I’ve been frequently asked the question “why invest in social media and content marketing?” .

The question often asked to substantiate whether there is any clear ROI in engaging in creating compelling new content and distributing it through social media channels. Somehow, it often takes time for executives more comfortable with traditional marketing tactics to come to reason with why they should consider content and social media core to their marketing online. The prospect of how all the content you generate and all the relationships you build with people online through your blog, social networks, podcasts, articles, slideshare presentations work together to create an online “pull” which will drive your inbound marketing sounds good but it’s not a pack of “instant noodles”. It’s perhaps something PR professionals will appreciate more than marketers since they can relate to how personality, image and brand can be built through strategic communication over a period of time.

To convince many other marketing professionals, we may need something a little closer to home to help understand the need to have an active social media and content marketing strategy in play. Something more comparable like “Lead Nurturing”. Lead nurturing doesn’t result in instant conversions. It is however, a highly effective marketing strategy and we marketers love it!

It keeps a constant engagement with prospective customers in the form of emails, newsletters, updates and other content which could be of value to them. It keeps “you as an organization or business” fresh in their minds since they are reminded of you with each “contact” and when they are ready to “buy” or “act” they know who to go to.

Social content marketing works much the same way. It’s perhaps even less intrusive that typical lead nurturing which in itself is pull based. Here’s an example:

The other day someone asked me if I knew a good web design firm in the APAC region. I thought about for a good 3 seconds and said ” try getting in touch with Brightlabs!”.

Now I’ve never used Brightlabs personally for any web design or development work. I do however read their blog posts quite often, see updates from them on Twitter, read their articles which show on my Linkedin feed. Since I ended up following them on Facebook, I also often come across a wall update or hear about what they are up to on my Facebook account feed. Simply through all the outreach and content they publish, they come off as a firm that really knows what they are doing. In my view, they come across as real professionals who have an eye for detail and passion in the sites they design and build. I feel like I know them well through their online communication. Whenever I’m online on any of my social sites such as Linkedin, Facebook or Twitter, I see them there. So when a requirement came up, the first thing that came to my head when I head web design was “Brightlabs“.

Your content and interaction with people on social networks does what you would expect from lead nurturing campaigns.

- Touch base with them frequently

-Provide them information and content which is valuable

-Don’t sell (at least not directly through your content)

-Be everywhere, social networks, search engines, blogs

-Build relationships through what you publish and what you say online

-Become known for what you do

When the time is right and they have a requirement, they will come to you. Going back to the question “Why invest in social media and content marketing?”. The same reason you would invest in lead nurturing program. To keep your prospective customers in the loop so that when they  have a requirement, they know you are there.

The problem is many people who are charged with the task of turning their website into a successful marketing channel take these two metrics and set them as their primary objectives losing sight of the big picture. Back links, increasing your page rank, maximizing page-views, reducing bounce rates although considered metrics for successful websites should actually be secondary outcomes which result from going after a primary goal which is far more important “creating a high quality engagement with your online audience“. If you do this, the rest will follow and you’ll end up having more than just a website with impressive traffic figures but doesn’t do wonders as far as your key objectives go. You’ll have a long term online asset which works for you.

Here is what we’re talking about:

Super Holiday Hotels sets up a brand new website for their new property in Male, Maldives. They decide they want some aggressive traffic building activity for their new site with tonnes of unique visitors and back links from the top travel websites with high page ranks to increase their own page rank. They set out to hire a few freelance article writers who can deliver bulk posts 500 words in length at a steal, hire more freelance guys who do link submissions to directories and promise 250 plus back links to your website in a month and another set of guys who will comment on other blogs (some of whom will use bots) and pay them for every 100 comments posted. In 8 months the Super Holiday Hotels has 35,000 unique visitors a month! A success! Oh… and they also get an average of 3 visitors who fill in their online reservation form and book rooms with them each month.

