Online Marketing News: Netflix Teaches B2B, Email Benchmarks & Facebook is a Copycat

Tiffani Allen

What B2B marketers can learn from Netflix [Infographic] What could B2B marketers possibly learn from Netflix? It turns out, quite a bit. Namely, that scheduled marketing needs to take a back seat to content that's packaged for consumption when your prospects are ready. LookBookHQ Email Marketing Benchmarks: 4Q16 Average Open, Click, and Bounce Rates A new study from Experian shows that email open and click metrics remained fairly stable year-over-year in 2016, but the average transaction-to-click rate grew by 10% and the average bounce rate increased by 11.8%. MarketingProfs Facebook Messenger copies Facebook’s copy of Instagram’s copy of Snapchat Stories Yes, you read that headline correctly. There is some truth behind all that sass. Last week, Facebook messenger rolled out it's copy of Facebook Stories -- a copy of the story feature owned first by Snapchat and later adopted by Instagram. They're calling Messenger Day. Marketing Land U.S. Digital Advertising Will Make $83 Billion This Year, Says EMarketer In 2017, eMarketer estimates that digital advertising revenues will grow to $83 billion. Leading that charge is Google with about 40% of that share of revenue, followed by Facebook with about 20%. Things are even closer when it comes to mobile revenue, with Google owning 32% of the market and Facebook owning 25%. AdWeek Google’s Share of Search Ad Market Projected to Grow to 80% by 2019 Search Engine Journal reports: "According to research firm eMarketer, Google is projected to hold 80% of the search ad market by 2019. As of last year, Google held 75.8% of the search ad market and this year it is currently holding on to 77.8%." Search Engine Journal Snapchat Receives Poor Grades From Marketers Marketers are reporting seeing low return from advertising on Snapchat. According to a recent study, Snapchat was outperformed by Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Twitter, Yahoo and YouTube. The media platform did, however, outperform AOL. Ad Age Ad Exchange Launches, Aims To Transform Ad Inventory Into Standardized Securities MediaPost reports: "There’s a new ad exchange, and it’s not programmatic. The NYIAX (New York Interactive Advertising Exchange), launched on Tuesday, aims to change ad inventory into standardized securities. The NYIAX will run on the Nasdaq’s technology infrastructure and be platform-agnostic." MediaPost 1055% higher share rate on Facebook native videos Social media analytics provider quintly published a new study which found that users interact with Facebook videos at a 109.67% higher rate than they do YouTube videos, and that users are sharing Facebook videos at a 477.76% higher rate. quintly What were your top online marketing news stories this week? We'll be back next week with more online marketing news. In the meantime, check out the @toprank feed or our YouTube channel!

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March 17, 2017 at 06:30AM

Broad Vs. Niche Content: How to Find the Right Content Marketing Balance

Joshua Nite

“’Cause whether you’re high or low, you gotta tip on the tightrope.” –Janelle Monae

Content marketing can sometimes feel like walking a tightrope through treacherous crosswinds. On one side, you have the need for brand recognition: Followers, likes, shares, all the metrics that make marketers feel good.

On the other, there’s the need to prove effectiveness through lead capture, conversions, and closed deals. These metrics used to be the sales department’s problem. As marketing becomes more data-driven, though, marketers are increasingly held responsible for proving their contribution to revenue.

Sometimes we end up swaying from one side to the other, constantly over-correcting. It’s hard to make forward progress if you’re just trying to keep your footing.

The good news is, once you find the right balance you can quickly pick up speed. You can make minor adjustments to make even more progress. You can attract the right audience and help lead them to a purchase decision.

Let’s take a look at two unbalanced ways to approach the problem, then explore what a healthy balance looks like.

Approach #1: Fill the Top of the Funnel

This marketing mentality comes from a reasonable place. Your pipeline is a funnel that has more people at the top and fewer at the bottom. So the more you fill the top, the more paying customers you will eventually acquire. Right?

So you create content that’s maximized for clicks and sharing. Let’s say your company makes artisanal handcrafted backscratchers. But you see a trending video with a dog jumping into a pool. So you make a compilation video of dogs jumping into pools. It’s a great video and it goes viral.

The problem is, if the content is irrelevant to your actual product offering, you’re hitting the wrong audience.

You can’t ask that audience to take the next step, because they haven’t taken a first step.

Approach #2: Focus on the Bottom of the Funnel

So pulling in a broad but irrelevant audience doesn’t work. Why not take it to the other extreme, and focus on the people that you know are interested in your product? They’re more likely to go straight from your content to a purchase decision.

That means creating content that convinces people your backscratcher is the best. Videos that highlight the hours spent lovingly whittling each backscratching tine. Blog posts about how most backscratchers use fake leather to wrap the handle, highlighting your genuine leather handles.

Anyone in the market for a backscratcher would be a fool to buy any other brand after reading your content.

But how many people are already in the market? How many even know there are multiple backscratching options out there?

Most importantly, how many people with itchy backs will never see your content? They’re not searching “what’s the best backscratcher,” they’re searching, “upper back skin irritation.”

This approach can capture a fraction of your potential audience, but leaves the majority out in the cold.

Four Tips for an Effective Content Balance

It should be clear by now that neither approach is going to keep you moving forward on your marketing tightrope. Here’s how to find the balance that will let you sprint down that rope to your next big goal.

#1: All Content Should Single Out Your Audience

Regardless of funnel stage, every piece of content you create should be relevant to your audience in some way. That means clearly defining who your audience is… but also defining who your audience is not. Don’t create content for people who want the cheapest backscratcher. They’re not your people. Focus on people who are likely to be moved by your value proposition.

#2: Create a High Ratio of Top of Funnel Content

Most organizations have more bottom of funnel content than top—like I said, it’s easier to connect that content to revenue. However, depending on your audience, you should have more top of funnel content than any other type. Just keep in mind the first point: It needs to be relevant content designed to be a first step towards a purchase.

#3: Don’t Neglect Mid-Funnel Content

It’s important to address the area between “my back itches sometimes, but whatever” and “I need a $100 artisanal backscratcher.” The middle of the funnel is where you can provide the most value to your potential audience. You’re positioning the brand as an authority in your industry, providing helpful information, improving your audience’s lives and earning trust. It’s a crucial step in the process.

