Without proper promotion and amplification, the effort is wasted.

This doesn’t seem like much of a secret, but apparently it is — because too many marketers haven’t gotten hip: You’re wasting tons of energy and resources on content creation if you aren’t backing it with a sustained, strategic promotion plan.

TopRank’s campaign with B2B telecommunications firm Mitel exemplifies the impact of a thoughtful promotional strategy behind valuable content. Boosted via sponsored influencer placements, their “The Now of Work” ebook reached millions through organic earned media.

Evidence is mounting that provides insight into three priorities that must take center stage if you want your B2B content marketing programs and campaigns to thrive in the modern marketing environment.

Stanford University found that stories are 22 times more memorable than facts. Is it any wonder that, according to the latest Content Preferences Survey from Demand Gen Report, 41% of B2B buyers seek content to share that tells a strong story and will resonate with the buying committee?

Not only does using stories as the framework for your B2B content help make the substance more cohesive, memorable, and shareable, it also – when done well – helps your audience relate and connect to it. “Storytelling is the language of emotion,” wrote Rooster Punk founders Paul Cash and James Trezona at MarketingProfs recently. “When you tell a story, you invite audiences to be in touch with their feelings, to get personally invested and to be swept along in the narrative. Great brands, like great stories, explore what makes us human.”

Indeed, research by Think with Google and CEB showed that B2B buyers are 50% more likely to make a purchase if they connect to a brand on an emotional level.

“Use emotion, storytelling, and soundtrack to grab attention in a way that will resonate with all category buyers and make the most of that earned attention by conveying a message that will link your brand to a specific buying situation,” advises LinkedIn’s Tyrona Heath*, whose B2B Institute has conducted eye-opening research and analysis around the measurable impact of emotional messaging in B2B marketing.

Third-party content can be extremely powerful for planning

When it comes to shifting focus from your brand’s solutions to your audience’s wants and needs, there are obvious challenges at play.

How do you truly know what they care about? How do you deliver legitimate value and add credibility to your message?

According to Lee, the key lies in OPC: Other People’s Content. Tap into existing tools, topics, and experts to elevate your brand beyond its own platform and resources. For example, you can:

• Find topics your customers care about with Semrush.
• Discover questions your customers want answered with StoryBase.
• Identify industry experts on those topics with Traackr.
• Partner with experts to answer buyer questions with Nimble.
• Create an experience combining expert and brand content with Ceros.
• Inspire experts to share stories where buyers are influenced with SparkToro.

Through the melding of your brand’s expertise with respected influencers already known to your audience, you can create easy-to-find best answer content that inspires. Best of all, you can do it in a scalable way.

(Image credit: Unsplash)

As the world opened up upon realization that the pandemic became endemic, consumers began to travel, eat out and socialize again. Some things are forever changed, including a shift to prioritizing a better work-life balance and seeking more meaning in life as employees resigned en masse during the Great Resignation.

This shift has spilled over to consumers seeking more value and meaning in the experiences offered to them by marketers, especially as Gen Z grows older and wields more spending power.

As marketers prepare for 2023, here are 4 key areas of note:

1. Build brand trust with Gen Z

A Bloomberg report from late 2021 reported Gen Z had around $360 billion in disposable income, more than double a 2018 estimate, and that spending power is only going to increase as more of the demographic comes of age and hits the workforce. 

The best way marketers can build trust with this increasingly influential generation is by delivering products, experiences and content that speaks to their preferences and values. 

Some 81% of Gen Z want personalized ads, compared to 57% of millennials and 43% of baby boomers, and the place they trust ads the most is Instagram, according to an Unsupervised study. Celebrity endorsements don’t appeal to this cohort, per the research. Rachel Kirsch, creative strategist at Unsupervised, explained to SmartBrief: “There’s been a shift in advertising to be more inclusive and more diverse to really connect with the modern consumer, and for many, celebrities are the antithesis of that.”

Brand inclusivity really matters to Gen Z, with 76% of the demographic reporting it’s a major factor when it comes to purchase decision-making on social media, according to Sprout Social. 

And if you need more convincing, here’s what one Gen Zer told Forbes: “Brands can do at least two things to best engage Gen Z: reach them through social media and align with their progressive way of thinking.”

