"Our customers … are really the best ambassadors …We want to make sure that we’re connecting with those people when they’re engaging in conversations online and make sure that we’re supporting them.”
– Shannon Hughes, Senior Director of Marketing, Udemy
MarketingSherpa reporters interview more than 250 marketers every year to find out what really works across marketing channels. In this session, Daniel Burstein, Director of Editorial Content, MarketingSherpa, will share how leading brands connect with their customers using content marketing as part of a multichannel strategy based on lessons from:
Udemy’s 43% increase in mentions across social media channels
IBM’s 291% increase in social referral traffic
River Pools & Spas’ 80% conversion rate
MarketingExperiments’ 232% increase in blog traffic
And many more B-to-B and B-to-C case studies
How videos can elevate your Google rankings and improve your EEAT - Benjamin ...
How to Overcome the 3 Most Common Content Marketing Barriers to Increase Traffic and Conversions
1. How to Overcome the 3 Most Common Content
Marketing Barriers to Increase Traffic and Conversions
2. 1. Use a significant offer to attract
attention
2. Ensure you can track from social to
in-store
3. Build on previous success to develop
an audience
Case Study 1: Hesselson’s Sporting Goods Store
Challenge: Small family-owned business that operates only as a brick-and-mortar, wanted to reach
customers online.
Campaign: Hesselson wanted to see how much a small business could benefit from social media by
creating a coupon campaign hosted on the store's existing Facebook page for three weeks.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/Hesselsons
Creative Sample:
Facebook Coupon
4. Coupon
Results:
• A 23% increase in online-to-offline conversion
• Over $5,500 generated in net store sales
• A 1,100% boost in ROI
Source: http://bit.ly/Hesselsons
5. 1. Find weak spots in your program
2. Grow an engaged list
3. Begin building testing strategies
Case Study 2: HomeAdvisor tests personalization
Challenge: For the first 13 years, it was known as ServiceMagic. In 2012, the company rebranded itself to
become HomeAdvisor
Campaign: After developing their marketing team, the first thing they did was onboarding their first
email service provider.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/SherpaHomeAdvisor
Creative Sample: Email
6. Creative Sample: Email test
Source (and more creative samples): http://bit.ly/SherpaHomeAdvisor
Control Treatment
The results from the relevant content test were a conversion rate that doubled and a clickthrough rate that
was 1.5 times greater than that of the control, according to McEwan.
7. Creative Sample: Email test
Source (and more creative samples): http://bit.ly/SherpaHomeAdvisor
Overall Results:
The overall results from this effort across 2012-2014 have been:
• Open rates have increased six percentage points
• A conversion rate increase of 120%
• An increase in email-generated revenue of 114%
Growth in 2013, year over year:
• 59% increase in transactions
Growth in 2014, year over year:
• A 37% increase in transactions
8. Focus on the audience and the message …
NOT THE
MEDIUMContent Callout:
Content marketing is all
about telling a
compelling story.
-Joe Pulizzi
Content Marketing Institute
9. Why content marketing?
Print
Advertising
Social
Media Mobile
Marketing
Direct
Mail
Trade Shows
SEO
Optimization
PPC
Webinars
Email
Marketing
CONTENT
0% 40%10% 20% 30%
10%
20%
30%
DEGREEOFDIFFICULTY
LEVEL OF EFFECTIVENESS
Lead Generation Benchmark Survey
Fielded January 2012, N=1,915
MarketingSherpa
Content Callout:
Content: there is no
easy button.
-Scott Abel
Content Strategist
10. About the MECLABS Institute
MECLABS is a research institute focused on discovering what really works in marketing.
We conduct real-world experiments with companies around the world to understand why
people say “yes”.
Our scientific approach provides the basis for education and training resources that help
create exceptional, customer-centric marketing organizations.
11. Speaker
Daniel Burstein
Director of Editorial Content
MECLABS
@DanielBurstein
Daniel oversees all editorial content coming from the MarketingExperiments and
MarketingSherpa brands while helping to shape the editorial direction for MECLABS
– working with our team of reporters to dig for actionable information while serving
as an advocate for the audience. Daniel is also a frequent speaker and moderator at
live events and on webinars. Previously, he was the main writer powering
MarketingExperiments publishing engine – from Web clinics to Research Journals to
the blog. Prior to joining the team, Daniel was Vice President of MindPulse
Communications – a boutique communications consultancy specializing in IT clients
such as IBM, VMware, and BEA Systems. Daniel has more than 15 years of
experience in copywriting, editing, internal communications, sales enablement, and
field marketing communications.
