Even the most well written blog will not have an impact if no one reads it. While blogging is on the rise in B2B marketing tactics, it is difficult to stand out in the crowd when there are more than two million blog posts written each day. To make sure your blog resonates with readers, there are three questions to ask before you start writing.

What’s Already Working?

Past blog performance is a great way to find topics that can be explored more. By using analytics software (i.e., Google Analytics), you can see which blog posts are trending as the most popular. Also, look at the search terms people used to find your site either through organic or paid search activity. If you find there is a topic that is driving more people to your site, consider writing fresh content on that topic or expanding on an existing piece of content.

It is easier to analyze your data and see trends by proactively keeping track of your blog statistics,. As an example, I keep an Excel spreadsheet with a row for each blog post. I then have columns for bit.ly clicks, Google Analytics data and Facebook engagement statistics for each. Periodically, I will analyze the data to see which topics are driving more traffic.

Sometimes it can be surprising what drives the most traffic to your website. For instance, the most popular content pieces on our website are an article on common grammar and punctuation mistakes, a blog on tips for taking the Google AdWords certification exam and a two-part blog series on our favorite infographics. While these are not irrelevant to what we do here, it was still surprising to see that they were driving so much more traffic than topics more closely related to our core services.

What’s Happening Now?

One way to increase the likelihood of content going viral is being one of the first to write on a topic. Is there a new product launch making an impact in your industry (such as Pinterest or Vine for social media marketing)? Maybe there’s been a new study published that has up-to-date, relevant findings. By keeping up with the latest industry trends, you can help to ensure that you will be one of the first to publish content on that topic.

Outside of your industry, are there any current events happening in popular culture? Taking advantage of the attention that is already being paid to an event can be a successful way to generate interest in a blog post. The term newsjacking refers to the method of using a current event to place your company into the spotlight. Several brands took advantage of the recent Super Bowl blackout to inject their message into the coverage that was occurring both on social media and beyond. Subsequently, many marketing blogs took the opportunity to write posts on newsjacking best practices.

What’s Interesting to Readers?

With limited free time and so many blogs being published, visitors are not likely to read a long post if it contains only text. Generally speaking, the more visual content you add to a blog post, the more engaged your readers will be. We make sure to include at least one image in each of our blog posts and articles.

Additionally, is there any rich media that you can embed in your blog post, such as a video or Slideshare? Doing so allows your reader to view the content without leaving your post and keeps them engaged. Below is a SlideShare presentation from Marketo full of blogging tips for B2B marketers.

The tone you use when writing a blog post is also important. Try to find a balance of casual and professional, and avoid being too “salesy.” Establishing a distinct voice is important, as it showcases your company’s personality. Hubspot and MarketingProfs both take a fun, casual tone with their blog posts, while blog posts from MarketingSherpa, while still conversational, tend to have more of a straight-laced tone.

Blogging is not just for moms or teenagers anymore. Its use in B2B marketing has increased significantly – 77% of B2B marketers are now using blogs as a content marketing tactic, and this trend shows no signs of slowing down. However, since this is a relatively new tactic for B2B marketers, many companies struggle with making their efforts effective. It is important to keep in mind what your readers want, in order to develop content that they will be likely to consume and share with those

Content marketing has risen in popularity among B2B marketers. According to B2B Content Marketing: 2012 Benchmarks, Budgets and Trends, published by Content Marketing Institute and Marketing Profs, 9 out of 10 marketers are utilizing content marketing. Content can take place in multiple formats, including text (blogs and articles), images (infographics and memes) and video. With so many types of content to choose from, developing a plan of action can be overwhelming. The types of content you produce should be influenced by multiple factors including your audience, the sales funnel and the medium you are utilizing.

Audience

Before beginning a content marketing campaign (or any other marketing campaign for that matter), you should be sure to have a complete picture of your audience. By understanding their concerns, needs and characteristics, it is easier to develop content on topics that they will find relevant.

