5 Steps to Content Marketing Success by Paddy Moogan #309

Hi, and welcome to the SEO Podcast, Unknown Secrets of Internet Marketing. My name is Chris Burris, owner of eWebResults. I am Charles Lewis, your client results advocate. Welcome to another fun-filled edition of our podcast. This is podcast number 309. It's going to be a wonderful podcast. As always, we do have a tip from our previous podcast. And the tip from our previous podcast is written right here. Our tip is optimize your mobile experience even when using responsive design. The responsive design is great, and it usually does a good job, especially using Bootstrap. But make sure you've optimized for mobile because you never know if you check it. It's important. All right, back to our regularly scheduled podcast. We are broadcasting live from Houston, Texas. And we are your friendly local neighborhood top position snatchers. And our mantra is do not be a douche. Don't be a douche. It is not a good look. It is not a good look. It is really not a good look. Hey, we've got a really good article that we're talking. And I see you pulled that off of Moz, eh? Yeah, we pulled this off of Moz. One of my favorite tools to use, by the way, anyway. Moz in general, yeah. Yeah, so this article is Five Steps to Content Marketing Success, posted by Patty Moogan. And so we'll dive into that a little bit later. Excellent. So if this is the first time you've ever listened to or watched this podcast, howdy. Welcome to the podcast. How you doing? We're glad you're joining us. If you've listened to this podcast before, you know what we're about to skip. Yeah. So we got more than 10 shikes. That's a share or a like or whatever on social platforms, on our social platforms. And we got a couple of reviews. So we're not going to tell you how you could go leave us a review. We will ask you, please, go leave us a review. What we will do, though, is give you some idea of where you could

shike us. And again, that's share or like us. And that's, I don't know, youtube.com slash eWebResults. Twitter.com slash eWebResults. Facebook.com slash eWebResults. Instagram.com slash eWebResults. LinkedIn.com slash company slash eWebResults. This is a new one. By the way, LinkedIn, get your shit together. Come on, man. Make it linkedin.com slash eWebResults. Or at least see, like I thought at one point I'd see. Yeah, because it's kind of obvious as a company. Yeah. I guess, though, it is geared towards people. Yeah, because mine is LinkedIn.com slash user slash Charles Lewis. So, okay. I get it. It's just, yeah. Yeah, company is kind of lame. All of those, go check them out. Like us. Follow us. Leave us a review or whatever. Shike us. If you're a PHP genius or a WordPress extraordinarily talented program, we're probably looking for you. Give us a call, 713-510-7846. You can, not you who just applied, you who are listening, can get a free website analysis. Yeah. And the way you get a free website analysis is you go to our website, eWebResults.com, and you will find the link to our... Yeah, it's a button right there. Matter of fact, in the sidebar, just put your name, put your phone, put your email, put your web address. Submit it. All of those will take care of you. So, we do not have any algorithm cataclysm today, so... I will care today. I got a little bit of news. I thought this was interesting. Microsoft is testing underwater data centers. So, you know, the Knox Network Operating Centers, they always have massive air conditioners, and the floor is raised to have a plenum area and actually to be able to run wires. And they're testing, just take that environment and drop it in the water, it's got better cooling. That makes sense. Kind of cool. Yeah. Mobile... Well, probably opens up a whole new area for storage. Yeah. Like, you know, no longer win some mountain or some cave or some warehouse, now it's underwater. Hidden underwater. That's kind of cool. Um, all of