#4: Bring It Home with Bottom of Funnel Content

In a well-balanced content plan, you will likely create the least amount of bottom of funnel content. That’s okay, because your early content was relevant and your middle content led the buyer further in their buyer’s journey. Now you just need a few pieces that speak directly to your different audience segments.

Each piece should show one segment exactly why your solution is right for them. One might talk about the sustainable hardwood in your backscratchers, another about durability, another might be an industry study on how well different brands of backscratcher alleviate an itch.

Check Your Balance

How can you tell if your content is perfectly balanced? Check your analytics. If you’re getting tons of impressions in search results but no clicks, or lots of page traffic but no response to your CTA, your top of funnel content needs to be more relevant.

If you have a high conversion percentage but low overall traffic, you’re too focused on the bottom. If you get plenty of blog subscribers but no purchases, that’s likely a middle funnel deficit.

Keep making adjustments to better give your potential customers what they need. As you balance your content, you’re likely to find traffic and conversions rising.

In other words, if you scratch their backs… they’ll scratch yours.

Need more help finding your balance? Learn how TopRank Marketing does content marketing.

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March 16, 2017 at 06:30AM

What CMOs Need to Know About Data Informed Content Marketing

Lee Odden

Driven by trends in lower performing advertising and changing consumer behaviors, many marketers have embraced content with the majority of companies adopting the practice.

According to CMI and MarketingProfs 2017 Content Marketing Benchmark report, the most successful B2B marketers spend an average of 39% of their marketing budget on content marketing and 39% plan on increasing spending in 2017.

However, even with the promise of greater marketing performance through content, organizations are challenged to produce a variety of engaging content on a consistent basis and there are a few key reasons why:

• 41% of marketers are clear on what an effective content marketing program looks like
• 36% are somewhat committed or not committed at all
• 75% are minimally or moderately successful at content marketing

What’s missing in the content marketing success equation where clarity is not so clear, commitment is not in full force and most companies think their success needs improvement?

Data.

A study by Forrester reports that companies only analyze 12 percent of the data they have available.

While there are numerous resources available from platforms to best practices, many marketers implement a sizable percentage of their content creation efforts based on something other than data. A 2016 study by Conductor found that 38% of content marketers rarely use data and 45% of B2C content marketers don’t target their content.

When it comes to content, creators are traditionally more art than science and using data to guide editorial planning is still not an advanced skill for many companies. In many other cases, content creators don’t have access to analysts to interpret data in a meaningful way or the tools and training to do it themselves.

Despite these obstacles, an international study by GDMA and the Winterberry Group, found that 80% of respondents believe customer data is critical to their marketing and advertising efforts. Top digital marketing executives agree:

“If you aren’t using data to inform your content strategy, what are you using? Gut feeling, testing, and / or creative epiphany should drive no more than 25% of your content efforts. The rest should be driven by understanding what content is resulting in conversions, assisted conversions, traffic from search and social, and what your audiences are looking for online in relation to your business offering.”
Jolina Pettice (/in/jolina-pettice) Vice President at TopRank Marketing

For some companies most of the available data to direct content creation comes from a variety of sources. There is value in understanding customer preferences through different data sources. In particular, an understanding of customer preferences for information discovery, consumption and interaction while looking for solutions are key. This kind of data insight helps reach some of the top goals marketers have for using data including a better customer experience and optimizing performance of campaigns. 

“Understanding how to use data to drive to the right client conversations has become the most powerful weapon in a marketer’s toolkit.  Using different types of data – intent data, behavioral data, purchase data – is key to driving engagement and building a demand funnel.  We use data for early stage engagement to inform our content marketing editorial calendar and campaign strategy and also to build buyer journeys by successfully converting inquires into sales conversations.”
Tami Cannizzaro (@tamicann) Vice President, North America Marketing at CA Technologies

It can be tempting for marketers to approach data informed content marketing practices purely through applied tactics, without attention to operational considerations. A holistic view from a marketing strategy standpoint as well as how it applies organizationally can create efficiencies for implementation and performance optimization.  

“A data-inspired framework is absolutely essential for modern marketers. To implement this necessity, we’ve fully integrated our content and demand gen organizations, with shared editorial planning and KPIs across the entire customer journey. With these common insights, our teams have built a continuous feedback loop – from topic selection through performance – that ensures every piece of content we create has a purpose and is measured against that purpose.”
Josh Mueller (@jmueller03) SVP, Global Marketing at Dun & Bradstreet

As far as we’ve come with content marketing, many companies still take a brand-centric, some say ego-centric, view of content. When empathy with the customer information journey is not front and center of content marketing planning, there is no motivation to collect, interpret and apply data. Senior marketing executives must make an effort understand this disconnect and implement change and resources in their marketing to leverage insights from data to create better customer experiences.

The role data plays in informing more effective content should focus on goals and measurement, successes and failures. It is the age old approach of scaling what’s working and discontinuing what’s not. That starts with having clear objectives documented for the contribution content will make to marketing and the key metrics used to track performance.

Senior marketing executives leading their organizations to more substantial and measurable returns from content marketing investments must focus on 3 key areas when it comes to content and experience:

Content Discovery:

Understand how the intended audience finds solutions. What do they search for? What social channels to they engage? What publications to the read? What information sources do they subscribe to? What are their influences?

For most companies, data is available to answer all of these questions and when mapped to a content marketing strategy, solves one of the most problematic issues marketers face: reach and engagement.

Content Consumption:

Delivering content to customers in the formats and channels they prefer is as essential as the topics and utility provided. Do your customers prefer video or long form text? Are they using mobile devices, tablets or computers? Which questions will you answer for buyers at each stage of their journey to find a solution?

Marketers must tap into the data needed to identify these content format and topic preferences to create the best experience possible. It is not enough to be found, marketers must use data to understand how to inform and create a great experience for customers with content.

Content Action:

Findable content that satisfies customer information needs isn’t effective for the brand unless it inspires action. According to the goals of the content for the intended audience, marketers should use data insights to understand the triggers that motivate desired actions whether a sale, a share or a referral.

