Decade

Goodly is 10 years old.

What began as a meager stab at search engine optimization a decade ago has become a vocation—you might say, a compulsion—of mine.

With nearly 400 thousand readers, Goodly no longer serves as a device for driving website traffic, but as a way of shouting, Hey, I'm still here.

I recently launched Blog, a new venture that's going to consume my time if it's to succeed—as, I hope, it will.

Meanwhile, God willing, Goodly will continue, pandemic or no, recession or no, civil war or no, global warming or no. 

I'm still here.

The Seven Pillars of Lead Gen

Businesses that depend on salespeople for lead generation cannot grow rapidly or steadily.

Salespeople aren't good at it. 

While slow, uncertain growth may be—in fact, is—just fine for most business owners, for the rest lead gen is the job of marketers.

I'm aghast at the number of marketers I encounter who don't grasp lead gen's fundamentals, perhaps because they've never had to do more for a business owner than "make us look pretty."

Those marketers need to master the seven pillars of lead gen, if they hope to avoid tomorrow's scrap heap of outmoded jobs.

The seven pillars are:

• Email. Of all the pillars, email has the best ROI; but it's overdone and threatened with extinction on many fronts. And many marketers have no clue how to write compelling emails, or leverage prospect lists.

• Events. Events are expensive, but unbeatable for generating leads and accelerating conversions. But many marketers don't grasp the importance of speaking at events, engaging attendees, or following up. They believe it's sufficient merely to show up.

• Telemarketing. Outbound telemarketing. although not cheap, has the highest response rate. But many marketers shun it, due to its unfortunate association with "boiler rooms."

• Direct mail. Out of favor for over a decade, postal mail is the Comeback Kid, because it delivers leads at high rates. But many marketers aren't even familiar with the basics.

• Content. Content is marketing, the secret sauce the generates leads—and SEO. But too many marketers lack the imagination and discipline to produce and publish quality content—whether written, recorded, or illustrated—at a regular pace. And too many don't know how to syndicate content.

• Advertising. With the targeting tools and niche websites available today, web ads have become solid sources of leads. But many marketers don't know what makes an ad click-worthy.

• PR. PR isn't dead, it's just different than it used to be. It's still storytelling par excellence and a powerful lead-gen tactic when used correctly.

Google: Popups Will be Penalized

If you value SEO, remove popups from your website.

Google doesn't love them anymore.

This January, its bots began to penalize sites that include them.

“Pages that show intrusive interstitials provide a poorer experience to users than other pages where content is immediately accessible,” Google's engineers proclaim.

Your site is toast if it displays a popup that covers content after the user lands on a page, or that appears while he's viewing it. 

You get doubly burned if the user has to kill the popup to view the content.

The only allowances Google makes are for helpful popups, like those seeking age verification or informing visitors about cookies.

Where Should a B2B Marketer Spend Her Money?

It's September. You're being bugged for next year's marketing budget.

Spending is an art form. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Sure, year-over-year analytics tell you which channels have produced, but—like any investment—"past performance is no guarantee of future results." We'd all still be buying full-page ads in trade magazines, if that were so.

For my money, your mix next year (ranked by percent of total spend) should look like this:

1. Events
2. Telemarketing
3. Direct mail
4. Retargeting
5. Email
6. SEO
7. PPC
8. Social

Too many channels for your paltry budget? Then work the list from the top down. You can't go wrong.

Don't be tempted to lay all your money on low-cost channels (like email and social), just because they're low cost.

A handful of proprietary events or an exhibit in a couple trade shows, done well, can generate enough leads to keep you in the black for 12 months. A well-conceived telemarketing campaign can do the same. Even a regular stream of pretty postcards can.

Content Marketers: Are You Running a Greasy Spoon?

I don’t have an audience; I have a set of standards.

― Don DeLillo

Content Marketing Digest describes the difference between the work of an SEO consultant and that of a brand journalist as "the difference between a greasy spoon diner with a broken dishwasher and a five-star restaurant."

You not only handicap, but harm, your brand when you make SEO your content marketing goal.

Feeding your tribe Michelin-star morsels should be your goal.

SEO-focused content marketing tarnishes your brand, says content marketer Roman Kowalski, because the consultants who practice it consider content "just a wrapper to contain the backlink." That mindset "leads to the creation of articles that don’t measure up to journalistic standards."

Consultants who focus on SEO are also hoodwinking clients, Kowalski says, by pretending they can still just swipe other brands' content; have a student in India rewrite it; run the keyword-stuffed abomination through Copyscape; and generate Google juice. The days when that tactic worked have passed. Google is wise to it. The best you can hope for from the tactic are for a few backlinks to appear on some bottom-feeder's website. And you'd better pray no client reads your content.

More effective, Kowalski says, is to create original content customers might read―and enjoy. Like case studies, research reports, how-to manuals, insight papers, or opinion pieces.