Sales Funnel

Since the target audience  influences which type of content you use, uncovering their stage in the sales funnel will help determine which types of content are most useful to them.

It is useful to map your content to a corresponding stage in the sales funnel. Content such as infographics, blog posts or articles can be used to generate leads at the top of the funnel. Once leads are in the middle of the funnel, provide content that is more specific to their particular needs such as whitepapers and webinars. At the bottom of the funnel, utilize content to close the deal. This content should demonstrate the value that a company can derive from using your product or service, and could include case studies, product demos or ROI calculators.

Medium

The medium you utilize to publish your content also has an effect on the type of content you should produce. Think of the characteristics of the medium. Facebook is more of a visual medium than Twitter, so your new infographic may have more of an impact on Facebook, while a new article might be shared more on Twitter. It is important to test using multiple media and continually refine your tactics in order to increase the impact of your campaign.

Get more from your investment  (and time) by repurposing content across multiple platforms. Consider sending an email with your “Top 5 Blog Posts” or tweeting an article “from the archives.” Repurposing content is a great way to extend the life of your content and increase exposure.

If done correctly, a content marketing campaign can produce great ROI, as it is typically inexpensive to produce and promote. However, a successful content marketing campaign requires more than creating a funny video and posting it on YouTube. It is essential to understand your audience, the sales funnel and the medium you are utilizing in order to maximize the impact of your content.

Need help maximizing the impact of your content marketing? Contact Launch today! And be sure to follow us on Twitter and Facebook to keep up to date with our insider marketing tips.

I recently attended the Marketo Summit 2012 in San Francisco.  While I really enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about Marketo’s marketing automation software, I also was thrilled at the number of sessions focused on general marketing tips, tricks and best practices.

Some of the takeaways served as reminders, but many were inventive new ideas with case studies and testing to back them up! One of my favorite sessions was “Writing Better Emails and Landing Pages.” While crafting better emails for lead generation and lead nurturing is an age-old marketing topic, the presenter did an excellent job of really providing outside the box ideas for moving marketing emails from delivery, to open, to click thru!

Without further ado, here are some key takeaways from that session:

Email Marketing Timing:

• Send emails early in the morning if possible.  Studies have shown that emails sent first thing in the morning are more likely to be read.
• Schedule automated emails to be sent in a more human-like fashion. For example, rather than scheduling an immediate follow up email from sales prompted by a case study download (e.g., “Thank you for your interest in our services – would you like a demo? ”), schedule it to send out the next morning.  This makes the email appear less automated and more personable.

Email Marketing Subject Lines:

• Keep your subject line to eight words or less – this keeps subjects short and sweet and more likely to be opened!
• Use brackets in your subject line when possible to call out your offer.  This goal is to make it stand out in an inbox e.g., “[Webcast Tomorrow] Register Now!”.  Differentiating your email is key.
• Address your recipient directly in the email and subject line – e.g., “What You Need to Know about Marketing Automation” versus “What CMOs Need to Know about Marketing Automation.”
• Want to avoid being marked as spam? Don’t use “free” in the subject line.

Email Marketing Content:

• Use bullets or numbered lists at the top of your email – people skim emails and you want your message as clear and concise as possible.
• Always use clickable links versus URLs.  What does this mean? It’s the difference between “Visit our website” (hyperlinking to the site) versus “www.launch-marketing.com.” The first is a clear call to action and much more compelling.
• Don’t use URL shorteners in your clickable links in emails. Sites like Bitly are awesome for Twitter or other places where you are limited to a word count, but using a shortened URL in your email links could mark it as spam and affect deliverability.
• Always use a greeting/salutation such as “Hello [First Name].”  This makes your email appear more personal, and less like spam.
• Here’s a new one – include typos in emails intentionally!  This typo tactic is used often by sales teams when sending out automated emails. Their goal is to appear as if they were typing the email at 7am at their desk and they happened to make a few typos as they were following up with each prospect individually.
• Last but not least – have ONE call to action.  The best way to ensure your most important link is clicked is by providing only one option to click!