the mobile carriers are investing millions of dollars for the Super Bowl. Of course. Right? How many times have you been in a stadium? Like, I feel like my cell phone doesn't work in stadiums in general. Like, it's got really bad reception. Now, is that because I'm on a carrier that's yellow? Well, I use Sprint. Oh, yeah. We both use Sprint, yeah. I've been using Sprint for years. And frankly, um, I, in Toyota Center, uh, Reliance Stadium, even when I was at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta, uh, just connected to their Wi-Fi. I have no problem. And so that's what I'm noticing. Most stadiums are giving you free access. Giving you some access. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Cause I've just tried. Oh, data sucks in stadium. Yeah. If you're trying to use data, you might go. If you've ever been at a concert and everyone turns on their phones, you know, instead of the lighter, you're like, okay, that's why I have no bandwidth. Yeah. Exactly. Um, this is another one. I thought it was really cool. So a 14 year old kid did an analysis on what, how much money the government could save if they changed the font, not the font size, but the font on their government documents, right? So a slightly thinner font and, and it's actually a little bit shorter. The number was, uh, $234 million. So I guess the better question would be how much trees would they save? Right. I mean, so, well, and that didn't even count the fact that it was shorter. So he wasn't like assuming, okay, you could have one less page, right? Cause if you've got a really long document and you, and you know, you're saving a couple letters per line, you could end up at the end saving a couple of pages. That was just purely ink cost. Wow. Just ink cost. And what a cool, I mean, simple, easy. He did it. He's on CNN, all that stuff. So that's kind of cool. That's what's up. Well, 14 year old, where are

you from? Uh, I do not know where he's from. Uh, he was insanely nerdy. And I can say that cause, uh, you know, I studied mechanical engineering and I'm a programmer nerd. So, um, that was, you know, with all due respect, he was insanely nerdy. Um, which is a good thing. Like insanely nerdy isn't necessarily a bad thing. Yeah. We're hoping that those people who call into that number are insanely nerdy that, uh, that PHP, you know, WordPress position. Um, all right. That's what I've got. You got any tips or news? I want some news. Yeah. So, so let's say, um, first off, all my WordPress users, right? A couple of days ago, WordPress released version 4.4.2. The security update, they're recommending an immediate download, of course. So if you WordPress users, go handle that. Um, so did this admit single. He's the guy, he was the head of Google search for the last 15 years. Right. But calling it quits. Huh? Chunking the deuces, Google them, done. It's been nice, but he's going on to pursue some of his, uh, uh, philanthropic purposes. Want to go be with his family. Yeah. So he spent a lot of time away from his wife and kids and now he got kids who are about to go off to college, so he won't spend some time with them before they go. I get it. Good job. Google is the best search and you definitely had a huge role to play in that. Absolutely, yeah. And lastly, this really could have been a punch in the face to Mark Zuckerberg. Yeah. We'll give him a punch in the face. Yeah. We all use Facebook a lot. Yeah. And we get shiked on Facebook. But this punch in the face to him is because he just became the sixth richest person in the world. Oh, I saw an article that was like fourth. So it's like, maybe it's fourth in the U.S. or something. Maybe fourth in the U.S. But sixth in the world, so it says Mark Zuckerberg,

and this is from Forbes, he says Mark Zuckerberg surpassed Oracle chairman Larry Edison to become the sixth richest person in the world and after I was trading. His net worth increased from $4.8 billion to $46.25 billion. Yeah. And then this is 12% after the market closed because it climbed 12%. I don't know how you climb 12% and add 10 times your net worth. Yeah. I think there's something wrong with that calculation. Literally, the stock climbed 12% and his value went from $4.8 billion to $46 billion. Nah, there's something wrong there. Forbes, go check your numbers. Either way, dude, Mark Zuckerberg, punch in the face to you because if indeed you are the sixth... You know, I think about the twins, like you think, remember the social media movie, right? You think about the twins who jumped out early, his partner who jumped out early. I bet you guys are like, this is some bullies. Well, you know, in Apple, there's the guy who was, I think it was the legal counsel for them. Yeah. They bought him out for like $10,000 and he would be worth, I think, billions, at least hundreds of millions now. Yeah. He doesn't regret it. And you know, interestingly enough, all kind of happiness studies say that that's actually true, that people are happy where they're at. Well, they are. It's pretty interesting. All right. So, we've got a couple of reviews. First one is from Brian L., and this is a punch in the face to Brian Lobig. We talked about him last night, and we actually gave him a punch in the face last night, and he went and left this review. And the real view is, of course, five stars. It says, Consulting with Chris is the title. This is a brief review of the Ibulent, eWebResults. Yeah, I'm going to have to go look that up. Ibulent. Ibulent. EWebResults Podcast and Professional SEO Consulting Provided by Chris Burris. I have listened, by the way, this is the first time I'm really like the center. Yeah, enjoy

