It used to be SEO, then it was Social Media Marketing, now the buzzword is Content Marketing or Inbound Marketing. There has never been so many changes to the way people will tell you to market a business than on the internet. It seems every other day there is a new magic bullet that some “marketing guru” has discovered, that will flood your business with new leads and sales via the internet. Now, I believe that Content Marketing is the best of what the internet has to offer for legitimate marketing, but it’s not the best method to drive traffic to your site and generate leads. Not by a long shot. Well, let me back up… it’s not the best method for about 80% of businesses. Before we get into the how’s and why’s let get into the what’s…
What is Content Marketing?
Content Marketing is just what it says it is. It’s the method of marketing online by offering helpful information to a certain target market that will make their life easier, less painful, and/or more profitable. Both B2C and B2B companies can use Content Marketing as a method of marketing, but typically it has been the “go to” method for businesses selling marketing services. You will find thousands of Content marketers in online groups and social media sites such as LinkedIn, Twitter, YouTube and Facebook. What they tend to do is write a blog post such as this one, about ways to market your business better in the hopes that someone will take some sort of action that will lead them closer to using their services or buying their product.
Another way people use Content Marketing is to be found in the search engines and get higher rankings in the search engine results. The way that is done is writing about a certain subject and creating different blog posts related to that subject. The goal is to rank for several different search terms that are all related, and when someone is searching those terms, they see several posts from the same company, which makes them think that this company is an expert, authority, and someone that they should listen to and possibly use their service or product.
For instance, let’s say you own a Chimney Sweeping Service. You may have a blog where you write about your Chimney Sweeping Services, but if you want to try to market using Content Marketing, you may also have posts on how to check to see if your chimney flue is blocked or clogged, or you may have a post on the safe way to build a fire in your fireplace. By doing that, you are sending out a lot of helpful content to the internet, and if someone is doing research or looking for information on chimney’s they will start noticing your content popping up a lot, and in their mind they will see you as an authority or an expert, and the next time they need a chimney sweep they will think of you and call you.
Or another way to to use content marketing is by offering an “ethical bribe”. This means that you offer the person reading your content some sort of freebie, and in return you get their contact information. Freebies tend to be reports, ebooks, or trial offers. So let’s say you are a software company that sells book keeping software. What you can do is have a person sign up for a 30 day trial of the software, once they enter in their information, whether it be an email address, a phone number, or both, you can now market to them on a regular basis via the phone or email by using an email marketing software. That is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow you are trying to find…their contact information. There is an old saying “the money is in the list”, and it’s true, your goal is to build a list of people that you can market to on a regular basis. And the best part is that they have expressed interest in your product or service so you know they have a use for it.
It’s essentially what companies have been doing for years. Magazines fill their pages with articles and news (content) to do what? To promote the ads. If you keep reading their content, eventually you may purchase something from one of the advertisers. Same with television, they try to put out shows that you will watch (content) in the hopes that you will purchase from an advertiser. It’s all content marketing, whether it’s offline or online.
If this is confusing to you just shoot me an email to brian@jbsprinting.net with your question and I will be happy to answer it, to help you understand content marketing better.
Why I don’t like Content Marketing?
I don’t think Content Marketing is bad. I love it. I am doing it right now. The thing I don’t like is that everyone thinks this is the best new way to advertise and market a business and that couldn’t be further from the truth. I’m gonna make a bold, controversial, statement here, but content marketing won’t work for about 80% of businesses. Don’t believe me? I bet If we got 100 people that have tried content marketing 80 of them will tell you they got little to no results as far as leads and sales.
And here is why…
It’s because you need to get your content found online, you need a reason to get people to go to your website, and you need to get traffic to your site. You can write all the content you want. You can write blog posts and articles all day every day, but if no one is finding the content then it does you absolutely no good. You won’t be building a following and you won’t be converting those followers into customers and clients. You will just be spending wasted hours writing for no one.
It takes time to build a following, it takes time to get your site ranking high in the search engines, and time is what most business owners don’t have. They need traffic and sales today. Not in a week, not in a month, not in a year. Today.
And before you say “Well, that is why you use SEO to rank your site”, those days are all but over. To hire someone that actually knows SEO, and can actually get your site ranking high for certain keywords can cost $5000 or more a month, and there is still no guarantee that they will get you the results you want to justify the cost and you are looking at about 90 or more days pending on the competitiveness of the keywords. And with the Panda and Penguin updates that Google rolled out it has made it ridiculously difficult to rank high in the SERPS for competitive keywords. Here is an article about SEO and the costs of having it done right: Read about it here.
