Tag : content marketing strategy

The 5 S’s of Social Media Copywriting

Go! Blog Image Templates (900x350) (8)
19Oct

When was the last time you checked one of your social media accounts? Chances are, it was less than an hour ago. Do you remember all the posts you scrolled through? Most likely not. In fact, you may remember 2-3 pieces of content you read at max. Why is this? Has the internet made our attention spans that bad? You better believe it. What’s a marketer to do?

There is literally an ever-growing number of posts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and the other platforms. Every minute, a countless number of new ones are published, thereby sending other pieces downward. This, in a nutshell, is why it is essential to make sure your writing is worth remembering. Is this possible? Absolutely — but you need training. The following five “S’s” are absolutely worth remembering as you attempt to write memorable copy for your business’s social media pages.

1. Short – While research shows that people are reading more, that doesn’t mean they want to read a lot. In fact, the longer your post, the less likely it is people to read the whole thing, much less engage with it. Keep things short. Yes, Twitter handles that for you because of its 140 character limit, but that in no way means that you need to always have 138-140 characters. Say what you need to say in as few words as possible while maintaining an appeasing style.

2. Simple – Speaking of style, it is important for writers to note that you aren’t writing poetry. Keep things simple, concise, and transparent. Readers shouldn’t have to decipher your message, but rather have the convenience of a clear message.

3. Specific – As a marketer, it may be your instinct to create a message that can appeal to as many people as possible. However, social media is about reaching your target audience. After all, every business has a specific demographic audience. Advertising can help deliver your specifically-curated message to the right people.

4. Sharp – Crafting your business’s message is the writer’s responsibility. You need to sharpen your message with concise and compelling copy. Cut away unnecessary words such as adjectives, and unneeded fluff. Directly address your audience, speak about a specific subject matter, and most importantly, provide a call to action such as a directive and a link.

5. Strategic – Finally, you need a strategy. It does not have to be overly elaborate, but you must plan for the future and consult your marketing team on the direction you need to take. Whether you are trying to promote a new product, build up an email list, wish holiday greetings, or direct your audience to a new podcast, you need to figure it out before you hit the keyboard.

Are you starting to get the picture? Social media marketing calls for hard-hitting content. There’s not room for ambiguity or longwinded rants — leave that for your personal page.

Read More

Keywords: The Forgotten Piece of the Content Marketing Puzzle

25Apr

If you are interested in marketing your business online, I’m sure that you have seen the surge in articles heralding the importance of generating original content in addition to having a solid content marketing strategy in place.

Having consistently updated content published on your site is crucial to getting more traffic from social media sites and search engines while creating a power of influence over your visitors.

I’m sure that this is where you might think we would start talking about how to write blogs and market them.  This is not the case.

What I want to talk about here is what you need to do BEFORE you put pen to paper (do people still do that?) and begin formulating your first blog.

Keywords.

With all of the fervor over the power of content marketing, one aspect that I don’t think is stressed enough is the use of keywords when writing your content.  Keywords are how people will be able to find you, your business, your services and your products online when searching for you – plain and simple.

Keywords also help you target the RIGHT market that you want to attract to your business.

Above and beyond this, keywords can make your website a powerhouse in Google (as they play a crucial role in SEO) and when used throughout your marketing materials (offline and online) can create a continuity with your overall strategy.

I have a two step process for keywords – in order to keep it simple and to get you to begin to formulate your first list.

First, write down who your target consumer is.  Then write down what your key product/service offering is.   Now you will have a good idea of who will be searching and what they will be searching for.

Second you want to formulate your list of keywords.  A quick way to see what keywords you are currently using is to use a tool such as Wordle (http://www.wordle.net).  This will provide a good baseline to grow from.

Then think above and beyond what you think “keyword” means and think more about how your target market would search for you on search engines like Google.  Come up with a list of keywords (such as “elders” or “seniors”), or keyword phrases (which are short phrases like “assisted living facilities florida” or “senior memory development”) that you think your target market would use to try to find you online.

Need some help?  Use the Google Keyword Tool (https://adwords.google.com/o/Targeting/Explorer?__c=1000000000&__u=1000000000&ideaRequestType=KEYWORD_IDEAS ).  This will help you come up with some good ideas that are a bit more out of the box.  Also, it will help you with coming up with more competitive keywords and keyword phrases that have high search-ability, but low competition with others in your market.

The point here is to come up with a solid keyword list that you can begin to use when formulating and executing your content strategy.  The more relevant keywords that you pack into your blogs or updates, the more chances that you have in not only showing up in Google searches, but also social media searches for your topic.

Even better?  This can constantly evolve with your business.  I would suggest taking a look at your keyword list every month to see if it needs tweaked.  A great tool to see how your keywords are working for your website (and social media) is Google Analytics.  If you are currently not using this wonderful tool to monitor your website, I would suggest that you install it now.  It is free and helps you see where your traffic is coming from and what potential customers are using to find you.

While the above task can be taxing, in the end it will truly help your content strategy get off and running with a bang!

Need Online Marketing Help?

Fill Out the Form Below and We Will Get Right Back to You!

[ninja_forms_display_form id=1]

Read More
x
Bulletproof Marketer