it. Take it in, bro. It says, I have listened to the eWebResults Podcast since early 2015 and encouraged my entire team of SEO account managers to do the same. I have my own SEO and internet marketing consultancy in Washington, D.C., and have found the content provided by this Texas twosome fun and fact-filled. I finally had the need to reach out to them for some professional consulting today and found Chris to be as knowledgeable and helpful one-on-one as the team is on their podcast. Thanks for all you do, and I'm sure you'll be chatting with you in the future. Rock on. Punch in the face to you, Mr. Brian. Mr. Brian. Ebulent. Ebulent. Cheerful and full of energy. Oh, cool. Go on. That's us. And then the next one is, this one was also five stars. This is by Meth Gamer. Okay. Yeah. Punch in the face. Yeah. The audio could not be better, but, oh, could be better, but the content is great. Looking forward to snatching top positions. That's what's up. Appreciate it. That's pretty cool. Matter of fact, hit us back. We made some adjustments on audio today. I kind of readjusted my microphone situation. So, is that what you think? Yeah, we're pretty busy here, so sometimes we don't get back to listen to our podcast, so that feedback helps us say, hey guys, go listen to your podcast. Yeah. So, we did that. Finally, this is a really long one. I'm going to try and read it quickly. Finally, this is from Tim Irvin. Activate chipmunk voice. Yeah. All right. And this one, I think, was five stars, but I didn't record it. So, these guys are the real deal. Have been a listener of the podcast for the past few weeks. Real deal. I've been involved with tech for nearly 20 years with a focus on e-commerce. I am fairly well-versed in SEO, but listening to these podcasts get me motivated to do more. Even if I am not learning something new, I am constantly gaining new insights from two

experts in the field and being reminded of things to add to my to-do list. Sorry about that. Which gets done immediately after listening because they pump me up so much. Wow. That's the first time we got that. That's cool. We should listen. Yeah. The podcast is entertaining as well. These guys are excellent speakers and know what they're talking about. I look forward to listening to their new podcast and find myself revisiting old ones on an almost daily basis. Whether you have an interest in the field, an expert in the field, or a business owner, whether you are those things, looking to improve your rating, the podcast is for you. I know I have spoken mostly about the podcast, but I will say many companies in this industry claim to be on top of the latest changes in the ever-so-dynamic field. But these guys really are on top of their game. I would recommend them for their services, and I am actually hoping to do some work with them shortly. Cool. As someone with nearly 20 years in this field, I can say that these guys always have something new to add, and their thoughts are always pertinent and valid. I often find myself disagreeing with articles and other podcasts on the subject or the ones that you're going over, valid topics. Go over the basics. This sounded like a run-on sentence, which only get you so far. These guys know what is up. Hats off to you guys. Keep up the good work. I will be in touch shortly. Punch in the face to Mr. Tim Irvin. Tim Irvin. That has a lot of value. Thank you so much. I appreciate you saying that because you're right. There are tons of articles on tons of sites that we can choose from, and every week I scour through to pull the content that I believe is going to be best for not only us to kind of absorb but to present to you. And you're right. We disagree also. There's a reason why I don't pull