Beyond inquiries and sales transactions, there are many other actions marketers can motivate in customers through content ranging from registrations, downloads, demos and subscriptions that lead to nurturing programs to social sharing and even advocacy to their peers.

Each of these areas can be informed with data. From web analytics to customer surveys to machine learning systems and artificial intelligence, there are numerous tools and resources that chief marketing offices have at their disposal to leverage data for insights that can more effectively inform content marketing.

The good news is that there is a trend upwards for using data in marketing with 53% of survey participants citing an increase in spending on data-driven marketing and advertising in 2016 according to the GDMA and Winterberry Group study.

Of course, to implement a data informed approach to content requires a framework that guides collection, analysis and management.

3 Sources for Data Informed Content Marketing

1. Search and social data. Google Analytics and Search Console, Moz, Brandwatch, BuzzSumo and many other specialty tools can provide marketers with actionable data insights for their content planning.

According to the 2017 CMI and MarketingProfs B2B Content Marketing report,

• 58% use website analysis,
• 57% use keyword research,
• 50% use employee feedback,
• 47% use competitive analysis,
• 44% use social listening,
• 42% use customer feedback,
• 40% use A/B testing and
• 37% use secondary data analysis

to inform their content.

2. Content Platform Analytics. Content Marketing platforms are increasingly integrating an analytics and insight component to better inform marketers about what kind of content is performing.

For example, Curata’s Content Marketing Platform (CMP) blends analytics with an editorial calendar integrating with technologies such as Google Analytics, Marketo, Eloqua, Pardot and Salesforce, enabling users to gain insight into the revenue generated by individual pieces of content

3. Predictive, Cognitive and AI. Predictive marketing solutions like Everstring (client) and cognitive solutions that leverage machine learning and AI like IBM Watson are exploding on to the market to provide companies that have vast amounts of structured and unstructured data to work with, a way to understand patterns, trends and even predict what kind of content or promotions will work best.

A solid content marketing framework that leverages data insights must focus on understanding customers in their journey to discover, consume and engage with content. Brands that master their ability to document a data informed content marketing strategy with clear measurement will be in a much better position to achieve goals in 2017 and beyond.

A version of this article was originally published on CMO.com.

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March 15, 2017 at 06:30AM

5 Key Insights from TrackMaven’s 2017 Digital Marketing Analytics Performance Report

Caitlin Burgess

In today’s changing digital landscape, marketers know that having good data and analytics are vital for understanding the impact of their digital marketing efforts. After all, in order to drive performance and prove ROI, you have to be able to measure what’s working and what’s not so you can address issues and capitalize on opportunities.

While digging into your brand’s own web and marketing analytics is an absolute must, understanding how you measure up to your industry peers can bring more insight and context—something TrackMaven’s 2017 Digital Marketing Analytics Performance Report aims to help with.

To create the report, TrackMaven used its digital marketing analytics platform to analyze a year’s worth of data—including social media performance, blog performance, public relations performance, and website health metrics—from over 700 businesses. The end product not only highlights trends, but also provides benchmarks and analysis of the most effective marketing channels across 13 industries and 39 sub-sectors.

Below we share five interesting takeaways, as well as some tips for using these insights to boost your efforts.

#1 – The higher education industry is killing it on social media.

According to the report, higher education institutions saw the highest social media follower growth across the social media landscape, averaging a 77% annual growth in followers. Of course, engaging social media content was a correlated factor, with the education industry ranking sixth in engagement out of the 13 industries analyzed.

Tip: Get to know your audience inside and out. From my perspective, achieving both follower growth and high engagement is directly tied to knowing who your audience is and using that information to deliver relevant, inspiring and valuable content.

Also, take some time to peruse social pages for higher ed institutions to get a feel for what their strategy is. Are they sharing tons of blog content? Are they highlighting students? Are they asking engaging questions? While your industry may be wildly different from higher education, you’ll likely find something worth tailoring and testing with your audience.

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Achieving both follower growth & high engagement is directly tied to knowing who your audience is.
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#2 – Don’t underestimate the power of Pinterest for B2B.

While Instagram was found to be the overall engagement winner—with 12 out of the 13 industries seeing the highest engagement ratio on that platform—Pinterest is also an engagement driver, particularly for B2B brands.

As you can see in the graph below, for B2B industries such as software and applications and construction equipment, Pinterest is getting more engagement on average than Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

While this little tidbit did not get a special call out in the report, TrackMaven has highlighted Pinterest’s “hidden value” for B2B in the past, saying: “B2B marketers need to stop thinking of Pinterest as a simple bulletin board and start thinking of it as your company’s whiteboard.”

Tip: Most social media platforms are meant for communication, Pinterest is all about providing a place for users to discover new things and ideas, and find inspiration for all areas of their lives. Create boards that intertwine industry-specific topics, as well as boards that allow you to share your own compelling content and showcase your brand’s personality.

HubSpot is a great example of all this in action. With nearly 60 different boards, HubSpot shares fun facts, inspiring quotes, an inside look at their company culture, client spotlights and tons of marketing content.

Some other B2B brands to look to for inspiration include FedEx, IBM, Adobe and Microsoft.

Read: Is Pinterest Still Alive & How Are Brands Using It?

#3 – Brands can take a content cue from the sports and entertainment industry.

According to the report, sports and entertainment brands have the strongest blog content performance on social media, with an average of 12,098 social shares per blog post. Of course, it’s also important to note that these brands are publishing an average of 55 blog posts per month—which comes in second for most posts published after the media and publishing industry, for obvious reasons.

Of course, sports and entertainment brands have one distinct advantage over other industries—timely, newsworthy items pop up pretty often, which gives them interesting content on the regular. But they’re still contending with competitors and news feed algorithms to get eyeballs to their content.

Regardless, for me the report findings still show that consistently publishing relevant, entertaining and valuable content, and amplifying it across your digital channels, is an absolute must.

Tip: Create a content creation and amplification calendar, that also builds in flex time to cover breaking industry news or timely topics that your audience will care about.

