Posts Tagged ‘HubSpot’
Six Ways to Search-Optimize a Blog
Monday, December 5th, 2011Many of the same principles apply to optimizing a blog for search as for optimizing a business website: use keywords in the body copy, post titles, subheadings, permalink URL, image alt tags and meta tags. But a blog also presents additional opportunities for search optimization beyond those that apply to standard websites (which is why Google loves blogs). Take advantage of these six techniques to help get your blog ranked highly in relevant searches, and increase your overall web presence.
1. Categories: For the sake of user-friendly site navigation, standard websites usually have a fairly small number (generally no more than six or seven) top-level sections. Furthermore, some of these are virtually worthless for search (e.g. investor pages, and “Contact Us” is almost always a top-level link even though this page has no search value).
But with a blog, you can create any (reasonable) number of top-level categories, and give these keyword-rich labels. For that reason, think about your blog categories carefully: create category tags that will be meaningful and useful to both human readers and search engine spiders.
2. Fresh content. Most B2B website content (other than items like news releases and upcoming events) and much B2C content as well is fairly static; once it’s written, it tends to stay pretty much intact for the life of the website. But Google’s recent algorithm changes (which Bing and other search engines will most likely try to mimic) favor fresh content, as least for certain types of searches. Authority still matters, but freshness is now a much more important ranking factor than it was in the past.
Blogs are one of the best mechanisms for publishing a steady stream of new content. They are also a great platform for responding to breaking news or the latest developments in your industry. So while an editorial calendar can help your blog posts on track and on schedule, it’s crucial to also build in the flexibility to write posts responding to current events in your industry. This both increases the relevance of your blog and takes advantage of new-to-the-world search phrases that won’t show up in keyword tools.
3. Syndication and blog directories. Content syndication and blog directory sites provide valuable backlinks as well as driving traffic directly to your blog. Technorati and AllTop are two of the general-topic blog directories. Nearly every industry has its own specific directories and syndication sites as well; for example, B2B Marketing Zone for B2B vendor and influencer blogs, and Social Media Informer for social media-related blogs. In addition, there are hundreds of smaller blog directories and RSS submission sites that can further increase the reach and visibility of your blog.
4. Social media. Sharing your content on social networking sites like Twitter and (most importantly) Google+ as well as social bookmarking sites creates links to your blog. More important, however, is that Google tracks social signals (the overall level of content sharing for your blog as well as the authority of those sharing it) as measures of the quality and authority of a blog. So while sharing your own content provides some SEO benefit, building and nurturing a network of authoritative people in your industry and producing content they want to share is even more valuable.
Add social media buttons to your blog to encourage readers to share your content. Tools like ShareThis, AddThis and Wibiya, or WordPress plugins like SexyBookmarks, make it easy to add buttons for any of the most popular social networks and bookmarking sites. Of course you can add these sharing buttons to a standard company website as well, but readers are far more likely to share useful blog content than ordinary vendor web pages; while 60% of all social postings link to published content (news sites or blogs), just 4% link to corporate website content.
You can also build high-authority backlinks through commenting on other blogs as well as writing guest posts (with embedded text links) for other industry blogs. Again, you could use these techniques without having your own blog, but many bloggers are more likely to consider publishing a guest post from a fellow blogger (whose writing they can easily evaluate) than from an unknown corporate or agency contact.
5. Clean code. Google and many other search engines reward sites that have fast loading time, use the latest best practices in web coding and are W3C-compliant with higher rankings. If all of that sounds a bit technical, don’t worry; most of the leading blog platforms automatically create fairly clean, compliant code. Free blog platforms like TypePad and WordPress produce clean code out of the box. Fee-based platforms like Compendium and HubSpot are also search-friendly.
6. WordPress plugins. WordPress blogs can easily be made even more search engine-friendly through the use of a few key plugins. You can find lots of posts about the best SEO plugins for WordPress, but a few of the absolutely key plugins are:
- • All in One SEO Pack. Among it’s other features, this plugin makes it easy to add meta title tags and automatically create search-friendly URLs for each post.
- • W3 Total Cache. This plugin uses caching and other techniques to dramatically increase the load speed of your blog and improve the user experience.
