With 9 out of 10 B2B marketers counting on content marketing tactics in their mix, it’s no wonder content marketing is getting so much attention on blogs, in traditional media and on the social web.

Along with the increased popularity of content, opportunists have begun aligning themselves with the topic of “content marketing”, even though their offering is only remotely related. As it was with websites in the 1990′s, SEO in the early 2000′s, social media over the past 5 years, so-called experts have begun pontificating advice based on thin air, obscure experiences and self interest.

To help our readers distill the signal from the noise, here are 3 myths about content marketing and how they are busted to give companies a clearer picture of reality when it comes to effective content marketing.

Myth 1: “Content Marketing” Simply Means Creating MORE Content

A misperception for many marketers new to the field of content marketing is that adding more content leads to improved business outcomes. When Google launched its Panda Update to filter out poor quality and thin content from search results, many members of the SEO community clamored to produce more content for the search engine rather than information focused qualitatively on the consumer intended to read it.

Myth Busted: Quality, not quantity rules the day when it comes to high value, high impact content marketing. But there’s nothing like a quantity of quality to win the week, month and year.  Content Marketing is based on creating useful information that meets the needs of the people the brand is trying to connect with. Relevancy, timeliness, context and utility all combine to create incredibly productive content marketing efforts. More is not better.

Myth 2: Quality Content is Not Sustainable

Fear of not being able to maintain high levels of content production is a reasonable concern, but not for companies that are connected to sources that matter most: their customers.  Companies that fear running out of interesting things to say have bigger issues to solve than writing their next blog post. 16% of the daily queries on Google have never been seen before, so there is plenty of opportunity to diversify key topics with empathy towards the voice of the customer.

Myth Busted: Connect with frontline customer service and sales staff to uncover important questions that, when answered, can lead to improved consideration, purchase, retention and advocacy within your market. Tapping into the themes and topics of importance to our community means you will never run out of meaningful ideas for your content creation efforts.

Myth 3: A Content Object Has Only One Life

Many companies approach content marketing by publishing singular content objects and promoting through channels of distribution like email, RSS, PR, advertising and social media. The investment in time and money into just one instance of a key story or message is akin to throwing money away and leaving the rest on the table for your competition.

Myth Busted: Content planning should include the repurposing of evergreen and co-created content. Break big topics down into a series to attract attention and inspire anticipation for the next content object. That means a series of blog posts, infographics, webinars, whitepapers, press releases, videos or case studies. Then repurpose those content objects into new forms to give your audience information in a format that better connects with their information consumption preferences.

Content used for marketing purposes only works when it’s useful to the people who consume, share and act on it.  Without fears or misperceptions in the way businesses can achieve a 360 degree array of benefits including awareness, interest, consideration, purchase, retention and advocacy with a thoughtful approach to content marketing.

This post is the first in a three part series where I’ll touch on common myths that are polluting perceptions of incredibly effective marketing tactics like content marketing, SEO and Social Media. These posts are also a preview to my presentation at BlogWorld’s BusinessNext conference January 8th (Tuesday) at the Rio in Las Vegas.

Here’s the official session description:

War of Words: Myth-Busting Social, SEO Content

This just in: “SEO is Dead”, “There is no ROI in Social Media” and many other proclamations are made in industry press and on blogs just about every week. And yet investment in social, search and content are all on the rise. Why the disconnect? From pageview journalism to egomaniacal SEO superstar wannabe’s, sweeping generalizations and out of context observations have created a number of myths about these highly effective online marketing channels.

This presentation will identify and bust the most common myths about SEO, Social Media and Content Marketing plus provide attendees with examples of how an integrated approach will win the battle and the war for more customers, better engagement and online marketing success.

Takeaways:

• Distinguish fact from fiction about social, SEO and Content Marketing
• Discover a model for integration that gets results
• See examples of modern social, SEO content in action

As always, those that liveblog the session can get a free copy of Optimize as will the top 2 people who livetweet.  I hope to see you there! (Registration info)

What are some of the biggest “myths” you’ve heard about content marketing? Any suggestions for myth-busting about SEO or social media?