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Build in flex time to cover breaking industry news or timely topics. @CaitlinMBurgess #digitalmarketing
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#4 – Website health varies widely from industry to industry.

To assess website health, TrackMaven averaged a year’s worth of Moz Domain Authority scores and ranked industries from lowest to highest—revealing a wide gap between industries.

For a quick overview, Moz’s Domain Authority is a 100-point logarithmic scale that uses more than 40 signals such as total number of links, MozRank and MozTrust to determine the strength of a website. Typically, sites with higher domain authority should fare better in organic search results—something of obvious importance to all brands.

According to the report, media and publishing brands ranked at the top with an average score of 86.23. Ranking at the bottom with 58.35 was the wellness industry. Those industries with scores under 60 get “failing grades” for website health, the report said.

Tip: Take advantage of Moz’s free tools to check the health of your website. Start by downloading and installing the free MozBar to get a high-level glance at what your Domain Authority looks like. In addition, use the Open Site Explorer option to see what quality link building opportunities exist, as well as get the scoop on how your competitors are doing, too. If you want to dive deeper, sign up for a free Moz Pro trial.

#5 – PR is an opportunity for all.

The higher education, media and publishing, and sports and entertainment industries consistently ranked at the top of performance areas in this report—and PR performance was no different. While more press mentions doesn’t necessarily equal more social shares of that mention, it’s clear that getting a little PR only adds to your digital marketing success.

Tip: Start building relationships with key industry news sites and publications, as well as industry thought leaders. Get on their radar by following and engaging with them on social media. When the time is right, reach out to introduce yourself and comment on the good work they’re doing.

Also, if you’re in the practice of sending out press releases, offer to give an exclusive interview with a key player in your organization. Journalists love exclusivity, and this could help you get your message out.

Finally, if you do get some good PR, amplify the crap out of it. If they’ve taken the time to write something good about you, thank them for it. This will also help you to continue to build that relationship.

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If you get some good PR, amplify the crap out of it. @CaitlinMBurgess #digitalmarketing #socialmedia
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Want More Digital Marketing Analytics Performance Insights?

Read the full TrackMaven report here.

How do you plan to up the effectiveness of your digital marketing efforts this year? Tell us in the comments section.

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March 14, 2017 at 06:30AM

10 Conference Hacks to Help You Crush Marketing Event Attendance

Ashley Zeckman

In my career as a marketer, I have attended more events and conferences than I can count. Events (especially those that span multiple days) are filled with so much information and it can quickly become overwhelming. By the second day you may feel that your brain is bulging with new information and you can’t possibly retain what you’ve learned.

Early on when I started working for TopRank Marketing, our CEO Lee Odden gave me a crash course on making the most of attending an event. His experience attending and speaking at events was an incredibly valuable resource for someone like me that wanted to take advantage of the awesome opportunity to attend events.

Below you’ll find some of my top tips for nailing event attendance whether you’re going with a team or flying solo. Hopefully the insights that I’ve been able to provide based on my own experience can help you get the most out of any marketing event you attend, large or small.

#1 – Make A Schedule

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve met someone on the plane that is attending the same conference that I am. One of the questions I always ask is which sessions they’re most excited about attending.

More often than not, they haven’t even looked at the event schedule and have no idea which sessions they’ll spend their time in.

If you don’t plan your sessions out beforehand you may miss out on some stellar sessions. Also, you’ll often find that you may miss sessions you want to see if you haven’t mapped out your day and considered how long it will take you to get from one session to the next. Some events even encourage attendees to register for specific sentences prior to the event and if you don’t, the sessions may be full and you’ll miss out.

#2 – Pack The Essentials

Event days are long. To make sure that you get the most out of the experience, it’s important to pack the essentials for your trip.

Between your laptop, your phone and any other devices you bring, you’ll use a lot of battery life at an event. I mean, A LOT. Make sure that you have all of your charging cords and some spare batteries packed and ready to go. Also, take advantage of the stops in your hotel room to charge your tech. Not all event rooms have charging stations and the last thing you want to do is inhibit your ability to capture information because your computer or phone dies.

While many events offer apps for connecting with other attendees, be sure to pack extra business cards for those passing moments when it makes sense to swap information.

#3 – Use the Conference Hashtag

The vast majority of events will share a hashtag for attendees to use on Twitter. The hashtag can typically be found on the conference website.

Before the event, you can use the hashtag to let others know that you will be attending. Following and interacting on Twitter prior to the event is a great way to begin getting to know your fellow attendees. It’s also a great way to set up plans to meet people in-real-life that you’ve been connected to online for years.

While you’re at the event, follow and use the hashtag to gain insights into sessions you can’t attend and share your POV.

#4 – Attend Networking Events

In order to get the most out of an event, it’s important to find “your people”. Most events offer a variety of networking opportunities during the day and in the evening. So instead of eating your lunch in a corner or snacking on pretzels in your room for dinner, make the steps to put yourself out there and connect with other marketers.

One of the biggest benefits of attending a conference is making real-world connections with other people who have shared interests and struggles that you can learn from.

#5 – Create Killer Content

If our team members are attending an event, you can bet that we will be taking advantage of the many content opportunities that exist in that setting. When many marketers are struggling to create a quantity of quality content, events can give your content a great boost.

Live blogging sessions has become a staple of our event strategy and provides a multitude of benefits including sharing great insights with your online community that could not attend, coverage of sessions other attendees could not be present for and a chance to connect with the speakers whose sessions you covered.

Events are also prime for co-creating video content with influencers and experts. In fact, if you plan and network appropriately you could capture enough video interviews to extend over several months.  

#6 – Sit Front & Center

It can be tempting to grab the seat in the back of the room with extra space for all of your items. But DON’T! Instead, get there early and grab a seat in the front of the room.

Often the speaker will be there early engaging with people in the front of the room so you can take the opportunity to introduce yourself to them and the other people around you.Also, if you plan on taking any photos for content you’re creating, sitting in the back won’t do you any favors!

#7 – Participate in Session Q&A

One of my most terrifying moments at a conference was the first time I stood up, walked to the mic and asked the speaker a question during the q&a portion of a session. While it might not be in your comfort zone, asking questions is another great way to get real answers to your top questions and connect with other attendees.

