informative Bulletproof Marketer newsletter as well as The Social Marketing Academy podcast!

3 Strategies For Dealing With Client ‘Surprises’

By Christopher Tompkins

4Aug

Media Mentions

Picture this: You onboard a new client, the contract is signed, the deliverables have been negotiated and you think you’ve given yourself and your team a fair amount of lead time on producing their content. Then, all of a sudden, a surprise element takes place — a trade show, book deal, a spot on a morning show — and the client suddenly needs their content yesterday. How many times have you been in this scenario?

Surprises happen so often in the marketing world that they shouldn’t surprise you anymore. Clients want the most for their money, but giving them everything they want in this regard may not be the best path forward for the campaign or your professional relationship.

This article originally appeared on Forbes.com, on August 4, 2021. Read the rest of the article here.

7 Ways You Should Be Using LinkedIn’s Advanced Search

By Christopher Tompkins

3Aug

Most social media users only scratch the surface when it comes to navigating their favorite sites. In reality, there are plenty of secret and not-so-secret ways to use these sites effectively. On LinkedIn, for example, the advanced search feature makes it easy to narrow down your list of potentially valuable contacts. So what should you search for?

Well, it depends on what you are after. Let me explain the different basic search categories that you can choose to search with:

All: quite simply, this searches all search criteria (People, Jobs, Companies, Groups, Updates, and Inbox). This is the broadest search and many times can turn up mostly jobs on the first few pages. If you want to dive deeper into this search, you can use the left column which will give you more advanced criteria to refine your search such as Relationship, Company, Location, Date Posted, Salary, Job Function, Industry, and Experience Level.
People: this searches everyone on LinkedIn and is the most powerful search if you are prospecting or looking for specific people to link up with. This also comes with more advanced options such as Relationship, Location, Current company, Industry, Past Company, School, Profile Language, Groups, Years of Experience, Function, Seniority Level, Interested In, Company Size, Fortune, and When Joined. If you click on “Advanced” right under the word “Search” near the top left corner of the page—all of these options will open up in a more easy-to-use box.
Jobs: this category will enable you to search all of the available vacancies that are posted on LinkedIn by companies and recruiters. It will give you the option of refining your search in many ways. Refining your search in this category is very important, as there are a plethora of jobs posted on LinkedIn, so if you are job searching you want to be as exact as you can. The extra search refining options are Keywords, Company, Title, Location, Country, Postal Code, Relationship, Date Posted, Salary, Job Function, Industry, and Experience Level. If you click on “Advanced” right under the word “Search” near the top left corner of the page – all of these options will open up in a more easy to use box (similar to that you will find under the “People” category).
Companies: the Companies category will enable you to search all of the REGISTERED companies on LinkedIn, which means all of these companies have corresponding LinkedIn Company Pages. The advanced search section here allows you to filter by Relationship, Location, Job Opportunities, Industry, Company Size, Number of Followers, and Fortune.
Groups: this is a search that I have taken you through on a couple of previous posts. Here you will be able to find the membership groups available on LinkedIn that pertain to your search criteria. You will be able to refine your search through Relationship, Categories, and Languages.
Updates: this is a terrific, and little used, search by newcomers to LinkedIn. This allows you to search all of the status updates that are made on LinkedIn. These include profile updates and status updates. This gives you refining criteria such as Network, Company, Location, Industry, Time, School, Group, Topics, Seniority, and Update Type.
Inbox: this is the final area where you are able to search on LinkedIn in this section. This will enable you to search your inbox for any messages that are relevant to your search term.

And finally one last search tip: when you are using the LinkedIn search function, use it the same as you would Google, Bing, or any other search engine. So, with that in mind, if you search for social media Florida, you will get the results for each of the key terms (social, media, Florida). But if you type in “social media Florida” or social+media+Florida and you will get EXACT results in any category. This will help laser focus your search.

Isn’t it a relief to be able to narrow your focus and separate the meaningful connections from the deceptive or time-wasting ones? Use these methods to make connections for yourself or your client and you’ll soon start to see your network branch and grow in a variety of new and exciting directions.

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