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8 Deadly Sins of Site Design

This recent infographic from Nexus Themes targets 8 common mistakes that drive customers away from your website.  These sins include:

• Bad Navigation
• Too Many Ads
• Bad Content Structure
• Obtrusive Use of Audio Video
• Registration Requirement
• Boring Content, Boring Design
• Poor Legibility
• Lack of Frequency

Yahoo Has More Users Than Gmail – Introduces A Faster, Cleaner Email Interface
Yahoo has begun pouring effort into updating their email platform across all platforms.  A more modern design is being implemented in hopes of attracting users to actually use their Yahoo! Mail account, instead of using it as a repository for junk mail.  Via Marketing Pilgrim.

First Look At Google+ Communities: The Importance For Brands, Search and PR
If you have used Facebook or LinkedIn Groups for business, you’ll be interested in Google+’s new feature.  Communities is another step by Google towards building authority around individuals related to a particular subject.  Via Econsultancy.

Twitter Adds Instagram-Like Photo Filters
Last week Instagram pulled Twitter Cards support from its app, meaning that users who shared  their images were relegated to simple links.  Twitter has teamed up with Aviary to provide it’s own series of photo filters.  Via Mashable.

For Email Marketers, List Segmentation Is a Top Priority
Finding a way to harness big data is a priority for many digital marketers.  For email marketers, segmenting consumers based on a series of characteristics and finding ways to target those consumers is no longer a stretch goal, it’s a reality.   Via eMarketer.

TopRank Team News

Evan Prokop – Traveling in Australia?  Don’t Use Apple Maps, or You May Die, Warn Australian Police
Apple Maps has garnered plenty of criticism since its launch, but the recent warnings from Australian police are certainly the most severe.  Due to incorrect directions, several people have been led to remote areas far from access to food and water, leading Australian police to advise against relying on the service.  Via Search Engine Watch.

Jolina Pettice – 5 Ways Social Media Will Change The Way You Work in 2013
Last year 73% of Fortune 500 companies were active on Twitter. What does 2013 hold for social media and business? Read on to find out.  Via Forbes.

Thom Craver – Google Makes Structured Data Easy with Data Highlighter
Rich Snippets are an excellent way to provide semantic data to search engines. In practice, however, it has been a tedious and technical process to implement.  Google Webmaster Tools has added a new tool to help make the process easier by highlighting text on a page. It only works for events at the moment, but it’s a good start.  Via State of Search.

Brian Larson – It’s Not Just for Landing Pages – Split Testing In Twitter
While most marketers don’t need to be sold on the benefit of conducting AB or multivariate tests on their webpages, very few are taking that scientific approach to social. The first question to ask re this epidemic  (that may be overly dramatic) is ‘Why’.  I’d venture to guess the reason is that most marketers have not developed the processes to address the ‘How’. Luckily, Social Media Examiner has the laid out the game plan to address that very question.  Via Social Media Examiner.

Rob Bayne – Social Media and the Boardroom: Much Work Remains
The role of business and social media has changed from something only the online marketing department was concerned about, to something that impacts companies in a multitude of ways.  Only 14% of companies are regularly engaged in monitoring social media sentiment, is yours one?  Via Social Media Today.

Mike Odden – Arrests Over $850M Facebook Botnet Crime Spree
10 suspects in a Facebook cybercrime ring have been arrested in the US  UK and other countries  around the world.  Facebook users had been targeted since 2010.  Via BBC.

Miranda Miller – U.S. Online Holiday Spending Approaches $27 Billion
Online spending is up again this year, continuing a steady year-over-year growth trend as more consumers take to doing their holiday shopping online. comScore reports $26.6 billion has been spent in the first 37 days of the 2012 holiday shopping season, up 13% over the same period last year.  Via Comscore.