#8 – Introduce Yourself to the Speaker

If you didn’t have a chance to meet the speaker before their session, stick around after and introduce yourself. If you didn’t feel comfortable asking a question in front of the whole group, now is your time.

Many speakers will also share their slides with you (if you ask nicely) which can be a fantastic resource for live blogging or taking information back to your team.

#9 – Browse The Exhibit Hall

If you are a fan of brand swag, visiting the exhibit hall is a no brainer. But, the hall also offers an opportunity to interact with potential partners, platforms and prospects.

At some events, the exhibit hall can be overwhelming, so you may want to visit a few times to make sure that you see everything and everyone that makes sense for your business. Just know that many of the people working at booths are business development employees so they will try their hardest to show you the benefits of their product or service and sign you up for contact after the event.

Be careful where you leave your business card because they will follow up post-event.

#10 – Share What You Learned

If you take good notes during an event, don’t keep it to yourself! Find an informal or formal way to share a download of what you experienced with your team once you return home.

Typically, our team will develop a presentation that pulls out the most important pieces of information for the rest of our teammates. Try to keep the focus on actionable insights that directly relate to your business.

Upcoming Events Where You Can Find TopRank Marketing

While it may take a little extra effort at first, you’ll quickly find that following these hacks will make you more efficient and improve your event experience.

Lee Odden will be spending the next couple months traveling around the world to educate audiences on developing successful content and influencer marketing programs. If you’re events to attend, be sure to check out Lee’s sessions!

Event: Social Media Marketing World, San Diego
Date: 3/24/17
Room: 28ABCDE
Session Topic: Future of Influencer Marketing: Strategies & Trends

Event: Content Marketing Conference, Boston
Date: 4/12/17
Session Topic: Keynote: The Influence Imperative

Event: Clever Content, Copenhagen, Denmark
Date: 4/25/17
Session Topic: Keynote: Search Marketing in 2017: Be the Best Answer

Event: Epic Content Marketing, Oslo, Norway
Date: 4/26/17
Session Topic: Keynote: Influencer Marketing: How to Create Quality Content & Relationships that Scale

Event: Future of Business, Oslo, Norway
Date: 4/27/17
Session Topic: Keynote: Optimize: Attract & Engage Customers with Integrated SEO, Social and Content

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March 13, 2017 at 06:30AM

Online Marketing News: State of Digital Marketing, New Geostickers & Top B2B Channels

Tiffani Allen

SEJ Annual Report: State of Digital Marketing 2017 Search Engine Journal conducted their annual study and found some fascinating statistics. For example, 42% of respondents allocate almost all of their digital budget to PPC and display advertising, and 62% of marketers surveyed listed Facebook as their preferred social platform. Search Engine Journal New Geostickers in Instagram Stories for New York City and Jakarta If you are using Instagram in New York or Jakarta, you may have noticed a new feature - Geostickers. When you take a photo, you can click on the sticker icon and the Geostickers will appear. This is coming from a long line of changes Instagram is making that look -- probably non-coincidentally -- a lot like Snapchat. Instagram The Top Digital Channels for Generating B2B Leads New research from DemandWave showed that 95% of B2B marketers are using social media, 93% are using email and 91% are using organic. Interestingly, 73% said email was their top driver of leads, followed by 70% who said organic and 55% that said social media. MarketingProfs Facebook Is Giving All Advertisers Cross-Platform Stats in Its Latest Push for Transparency Facebook's measurement department, comprised of some of the old Atlas team, has created a measurement dashboard that allows marketers to see cross-network stats to help them analyze their Facebook and Instagram campaigns, along with ads that run on Facebook's publisher partner sites. AdWeek Prove Your Impact: The 2017 Digital Marketing Analytics Performance Report A new study from TrackMaven shows insights into social network engagement and audiences, top-of-funnel blog content, PR performance, and overall website health by industry. TrackMaven Google rolls out free Data Studio globally, improves filters & other features Marketing Land reports: Google has now rolled out the free version of its reporting tool, Data Studio, globally and made several improvements to the tool, including filters and analytics segments." Marketing Land Twitter Hears Advertisers: 'We Want to Buy Like We Do on TV' According to Advertising Age, "Twitter is now offering some advertisers guarantees on video ads, a step of maturation for the company that makes its ad product similar to a TV-style buy." Pre-roll ads will be counted according to Media Ratings Council standards, and Integral Ad Science and third parties like it are confirming the results. Ad Age A new Google tool actually lets you search videos for specific objects Google released their new Cloud Video Intelligence tool that allows users to search one or more videos using keywords and get a list of results that detail where in the video you can find objects relevant to your search. Mashable What were your top news stories of this week? We'll be back next week with more top online marketing news stories! Have something to share? Tweet it to @toprank.

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March 10, 2017 at 06:30AM

How to Thrive in the Post Digital World

Lee Odden

When I first heard Eric Yale from Forrester suggest at the Digital Summit conference that we live in a post digital world, I have to admit. I thought he was a bit nuts. Or just being sensational.

I was wrong.

If you’re thinking the same thing, here’s a rundown of what Eric said to provide some clarity.

In today’s marketing world, it is increasingly important for brand and consumer interactions to be frictionless, anticipatory and immersive. This is what customers expect and in a post digital world, it’s what brands need to deliver.

To understand what this means for marketing, Eric suggested that there are three fundamental reasons we are “post digital”.

First, customers are entitled. With the proliferation of digital devices, customers have huge expectations from brands. The evolution of this expectation is centered in the growth of always addressable customers – that is, customers who use more than three devices from multiple physical locations to connect with a brand. These customers expect to see the right message in the right place at the right time. In 2011 it was 51% of US online adults and in 2016 that number has grown to 67%.

Second, the digital distinction has dissolved. It’s no longer about what’s digital and what’s not.

With 59% of consumers using mobile phones while shopping in a retail store, companies are beginning to experiment in ways that integrate mobile with physical. For example, digital dressing rooms in brick and mortar stores.

Third, digital insights fuel business strategy. Digital insights are being used to inform marketing as well as overall business strategy across the enterprise.