- • Google XML Sitemaps with qTranslate Support. Sitemaps help the search engines more fully and accurately index a website or blog. For a relatively static business website, it’s easy to create an XML sitemap using an online tool then submit it to the major search engines. For a blog, which is constantly changing, using a manual process would be virtually impossible. Fortunately, this plugin creates an XML sitemap of your WordPress blog in a format supported by Ask.com, Google, MSN Search (Bing) and Yahoo, and automatically keeps it up to date as you write new posts, add categories, and make other changes to your blog.
- • WP Google Analytics. Google Analytics provides a wealth of information to help with SEO efforts, such as which keywords and referral sites are driving the most traffic and which landing pages draw the most search traffic. This plugin makes it a snap to add the Google Analytics tracking code to all of your blog pages and posts, and automatically include the code on new posts.
- • Sexy Bookmarks. The Sexy Bookmarks plugin adds a configurable set of social networking and social bookmarking buttons to each of your blog posts, making it easy for your readers to share your content on their site(s) of choice. Sharing provides useful social signals to the search engines about the authority of your content and creates valuable backlinks.
- • Do Follow. By default, WordPress applies the insidious nofollow tag to outbound links from your blog. This is done ostensibly to prevent your blog from passing authority to sketchy sites through comment and backlink spam. However, if you are moderating comments to your blog, those kinds of links shouldn’t be an issue. Do-follow outbound links to high-quality, relevant websites actually help with SEO as well as increasing reader satisfaction, generating more comments, and helping with relationship building.
Once you’ve developed and optimized an effective business website and launched a properly optimized business blog, the core of your web presence optimization framework is in place. Now you’re ready to take the next steps to expand that presence and work toward dominating in the search engines for your core terms.
Trust Me: Why Trust is Crucial for Business Success, and How to Build It
Tuesday, May 31st, 2011According to a recent presentation from HubSpot, “selling is 10X easier once you have established trust.” Other than having something of value to offer, trust is the most essential element for business success. It removes psychological barriers and objections to buying, and makes people want to do business with you because they are comfortable.
I was talking to a client not long ago about some travel she has coming up that will take her away from the office for several weeks. Half-jokingly, I told her not to worry, I can build her business without her. She laughed, then said, “You know what’s amazing? Even though we’ve only been working together for a few months, I completely trust you to do it.”
That is amazing, and it is treasured. Particularly for consultants like me who work mostly out of sight of our clients, but really for any business, trust is absolutely essential to maintaining long-term client relationships and generating referral business.
Trust is precious yet delicate, like a work of fine art, such as a Ming vase:
- • It’s extremely valuable.
- • It’s difficult to obtain.
- • It’s fragile and easily broken.
- • Once broken, it’s extraordinarily difficult to repair.
But trust is unlike that vase in one critical aspect. Once you’ve obtained a Ming vase (or any other physical thing of value), assuming you take reasonable steps to safeguard it, it’s yours. Trust, on the other hand, can never be taken for granted and must be constantly and vigilantly re-earned. It cannot be, like civilization in the words of Kipling, something “laboriously achieved” but only “precariously defended.”
Most high-value purchases now begin online. Your first opportunity to build trust comes from what you say online and what others say about you. That’s why blogging is important (as a way to educate, inform and even entertain, without blatant selling) as is social media (for answering questions and building online relationships that lead to positive third-party coverage and comments).
But the process of building trust is even more fundamental than that. Blogs and social networks are just tools. They can be used productively, or clumsily. What matters most is your approach to business.
Before the Sale
- • Explain (without hype or a sales pitch) what you do, so people understand if you are offering what they are looking for.
- • Demonstrate knowledge (through blogging, guest posts, comments, interaction on social networks, presentations, etc.).
- • Differentiate yourself, with disparaging your competition. Walmart (“Always the Low Price”) and Lexus (“The Pursuit of Perfection”) are effective examples in the consumer world. The agency I work with, KC Associates, is a full service marketing and PR agency (of which there are zillions) but focused exclusively on b2b technology clients; the focus sets the agency apart.
- • Be transparent. Buyers can smell BS from a great distance. Better to give an answer that is less than ideal but honest than one that is just what you think the prospect wants to hear but is an exaggeration (or worse).