12. Topics of discussion
1. Overcoming the three most common content marketing barriers
2. How to effectively sell your content
3. How to identify your story
16. What constitutes as content marketing?
E-booksTip sheets Webinars Blogs
Case studiesArticles Videos
And so much more.
17. We don’t want
to give away
our secrets
We don’t want
to give away our
content for free
Three content marketing barriers
We don’t have
time to produce
quality content
18. We don’t want
to give away
our secrets
We don’t want
to give away our
content for free
Three content marketing barriers
We don’t have
time to produce
quality content
26. We don’t want
to give away
our secrets
We don’t want
to give away our
content for free
Three content marketing barriers
We don’t have
time to produce
quality content
27. 2012 Lead Generation Benchmark Survey: Fielded January 2012, N=1,915
Marketers’ expected changes to channel budget
3%
4%
6%
9%
13%
14%
14%
19%
23%
24%
27%
29%
17%
19%
17%
29%
32%
33%
38%
44%
39%
44%
46%
45%
59%
59%
60%
57%
49%
52%
46%
32%
37%
30%
24%
23%
Print advertising
Tradeshows
Direct mail
Webinars
Paid search (PPC)
Mobile marketing
Marketing…
Email marketing
Content marketing
SEO
Social media
Website…
Increase greatly Increase slightly No change
62% Increase
29. You pay with help, you receive attention and trust
Your
Company
Customers
Share of Mind
Trust
Content
Relevant
Helpful
Entertaining
30. We don’t want
to give away
our secrets
We don’t want
to give away our
content for free
Three content marketing barriers
We don’t have
time to produce
quality content
31.
32. Real content
marketing adds
value for the
customer, no
matter the topic
http://bit.ly/19zX8k4
Content Callout:
Be the best answer.
-Lee Odden
TopRank Marketing
33. Real content
marketing adds
value for the
customer, no
matter the topic
We tell potential customers,
‘You know what, fiberglass might not be for you.
And that’s OK, we’re going to figure it out together.’
– Marcus Sheridan
“
“
http://bit.ly/19zX8k4
37. Topics of discussion
1. Overcoming the three most common content marketing barriers
2. How to effectively sell your content
3. How to identify your story
38. How to identify your story
Every customer wants two things:
Eliminate
the negative
Accentuate
the positive
Content Callout:
Content is anything
that adds value to
the reader's life.
-Avinash Kaushik
Google
39. Help women identify new beauty trends
Facebook
395,440 likes
842 people talking about this
Twitter
782K followers
Company: Beautylish
Industry: Beauty
Project: Brand journalism
http://bit.ly/18PBt4s
40. Help people learn about wine
154% lift in organic traffic
50% increase in monthly
email opt-ins
153,535 Facebook likes
Company: Wine Enthusiast
Industry: Wine retailer
Campaign: Product education
http://bit.ly/1tjGlqm
41. Help marketers improve their ecommerce efforts
Help ecommerce
marketers see where
they stand, and
insights for
improvement.
Company: MarketingSherpa
Product: Ecommerce Success Score Survey
http://bit.ly/1vx8P2k
42. Free is not free
Value Cost
The Prospect’s Mind
• What is truly free?
• Every action requires a value proposition
43. The value proposition
http://www.meclabs.com/methodology
Content Callout:
Treat your content
like a product.
-Drew Davis
Brandscaping
1
3
2
Question: If I am your ideal customer, why
should I engage with your content rather than
any of your competitors’ content?
Prospect B
PRODUCT
#3
PRODUCT
#4
PRODUCT
#1
PRODUCT
#2
PRODUCT
#3
PRODUCT
#4
PRODUCT
#2
PRODUCT
#3
PRODUCT
#4
Primary
Value
Proposition
Conversion steps
associated with a
specific product
PRODUCT
#2
PROSPECT-LEVEL
PROCESS-LEVEL
PRODUCT
#1
PRODUCT
#1
PRODUCT-LEVEL
46. But this…
Not this…
Orientatio
n
Small form
Single CTATestimonial
Quantifier
Start Rate
Conversion
Rate
Control 0.73% 0.73%
Treatment – Optimized 10.37% 4.76%
Relative Difference 1,312% 548%
Increase in conversion
Selling free content on the registration page
increased conversion rate by 548%
548%
Even “free” offers require a conversion
49. What are we trying to communicate?
Join the conversationSubmit Comment
50. What are we trying to communicate?
Join the conversationSubmit Comment
4,357 4,278
38 50
0.87% 1.74%
Visits
Comments
Conversion
51. What are we trying to communicate?
Join the conversationSubmit Comment
4,357 4,278
38 50
0.87% 1.74%
Visits
Comments
Conversion
39% Increase
52. Topics of discussion
1. Overcoming the three most common content marketing barriers
2. How to effectively sell your content
3. How to identify your story
53. 1. Familiarize team with new content
process
2. Cultivate key influencers
3. Curate stories for content
4. Optimize course language for SEO
5. Share customer insights throughout
the organization
Case Study 3: Udemy - Join the conversation
Challenge: Udemy was unable to see discussions that were happening on instructors' personal blogs or
those conversations happening outside of the U.S.