Mike Yanke – Holiday Traditions Falls As NORAD To Track Santa With Bing Maps
A long-standing holiday tradition, dating back five years now, will fall in 2012 as NORAD’s Santa Tracking will be supported by Bing Maps rather than Google.  Does this mean that Bing Maps are emerging as victorious in the online map wars – or does it mean that Google hates Christmas?  Because it can only be one or the other, after all.  Search Engine Land reports.

Time to Weigh In: Do you think that a site redesign is enough to get Yahoo! Mail users to spend more time on the platform?  Have you begun testing Google+ Communities for your business?  Have you ever run an A/B test on a social network?  What were the results?

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As a business journalist, I looked forward to information from a handful of specific sources each quarter. In fact, my quarterly e-commerce reports would wait until each of these select few companies, from whom I had come to expect great information, released their data. I relied on these sources for fantastic written and visual content our readers appreciated.

Now, when you have journalists and readers actually waiting on and looking forward to your content, isn’t that a massive win for your brand?

This is the power of sequenced content. Your audience comes to expect a certain type of product from you with each new installment. They subscribe to your RSS feed so they won’t miss it. They follow you in social channels to catch that first tweet once it’s released. They absolutely cannot wait to see what you’re coming up with next!

One of the greatest practitioners I know in generating buzz and anticipation for the next piece of his puzzle is Larry Kim, from WordStream. What is sequenced content, exactly? Kim explains it as, “a full content marketing campaign, typically consisting of original research, which is then followed by a sequence of follow-up articles which cover the same topic from a different angle.”

WordStream Discovers the Power of Original Research

WordStream has generated millions of pageviews over the last four years, having published approximately two thousand unique, original articles. Incredibly, 50% of that traffic was derived from his Top 10 performing sequenced article campaigns alone!

In May of this year, around the time of the Facebook IPO, Kim and his team at WordStream released a study on Facebook Advertising that suggested Facebook Display advertising doesn’t work. He turned his original research into a professionally designed infographic to make his information visually appealing and easy to share. In order to keep the story going, Kim then wrote a series of follow-up posts, such as Why I Bought Facebook IPO Shares and Why I Dumped My Facebook Shares, from a business angle.

Another of his sequenced content campaigns delivers data points on the most lucrative keywords in Google’s paid advertising arsenal and is a perennial favorite with media and readers.

Follow-up stories are incredibly helpful, says Kim, in that they have driven thousands of additional page views, social shares and links to the original study, in his experience. He had even more media inquiries from journalists looking to interview people who had recently bought or sold Facebook shares.

Kim has invested millions in publishing original research. Is he some kind of saint, altruistically out to help his fellow marketer with his company’s data and insights? Does he want to be famous author? No, he uses sequenced content to help establish thought leadership, build brand recognition and ultimately drive sales for WordStream. Numbers don’t lie; Kim’s sequenced content has earned his company:

• thousands of social media shares, including over 1,000 tweets and almost as many Likes on the Facebook Advertising example above,
• a significant presence in major news sources and business/technology publications,
• hundreds of thousands of blog visitors per month,
• increased organic traffic to the website,
• and a greater volume of more relevant, better converting leads for their software products, AdWords Grader and 20 Minute PPC Work Week.

Take a page from Larry’s book with these best practices for sequenced content campaigns:

• Produce original, interesting research or analysis.
• Stay relevant to your audience and target market by offering content closely related to your product or service.
• Seek out hot topics and become the news.
• Make it easy and fun for readers to share your content with their social contacts.
• Stay on point; set out to prove one concept or idea and keep your work tightly tied to that idea.

TopRank Rocks Social Media with Curation and Networking

I’m still relatively new to TopRank Online Marketing, but one of the main reasons I was inspired to join the team is their brilliant content marketing strategy. For the past three years, TopRank has published the 25 Women Who Rock Social Media series, with excellent reception.