After the Sale
- • Do what you say you are going to do.
- • Be as responsive as possible.
- • Set realistic expectations (then work hard to exceed them).
- • Be forthright. Your customers don’t expect you to be perfect, but they do you expect you to be straight with them. If something doesn’t work as well as planned, tell your customer, as precisely as possible, why. Then make recommendations for what to do differently next time.
Particularly with the explosion of social media and online content, buyers are more informed than ever before. The shady, fly-by-night operators will be exposed more quickly—while vendors who deliver value and engender trust will thrive.
B2B Marketing Stats from HubSpot’s Marketing Data Box
Monday, May 16th, 2011HubSpot last week released the Marketing Data Box, a 3.4 megabyte, 65-slide data dump of marketing facts and statistics from a variety of sources. While there is some excellent information here, the wide range of topics covered (B2B, B2C, consumer demographics, TV, online, mobile, print…) ensures that while almost every marketer will find some information of value in the report, each reader will also have to sift through a bunch of figures and charts they don’t give a flying rat’s tail about in order to find those nuggets.
Here are some of the most interesting observations for B2B marketers:
Slide 10: B2B magazines continue to struggle. While print in general has taken a beating over the past decade, B2B publications have been particularly hard hit, leading to speculation about the future of B2B trade magazines (content marketing? Content aggregation?). Trade mags are struggling to maintain their value as they compete with industry analysts putting more content online, independent bloggers, and of course B2B marketers themselves publishing more of their own original content. The good news for B2B marketers is that these publications still reach a highly qualified audience, advertising prices have dropped (in some cases dramatically) and deals can be made.
Slide 11: Americans are increasingly going online for news. Though hardly a shocking revelation, this report nicely quantifies the shift. While most Americans still say they get their news primarily from television, that figure has declined to 66% from its peak of 82% in 2002. Over the same time period, radio has declined modestly, newspaper readership has plunged, and the Internet news audience has soared from 14% to 41%.
Slide 17: Websites and email dominate marketers’ time. The corporate website is the focus of marketing efforts (as Vanessa Fox suggests) according to 88% of marketers overall, but 93% of B2B marketers (see chart below). Email is the #2 priority. Social media is now in third place (for 61% of B2B marketers), having pulled ahead of B2B publications, paid search and banner ads.
Slide 21: Online costs per lead are lower. Not surprisingly, offline tactics (trade shows in particular) are viewed as costly by B2B marketers on a cost-per-lead basis, while online tactics are seen as more cost-effective. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that a mix of tactics remains the best approach. Direct mail, for example, can be highly effective if done properly. The higher cost per lead may very be justified by higher quality (close rate).
Slide 25: Google use is still higher than Facebook. As the report notes, “Overall, 40% more U.S. adults say they use Google in a typical week (60%) than have a Facebook page (43%).” Heavier use of Google than Facebook is even more pronounced among men (still the majority of B2B buyers) than women.
Slide 35: Nearly one-third of U.S. consumers own smart phones. As of December 2010, almost a third (31%) of U.S. cell phone users owned a smart phone. Marketers can no longer put off thinking about how mobile fits into their marketing mix. For example, marketers need to understand how QR codes work and different ways QR codes can be used in marketing. While execution is more urgent for consumer marketers, B2B marketers need to at least start thinking strategically about topics like apps, QR codes, and how their content appears on smart phones.
Slide 37: The most popular use of mobile Internet time? Email. Per this report, “Email represents a leading 38.5% of time spent (by mobile users online). No other activity comes close, with social networking coming in a distant second (10.7%).” News and current events account for roughly 7% of mobile online time, followed by search at 6%.
You can get all of the details by downloading the free HubSpot Marketing Data Box for yourself.
20 Ways to Generate ROI from a Corporate Blog
Tuesday, May 10th, 2011The “ROI of social media” (or lack thereof) is a hot, and still hotly contested, topic. I summarized arguments from both sides a few months ago in The Social Media ROI Debate. More recently, numerous writers including Olivier Blanchard, Neil Glassman and Mark Schaefer have tried to make the case that social media ROI is real, can be measured, and must be measured.