And how bout Social Media? Unless you are a celebrity, author, expert, big brand, professional athlete, or cultural icon, there will be very little results from your social media efforts. You may build up a large fan base to your page or a huge number of followers, but they will rarely turn into sales, for the simple fact that people don’t go on social media sites to buy stuff, they go on to be social, tend to their farm, and look at pictures their friends posted.
Here is an eye opening statistic : 80% of Facebook users don’t click on ads: Read about it here).
And here is an article from Bloomberg about how some big brand companies are closing down their fanpages because they are not generating sales: You can read the Bloomberg Article here.
And the same applies to Twitter (although I find Twitter to be the most promising out of the big 4, and YouTube second pending on your business type) and LinkedIn. Essentially Social Media has be come a spam infested world, where more information is ignored than paid attention to. I mean think about it, how often do you click on a link someone posted on Twitter? When was the last time you really got involved or even read the discussions in a LinkedIn group that you belong to, never mind actually calling that person and purchasing their products or services? Not often if ever? Exactly.
So if Content Marketing doesn’t work for most businesses, then why is everyone trying it and saying it’s the most effective way of advertising?
Well the answers will vary, but in my opinion, and from what I can tell there are two distinct reasons why people are running to the internet to try to market their business.
1.) It’s free. Businesses, especially small and medium sized businesses, are always looking to market and advertise for the least amount of money possible. There is nothing wrong with that, not everyone has big advertising dollars to spend. So they read articles about Social Media and think that will be a great way to advertise their business for no cost. But here is the harsh reality, it does cost, it costs in time. Everything a business owner does has a cost associated with it, and if you are spending hours, days, and months trying to generate business from social media and you are not getting sales from your efforts then it is costing you money, and in some cases a lot of money.
They also hear stories about companies making millions of dollars through Content Marketing. Companies that built entire businesses on the Content marketing theory. They think hey if this company did it, then I should be able to too. And some do, but the majority don’t, so again what you thought was free really isn’t. Writing blog posts, and generating good content takes time, and time is money.
And I’m not even going to get into the business owner that thinks they can do their own SEO. They spend months trying to get to the top of the search engines and no matter how hard they try they can’t get past page 3. Time wasted, money wasted.
2.) It’s seems like a path of least resistance. There is one thing that most people hate to do, and that is sell. They hate the thought of cold calling, they hate the thought of being perceived as a sales person, they are petrified of rejection. Most people you talk to would rather do anything besides actually getting out into the world and sell their products and services. Listen, if you aren’t selling then you aren’t making sales. If you aren’t making sales, then you aren’t making money, it’s as simple as that.
So when business owners hear about content marketing, and how a person can just write about their business and industry and have people calling them, it sounds like the perfect scenario. “You mean I can make money without selling?”. All the fear of rejection is gone, all of the perception of being a sales person is gone. It’s the best of both worlds right? I’m making money and not talking to a soul, they come to you. Again, in a perfect world, if social media and content marketing worked for most people, this would be the perfect solution, but it doesn’t work that way, and it never will. You are not gonna blog your way to the top of the SERPS, and you are not gonna Tweet your way to tons of new customers.
You have to get out there and sell. And I don’t know where this whole fad of thinking selling is a bad thing started, but business owners need to get that out of their head. There is nothing wrong with selling, every one sells in one way or the other and if you don’t like to sell then you shouldn’t be in business. You are a business owner and part of your job is to sell so you can earn money and put food on the table. There is nothing wrong with that. You are in business to sell your product or service. Don’t be afraid to do that.
And don’t use the excuse of being to busy to do sales. There is no such thing as being to busy. If you think you are to busy then what that really means is that you are not managing your time properly. If you can not find a minimum of 15-20 a week to go out and sell then you are going to have a long road, and most likely a failed business. Don’t think that Content Marketing is going to be a substitute for selling. It won’t.
My opinion of why people continue to do it even though they don’t get results, is because they don’t want to put themselves out there and try to actually sell. They want it to work so bad so they don’t have to spend money on advertising and/or actually have to put themselves out there and get belly to belly with prospects. They want it to work so bad, that they refuse to face the facts that it just ain’t working for them. Essentially they are in denial.
So Content Marketing is useless?
No.
When I say that Content Marketing doesn’t work I mean it doesn’t work as a method of lead generation. Someone is not going to read your content or see your social media updates and purchase from you. And as I wrote earlier, the chances of them coming across your online and social media content to begin with is pretty slim to begin with. In fact in the 2012 Channel Preference Survey Social Media sites were listed as one of the worst ways to promote your business because buyers don’t want to be contacted through those channels. There are two channels they want to be contacted by and we will be talking about them later. In fact I’m going to tell you how a staggering 86% of all consumers wish to be contacted and marketed to and it’s not with content marketing or social media marketing.