Each year’s winners nominate the next year’s candidates. This content creation strategy accomplishes a number of really awesome objectives in one fell swoop:

• Celebrating the successes of others is great PR and a fantastic networking opportunity.
• Industry influencers have a vested interest in promoting the content.
• The entire collection of content is highly relevant to a marketing audience.
• Readers anticipate and look forward to the next installation.

TopRank’s free visual e-book series is another example of the power of sequenced content in practice.  The title “B2B Marketing Innovation” alone has been viewed almost 60,000 times! Our Content Marketing Secrets eBook has just as many views and has been embedded 71 times, creating an even greater opportunity for new sets of eyes to reach our content.

TopRank’s tips for winning sequenced content campaigns:

• Act as a curator of awesome, celebrating the successes of others, for influencer buy-in and increased exposure.
• Focus on one format and do it incredibly well.
• Repurpose content and build out your content marketing campaign by writing a blog post about your e-book, sharing snippets in social channels, etc.

There are a number of other companies excelling in sequenced content creation and I’m running out of room! More and more, we see smaller companies acting as publishers and using these strategies to create original, interesting content, or curate and repurpose to win views, social shares and leads for their products and services. Success in content marketing isn’t reserved for bigger brands; focusing on building a series of content can actually help you focus and build campaigns you can easily scale.

Do you know of a brand, large or small, killing it with sequenced content that gets social shares and wins targeted leads? Share your favorites in the comments.

Image via Shutterstock.

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As consumers we make a few large priced purchases that we remember and many small cost items here and there.  For the larger items we expect personalized care and service, whereas the smaller purchases may be out of our mind just as quickly as we’ve purchased them.

There is another category and those are the purchases that we make each month, without even thinking about it.  Subscription based services are great, you get your service when you want it, your account is auto charged each month, it’s pretty awesome.  Until of course it stops working.

You may have had the same experience as I have where you call, furious that your cable or Internet stopped working and reach an automated system, or are put on hold for what feels like hours.  Fortunately, social media has provided an opportunity for these seemingly “unreachable” companies to help customers in need.

In this post you’ll find three examples of subscription based companies that are using social media to answer the questions and concerns of their customers and keep them up to date on what’s new.  Any company looking to better connect with customers can look to these organizations for ways to communicate properly with consumers using social media.

Sprint

Sprint uses the handle @sprintcare on Twitter to answer customer questions and field issues.  The level of personality that comes through in their tweets feels very genuine and compassionate towards the problems of their customers.  They even go so far as to use the initials of the person providing information at the end of each tweet.  This way consumers are assured that they are getting help from a “real person” and not just from someone nameless within the organization.

Sprint’s Facebook page provides easy access to all of the ways customers can connect with the wireless provider as well as insight into some of their customer service team members and frequently asked questions.

Netflix

The majority of inquiries that Netflix receives on their @netflixhelps Twitter account are customers requesting that new titles be added to their content library or loading errors that they are experiencing.  Netflix does a great job of pointing users facing issues to existing content on their website.  For those looking for new titles, Netflix shares that while they have no control over when they receive specific titles, they are currently working with studios to secure the requested content.

While Netflix is not using Facebook to solve customer service issues they are taking the opportunity to inform customers of new titles and specials available on their streaming service package.

SiriusXM Radio

SiriusXM’s Twitter account @sxm_help is run by “Kate” and is focused on helping customers find radio stations they’re looking for and taking suggestions for new channels to add.  As with Sprint customer help, SiriusXM makes a point of interacting with customers in a qualitative way.

SiriusXM doesn’t take any specific customer requests on Facebook but they do point to other helpful resources on Twitter, FAQ’s, and quick access to email them a question or comment.

Whether you’re providing a video service or subscription based marketing services, there is always an opportunity to provide your customers additional care using social media.

What companies have you found to provide good customer service by augmenting their strategy using social media.

Image via Shutterstock.

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