Yet a Bazaarvoice/CMO Club study showed that only 15% of CMOs could point to a “significant return” from Facebook marketing efforts, while 9% report no ROI and 35% basically had no idea. Jacquie McCarman argued in It’s Not Your CEO’s Fault He’s a Social Media Moron that “Most C-levels will scroll down to the bottom line to determine effectiveness of any campaign but what many don’t realize is that the bottom line definitions have changed with this new-fangled internet technology. All of the old measurements are moot.”
Austen Mayor writes that although “executives like numbers,” social media efforts should proceed even without hard ROI attached because “The sooner a company starts climbing the deep functionalities learning curve, the sooner their Klout score will be at a respectable level,” and “social media might be bigger than the industrial revolution in terms of societal effects.” On ClickZ, Heidi Cohen reports that even at this stage, only one in three companies are even trying to measure social media ROI, because doing that is hard, though she also outlines five other social media metrics that matter. And another recent study from McKinsey concluded that, whether you can directly measure ROI or not, companies that embrace social media are more profitable than those who don’t, and “those that fail to implement social media could be making a “critical mistake”.”
It’s challenging to get the metrics really needed to measure social media ROI primarily because social media is much more like public relations than it is like direct marketing or search engine advertising. It can influence your prospects to buy from you, but doesn’t normally lead straight to a purchase. Nevertheless, social media activity consumes resources and therefore must produce business results–or those resources will be spent somewhere else. Marketers need to do the best they can with measurement, but also think about how to move their social media followers, who are often near the top of the purchase funnel, into and along the sales process.
The core of social media marketing efforts should be the corporate blog. Through a blog, marketers become publishers, providing their audience with relevant and valuable content. Publishing has historically relied on advertising, or sponsorships, to pay for content production. Corporate blogs can operate in a similar fashion, except that the sole sponsor or advertiser is the company itself. Essentially, marketers need to (carefully and tactfully) advertise on their own blogs. What should they promote? Here are 20 ideas.
Promote white papers / eBooks / reports for lead generation. According to MarketingSherpa (and many other sources), generating qualified leads remains the top priority for B2B marketers. Use “ads” in your blog sidebar, and in-post text links where appropriate, to drive visitors to your white paper or other gated content download pages. When you come out with a new white paper, summarize one of the main findings in a blog post with a link to the page to download the full document.
Generate webinar registrations. Again, you can “advertise” upcoming webinars in your sidebar. Also, as with white papers, write up a short summary of the webinar in a preview post linked to the signup form. After the webinar (if it’s been recorded), write a follow-up post answering questions from the event and directing visitors to the recorded version online.
Build your email subscriber list. Feature a newsletter signup box prominently near the upper-right corner of your blog. From time to time, write “teaser” posts informing readers of what content they are missing, but could be getting, as a newsletter subscriber.
Invite visitors to hear your experts speak or meet you live. Exhibiting at an upcoming trade show? Speaking at an event? Attending a local tweetup? Let your readers know! Social media is a great way to make more in-real-life contacts.
Get more from your presentations. For those readers who aren’t able to make it to that industry event to hear your product expert speak live, extend the life of that carefully crafted presentation by posting it on a social content sharing site like Slideshare. Include a call to action at the end of the presentation or a link to learn more.
Display testimonials linked to case studies in your sidebar. Your customers’ words are more powerful than your own.
Offer a free trial of your product (if practical).
Link to product information from within your blog posts. While it’s inappropriate to simply write a blog post extolling the wonderfulness of your product or service (that’s a marketing slick, not a helpful blog post), there will be times when, in presenting a solution to a problem, a mention of your product naturally fits in. Or better yet, a text description of your product (e.g. “help desk software” instead of the product name). Link it to the page on your website about that product. Most readers won’t bother clicking on the link, but those who do likely have an interest in the product. And as a side benefit, this is helpful for SEO.
Make your content easy to share by including social sharing buttons on your blog posts. This doesn’t directly lead to ROI, but when readers share your content, they are enhancing your reputation by implicitly giving your their endorsements.
Grow your social network by including links to your Twitter account, Facebook page, YouTube channel and other social media points of presence. Again, this doesn’t produce leads directly, but it gives you more “at bats” with your audience.