The Beachfront Hotel sets up a brand new website for their new property in Male, Maldives. They decide they want to turn their website into a source of inbound reservations and bookings for the long term so that most of their sales will come through the website. They know the way to do this is build a reputation online, reflect their own hospitable personality and love for their island nation online through their social media channels and create relationships with online travelers so that some day they may arrive at the property as guests. They engage BuzzFactory.net! (…just kidding) They create an resource for people traveling to the Maldives irrespective of where they plan to stay. They deliver great content which carries their personality as a business while also ensuring what they publish is information that readers can rely on and help them on their travels there. They work steadily at building a publication which is invaluable to anyone who plans to visit Male, creates a community of those interested in the island around their site, creating communities on Facebook, Twitter while answering questions for those communities keeping them updates on what happens on the island and the property. In 8 months The Beachfront Hotel has reached 10,000 visitors a month. Disappointment? Not really… they will eventually get to 35,000 in a few months time and keep climbing. More importantly, with just 10,000 visitors a month, they have averaged 20 bookings and reservations a month through their website which accounts for 50% of their occupancy each month. It’s working!

Quality! Quality! Quality!

Quality of your objectives and plan + Quality of your execution = Quality of your results

The Beachfront Hotel was not blinded by the numbers of back links and unique visitors. The visitors to their website were not a flow of traffic from some irrelevant high traffic website as a result of clever traffic building schemes, they were people searching for travel information in Male and found a reliable online personality by the name of The Beachfront Hotel which offered it. They interacted with them on Facebook, decided to explore the website a bit further and made a decision to stay there during their visit. In the long run…chances are…other high ranking travel websites will see The Beachfront Hotels online publication as a great resource for that destination and link them anyway.

Traffic and back links are a by-product of having a really great website which others consider a “great resource” or “important website” with your domain. With the right direction, right objectives and metrics to measure your online marketing success by, you’ll be on your way to building a really great web asset.

We’ve just concluded a very enjoyable 2 hour session on “Getting Started With Blogging” and making the most of the Wordpress platform here at Open Space. The lively audience which consistently grew as the session continued participated and interacted with their questions on the basics of blogging, getting started and tips on how to become an active part of the blogosphere. It was a pleasure interacting with people from various walks of life and discussing how they could use blogging to their advantage whether it was to create awareness for their nonprofit organizations, their college projects, businesses or personal passions and made for a lively session. We hope the workshop will help inspire them to kick-start their own blogs really soon!

The session was arranged by Open Space which is a brilliant initiative by the Centre For Communication and Development Studies which follows a mantra of Talk -> Think -> Act for change. The Open Space centre in Pune leverages literature, cinema, theater, music, debates and several forms of communication to create discussion on issues that impact society, build knowledge, skills and initiate change. For more on Open Space and the work they do check out their website www.openspaceindia.org and their publication www.infochangeindia.org

We look forward to being back!

Business Today Aug 22- Angels in the Crowd

In an early stage business the situation is very different. There isn’t a steady base of customers you can already rely on and the challenge isn’t really growing it, the challenge is to create that customer base. Social media marketing or online marketing is really about engaging people through conversation, content and building a brand through which audiences will start recognizing you through and eventually, approaching you. It’s inbound and pull based but it’s not instant and needs time to develop. Time is something in short supply in the early stages and closing customers is a priority. This should mean…. focusing completely on sales will help you go after targeted set of prospects and close customers slow and steady to build the revenue stream. However, there is a conflict in this strategy.

Given a hypothetical situation where you employee a 3 person sales team using email and telephone campaigns to pursue and close new customers, the progress over a few months is likely to appear like the blue line above. There will be a more or less steady line with some good months, some bad ones but the only way to increase sales in future is to increase the size of the sales team and invest more into sales. Great way to start business development but no long term benefits for growth.

It’s like hunting for your food. The more you need, the more hunters you need and it’s not a sustainable strategy.

Given the same situation where you employ a team of 3 for social media marketing and outreach, you are likely to see something similar to the red line. You may not see much progress over the first few months but as the ecosystem of content and buzz around your business grows, you’ll find an increasing flow of prospects towards your site which with time can be closed as customers. The process starts slow but consistently grows with the same amount of work put in every month. This means, though in the short run it may seem slow, in the long run you can grow your customer base without increasing your investment in the process. Not a great start but great future benefits perfect for high growth.