Content Marketing should be used as a reinforcement tool to keep the “conversation” going with people whom your business has developed a relationship with, and with people who have expressed interest in possibly starting a relationship with your business.
Remember earlier when I wrote about the money being in the list? Those are the people that you want to use content marketing with. Those are people that have spent money with you already or people that have expressed interest in your business by signing up to your list. But the key is to get these people on your list.
And that is where content marketing fails. It doesn’t generate leads. It doesn’t get quality people to your site, to your fanpage, following your Twitter feed, and most importantly on your list (for the most part, of course there are always one or two exceptions, but not many).
Here is some proof. Check out these results for content marketing by clicking here. Go through the results. All of them (at least the ones that were on the first page at the time of this writing) will tell you what content marketing is, why it’s so great, and how it can grow your business, but none tell you HOW to do it, and how to get your content found and how to generate leads. All they tell you is to create content so WHEN (they should say if) someone finds your content they will begin to know, like and trust you and your business, and eventually buy from you.
Well the fact that they won’t tell you or show you how to get your content found is a pretty obvious signal that they are not telling you the whole story and/or they don’t know how to get found and generate leads. Reminds me of the old saying, “Those who can’t, teach”.
Try this search here. Again lots of information about what content marketing is, and how it can work wonders for your business, but not to much on how to actually implement it. Maybe it’s me but I’m starting to wonder if it’s so great how come no one can tell me how to actually do it in a way that will get results.
They don’t tell you how to get your content found because there is one huge, gigantic, and critical piece to the puzzle that they can’t show you. And that is getting your content found. You can do everything under the sun to have a well optimized site (<--SEO talk) and you can try to get as many backlinks as possible (<-- more SEO talk) but those aren't the primary signals any more, and the updates that Google has rolled out recently, and how it effects backlinking and on-page SEO, proves my point. Getting to the first page of the Search Engines is tougher than it has ever been. Go try and rank on the first page for what you do, 80% of you won't. The top three spots in Google get 58.4% of the traffic for any particular keyword so if you are not on one of those spots your content is not getting found, read, and you are not getting what really matters…traffic to your site.
Traffic is all that matters.
So the obvious conclusion that we can come to at this point is that you need traffic to your site to get your content found. To take it even further, you don’t just want traffic to your website, you want to generate leads, you want people contacting you, you want their contact information so you can reach out to them, you want to build your list and you want feet walking through the door.
To get your online content found you need to rank high in the SERPS. Now as I already wrote unless you can hire a super star SEO professional, that most likely won’t happen. So what you need to do is build traffic. The more Google changes and updates the more it is becoming apparent that the sites that get the most traffic are going to be the sites at the top. Backlinking and social signals will take a back seat, and the sites that get the most traffic will be king.
You see Google has a problem, and they have been trying to fix it for years and that problem is webspam. It’s a big problem they have been trying to correct for years. It used to be that backlinks were king, and now with the Penguin Update, it is apparent that that is no longer the case, due to the fact that they stopped counting a majority of backlinks to people’s sites. Backlinks will always be a factor but they are no longer the #1 factor like they were in the past. And as time goes on Google is going to keep decreasing the importance of backlinks for the most part because there will always be people trying to “game” the system. The sites that get ranked high are gonna be the ones that get the most traffic. You can’t fabricate visitors like you can fabricate backlinks. It is the one natural signal that a site is good. It’s pretty common sense, nobody goes to the restaurant that serves bad food and the service stinks. It’s the same with websites. The popular ones are going to be at the top of the search engines and get the most traffic because people want to go where the quality is. It’s the search engines only play really to keep the web legitimate and offer quality search result to their users. They are going to have to use the traffic a site gets as the #1 factor as to whether a site should be at the top or not.
So if the key to getting to the top of the SERPS is traffic, then you need to get people there. When they get there then you need to get them onto your list and from THERE you can use content marketing to try to convert them into a buyer. Does that make sense? Content Marketing can be a great marketing tool, but it is only effective when someone is on your list and has expressed interest in what you do. It’s not gonna get you leads, but it can help in converting leads (AHA moment anyone?).
Trying to get leads any other way is a waste of time and energy. Your lead generation will be dismal because you don’t have the traffic to get to the top of the SERPS, so your content will not be found and you will just be spinning your wheels. This is the one thing the “experts” won’t tell you. They don’t tell you this because they want to sell you a software or training course and would rather you find out on your own that it doesn’t work for lead generation after you spent your hard earned money.
OK, so how do I get traffic to my site?