Campaign: Connect with people engaging in conversations about Udemy online and identify key
influencers and make sure they felt supported.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/SherpaUdemy
Creative Samples
55. "We felt like we were missing pieces of
conversations or we were missing
conversations entirely, and so that was a
lot of what drove the decision [to change]
was … trying to understand better places
where we had just been missing that
conversation."
Shannon Hughes, Senior Director of Marketing, Udemy
56. Results
Results:
• A 43% increase in Udemy mentions across social media channels
• A 12% boost in positive mentions
• A 35% boost in people engaging with content
Source: http://bit.ly/SherpaUdemy
57. 1. Tell (only) the (verifiable) Truth
2. Purge all vague modifiers
3. Let someone else do your bragging
4. Substitute general descriptions with
specific facts
5. Admit your Weaknesses
Case Study 4: Improving MarketingExperiments Blog
Challenge: January – August 2010, Blog traffic was below expectations for the quality and amount of
content produced
Campaign: Incorporate specific changes to reach a bigger audience base and strengthen SEO using
transparent marketing techniques.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/CMI-Mex
Creative Sample:
Blog
58. 1. Tell (only) the (verifiable) Truth
2. Purge all vague modifiers
3. Let someone else do your bragging
4. Substitute general descriptions with
specific facts
5. Admit your Weaknesses
Case Study 4: Improving MarketingExperiments Blog
Challenge: January – August 2010, Blog traffic was below expectations for the quality and amount of
content produced
Campaign: Incorporate specific changes to reach a bigger audience base and strengthen SEO using
transparent marketing techniques.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/CMI-Mex
Creative Sample:
Blog
Result:
• 232% increase in visits over 8 months
59. 1. Conduct audience and conversation research to
develop the Hub's framework
2. Create a Big Data & Analytics Hub editorial board
3. Determine content types for the Hub
4. Brainstorm how to drive users to the Hub by
rethinking how IBM uses social networks
5. Launch the Hub
Case Study 5: IBM helps people understand Big Data
Challenge: IBM team needed to create a warm landing spot for people coming from those dynamic, real-
time social media environments to increase exposure to messaging and content via social engagement.
Campaign: Development of the Big Data & Analytics Hub – a dynamic website optimized for multimedia
content, search and social sharing.
Steps:
Source: http://bit.ly/1f5DQqH
Creative Sample:
61. Creative
Results:
• 291% increase in social referral traffic
• 151% increase in organic search
• 269% increase in average time spent on the website
Source: http://bit.ly/1f5DQqH
64. Additional Resources
Blog Case Study: Three Lessons Learned from a 232% Increase in Visits
http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2010/08/blog-case-study-increase-visits/
Selling Free Content: Why Seth Godin never gives anything away for free
http://www.marketingexperiments.com/blog/marketing-insights/free-content-value-exchange.html
Content Marketing and SEO: The world doesn’t need another blog post
http://sherpablog.marketingsherpa.com/search-marketing/customer-focused-content-marketing/
Content Marketing: 3 tips for how to get started
http://sherpablog.marketingsherpa.com/inbound-marketing/content-marketing-getting-started/
Notas del editor
In these examples, you saw YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, tools, articles… the key is to focus on understanding how to give your audience the valuable content they want with a good message, and let the medium come into play later. When they started, they might not have known that they would be using a certain channel. In the beginning, it’s all about finding what you want to say, and then how you want to say it.
In our research from marketers around the world, we asked them about what types of marketing are most effective, and also their difficulty. Content was very high with effectiveness, but im sure as you can imagine, it’s difficult as well to pull the resources to put together great content. You need writers, editors, IT support for the websites, social media plug ins and people to promote content. It takes a lot of time and resources to get it right. But, with that said, it’s a very effective tactic to reach targeted audiences, and get them aware of your brand
We hear all kinds of challenges from marketers when it comes to content marketing…
The first is that many marketers say they don’t have the time to do this.
Selling free content must be valuable. Take for instance our event presentations: they run around 30 minutes long, which is a BIG commitment. To help our readers decide if that’s going to be a good use of their valuable time, we provide short 2-4 minute excerpts from the presentation on the blog, and link back to the full presentation…
Selling free content must be valuable. Take for instance our event presentations: they run around 30 minutes long, which is a BIG commitment. To help our readers decide if that’s going to be a good use of their valuable time, we provide short 2-4 minute excerpts from the presentation on the blog, and link back to the full presentation…
I’ve been talking a lot about consumer brands, but this works for the B2B sector as well. Take McGladrey, you probably have not heard of them.