Most effective is old-fashioned PR―the creation of well-researched pieces that would pass traditional editorial oversight by mainstream and trade media outlets.

"Creating this type of article is far beyond the domain of the SEO consultant," Kowalski says. "It requires the unbiased eye of a trained journalist who also has the mind of a marketer.

"The goal isn’t just to drive traffic―it is to provide useful content and to engage the audience.

"As search engine algorithms grow more sophisticated every year, marketers will have to continuously adjust their strategies to shift from simply capturing eyeballs to capturing mindshare."

Bloggers' Work Habits

Orbit Media asked 1,055 bloggers how they work. It found:

• Bloggers spend on average 3 hours to write a post (26% more time than a year earlier); only 1 in 3 spends less than 2 hours per post.

• 1 in 4 bloggers rely on an editor to improve their posts.

• The average post is 1,050 words long (19% longer than a year earlier).

• Nearly 50% of bloggers include lists in their posts; 15%, video.

• Most bloggers publish weekly; the number who publish daily is down by more than 50% from a year earlier.

• Over 95% of bloggers promote their posts on social media; a majority use email.

• 56% of bloggers routinely check their posts' traffic; 20% never do.

My work habits? Yours truly:

• Spends about 1.5 hours per post.

• Works without the benefit of an editor.

• Writes brief posts, 350 words or so.

• Loves to include lists and videos.

• Publishes 7 days a week.

• Uses social media to promote every post.

• Checks traffic, but not obsessively.

What are your work habits?

The 5-Finger Guide to B2B Marketing

B2B marketer, where should you focus?Mark Schmukler of Marketing Insider Group says you should master these five areas:

Your website. All roads (whether email, SEO or SEM) lead to your website. It'd better be responsive. If it's not mobile friendly, you're toast right off the bat. Fifty-seven percent of visitors won't like you.

Your brand. Develop a brand guide and harmonize everything customers encounter, from business cards to brochures, email signatures to trade show exhibits. Your credibility is at stake, especially if you operate in a niche industry.

Search Engine Optimization. The key to SEO is content. Lots of it. Content is the way to gain authority with Google. And it needs to be placed all over the web, not just on your own site, so learn how to do PR.

Search Engine Marketing. SEM comes into play where SEO leaves off. Google Adwords puts you among the top four slots in Google searches. Why Google Adwords? Simple. Google owns owns 71% of the search market.

LinkedIn. Forget the other social media platforms until you leverage LinkedIn. Ninety-four percent of B2B marketers use it to distribute content, especially those who need to reach senior managers (half the world's highest earners are members). And sponsored content is awesome. You can target members based on 15 categories, including location, industry, job title, seniority, gender, age, and years of experience.

Marketing Myopia 2016

Our “measure everything” age has engendered a new form of marketing myopia, says Todd Ebert in Convince & Convert.

"While marketers once accepted as fact that they didn’t know which half of their ad budget was wasted, today they’ve done a 180 and believe that if it can’t be measured, it’s not worth doing," Ebert says.

Marketers' new myopia causes them to put all their money on one number, whether that's SEO, podcasts or white papers, and to walk away from proven, but less measurable, tactics like advertising, PR and exhibiting at trade shows.

A riskier bet you couldn't imagine.

Betting only on search, for example, ignores every buyer who hasn't started her product research; while betting only on podcasts or white papers ignores every buyer who thinks she's finished it.

In fact, betting it all on one number—no matter how measurable—undermines the marketer's tactic of choice, Ebert says.

"If you don’t do anything to drive brand familiarity and interest at the beginning of the journey, then it won’t matter how well you optimize at the end because you won’t be invited into the buyer’s consideration set."

Should You Blog When You're Tiny?

You're never too tiny to blog, says blogger Lindsay Kolowich.

"Some of the most dramatic successes we've seen with blogging come from businesses in niche industries," she says.

Kolowich points to the success of tiny Conversant Bio.

The firm boosted leads seven times in 10 months by publishing six posts a month.

When it comes to blogging, the burning question isn't should, but how.

Conversant Bio found the secret to blogging success when it quit being a supplier and became a thought leader.

Instead of publishing hackneyed posts like "10 Benefits of a Tissue Sample for Research," the firm published posts about trends in cancer research.

The posts pulled prospects because they included keywords pharma researchers use when they Google—and not by accident.

Before writing any post, the firm learned the keywords prospects Google by asking cancer researchers. Its writers then created posts that included one or more keywords in the title, subheads, body and meta-tags.

Within 10 months of starting its blog, Conversant Bio saw visits swell to 34,000 a month (70% as a result of Google searches).

The firm turned readers into leads by offering them e-books based on the blog posts.

Conversant Bio's chief commercial officer anticipates a 14,500% ROI in the effort in three years.

Hack vs. Hacker

Never mistake a hack for a hacker.

Unless she's evil, a hacker creates code.

A hack creates crap.