For example, Royal Caribbean’s digital bracelet streamlines onboarding and allows payment at stores on the ship. And John Hancock uses private Fitbits that collect data which can affect customer insurance pricing.

So, what does post digital marketing look like?

Eric says it’s about doing what you say – making good on your brand promise online and offline. It’s about making sure the customer has a great experience across the spectrum. It’s about a shift in thinking.

Think of it this way: Instead of wondering what media you should buy, think about how you can solve customer problems. Or, instead of thinking only about what offer will drive a customer purchase, think about how you can reduce the stress of your customer’s decision process.

This shift in perspective is important because legacy marketing manners don’t work any more:

• 85% of consumers say advertising has little or no influence on their decisions
• 43% of marketers still don’t know what marketing actually works

To change your mindset, you have to think about what marketing actually is and reimagine the marketing function and your role within it. Also, think about how you participate in the rest of your company.

To break it down, Eric, offered three rules for post-digital marketing:

1. Be human. Use empathy to understand your customers and their experience. Be anticipatory in your efforts to serve customers and solve their problems.
2. Be helpful. Focus on solving problems for your customers, not just selling products. For example, Staples turned the Easy Button into an app you can easily talk to to order office supplies. OpenTable is smart enough to send reminders to book a reservation for Valentine’s day before the Super Bowl.
3. Be handy. Understanding and optimizing the customer experience is key to a frictionless solution. For example, Marriott launched their app for mobile check-ins and added the ability for hotel guests to make front desk requests from the app. After evaluating the most frequent types of calls to the front desk,  they made it possible to easily accomplish those asks through the app – from toiletries to more towels.

Eric says the post digital world is already here – even if you’re still in the midst of digital transformation. A post-digital perspective might require a new mindset from legacy thinking, but with core rules like “be human”, “be helpful” and “be handy”, I think we can agree they are fundamental and certainly doable for most companies.

Eric Yale @ericyale is Senior Consultant, Marketing and Strategy Practice at Forrester.

If you are in the Los Angeles area April 4-5th, be sure to check out the next Digital Summit conference (#DSLA)

Beverly Jackson of MGM will be giving the opening keynote and there will be a lunchtime interview keynote with Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple. For my part, I will be giving a closing keynote about the future of influencer marketing. There are many other top notch speakers presenting as well from Facebook, Pinterest, Google, LinkedIn, BET Networks, Adobe, Forbes, The Economist, AOL, BMC Software, MIT, Wells Fargo, The Onion and many more. Digital Summit is a can’t miss conference.

Check out the DSLA website for the full agenda.

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March 09, 2017 at 06:09AM

8 Important Questions Your Social Media Marketing Strategy Must Answer

Caitlin Burgess

Social media has become a necessary and important marketing tactic for nearly every business, helping brands and marketers build brand awareness, share and interact with customers and prospects, and create another vital touch point in the evolving customer journey.

But as the social media landscape continues to evolve, competition for audience attention is stiff. In fact, 40% of marketers say social media marketing has become more difficult for them in the last year, according to Social Media Examiner’s 2016 Industry Report. As a result, many brands and marketers feel their social media marketing strategy needs to incorporate a little bit of everything to compete.

However, adding more channels and tactics to your strategy isn’t sustainable, let alone the key to getting the growth, engagement and ROI you’re looking for. The real key is crafting a social media marketing strategy that strikes a balance between your audience’s needs and your brand’s unique business goals.

And in order to create the perfectly balanced strategy, there are some critical questions you must be able to answer. Below we outline nine questions that can help guide your creation efforts.

#1 – How does my social media strategy fit within my overall digital marketing strategy?

Your social media marketing efforts should not be siloed. They should be an integral part of your overall digital marketing strategy—from helping curate content ideas to building brand awareness to engaging with influencers.

Tip: Use your digital marketing strategy as a roadmap for determining how social media can support your overall objectives, as well as individual campaigns or projects.

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Your #socialmediamarketing efforts should not be siloed. @CaitlinMBurgess
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#2- What is my objective?

Simply put, there can be no strategy if there’s no end goal. Your objectives are the foundation of your strategy, guiding every decision and tactic that comes next.

Tip: Whether you want to increase your number of followers, boost referral traffic to your website, foster engagement or drive more conversions, set goals that can be measured. In addition, set benchmark goals so you can gauge the success of your efforts as you go so you can put more effort behind what’s working and improve what’s not.

#3 – How will I measure effectiveness or results?

Once you have your objectives, you have to determine how you’ll know if you’ve actually achieved them in a meaningful way. As mentioned above, your goals should be measureable. However, you’ll need to interpret the data you collect to get an accurate view.

Tip: Go beyond high-level metrics. For example, if one of your objectives is to increase website traffic, don’t just look at overall social referral traffic to gauge success. Dig deeper to understand how those visitors are interacting with your content once they get there. Some things to consider are top performing pages, time spent on page, the average number of pages visited and conversions.

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Go beyond high-level metrics to determine the effectiveness of #socialmediamarketing. @CaitlinMBurgess
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#4 – Who is my audience?

If you want to build rapport and provide your audience with relevant content and discussion, you need to understand their interests, motivations and pain points, as well as which platforms they’re utilizing most.

Tip: Get started by defining who your ideal customer is by creating a customer persona, which is a general representation of who your target customer/follower is. Get in touch with your sales team to gather direct insights, and dig into your website analytics to learn which channels are driving the most traffic and engagement. In addition, use the insights and analytics options within social platforms to see when and how your followers are engaging with your content.

The goal here is to uncover which social channels are best for reaching your target audience, as well as what topics, content types and discussions are most relevant.

#5 – What type of content does my audience consume on social?

In today’s social media environment, simply sharing links to your company website or blog with a bit of text will not drive your objectives.

Tip: Use the audience insights you’ve gained from your work to create customer personas to create a plan including the appropriate mix of images, videos, links and discussion starters that connect to your audience’s topical interests and information needs.

#6 – What do I want my followers to know about my brand?

Social media gives your brand the opportunity to show people who you are and the value your offer, not just what you sell. Is your brand focused on innovation? Is your amazing corporate culture something that sets you apart from the competition?