I hope you found these tips as insightful as I did.  If you have any to add, let me know – I’d love to add them to the list!

Interested in more B2B marketing tips and tricks? Read these tips to increase demand generation email response rates.  Also, follow Launch on Twitter & Facebook!

I recently attended a conference where @Joshuabaer spoke about what he would do differently if he started a company today. As an entrepreneur with a host of technology companies under his belt that he founded, plus countless other start-ups he has mentored or invested in – he had a lot of great thoughts to share with his usual disclaimer – these may not work for everyone but they would definitely work for him! Here is a recap of Joshua’s Top 10:

1. Pick a problem you have personally or one you see repeatedly

When you start a company, you will invest a lot of blood, sweat and tears in it so pick something you are truly passionate about. Often this means you would be the user of the product or service too – which means you really understand the pain and the need.

2. Find a cofounder

As every entrepreneur knows, starting a company is hard and there is a lot to do. Finding a cofounder or several can help your idea become even bigger and better than originally anticipated because of the unique perspective they bring to the table. It is important to note though, co-founding a company is like getting married, so pick well!

3. Have as few secrets as possible

Although this may seem like it goes against the grain of traditional entrepreneurs, talking about your idea has huge upsides. When you share what you are thinking about, you will likely get good feedback, additional ideas and new connections that are relevant to helping your business get off the ground. The downsides are minimal, unless of course, you are starting a company with Mark Zuckerberg – then you may want to keep things quiet. But hey, Facebook is new to Austin so we should be in the clear.

4. Outsource as much as possible

“Entrepreneurs wear many hats” is a statement you hear pretty commonly. True – but there is only so much room on someone’s head! As a founder or co-founder, Josh recommends you focus on the aspects of your technology and company that will impact your business the most and that you are really good at. The rest should be outsourced, like accounting and marketing. He also noted that where you can use SaaS, do that option instead of getting software to put on your server.

5. Raise as little as possible

Joshua’s philosophy is only take what you need and aim for a business that does not require a lot of money. Having started several companies [some bootstrapped , some angel backed], and now as an investor himself, he knows that fundraising is not that much fun and it takes away from running the business.

6. Get customers to pay in advance

So often entrepreneurs think no one will pay for what they’re building – especially when it is still a concept. Yet if you are solving a real problem for a customer, they often will consider paying in advance because they see the benefit it will have to their organization. At the conference I attended, there were several entrepreneurs who had used this approach very successfully so I know it works!

7. Build mobile first

Mobile is where the growth is in the market, so Joshua recommends that if you have a problem you are addressing with your soon to be built software, design it to work in a mobile environment. Another bonus of this approach – building mobile first forces you to focus on what matters the most from a product development perspective because you can only have a few key buttons, etc. on the page.

8. Build in the cloud

Being a cloud-based company provides significantly more flexibility from a development perspective. As an example, in the cloud it is feasible to clone everything on new instances and run simulations to uncover problems in a matter of minutes or hours. In contrast, trying to do this using on-premise servers wouldn’t be easy or very feasible to do given the additional capital requirements and resources needed to set it up.

9. Build in Rails

Joshua shared that Rails programmers want to build beautiful and elegant code, which also means it is easy to read and easy to change. It is the language he prefers for his companies.

10. Go through an accelerator program

If you are just getting started on your start-up, be it your first time or your third company, he recommends going through an accelerator program as you’ll be around a bunch of other startups. Being surrounded by other entrepreneurs will add a lot of value to your growing business and the mentors there can help guide you on the path to success.

Austin has several great resources for entrepreneurs including Capital Factory [which Joshua is a Director of], Tech Ranch and Austin Technology Incubator. Looking for accelerators in other cities? Here is a good list with application deadlines included.