2. Stay aware of economic pressures on consumers

One area of marketing that’s recently become more important is providing value to consumers, as rising inflation bites and a potential recession looms on the horizon. 

Thirty percent of US consumers currently feel pessimistic and think the long term economic outlook is gloomy, and that they could soon experience the worst recession of their lifetime, according to McKinsey. That’s the most pessimistic Americans have felt since the start of the pandemic.

Marketers can build trust with consumers worried about their personal finances with empathetic messaging and strategies such as promotions or discounts. Loyalty programs are also growing in popularity as a way for brands to add value, with 42% planning to add one this year and 26% citing first-party data as a major brand benefit, per this report from Oracle. 

“The mindset of consumers is still very cautionary. Inflation is still going to be very top of mind for them,” says McKinsey partner Kelsey Robinson to Fortune of the coming months. 

Marketers should track consumer sentiment going forward into next year and be ready to adapt messaging as the economic situation evolves.

3. Prepare for the metaverse

The metaverse may have been hyped for some time, but with advertising spend in the space set to reach between $144 billion and $206 billion by 2030, per McKinsey, it’s going to continue to be an area of interest for marketers next year. 

Although the metaverse is yet to truly materialize, virtual gaming worlds are one way marketers can practice engaging and reaching consumers as they explore virtual identities and lives. 

A recent report from Momentum Worldwide and the 4A’s called these gamers “the accidentals” – consumers playing games such as Fortnite, Roblox and Minecraft. Interestingly, the research found consumers who visited the metaverse felt more included there than in real life and also reported feeling significantly happier after their virtual experiences. 

“With new options to decorate personal VR spaces, avatars and more, there will be an increased need to generate content for these experiences and allow users to build unique digital identities,” notes Adobe designer Brooke Hopper in a Fast Company article.

4. Engage with short-form video

Social media spend will comprise 18.1% of the average marketing budget by 2023, rising to 23.5% within five years, according to Deloitte’s 2022 CMO Survey. 

Marketers are boosting investment in social media to reach consumers where they’re spending the most time, and the rise of TikTok has shown one sure way of capturing their attention – short-form video. 

The popularity of this content format can be seen in the way other social platforms have shifted focus, from YouTube’s introduction of YouTube Shorts to Meta’s bet on Instagram Reels, even cutting its podcast and audio services and urging creators to focus on short-form video instead. 

“The Reels campaigns that have been the most successful thus far are those that used creative that mirrors the aesthetic of TikTok’s UGC videos,” Andy Taylor, vice president, research at Tinuiti, told SmartBrief. 

The most recent example of this shift to TikTok-style content is Amazon’s internal testing of an “Inspire” feed to display videos showcasing products, according to this Wall Street Journal report.

Marketers who consider these trends as they craft their overall strategies can begin 2023 prepared for whatever comes next in these unpredictable times.

https://contently.com/2022/06/14/7-steps-to-take-if-your-search-rankings-drop/

7 Steps to Take If Your Search Rankings Drop

It’s a situation you have probably faced as a content marketer: You publish a piece of content—perhaps a blog post—on your website. After a while it hits Page One in the SERP. It drives traffic and all is going according to plan.

And then, possibly out of nowhere, that ranking drops dramatically—and with it, your site traffic begins to fall. While this can be disappointing, know that the solution may involve simple fixes or updates that could benefit your content (and your business) in the long run.

Why organic search matters when publishing content

The importance of SEO to a content strategy cannot be overstated. In today’s world, consumers and businesses turn to search engines like Google for quick-and-easy answers to whatever questions or problems they have.

For content strategists across industries, SEO can attract potential customers—whether consumers or businesses—to your website. It’s possible that SEO may even be the primary driver of visitors to your blog or site.

Data has also shown that organic search drives significantly more traffic than paid search. In addition, search engine users tend to trust organic results more than ads, which speaks to the importance of creating quality content that Google naturally finds worthy of ranking near the top of Page One.

Your page’s organic SEO ranking dropped. Now what?

Don’t panic if your search rankings suddenly or gradually dive because there’s probably something you can do to resolve the issue. So take a deep breath and follow this action plan, developed from conversations with three SEO experts.