Tip: Tell your company’s story. Develop a brand voice that brings a human element and personality to your social media pages. Leave the jargon and sales pitches behind, and talk to people on their level.

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Develop a brand voice that brings a human element & personality to your #socialmedia pages.
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#7 – How often will I engage on each channel?

Consistency is key to fostering continued engagement on your social channels. But that doesn’t mean you have to post 10 times a day on each channel. Ultimately, you want to be a regular fixture in news feeds, but not overwhelm your audience.

Tip: Develop a daily, weekly or monthly plan or schedule that details when, where, what and how you’ll be posting. Below is an example of what your template could look like.

#8 – How will I execute my strategy?

All your research and planning will be for nothing if you haven’t defined the tactics, tools and resources you’ll need to execute.

Tip: Combine your social media strategy with your other digital and content marketing efforts to create a tactical mix that speaks to your audience. Some tactics that you could include are influencer content, paid ads, video and live chats.

In addition, determine which curation or management tools will help you find and share relevant content with your audience. Also, make sure you define who within your organization will be responsible for execution and measurement.

When developing your social media marketing strategy, what other key questions did you need to answer? Tell us in the comments section below.

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March 08, 2017 at 06:30AM

Evolve or Die: The Role of Purpose & Authenticity in Marketing

Lee Odden

In a world where the average U.S. consumer is confronted with 64GB of data per day, I think it’s safe to say that marketing requires a very different approach.

Marketers all over the world are searching hard for silver bullets and ways to differentiate. And I think a lot of companies are wondering what it will take to realize substantial growth.

It will certainly take more than being “the best answer” at every touchpoint or simply outspending the competition. Who can really afford that?

Growing in today’s world of digital information overload will require something special: Building from purpose and authenticity.

It was purpose and authenticity that was the focus of a presentation I heard at Digital Summit from Mackenzie (Mack) Fogelson recently. Did you know?

• 63% of consumers would rather buy from a company they consider authentic. (Cohn & Wolfe)
• 73% of consumers care about the company, not just the product when purchasing. (BBMG)
• 50% of purchases are made because of word-of-mouth (Brains on Fire)

Companies focus far too much on how the brand is packaged and who the company is instead of looking at something even more compelling: Purpose, People, Promise. In Mack’s presentation, she drilled down into each.

1. Purpose is the key to growth. Businesses are challenged by an environment of constant change. Consumers expect more from the businesses they support and employees want more meaning in their work. A purpose offers a solution to each of these challenges and drives focus, strategy and growth.

“Purpose-driven companies make more money, have more engaged employees and are better at innovation and transformational change.” Harvard Business Review

Business growth in a digital world starts by clarifying your purpose as a business. “An ideal is a belief system that drives everything a brand does.” For more on that, check out this resource from Ogilvy: http://ift.tt/2mwyeOH

Image: Ogilvy

For an example of a brand hitting this head on, look at how Dove’s cultural tension tackles low self-esteem and poor body image in girls. Dove’s best self provides a gentle alternative to soap that cares for women’s bodies. Dove’s big ideal, in the middle, is that the world would be a better place if women were allowed to feel good about their bodies.

In this scenario, you can see that Dove’s focus isn’t on soap. It’s on helping women feel good about their bodies and that focus is aligned with their marketing strategy. The result? Let’s just say that Dove experienced a $1.5 billion jump in sales over a decade.

I think the key thing here comes from Jim Stengel, who said this was “not social responsibility or altruism, but a program for profit and improving people’s lives.”

What does that mean to marketers? Building a purpose-driven authentic brand brings growth.

2. People: Bridge the gap between your purpose and your people. Mack talked about their work with Traveling Vineyard. Starting by identifying 3 persona groups who aligned with the company’s purpose, Mack / Genuinely aligned the persona groups with real people from their community.

You can connect your people with purpose by identifying their challenges and goals, then work to understand their behaviors at each stage of the journey. What are they thinking, feeling and doing? With this understanding, you can use content to remove the roadblocks by addressing what customers are thinking, feeling and doing at each stage.

Purpose + People = growth

3. Promise: Your actions as a company afford you a runway with customers. The brand promise

Four steps to growth through a digital strategy:

1. Clarify the purpose of your organization. Purpose (the big ideal) is the intersection of cultural tension and your brand’s best self.

Purpose is:

• Aspirational and belief-driven
• Broader than a company’s products or services
• At the hear of a business model
• Long term, action oriented thinking
• An improvement in customers and employees lives

Purpose is not:

• A vision, mission, or values statement
• Solely focused the internal organization
• Not brand guidelines, corporate responsibility or PR
• A tagline
• A trend

2. Deconstruct your customer’s journey. Figure out what they are thinking, feeling and doing at each stage. Use a customer journey map template (pdf) as a guide.

3. Connect your team’s purpose and your organization’s purpose. Ask yourself: What does the organization as a whole exist to achieve? Also ask, “What role does your team play in achieving that purpose?”

4. Communicate your purpose externally and change the conversation from all about your product to purpose. A focus on purpose opens up the opportunity for your brand to connect in a meaningful way. The combination of promise and purpose is your greatest competitive advantage.

Need proof?

• 85% of purpose-led companies showed positive growth. Harvard Business Review
• 72% of global customers would recommend a company with a purpose. EY
• Employees are 3 times more likely to stay at purpose-driven organizations. Imperative/LinkedIn

The kicker: Only 37% of executives believe their organizations are aligned with purpose.

If that’s not motivation to start this journey to evolve, I don’t know what is.

Mack Fogelson is the Founder and CEO of Genuinely.co

If you are in the Los Angeles area April 4-5th, be sure to check out the Digital Summit LA conference #DSLA

I’m going to be the closing keynoting on influencer marketing along with an opening keynote from Beverly Jackson of MGM and a lunchtime interview keynote with Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple. There are many other top notch speakers presenting from Facebook, Pinterest, Google, LinkedIn, BET Networks, Adobe, Forbes, The Economist, AOL, BMC Software, MIT, Wells Fargo, The Onion and many more.