They are the fifth largest assurance, tax and consulting firm globally, and they spend 60% of their marketing focus on content.
The next challenge we hear is that we don’t want to give away this content for free.
But in reality, the only way to do content marketing is make it free. We saw a 62% increase in content marketing budgets projected from our research. More and more marketers are looking to allocate more time and resources into content marketing because it works.
You pay with help, and you receive their trust. Even if they aren’t ready to buy your products yet, they’ll come back to you again and again if you can produce that valuable content.
Finally, another challenge we hear about often is we don’t want to share our secrets.
The thing is, there are no more secrets anymore. You can google how to do just about anything now. Companies are sharing their knowledge about best practices and what they’ve learned. We publish on the MarketingExperiments Blog about tests we run for research partners and share results and what marketers can take away from it. We do this to help marketers, and to also showcase our knowledge on optimization so hopefully one day, they can look to us as experts, and reach out to form a research partnership.
Back to the example with river pools, Marcus knows that sharing content, even if maybe that content leads to his prospects going to a competitor if River Pools isn’t the best fit for them, that’s OK. They are still getting new business from clients and those that interact with him had a positive experience, and will continue to look to his brand for content. Maybe in the future, they’ll come back to River Pools.
Having great content is one thing, so how do you use it to your advantage, and present it ina way that will help customers but also lead to sales.
Here’s a great example of one marketer that sells pools. Normally, they would send out an email confirming an appointment for them to come out and give a consultation.
This works fine, but they wanted to help customers further to help them make a decision. This goes even if the content helps them not decide to buy. Its very transparent, and helps them make their decision no matter the outcome.
As a result of sharing their articles and posts related on buying pools, he found that overall, if a potential customer sees 30 articles, they are 80% likely to convert.
Sells beauty products and makeup online, publishes content on how to use products to their full potential
In 2011
Teaching people about wine pairings, types of wine, buying guides, videos, reviews, ratings, best of lists
Help them overcome challenges, too. This is a special tool we created that was a short survey that told marketers their unique success score, and provided ways to improve it with our content.
It’s not enough to provide free content, and hope people eat it up. You need to sell it, just like any other product. Nothing in life is free. Here on campus, I’m sure you see events or meeting where they have free pizza or cookies or something, but it’s always to get you to attend a club meeting or join a group. You’re paying with your valuable time. You could be studying or hanging out with friends, but you’re here at a meeting for a club perhaps because of the allure of free food.
Same goes for free content. People are weighing not monetary costs, but costs in time. Is this content pertaining to me efforts? If it is, is it useful? Llike the content youre seeing today, it was presented in a free 30 minute webinar. That’s a long time for someone to stop their work, and focus on what we have to say for that long. You must balance the value of what you have with the mental costs. Every action requires a value proposition…meaning
For every piece of content, you need to answer questions like “why should my target customer read this blog post, instead of any other blog post?” or “attend this webinar, instead of any other webinar:
You have to look at the value of the content being produced.
For a lot of free content out there, you must enter in your information to get access. You cannot simply put out a piece of content and expect people to come running just because it’s free. You need to sell it. This is a B2B company, looking for people to sign up and try their free demo. There’s not much value on the page. Why should people take the time to fill in this form. It’s not clear.
They tweaked their messaging. They added a big blue banner that explained what the product did, why it would be useful with the “cut your work load up to 64%,” and added a testimonial of their customers. There was a smaller form and a clear CTA to get FREE access.
So, let’s dive into how we applied this knowledge to our own MarketingExperiments blog. We encourage our readers to interact with our content, not just through social sharing, but also commenting on what we talk about and sharing their own insights. This appears at the bottom of every post, and you can see the button says “Submit Comment”
We have taught many times through our free webinars and our research that submit is a bad word. You are demanding something from people. SUBMIT TO US!
One of our readers knew this, and asked
Hey, you should set up a test, and see if maybe changing the button copy will engage more people. Be more inviting and ask them to share their thoughts.
Well, we did. We set up an A/b split test. Half of the people seeing blog posts on the site would see the normal, Submit comment button, and the other half saw “join the conversation”
And for this, we saw an increase in the number of comments for a blog post,
Which translates into a 34% increase in people commenting and talking with us and their peers.
Support of a vendor
Support of a vendor
Support of a vendor
And finally, the last piece of successful content marketing is to stop at nothing.