Integrate social media activities with your CRM system. If there is an individual in your CRM system who is also following you on Twitter, or who likes you on Facebook, or who has left a comment on your blog, that should be noted. If there are several individuals from the same prospect company doing these things, that should really be noted. Don’t pass up the chance to get closer to these people.
Respond to comments (helpfully and appropriately). It’s not always proper to “sell” when responding to a comment, but when pointing someone to information about your products or services that can solve their problems is pertinent, don’t be afraid to do so!
Amplify new product or service announcements (carefully). A blog post isn’t the place to publish a press release, but when apropos, it is a perfectly reasonable place to link to one. Promote the announcement in your sidebar or link to naturally from within a related post.
Answer questions in your blog posts. Some of the most popular posts I’ve written on this blog were essentially extended responses to client questions. Common customer questions will very often pertain to your products or services. Again, while blog posts shouldn’t be too salesy, it’s perfectly acceptable to mention products or services (with links to more information, case studies or white papers) when required to answer an inquiry.
Gather market intelligence. Response rates for email surveys continue to decline; who has the time to answer a survey? (At least without a very attractive incentive to do so.) A corporate blog is a great vehicle, however, for gathering intelligence from your customers and prospects in small chunks. Include a quick poll widget in your sidebar to gather answers to yes/no or multiple choice questions. Ask essay-type questions in your blog posts and encourage readers to answer with a comment.
Showcase your customer support. Got some great support resources online? An active and helpful support forum? A responsive customer support Twitter account? Write about and link to these resources in your blog; customers may need to be reminded, and prospects may (hopefully) be impressed by the breadth and sophistication of your support offerings.
Promote your “evergreen” content and assets. These can be things like lists (e.g., Aira Bongko’s extensive list of Twitter apps or Ken Burbary’s wiki on social media monitoring tools), industry-specific glossaries (like this one on IT service delivery terms), free online tools (HubSpot’s Website Grader has been a phenomenally successful lead generator), collections of resources, free software utilities–the possibilities are limited only by your creativity.
Highlight your partners. If you sell through any kind of channel, find creative ways to link to your partners, either within blog posts (for example, when discussing a specific topic where one of your partners has expertise or writing about a specific geographic region) or even by “advertising” for them in your sidebar. Helping your partners ultimately helps you. Recognition on your blog can even be an incentive for greater performance.
Make it easy for the press to contact you. A well-written blog can be a PR magnet. A journalist is conducting research for a story…finds your blog…is impressed by the facts and knowledge conveyed and wants to learn more. Where do you send them–to a standard blog “contact us” form? A better approach is to make it prominent and easy for members of the media to click directly to your website’s online newsroom or media page. Link to this in your sidebar and on the “About” and “Contact” pages on your blog.
Highlight your company’s community involvement. Okay, this won’t directly produce leads or sales, but it helps spread the kind of publicity that can definitely cast your company in a favorable light, help generate media coverage, and make people more likely to want to do business with you. Be strategic about this; look for opportunities to showcase your company’s expertise while also doing good for society. Two quick examples:
- • A manufacturer of industrial control devices donated some of its products and engineering expertise to students at a local college to help build a solar-powered vehicle for a green energy competition. The car won, but more importantly so did the students, the college, the company (which got some great press and was able to show off it’s engineering capabilities) and, ultimately, perhaps the environment.
- • An IT services firm donated the time of several of its developers to local non-profit groups for a weekend. Again, the non-profits benefited (by getting applications built at no cost, including an improved online donation system for on group), the firm was able to demonstrate the prowess of its developers, and the event was well-covered by local media.
Social media ROI may indeed be challenging to measure, but ultimately, it’s a business activity requiring resources and so it must produce a return. The ideas above are a place to start. Got more? Please share them in the comments.
The Dirty Dozen Top 12 Social Media Mistakes to Avoid
Tuesday, April 19th, 2011There have been numerous posts written about the pitfalls of social media marketing (including helpful pieces from Online Social Networking, Sysomos, and one I wrote for HubSpot). But the list below is a summary of the most common mistakes based on both my client experience and research for this recent presentation:
Avoid these dirty dozen of the most common social media marketing mistakes and you’ll be well on your way making social media not just an effective vehicle for marketing and PR, but a productive tool across your organization.