a lot of articles because I just totally disagree with it. So I'm glad you actually noticed that. Very cool. Well, that is the potatoes of our podcast. Time to get into the meat. Awesome. Awesome. So like we said earlier, give a big punch in the face to Patty, Patty Mugen and the good folks over at Moz. He posted this article, Five Steps to Content Marketing Success. We're all in content marketing. Especially if you're doing SEO, then content marketing is frankly a big part of what you do. And so let's get right into it. I like how he starts off. He says, in this post, I'm going to shower processes for putting together a content marketing campaign. It doesn't guarantee success either, but I'm positive that it puts us in a much better position than if we didn't have a process at all. Let me take this time to say, look, Patty, this is the ultimate cosign. I totally agree because everybody does marketing a little bit differently. But the key is you have a process. We have a process. Other agencies have a process and you must have a process for whatever you're doing. That way you can test it and measure it and constantly improve it and tweak it and change it. If you don't have a process, then you're kind of just shooting at the wind and you may not get results. So punch in the face to you for having a process. Let's dig in. Step one, he says, research and idea generation. Research and idea generation. And again, we're talking about five steps to content marketing success. Research and idea generation. He goes on to say it's easy to dive straight into brainstorming and idea generation. And sometimes that can work. However, I recommend a period of research into an industry prior to this so you can get a feel for what's been done before, what's worked or what hasn't worked. He's right. At the end of the day, research is extremely important. You got to find the right topic. You

can't just come up with an idea and say, man, let's put a content strategy behind it. Let's blog and you write, rush some content. Let's start tweeting and Facebooking and you rush some content. Let's create some video and you rush it. No, no, no. Slow down. Yeah. Stop. Put the brakes on. Do some research. Research is that is really important. You must find the right topic. And more importantly, that topic, you really want it to kind of correlate with your core service or your target key phrase or, you know, whatever your online objective is. I told you that the phone would ring. Yeah. So you want to make sure that you find content that that that's that's correlates with what you offer. Right. He also goes on to say that, um, um, uh, make sure that you're not under pressure to come up with a completely new idea. And he's right because a lot of times you won't. There's really nothing new under the sun, but you can address your spin to it. Right. You can't add your twist to it. You can maybe disagree with it and promote what you think is right. Also about researching the type of content, figure out what the topic of the content, figure out research, the type of content that you want to put out there. Right. This is what I'm adding. So, so you may determine your topic. Right. Like, okay, we're going to talk about blah, whatever blah is for you. Sheep. Sheep. Okay. After you determine your topic, then figure out how you're going to present that topic. Right. Is this going to be a blog post? Is it going to be a video, infographic, white paper, a newsletter? How are you going to put this content out there? How are you going to produce it? That's a part of the research. After you figure out your topic, you need to understand, um, how you're going to put it out there. And lastly, you need to determine what's going to work best for that content

could be more than one of those. It may need to be a post and a video. Right. Or it may need to be a white paper and infographic. Right. Or just one of the two. So do your research. It may need to be a podcast posted on YouTube and co-broadcast on Periscope. Exactly. Then transcribed and put on your site and also sent to iTunes so people can download it. And next week we may try Facebook Live. I'm just saying. And shared on LinkedIn.com slash company slash you. So the point is, do your research and make sure you understand that the topic you're writing about, how you're going to put it out there and when. Yeah. Number two. Two. He says, idea validation. And this is cool because you want to kind of make sure that the idea you came up with is actually valid. He goes on to say, you can think that you have a great idea, but how do you know for sure? The fact is, you can never predict this 100%, but you can increase the possibility by using some type of framework to validate that idea. He goes on to reference some framework from a book called Make to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath. Punch in the face to those guys. I did click the link. Looks pretty interesting. I'll check it out some more. But basically, he kind of summarized that. And their publication, their framework is actually kind of cool. It basically talked about a checklist, if you will, of what you can do to see if your idea is valid. Right. Right. So his checklist starts off with simplicity. Is your idea simple? Can people absorb it quickly? Or is it too complicated? Right. Unexpectedness. Is this a nuke idea? Is this an old idea? Is this your remixed version of some existing idea? Right. Concreteness. How concrete is this idea? Is it solid? This is what it is. Nothing changes. Or is there room for ambiguity? I can never say that word. Ambiguity. Guity. Yeah. Or

