I recently had the opportunity to present at the RISE Conference here in Austin. Given the audience was filled with entrepreneurs in various stages of starting or running a business, I focused my presentation, “The Top Three Ways To Uncover More Qualified Leads for Sales”, on often overlooked and easy-to-implement ideas that lead to generating more leads. After a short presentation, we spent time discussing the companies of various audience members and the specific needs and challenges they were experiencing related to lead generation. It was a lively discussion, and as an outcome they were able to walk away with several tangible next steps that could be implemented back at the office.

Enjoy the slideshow and hopefully you will walk away with tangible ideas as well. Learn more about our lead generation services, and be sure to follow us on Twitter or like us on Facebook for more B2B marketing content.

One of the latest catchphrases in the marketing world is “content is king.” This phrase highlights the growing popularity of content marketing. 91% of organizations are now using content marketing, which involves communicating with prospects by providing valuable, engaging information rather than overtly selling to them, to move leads through the sales funnel.

However, successful content marketing often requires a large, robust collateral system with many pieces that can be utilized. To many marketers, building such a large system can seem to be a daunting task. Here are a few important things to keep in mind when building a collateral system:

1.       Produce a Wide Variety of Pieces

A complete collateral system is composed of a variety of pieces, each with a specific purpose. These can include whitepapers, case studies, data sheets and more. When determining the types of content you produce, keep in mind your audience and their needs, as well as how the pieces will be used. For example, sales reps may need them for sales conversations and marketing may need content for trade shows.

When thinking about your audience, it helps to map the content that you currently have to your personas and sales funnel stages. This helps to ensure that you have enough pieces at each stage and know any areas that are lacking.

2.       Establish a Cohesive Style

With so many different types of collateral pieces, it is important to maintain a cohesive look so that all of the pieces work together. Each type of collateral should have similar core elements, such as font styles and colors, headers and footers and imagery styles. Additionally, you should establish a voice and tone for all written pieces to reflect the personality of your company.

3.       Use the Resources at Your Disposal

Producing a large number of collateral pieces can be time-consuming so leveraging available resources helps make this process more efficient. Your internal teams can be valuable resources for producing content. This is especially true of client-facing employees, such as your sales team, who interact regularly with prospects and understand their interests and needs. Additionally, you can leverage your executive team to produce content that carries credibility and name-recognition.

Another area that can be used to source content is customer interviews. While these are obvious sources for case studies, you can also use these interviews as an opportunity to understand the types of content that your target audience best reacts to, as well as specific topics they are interested in.

Additionally, content can be re-purposed across multiple formats and worked into various areas of your marketing plan. A whitepaper, for example, could be shortened into a blog post or used as the basis for a webinar . This way, you are using the time and effort spent to produce the content pieces as efficiently as possible.

The Conclusion on Content

With so many marketing activities utilizing content, it is important to have a robust collateral system with enough different pieces of content to use. While it can seem overwhelming to produce so many pieces of content, by thinking about it strategically and following the steps above, you can start to produce quality pieces of content that work together as an effective collateral system.

Need help building out your organization’s collateral system? Contact Launch today! Be sure to follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook to stay up to date with the latest B2B marketing tips and trends.

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

What is a Meme?

Memes are simple ideas that spread quickly through the internet. They typically take the form of videos or photos. Here are a couple of popular memes:

Grumpy Cat                                                              Success Kid
                    

 Double Rainbow

Memes and Marketing

While memes are typically thought of as a funny image to share with friends, they can also be utilized as part of a marketing plan to generate buzz and word of mouth. They are a great way to reach an audience, especially through social media. The light-heartedness and easy sharability of these images increase their likelihood of going viral. This is especially useful on Facebook, as this helps to improve your page’s Edgerank, increasing the organic reach of your posts.

Memes can also be a useful way to generate leads. One method for generating leads from memes is by using them to drive traffic to a landing page featuring a valuable and relevant resource, such as a white paper or an eBook, behind a simple, short form.

As with all other marketing tactics, it is a best practice to continuously test in order to derive the greatest results from a meme campaign. We have found that memes related to popular culture posted around lunchtime or after 5:00pm have the highest engagement. While this is true for our page, it may not be true for yours. Test different calls-to-actions, formats and posting times to find the best combination for your Facebook page.

Marketo does a great job of this on their Facebook page:

Launch’s B2B Marketing Memes

We recently created a series of memes focused on B2B marketing and lead generation. Here are a few examples:

As discussed above, we always link the memes to a relevant piece of content, in order to use the memes to drive traffic to our website.

How can you use memes in your company’s marketing campaigns? Be sure to follow us on Twitter or like us on Facebook for more B2B marketing best practices.