1. Verify that your search rankings truly fell (and by how much)

There are several reasons why this may happen. Before you take action, benchmark the webpage’s new position from its last-known ranking to confirm that your ranking truly fell.

To confirm a search ranking drop of any degree, you can use rank tracker tools on standard SEO tools (think Moz or Semrush). Also, find additional information on Google Search Console, which automatically tracks your average search rankings over time.

Assuming you know what the ranking was before the drop, you can also search for a relevant query on your web browser using Incognito Mode (which doesn’t track your search history) and see where your ranking now sits. Remember: Google can personalize search results based on your search history, web history, or location, so using Incognito Mode is especially important here.

A drop in page traffic can also signal that a search ranking has taken a dive.

2. Wait two weeks

While an SEO ranking drop (especially on a page that drives a lot of traffic) can be disappointing, the first step Brian Dean, founder of Backlinko, recommends is taken after confirming the drop is to wait two weeks.

“I wouldn’t make any changes right away if you see a rankings drop because, a lot of times, rankings will drop as an update from Google is being rolled out,” says Dean, who’s also the co-founder of the site Exploding Topics.

If the drop was rapid and dramatic, you might be able to trace it back to a major Google update or a technical issue with your website, Dean says. So wait two weeks before jumping to any conclusions. Then, check whether your ranking returns to its original spot or close to it. The change may very well have been temporary. But if that’s not the case, continue to Step 3.

3. Assess the urgency of correcting the issue

If the ranking drop seems legitimate, ask yourself (or your colleagues) how this drop in ranking might impact your business and whether it might eventually correlate with a decrease in sales or profit or negatively affect another KPI.

Start by analyzing the extent of the situation by taking a page-by-page approach: Did a few blog posts on your site receive 10 percent less traffic year-over-year? Or is it a bigger issue, like traffic to your homepage falling 80 percent from last month?

Having as clear a picture as possible of what’s at stake will help you determine the urgency behind correcting it and how much time, energy, and funding you should invest in taking action.

4. Identify the cause(s) of the ranking drop

There are many SEO tools to help you identify the cause of a ranking drop. However, there may be various factors causing the slide, and they are not always immediately apparent.

A big change or update to Google’s algorithm for determining search rankings could be the culprit, so start there. These changes happen regularly. And while the powers that be often announce more significant updates, that’s not always the case for more minor updates, says Eric Enge, who runs Pilot Holding, a digital marketing and SEO consultancy and co-author of the book The Art of SEO.

You can also ask your colleagues whether any major changes were recently made to your company’s website that may have contributed to a sudden or gradual ranking drop. Plus, you can check on Google Search Console whether Google is having any trouble crawling a page or if you’re facing a Google penalty.

If none of those applies, start checking out your competition for the relevant search queries. Did your SEO competitors make any noticeable changes that may have bumped up their ranking to overtake yours?

“If you don’t have some direct problem causing the drop, then you get to a point where maybe you need to improve the content and invest in making it better,” says Enge, who was previously founder at Stone Temple Consulting.

5. Take action and correct the issues

Once you know what’s causing the problem, you can correct the issue. What you do can vary among web pages, so it’s essential to take a page-by-page approach to remedy a search ranking drop in the first place.

While some resolutions may be more technical in nature, the content often simply needs to be improved and updated, says Bruce Jones, an SEO consultant who also runs 1on1seotraining.com. These improvements can take many forms, like getting more backlinks, adding more list items to a blog post, or upping the word count. “Sometimes it might just be little tweaks that might move the needle,” Jones says.

At this step, you may also want to check on SEO in alt text for images, or you might need to address a keyword density issue. Regardless of the steps you take, remember to keep users’ search intent front of mind. What do the highest-ranked pages for a query provide that you don’t? How can you better meet your audience’s needs?

6. Make additional updates to your content as needed

You can also use this opportunity to improve your content and make it stronger, whether for SEO, user experience, timeliness, or overall quality. Dean says this may involve updating out-of-date statistics, adding more internal links, or updating the writing style to better align with your brand’s voice.

7. Keep a close eye on the data

Remember that it could take some time for Google to re-index your page after making changes. “Once you’re done with the last change, set the calendar for a month,” Dean suggests. Then, go back and check whether your ranking improved.