credibility. You can never say it unless you're rapping, and then it just comes out. Then it comes out. Yeah. Perfect. Because I've said it many times before. Credibility. Right. How credible is this content that you're putting out? How credible are you? How credible is your source that you're using? Does this content have any emotion? Does it tug on heartstrings? Emotion tends to captivate people and make them engage. And so these are things you need to kind of test off your checklist to see if your idea is valid. And usually if you can hit two or three of those, like it is credible, it is relevant, then you may be going down the path of actually creating some pretty good content. Yeah. Number three. Three. He says production. Production. Right. So this is after you've researched and after you've validated your idea, now it's time to start production. He goes on to say, never, ever say, I want an infographic or I want a video or I want an interactive piece of content. You should focus on getting the idea right first, then figure out the best way to present that idea. He's right. He actually goes right back to the research. Right. Before you determine how you're going to produce it, you need to determine what it is you're going to produce and then figure out the best way to present that topic. I like this part. He goes on to say, still in production. He says, it's function over form. He goes on and, you know, the function over form is basically figuring out how is this going to work is the best way to present it. He actually recommends a mobile first design. Not quite sure about that one, Patty. I get it. Especially with so many people using mobile. You know, mobile is the thing now. It's not the future. It's the right now. I get it. But I would say checking analytics first, right? Because at the end of the day, if 70, 80% of your website traffic comes from a

desktop, then your content will likely be absorbed in the same fashion. And you may want to make sure that it's better there than necessarily spinning your wheels on a mobile. However, if your content is kind of staggered across all platforms, mobile, tablet, desktop, and you notice a lot of social activity, then absolutely. He's right. Make sure it's mobile first because you have a higher likelihood of being viewed first on a mobile device. But definitely check your analytics. Make analytics your best friend before you make these type of decisions. And frankly, those analytic research and that data should go into that research. And we're like hesitant now to say focus on mobile first? That may change in six months or a year. It may change next week. Yeah. It may definitely change by the summer. Yeah. It just depends. And I think part of that is with us particularly, we tend to focus on small to medium-sized service providers. Right. And so a lot of AC guys or a plumber or electrician tend to go to music school. These type of things tend to be our best clients. Right. And usually those services, they get visits from desktops. Yeah. Right. And so if we had more, let's say, entertainment clients and things like that, then there would probably be definitely more. Restaurant clients. Same thing. Like restaurant might. Tons of mobile. Probably not. Yeah. Because we do have a restaurant client. Yeah. And 97% of his traffic is all mobile. Yeah. And so it depends. But I'd say definitely understand your data. Understand the engagement your site is having with the visitors. Understand how they use it to make their decision on how you produce your content. Number four. Four. He says promotion. So this is after you've researched, after you've validated the idea, after you've produced it. Now you've got to promote it. Right. He says spend just as much time on promotion as you do on a production. Yeah. He says it's easy to get caught up on design, development, and the idea itself.

You can end up spending most of your time on producing it and not nearly enough time promoting it. Yeah. He's right. Punch in the face again. He says you have to promote it. At the end of the day, this is not a build it and they will come situation. You have to build it right. Right. And then they might come. And by build it right, he even gave us a checklist. Like all your social share buttons installed. Right. Do you have a conversion call to action? If this is not on your domain, do you have a link back to your domain? Right. Those kind of things you need to make sure you've built right. Yeah. But not only that, you got to promote it. You have to promote it. He even talks about how you can promote it. Paid, earned, owned type of promotion. Right. So that paid promotion, that's your pay-per-click, that's your boosted post, sponsored ads, things like that. Maybe it's a sponsored Instagram post or a LinkedIn sponsored post. Or maybe you even paid a celebrity. That's the new thing. I've been kind of seeing what's going on because a celebrity who had 100,000 followers and he's your target demographic. And so his followers, then you pay him to tweet your stuff. Yeah. It's kind of worse that way. Maybe this is an earned type of promotion. Earned meaning basically this is based off your reputation. This is your social status. Your influence. You are the guy who has 100,000 followers. Exactly. You came up with a product. Exactly. Or maybe this is owned. Right. This is your followers. This is your email list. Right. This is your own network of people. These are just three different ways to promote your content. And truthfully, you want to kind of mix a little bit of all of that. You definitely want to tag your existing email list, your existing social shikes. You want to tag them. You want to tag your influencer network. People who look up to you, people who ask questions,