Failing to LISTEN. Social media is about having a conversati0n with your prospects, not broadcasting to them. You can’t have a conversation without listening. Trying to treat social media like the old world of interruption-based advertising won’t work. It will backfire.
Assigning it to an intern. Your social media presence is, for many of the people you’re trying to reach, now the public face of your company. Your social media strategist is your public spokesperson. It takes business savvy and years of industry experience to do this well. It’s far easier to teach a subject matter expert in your company how to use social media tools than it is to try to magically impart product, company, industry and business knowledge to a social media intern.
Failing to plan. Social media efforts should be based on understanding of which tools to use (based on where your customers, partners and industry influencers congregate), who will be responsible for what tasks, what your objectives are, and how you will measure success. Otherwise, you’re flailing.
Using social media as a direct response vehicle. Except in rare cases (e.g., a restaurant tweeting out lunch specials to area businesses at late morning) social media is just not effective as a direct marketing / direct response tool. Particularly in the b2b world, your fans, followers and connections are looking for helpful information and interaction; blatant promotion is more likely to turn them away than to turn them into customers.
Trying to automate interaction. Conversations can’t be automated. Automated welcome DMs on Twitter and the like are obnoxious. While there are places for automation in social media (such as monitoring and automatically submitting blog posts to various social networking and bookmarking sites), it’s best used carefully and sparingly.
Expecting instant results. Social media success is based on content and trust. It takes time to build a critical mass of both. Search traffic to blogs increases over time as the blog establishes authority and amasses content. Followers, fans and connections increase as trust and dialog are developed. By all means, expect and measure results from social media. Just don’t have unrealistic expectations of achieving those results overnight.
Allocating insufficient time and resources. Some marketers (and even CFOs) mistakenly view social media as “free.” While it’s true you don’t have to pay a fee to put up a Facebook page or start tweeting, there is nothing free about successfully using social media to reach and engage with customers and prospects. It takes time and effort to create content, promote it, monitor social media conversations, and participate in dialog. Social media marketing requires adequate allocation of time and budget just like any other tactic; the specific line items are just different.
Sending mixed signals or messages. Virtually every organization that has employees is already participating in social media, whether “officially” or not. With three-quarters of Internet users now using social media, your employees are already out there. And just as almost everyone talks about work about work outside the workplace, most people will tweet or post about their employment from time to time as well. It’s critical to communicate your social media objectives and messages to employees, establish and communicate a social media policy, and train them in the proper business use of social networks. Proper training dramatically reduces the risk of an employee releasing sensitive information, inappropriate comments or just plain muddled messages (e.g. Kmart as the place for fashion, or Oracle as ideal for small business) to the market.
Being dishonest or misrepresenting the facts. As noted above, social media success requires building trust with your audience; nothing shatters that trust like being untruthful or even less than transparent in social media. The Walmart blogging scandal is a classic case study in what not to do, but the problem isn’t limited to big companies or to the b2c world. A blog represented as being by the CEO better contain the CEO’s words. Corporate Twitter accounts should reveal who’s behind them whenever possible. It’s far easier to just do the right thing from the start than to try to repair a damaged reputation later.
Failing to provide fresh, relevant and valued content. In less than two decades, we’ve gone from a world of information scarcity to information overload. To stand out and make an impact, your content needs to be both original and helpful to your audience. Traditional marketing materials (e.g. product brochures and case studies) are not content; they still have their place, but that is later in the sales cycle after a sales dialog has been established, not at the exploration and initial interest stage where much social media interaction occurs.
Being negative. On the Internet, your words live forever. There’s rarely any benefit from making enemies, and prospective customers respond far more positively to constructive information than to trash talk. That’s not to say of course that you can’t objectively describe a disappointment with a vendor or be a bit controversial at times, but personal attacks and derogatory statements about competitors are more likely to damage the source than the target.
Treating social media as a silo. Social media is, ultimately, a sophisticated communications tool; it’s utility extends far beyond marketing and PR to product development, HR, customer service and other groups. In the most advanced stage of social media adoption, companies truly integrate the use of social media across the organization. For those organizations in earlier stages, the key is to train your marketers and subject matter experts on the proper use of social media tools, not to treat social media as a distinct function separated from business knowledge or function.