Continuously monitoring your page rankings on Google Search Console or other rank trackers can also be worthwhile. “(The ranking is) probably not going to go straight up,” Dean explains. “But as long as it’s trending up, that’s a good sign that what you did is working. And you might want to already scale that out to other pages that aren’t even affected yet to get ahead of perhaps the next update.”

https://corp.smartbrief.com/original/2022/06/social-marketing-how-to-reach-your-audience?utm_source=brief

(Image credit: Pixabay)

Know your audience then shape your social strategy to reach them on the appropriate platform. This is the wisdom of the ages, as long as I have been involved in social media marketing, which is about 15 years! Yet, marketers or businesses continue to under utilize the correct platform based on their audience. Do you know how different generations are using social platforms and what their expectations from brands may be? The answers are the keys to effective social marketing. To help everybody out, Emplifi just released a decent survery providing new details on how to choose platforms based on age demographic.

A new report from Emplifi, with research conducted by Harris Interactive, offers some insights to help marketers shape their social strategies. 

“Social continues to pull away as the consumers’ choice, and the companies that will succeed are those who follow their customers’ lead and embrace social as well,” said Emplifi’s Shellie Vornhagen in a press release. 

The report answers several key questions for marketers:

Which social platforms do each generation prefer?

Generation X can be found on Facebook, while TikTok and Instagram are favored by Generation Z. YouTube and Twitter have similar engagement across all age groups. 

All age groups prefer to communicate with brands via social media rather than any other channel. 

How are consumers using social during the purchasing journey?

More than 40% of Americans already use social media to interact with brands during the purchase process, and 68% either use or would like to use social media to ask questions before buying a product. 

Some 64% use social media or would like to use it to make purchases and 59% say the same about post-purchase communications. 

Facebook is the top platform for providing purchase inspiration to Gen X and millennials, but YouTube is top for Gen Z, although it also ranked highly across other age groups. TikTok also is a significant purchase driver for Gen Z. 

What do consumers expect from brands on social?

Sixty-two percent of consumers don’t think they receive an excellent customer experience when making purchases on social media, rising to 70% among Gen Z. 

And 52% expect brands to answer their queries within an hour, while 32% expect a reply within 30 minutes. 

The research exposes a gap between customer expectations and reality as 39% typically end up waiting at least two hours for a response, while 20% are left waiting for 24 hours. 

What this means for marketers

The report shows that consumers are already using social to drive purchase decisions and offers insights to help marketers target customers on the right social platforms. 

Perhaps the most significant finding is that all respondents, but particularly Gen Z, want better customer experiences from brands on social media, especially when it comes to response times. 

“Brands need to adopt an ‘always on’ approach when it comes to social media interactions,” the report advises.

We already know Gen Z consumers have a high expectation of brands in terms of personalization and that they want to see inclusive content from brands that involves communities and creators. 

Marketers who combine those strategies with fast social response times could help their brand to become a favorite among the younger generation.

Our lives seem to be an endless cycle of repeat questions at times.

• What is your social security number?
• What year were you born?
• What is your address?

It feels like Wash, Rinse, Repeat. This may be how most business owners and leaders feel when they contact a PR firm or a marketing agency.

The standard set of questions start:

• Who is your target market?
• What is your budget for marketing efforts?
• What goals are you trying to achieve through PR?
• What are the markers of success you monitor to determine your whether your efforts are working?
• What PR or marketing tactics do you use consistently?

However, your marketing and bespoke tailoring may not be so different from each other in several areas.

• Marketing is a custom fit not a one-size-fits-all.
• Marketing requires specific tactics and tools. Bespoke clothiers work with only the best fabrics, seamstresses and tailor.
• Marketing just like bespoke clothing comes in a wide array of budgets. Depending on the level of customization, the budget for marketing increases.

Let’s see what happens when you begin to think of your marketing department, supporting marketing agency or even fractional CMO as a haute couture specialist or a bespoke tailor. Remember, they are trying to determine absolute best fit.

How to Create Custom Fit Marketing and PR

ME: Who is your target market?

You: I just told you. We serve _____.  Why are you asking this again?

ME: I know you told me ______, but after you explained your current business model, product/service, and clients, my guess is that your business may attract _____.  Do you want to attract the target market you mentioned, or are you just telling me what you decided years ago when you started your business?