It’s like farming for your food. You cultivate a customer base by sowing content. It’s highly sustainable in the long run. As the content and buzz around your business increases each month, so does your business development.

Ideally you need both. Some amount of direct sales to kick start the customer base since you can’t completely rely on social media marketing to reap immediate results. At the same time, you need to start your social media and content marketing campaigns as early as possible so that in the later stages you don’t find yourself in a situation where your business development growth has just flat-lined because you were not thinking long term.

Our advice is start cultivating your social content farm as early as you possibly can. It’s sustainable, will grow and provide you more in time through a steady process than the hunting strategy which is effective but will make you work just as hard for every customer you intend to close and eventually, won’t work towards scaling your business. Hope that helps!

Sure….the quiet kid at the back of the class who wait’s his or her turn to speak may really end up being a brilliant student and perhaps a great friend if you get the chance to know who they are but you always know the ones who are always talking since…they are always talking.

When marketing a brand or business online you’re seeking attention. You want to be that noisy kid in class who everyone knows because you can’t be ignored. The social web is a lot like this classroom and publishing content through the blog, through the social networking sites, on twitter and other communication channels is the noise that’s going to get you noticed and have everyones attention. If you need others around to know you and know you’re around then you have you need to be talkative through online media. The difference being you’ll be required to deliver valuable content (not just heckle the teachers) in order to create more than just a ruckus in class. The more actively and frequently your media arm can publish valuable content, the more you’ll be “known” among social circles.

You know how you were always told not to be the noisy one in class? As an online marketer, it’s time to forget this and be that kid! After all…. everyone knows the noisy kid in class!

PR, especially in the online context has changed considerably. What was associated with special PR firms who create a very long term plan for cash rich businesses or individuals who had large budgets to spend over time with these firms is now….well… a lot like what we do everyday. The difference is  it need not be expensive or only for those who can afford it nor does it have to be a slow long carefully crafted image building exercise executed slowly through the press or traditional channels. It’s now a more nimble process of creating conversations over the web through easily accessible channels like blogs, social networking, free PR distribution sites, Twitter, online communities and more. You can be a global banking corporation, a rock band, a t-shirt printing business or an individual working on a web application and you can still access the same tools and practices to reach out to online audiences and create your own PR engine.

The changing face of PR as we witness it today is characterized by:

Web conversations: speaking out loud about what you’re doing, what you represent and sharing your brand or message with the millions that are connected to each other via social networks, blogs and other tools. It’s no longer about publishing “one-way” press releases or publicity pieces with a formal declaration on behalf of the business or individual once in a blue moon. It’s about being upfront and sharing your thoughts and updating audiences online through a two-way dialog.

Speed & Spontaneity: Have something on your mind? Tweet about it. Have an important deal or event which you’d like to share? Draft a quick press release and submit it to the several free press release sites out there. Need a quicker way to share it? Do a blog post and get it published and shared instantly! The long turnaround times for acting on a message that needs to go out are no longer there. What happens today can be published today and shared right away.

Low / No Costs – Accessible To All: The playing field has been leveled and the tools that really matter when it comes to building a presence or brand on the the web are those accessible to the masses. From the enterprise businesses to a one man brand blogs, Facebook, Linkedin, Slideshare….it’s all at your disposal. There are startups and small businesses that have built larger followings and created more buzz online than global enterprises and they didn’t have expensive PR firms…just a determined effort to communicate frequently with others through their content.

If there is one significant change thats noteworthy about PR today is that it’s been thrown open to the masses. You can have an active PR campaign no matter what you do and who you are…in fact ….you should!