Check out the DSLA website for the full agenda.

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March 07, 2017 at 06:15AM

5 Digital Marketing Brain Training Exercises to Keep You Sharp

Ashley Zeckman

Over the years, we’ve all developed some bad habits as marketers. Some may be a result of our environment, while others have been self inflicted. As more and more bad habits enter our digital marketing routine, there is less room for healthy exercises to keep us strong.

The most recent CMO Survey uncovered that CMOs consistently rate the level of their staff’s marketing knowledge as average. So while marketing spend and production are increasing, the level of marketing knowledge isn’t following suit.

Avoid a marketing rut by beginning a digital marketing training routine to build strength and endurance over time. To give you a kickstart, we’ve provided the 5 brain training exercises below that will help you down the path to building your marketing muscles.

#1 – Make the Time to Learn

To start, it’s important to get into a routine that allows you to absorb new information each day. You can look both within and outside your organization for helpful resources to further your marketing knowledge.

Set aside some time on your calendar and make it a point to consume content from other marketers on a daily basis. Blog content can be easy to consume (and share) so set a goal of reading at least 2-3 blog posts from other smart marketers each day. If you’re short on time, tools like Spreed can make content consumption a breeze

In addition to reading the content published by our team on TopRankBlog.com below are some additional resources that I visit often:

• Marketing Profs
• Content Marketing Institute
• Social Media Examiner
• BuzzSumo
• Buffer

#2 – Push Yourself to Try New Things

Venturing outside of your normal routine can be scary but the benefits can be great. As consumer needs evolve, the way that marketers deliver information needs to change as well.

Start by making a list of digital marketing tactics that you want to begin incorporating into your marketing strategy and then do your due diligence to research examples and best practices for your top three.

While the concept of video, interactive or live content might seem overwhelming at first, you’ll quickly find that there are some simple steps you can take to begin testing these tactics and adding those that work into your routine.

#3 – Get Certified

It’s important to level up your training routine on a consistent basis. One way to do that is by becoming certified. You’d be surprised at how impactful it can be to take the time to get marketing certified in a variety of areas. If you want to continue your education but aren’t interested in going back for an MBA, you may want to consider some of the certification programs (free and paid) below:

• Hootsuite: Social Media Marketing Certification
• Google: AdWords Certification
• Google: Analytics Certification
• HubSpot: Inbound Marketing Certification

#4 – Set Your Goals Up Front

Large or small, it’s important to set goals for your digital marketing training. What do you want to learn, execute and measure by a specific date? Determining what your goals are early on can be incredibly helpful in sticking to your routine.

For example, if you want to add influencer driven content to your marketing strategy, create a plan to find out what steps need to be taken, and how you’ll “train” to get there.

#5 – Be Patient & Stick with the Program

If you don’t feel like you’re getting the results you want right away, don’t get discouraged.

Learning how to add new marketing skills to your arsenal takes time and dedication. Some weeks you’ll see a lot of progress in your increased knowledge and application, while other weeks will be a bit slower.

Keep following your learning routine and you’ll begin to see the impact that it has on the progress of your digital marketing development.

Put Your Brain Training Into Action

Just like with anything,  you will get out of this training what you put in. You may find that some training exercises aren’t quite right for you, but you can quickly replace them with something that does keep you on track.

The hardest part is to take the first step and make a commitment to yourself to train on a daily basis. What digital marketing exercises have you added to help keep you sharp?

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March 06, 2017 at 07:17AM

Online Marketing News: 139 Instagram Stats, Overweight Online Ads and Content Insights

Tiffani Allen

139 Stats and Facts About Instagram [Infographic] A new infographic has highlighted 139 fun facts and stats about Instagram. Notably, the network brought in an estimated $1.53 billion in advertising revenue and accounted for 8.4% of Facebook's total advertising revenue. Another fun tidbit - if Selena Gomez were a country, and her followers were a population, she'd be the 12th most populous country in the world. MarketingProfs 40% of Online Ads Are Found to Be Overweight and Slow Sites A recent report showed that 40% of online ads are 'overweight' and are slow to load, causing advertisers' content to not show up to users. Publishers like Business Insider have taken measures to notify their advertisers that their ads need to be within a certain size to guarantee visibility. Ad Age 5 Research Insights to Drive Your Content Marketing Content Marketing Institute and Marketing Profs' annual survey showed there are very specific drivers of content marketing success: Increased efficiency and quality, strategy development, adequate time allocation and management support, to name a few. Content Marketing Institute Snapchat Is Growing Thanks to Older Americans, While Millennial Usage Declines Snapchat grew to 70.4 million users this year, with 45-54 year-olds being the fastest growing demographic. However, those users still only account for 6.4% of all Snapchat users. AdWeek YouTube viewers now consuming 1B hours of video content a day Marketing Land reports: "YouTube says people around the world are now consuming a billion hours of video content per day on the site. According to the announcement, the milestone was reached last year, but YouTube only shared the news [Monday]." Marketing Land Instagram now allows multi-photo posts and extended Carousel Ads Instagram users are now allowed to share multiple photos and videos in one post, and the platform has increased carousel units to 10 different photos and videos. For advertisers, carousels can serve as visual storytelling for campaigns, increasing interest of the viewer and campaign awareness. ClickZ Customer Brand Satisfaction Drives Email Engagement, Study Shows A recent study shows that happy customers are more engaged in branded emails -- half of consumers surveyed said they often or always subscribe to a brand's email list if they're satisfied with their products or services. Conversely, only 23% of unsatisfied customers often or always subscribe to that brand's email list. MediaPost Facebook's Rolling Out a New Page Inbox to Manage Page, Messenger and Instagram Comments in One Place Social Media Today reports: "Facebook's rolling out an update for Pages that changes the standard "Messages" tab into a redesigned "Inbox". This Inbox will enable brands to manage their Messenger messages, Facebook posts, and Instagram comments in one centralized hub, reducing the need to log in on different platforms to manage communications." Social Media Today What were your top online marketing news stories this week? I'll be back next week with more online marketing news. If you have something to share, sound off in the comments or Tweet to @toprank!

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March 03, 2017 at 06:30AM