ME: What goals are you trying to achieve through marketing?

You: I want to make more money!

ME: Are there product lines that are under-producing? Are we attempting to drive traffic to those product lines to determine if they should continue? Or are we just growing your largest profit center even higher? What goals did you set as a company? My guess is that your goals are pretty specific. Just making more money is more generic. I am sure you need certain profit centers to make more money.  What are they? Who uses thoseservices/products? What kind of marketing have you done specific to those services/products?

ME: What marketing tactics do you use consistently?

You: Nothing. That is why we are here! If we could consistently handle our marketing, we wouldn’t need you.

ME: I understand. However, there are probably things you do well. Do you ask for referrals? Does your staff share your Google Review Link? Do you network with certain groups regularly? Do you send out a marketing email monthly? Just because you aren’t doing everything you would like to do doesn’t mean that you aren’t doing something well. We need to know what those things are so that we can build on those and grow your exposure.

ME: What is your most productive marketing tactic?

You: I don’t know. We don’t track that stuff.

ME: Even if you don’t track those numbers, you can make a best guess. How do clients/customers report they found you? Google? Social media? Someone told them about you? They drove by and saw your sign? This will give us a starting point of how current new business is finding you.

ME: What is your budget for marketing efforts?

You: As little as possible with as much reach as possible.

In determining the answers to these questions, we can come up with a custom marketing plan for your business. We can provide custom media placements and spend an alloted amount of time, based on your budget. So next time, you pitch a client, make it a custom approach to win the business.

Susan Nefzger is the owner of a S Nefzger PR, in operation for more than 18 years specializing, in public relations, marketing, writing and executive coaching.

The Instagram Algorithm in 2022

Just an FYI, but there are multiple algorithms at play across the app – with each one tailored to deliver content that it believes will be of high-interest to users.

Keeping this in mind, once you understand how the algorithms actually work, you can tailor your content strategy to work alongside it.

Regardless of whether you have a personal, creator, or business account, it won’t make any difference to how the Instagram algorithm ranks your content.

That said, switching to an Instagram business account does come with its own set of perks — including the ability to Auto Publish your posts with Later. You can add a story or schedule it on Later.

PRO TIP: If you want to improve your ranking with the Instagram algorithm, the best thing you can do is drive as many interactions (likes, comments, saves, and clicks) as possible.

*And by building momentum with your existing community, you’ll soon find your content surfaced to new audiences.*

Here are six ways to improve your algorithmic ranking and reach new audiences:

#1: Consistently Share Instagram Reels

Instagram Reels may be over 12 months old now, but they're still being heavily promoted by Instagram across the entire app experience.

Plus, Reels get twice as much real-estate in the Instagram Explore page – making them a major tactic for discovery and growth.

#2: Encourage More Interactions with Instagram Stories Stickers

Instagram Stories stickers are a great way to encourage audience engagement — and the more engagement your posts get, the higher they’ll be boosted by the Instagram algorithm.

There are lots of Instagram stickers, but the best ones for driving engagement are the poll, emoji slider, and question stickers.

Poll and emoji slider stickers are a quick and easy engagement win, and can work for almost any business or brand.

Question stickers may not be as quick to take part in, but they can be just as good at driving genuine engagement with your audience, which is highly valuable for the Instagram algorithm.

TIP: Include a sticker on your first story for an added boost!

#3: Drive Conversations with Engaging Captions and Comments

Instagram has confirmed comments and likes are important when it comes to feed ranking — so it’s a great idea to encourage as many as possible for your posts.

One of the best ways to do this? Write good captions that drive engagement.

As entrepreneur Elise Darma mentions in our free How to Write Engaging Instagram Captions workshop, including a call-to-action in your Instagram caption can help drive more interactions.

This could be as simple as asking your followers to share their thoughts, double-tap if they agree, tag a friend in the comments, or click the link in your bio.

Want to write more conversational captions? Check out The Ultimate Guide to Writing Good Instagram Captions.

#4: Optimize Your Hashtag Strategy

Adding hashtags to your posts is an effective way to reach more people on Instagram, which means more “views” for the Instagram algorithm to take into account.

And with a good hashtag strategy, you won’t just reach more people — you’ll reach people who are relevant to your business, and most likely to engage with your content.