The blog is perhaps one of the most versatile online marketing tools and if you could focus on maintaining an engaging blog, that can be the key to fueling a number of online marketing and outreach efforts which can help gain traction on the web for your brand. For those who are believers in re-usability of a perfectly good marketing asset, it doesn’t get much better than the blog. A good blog post can be:

Bookmarked on social sites

Tweeted

Shared on Facebook

Shared on Linkedin Groups

Edited and converted into downloadable pdf resources

Distributed in the form of a newsletter

Shared through RSS feeds on other sites and so much more

A single blog post can be used to reach out to not just those who come across your blog but those on other channels and fuel newsletters, lead nurturing campaigns and others. Content like this is adaptable. People like their content in different forms and find it through different channels. Some through your Facebook group, some through Twitter, some in their email boxes and others through search engines or RSS readers. “What about the risk of overlap?” some may ask. There may be a small risk of overlap but it’s often very low. For example, if you Tweet about an article once, you may reach out to a small percentage of your followers who are around at the time. Similarly, if you email the content in the form of a monthly newsletter, just a small percentage of your entire database is likely to open and read it. The same goes for those who come across it on Linkedin groups. In fact…to really make the most of your content, you need to be able to adapt it to different channels and distribute it to audiences across different social networks.

Start with your blog. Then, work from there using your blog content to do the work on other online marketing channels (and offline if you consider creating print magazines, newsletters and catalogs out of your blog content). Re-usability ensures you get the most out of your content and there is nothing quite like a blog when it comes to that.

Well let’s see…

1. The office is quiet
2. You don’t need to spend on phone and traveling expenses
3. You don’t have to worry about what to do if you have too many customers pouring in

Heck…there are no advantages! Having a salesperson who doesn’t communicate is absolutely pointless! Having marketers that are not making a noise about your business or actively doing something to promote your products are equally of no use. Then why have a website that’s doing nothing to make a noise about your business and actively market itself on the social web to sell for you?

Conversation is the very basis of the social web we are all a part of today. If you have a great website but you are not actively reaching out to people on the web and not joining in the conversation it’s virtually like setting up a shop in the neighborhood with no salesperson and making no attempts to reach out to the community letting them know you are here.  Perhaps setting up your website establishes that you have a presence on the online world but to make that presence felt you need to connect with the social web and …make some noise so to speak. How do you make some noise? Keep publishing.

Blog, tweet, comment, update statuses, make connections online, start communities, publish articles, send out press releases, create videos, create podcasts… keep speaking online … and you will be noticed. Stop speaking (publishing) and you will be ignored. The web is a crowded market place and just as you would find street vendors shouting on top of their voices to grab some attention in a bustling bazaar, that’s what needs to be done on the web to draw the right people using content and publishing to create conversation.  Having a blog doesn’t get you noticed, blogging actively get’s you noticed. Achieving something like winning an award for your business doesn’t bring traffic to your website, telling others through your blog or press releases and shouting about it on social networking sites will.

There are no advantages to having a salesman or marketer who doesn’t communicate and actively promote. There are no advantages to having a website that no one is talking about on the social web and no one knows about.

Make some noise. Keep publishing. Jump start your content marketing and start a conversation. It’s easy to ignore the silent website, it’s hard to miss the one that everyone is talking about and doesn’t stop talking itself.

That’s right! BuzzFactory.net has just launched a “Create A Custom Social Content Marketing Package” as an alternative to the existing solutions. You can now create your own social content marketing strategy and BuzzFactory.net will make sure it gets executed on every month like clockwork.

The online visibility solutions we have been offering are carefully tailored mixes of content and social marketing  activity which we know to work towards creating an online buzz for most needs. However, we understand  not every business has the same requirements and we’ve often tweaked the solutions to develop a mix of content and promotion activities that would suit a very specific requirement.

The new “Custom Social Marketing Solutions” offering on the website allows you to take the helm and create your very own content marketing strategy by selecting from a range of content development options, promotion and social media marketing activities which would help create the buzz around your brand on the web that you are looking for. The content options include:

• Engaging blog posts
• Keyword rich articles
• Guides
• White papers
• Reports
• PDF download documents
• Press releases
• Slideshare presentations
• Email drafts

Combine this with active social bookmarking across major social sites and promotion of content across social networking sites, Twitter, Linkedin and you virtually have a customized social content marketing strategy that’s ready to be put into action. Based on this submission we’ll get back to you with a proposal and a pricing quote shortly and if it all looks good, you’ll have a team to execute your plan for you.

Have a content marketing plan you need a pricing quote for? Use the “Custom Social Content Marketing Solutions” form and get a pricing quote soon!