people who kind of do what you ask them to do. Yeah. And then invest some dollars. You got to do some paid stuff. If you post it on Facebook and it gets some great shikes, boost it. Yep. It makes sense to do it. Number five. Five. Last one. He says, conversion and tracking. Of course. He said, it can be quite hard to convert a visitor to a piece of content that is designed for links and social shares. He's right. He said, this kind of content pieces are often not designed to sell to visitors. So, getting them to click across to the main site or product page and let alone getting them to buy something could be difficult. He's absolutely right. And so, I think in this case, if that's your goal, you may need to reevaluate. Because usually, a content post that's meant to generate shikes and kind of go viral likely won't generate sales or in-store business or things like that. So, kind of realign what your conversions are. Maybe you should change your goals. So, maybe instead of a purchase, maybe you just need a social follow. Count that as a goal. That's a win. This person read your content and then liked your page and followed you on Twitter. Not only that, if they hit your page, they probably made it to your remarketing list. That's a goal. Maybe they signed up for your email newsletter. Kind of a soft capture. That's a goal. So, understand what those conversions are. And like I said before, make analytics your best friend because that's how you track all of that. That way, you can see how those goals work. Where those people came from. How they engaged with your site. What page they were on when they left your site. Which social network got them to your site. And how they engaged from that point. I was looking at stats the other day for a different client of ours. We have a music school out in Austin. And I was looking at their stats.

It was crazy because everybody who came from Twitter, quick bounces. Okay. Bounces really high. Like 78%. Everybody who came from Facebook was like 30%. Like they 5 or 6 pages, 10 minutes on the site. It was like, wow. Yeah. Okay. So, note to self. 10 dollars. On Facebook. And not only that, note to self, create different landing page for Twitter. Because just maybe that's not the right place for Twitter folks to be landing at. And so, you know, we just have to make those kind of adjustments and data and analytics. Is how you're able to make those decisions. Patty Mugen. Punching the face to you, man. Great article. Five steps to content marketing success. We'll post this on our site. And check in later. Awesome. All right. So, do we have any what? No, I do not have any what news. There's no what. All right. No what news. If you're interested in growing your business using the largest, simplest marketing tool on the planet. The internet. Make sure to reach out to us. You can reach us at 713-592-6724. If you're, and actually we just picked up a client today for consulting. So, we do consulting. We'll do consulting work for you if you want to just reach out to us and have us advise you on a particular account or whatever it may be. Remember, we were filmed live. I think I missed something. You did. Before you get to that, I do kind of have, it's not really a what, it's not really a what news, but it's just more of a rest in peace to Trayvon Martin. I think he would have been 21 years old today. And so, gone but not forgotten. Yeah. What I did miss was the referral. We do have a referral program, so you send a client to us. So, one, we could consult on it and you could do better and keep it. Or you could send them to us. You don't worry about it. They pay us. We pay you. Take advantage. This was

filmed live at 5999 West 34th Street, Suite 106 Houston, Texas 77092. The video and the audio and the transcript can be found on our website ewebresults.com. You have been listening to the most popular internet marketing podcast on iTunes in the known universe. Thank it. That's because of you. Thank you. You, you, you, you. All of you. All locally, internationally, and then galactically. Yeah. Until the next podcast, my name is Chris Burris. Charles Lewis. Bye-bye for now. Balance check. Balance check. 309. Let's see. Where we at? It's Friday afternoon, man, and it's going down. Christian Chuck, man, you know it's about time. Turn the volume up. Listen in right now. SEO Podcast 309. Boom. SEO Podcast 309.