In a recent Later study, we discovered that feed posts with 30 hashtags get the highest level of engagement on average.

30 hashtags may feel like a lot, but one way to discover new hashtags for your brand is by using Later’s Hashtag Suggestions feature.

Hashtag Suggestions works by automatically finding relevant hashtags for your posts based on other hashtags you use.

All you have to do is know one relevant hashtag, put it into Hashtag Suggestions, hit “Suggest,” and the feature will immediately generate 30 other hashtags, sorted by relevance.

More about Instagram on my next blog for business users.

Feel free to contact me at snefzgerpr@gmail.com for more info.

Twitter Tests Spaces Audio Clips to Maximize Content Creation and Sharing from Audio Broadcasts

As you can see in these example screens, the new clipping tool enables you to create audio clips from a recorded Space, which can then be shared via tweet, with a link back to the full recording.

That provides another way to generate more content from Spaces, and boost interest in your broadcasts. Even though, Twitter is still lagging behind Clubhouse. Clubhouse added the same feature back in September.

Functionally, it’s not a huge leap forward for the format, but as with all social audio elements, the advantage that Twitter has is scale, and the capacity to reach a wider audience with its audio tools.

More people now seem to be using Twitter Spaces instead, and the more that Twitter can build out its Spaces offerings, the less it will receive criticism and/or be dismissed as a Clubhouse clone.

Again, it was Clubhouse that sparked the original audio social trend amid the COVID lockdowns, providing a fresh take on social interaction and engagement. But a lot of that, was also seemingly built on exclusivity, with Clubhouse only available via invite-only initially. Users were turned off due to the irrelevant junk build up, from larger numbers.

Spaces suffers from the same. Tap over to the Spaces tab and you’ll see a heap of crypto and Web3 focused rooms, which, if you’re into those things, could be great. But if you’re not, it’s not the most enticing experience.

Ideally, Twitter would be able to better highlight the most relevant broadcasts to each user in real time, based on what it already knows about their interests due to their engagement in the app, but thus far, it hasn’t perfected its matching. That could still happen, and Twitter should hold an advantage over Clubhouse in this respect, but I’m yet to see Twitter create a great, functional algorithm to highlight the most relevant content in my own experience (see also: Topics, accounts to follow, trends).

As for Clubhouse, it’s still growing in some regions, particularly India, while it recently saw an uptick in use in Russia, where it’s avoided government censorship. I mean, growth is growth, I guess, though not the ideal expansion - but there is still potential for Clubhouse to broaden its footprint by facilitating audio connection, especially in regions where many languages are spoken, and not everyone can write each as fluently as they can comprehend it.

But then again, a lot of its growth does also seem reliant on it not being censored by governments, because it’s not yet big enough to be a concern. Russian officials have tried to control what’s being shared on Twitter and Facebook, as has the Indian Government at different times. If either casts its eye Clubhouse’s way, that could become a problem for the app.

Shopping on social networks such as Facebook, TikTok and WeChat is going to grow three times faster than sales from traditional channels over the next three years, according to a study released by Accenture. 

Social commerce, defined as transactions that take place entirely within the context of a social-media platform, will reach $1.2 trillion by 2025, up from $492 billion in 2021, the consulting company said in the report. The trend is being driven primarily by Gen Z and Millennial consumers, who are expected to account for 62% of the spending. 

The most popular products sold via social networks include clothing, consumer electronics and home decor. Beauty and personal care is also seeing growth, with online influencers playing a significant role.

The trend offers good news for mom-and-pop shops: More than half of so-called social buyers surveyed said they are likely to support small businesses over larger retailers and would likely buy from them again. This may allow new brands to build loyalty and gain traction.

Accenture also found that around 3.5 billion people used social media in 2021, spending on average two and a half hours engaged with it per day. The market for social commerce is far less saturated in the U.S. and the U.K. than in China, where 80% of social media users make social-commerce purchases, according to Accenture.

China is expected to remain the most advanced market for social commerce in size and maturity, Accenture said, with the highest growth being posted in developing markets such as India and Brazil. 

The study is based on an online study of 10,053 social-media users in China, India, Brazil, the U.S. and the U.K. conducted from Aug. 12 to Sept. 3. It also carried out in-depth interviews in those markets earlier during 2021.