In general, a hack's a writer who produces undistinguished prose. (The opprobious name derives from hackney, a horse for hire.)

In marketing, a hack's a writer who's:

• Passionate about content; immune to ideas.
• Happy to plagiarize; put off by research.
• Enamored of opinions; averse to facts.
• Obsessed with quantity; indifferent to quality.

Foremost, a hack's a writer who chases eyeballs.

Speaking of quantity, Express Writers offers a useful hack: publish content of "ideal length."

I'll hack the info graphic. Here's the bottom line:

• Write blog posts 2,000 words long; 
• Write Facebook posts 40 characters long; 
• Write Tweets 11 characters long; and 
• Write Pinterest captions 200 characters long.

7 Rules to Rock Your Content

Scale your brand's voice… 

Master the social networks…

Ignite likes and shares…  

And pocket more money than you ever thought possible!

No kidding.

Content will rock your bottom line.

But, you ask… How? 

How do I rock my content?

It's easy.

Follow these 7 rules.

They come courtesy of maxi-marketer William Claude Fields...

1. A thing worth having is a thing worth cheating for. 

Is your goal to grab millions of eyeballs? Stuff your stuff with keywords.

2. If you can’t dazzle 'em with brilliance, baffle 'em with bullshit. 

Great content takes hard work. Why bother?

3. You can fool some of the people some of the time—and that’s enough to make a decent living.

Every platform delivers a different audience, so repackage every piece of content you create. But don't spend a lot time at it. 

4. Start every day off with a smile and get it over with. 

Cheery content's contagious, so publish drivel daily before 9 am. Then head to the beach and relax.

5. I am free of all prejudice. I hate everyone equally. 

Don't discriminate: treat all audiences with the same low level of respect. Pretend you're United Airlines.

6. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it. 

Fail fast, fail forward.

7. A rich man is nothing but a poor man with money.

Take the 6 rules above. 

Rinse. 

Repeat.

And have a happy April 1, my rich friend.

Evidence to the Contrary, Short is Sweet

Look and you'll find countless proofs of the advantages of long-form over short-form marketing content. 

For example:

• Tests by Hubspot confirm the long-established fact that Google rewards blog posts 2,500 or more words in length.

• Tests by Neil Patel prove posts of 1,500 or more words capture 68% more Tweets and 23% more Facebook likes than shorter ones.

• Tests by Buzzsumo show Facebook posts linked to long blog posts receive 40% more interactions than Facebook posts linked to short blog posts.

But I'll stick to my guns on the matter.

Gobs of evidence to the contrary, short-form beats long-form, at least in the long haul.

As Don Peppers says, marketing content should be snackable.

"The more frictionless it is to digest your content, the more your customers are likely to rely on it," Peppers says.

A single lesson from history, I'd argue, proves my point:

• In 1863, at the dedication ceremony for the national cemetery at Gettysburg, Secretary of State Edward Everett delivered a 13,607-word address to the crowd. 

• Immediately following Everett, President Lincoln delivered a 272-word address.

You know the rest.

It's history.

Go Slow

Patience is a virtue in B2B marketing, says agency owner Eric Fischgrund, writing for Huffington Post.

Winning the race for leads, revenue and leaps in share price demands not only that you form a content plan, but stick to it.

Repeat thyself

Don't scrap a reasonable plan because results don't materialize overnight, Fischgrund says.

"If a white paper fails to generate downloads and leads, or a blog post fails to drive visitors to the website, there is no need to panic. Go back and review the delivery—consider the time of day or day of the week the content was published, or review the ads you placed on LinkedIn to generate clicks. Perhaps you will find it had nothing to do with the content or landing page, but because you reached your audience via e-mail blast at a time normally spent away from the computer."

Be patient

Don't expect to rally prospects, customers, analysts and influencers in a month.

"In reality, it takes time to establish a platform, cultivate a following, and execute upon strategic objectives," Fischgrund says. "It's a far smarter practice to focus on quality, not quantity of the content and messaging published via social media."

Cultivate the media

Get to know the reporters for trade, regional and national publications.

"Form relationships with reporters and media outlets," Fischgrund says. "Reporters always seek value, and if you can position yourself or your client as an expert, or their news as being important, you will achieve exposure."

Remember: the hare's fast, but the tortoise wins.

Searchers Getting Wordy

Bloggers can take heart from a trend in the way customers are searching on line.

Searchers are increasingly using complete sentences and long phrases as search terms, according to software maker Hubspot.

They're realizing that simple search terms can no longer pinpoint useful Web content, given its enormity.

So, for example, instead of entering "sales training," a searcher might enter "two-day onsite sales training for a small insurance brokerage in Kentucky."

"As a result of these more complex searches, Google has actually changed its algorithm to better fit conversational questions from searchers," Hubspot says.

Google's change in its algorithm will help drive more traffic to blogs, "which are designed by nature to be educational, answer questions, and provide background info," Hubspot says.