Getting traffic to your site is not hard. You just need to understand the best way to do it. But let me use an example to show you the best way to get traffic…
I’m sure many of you, have gotten a letter from Google with a letter in it inviting you to try Google Adwords as well as a coupon for $50 or $100 to get you started (I’m not promoting PPC advertising, I think that is a waste of money too, just using this as an example and to prove a point). Facebook has also done this for their PPC ad service as well. Don’t you find that interesting? The #1 and #2 most visited websites on the internet are sending out direct mail. HMMMMM…..couldn’t these sites with all their notoriety and social reach just use content marketing and content marketing alone to promote their services?
Apparently not.
Think about that, Google and Facebook promote their online marketing and advertising service with traditional direct mail marketing. All of the resources they have, all of the online marketing people they employ, and they use a method that some would consider old and ineffective. They do it because they know it works and that it is the best way to generate leads. Once someone uses the coupon then they can use content marketing to continue to market to them.
So you are saying that Direct Mail is the best lead generation tool?
YES!! I am.
Well it’s not the only lead generation tool. Getting out there and getting in front of business owners and decision makers is good too, but Direct Mail has been proven to get results time and time again. Here are a few statistics I got from a recent webinar I was on with the USPS, you can watch the webinar here. They may take it down eventually so if the link doesn’t work it’s not my fault.
- 81% of recipients read or scan mail
- 76% of recipients are influenced by mail
- 18 to 24 year olds connect most with mail (this one was an eye opener for me, given the online information age we supposedly live in)
- Every dollar spent on direct marketing generates on average 12.50 in sales
I’m going to go over on how to take advantage of those above statistics, but want to cover one thing first. You may be saying, “Well, of course you are going to promote printing and direct mail, you are a printing company”. And yes that is true, I market printing and direct mail. But, the statistics are the statistics, and they can not be denied.
It’s my job to educate business owners on the best way to market their business and increase their sales, and this is one of the best ways. Whether you choose JBS Printing or another provider, or decide not to do anything with this information is up to you. We can give you the information, but it’s your decision to take action with it or not.
How to set up the perfect lead generation and marketing system for your business
If you are trying to generate leads you need to take a two step approach:
1.) Use a method to generate leads.
2.) Use a method to collect the leads contact information so you can market to them into the future.
You see the big misconception with Direct Mail is that it is expensive. And it can be. But if you work with a Direct Mail Service provider that knows how to correctly set up and run a Direct Mail campaign, not only will it cut down on costs, but it will yield better results. And it’s not rocket science and I’m am going to give you the step by step plans on how to do it.
This is what you need:
- A printing company that provides direct mail campaigns.
- A well thought out Direct Mail Piece that will drive traffic.
- A destination for the recipients to go to (typically a website, but can be a Facebook Fanpage if you want. I recommend a website but through planning you can determine the best destination for your leads. If you would like a free consultation on the best approach feel free to call me @ 781-871-4705).
- An email autoresponder service
That is really it. I mean you can always add bells and whistles but that is the basics of what a business needs and most businesses won’t need more than that.
So how does it work?
- Well the fist thing is to decide what type of mailing you want to do. Depending on your type of business with determine the best way to mail. If you are a specialized company that has a specific niche, such as a small business marketing consultant, then you are only going to want to mail to small businesses and not large ones.
If you are in a business that markets to a general audience of consumers such as a restaurant, then you are going to want to mail to local homes and businesses.
Pending on what you do, you will either go with traditional direct marketing or Every Door Direct (EDDM). I’m not going to get into the differences and how they work here. Your mail services provider can explain the differences between both or you can call us @ 781-871-4705 and we will be happy to explain the differences.
Here is the major advantage of direct mail. You can control it. You control who you market to, who sees your advertisement, when it goes out, how it is delivered, etc.
You don’t need to worry about whether or not the search engines will index your site or post. No worrying if people are going to find your content or not, pending on how the search engines rank your content. Again if you are on page 20 of Google no one is finding you.
Direct mail is the best way to get your message out, and get it out fast, and it will generate leads faster than SEO, content marketing and social media marketing. For a lot less money in the long run.
- You need a direct mail piece that is going to get a response. This is where 90% of businesses go wrong with their direct mail, and why people think direct mail doesn’t work. It not just about creating a mailer with your contact info and what you do int the hopes that someone will read it and call you. You need to have a call to action that your target customer will act on. This can be a report, a coupon, a free trial of a software, a free gift. The list goes on and on.
The key is having something that the recipient will want. What that is would be depend on your business. You would know best what your client wants, whether it be information or savings on a product or service. Determine what they need and give it to them.
- Once you have your offer in place, you need to tell them how to get it. By directing them to your website to get the information or coupon is the best way. By doing that you are generating traffic to your site, that the search engines will take notice of. so in essence, you are doing a few things at this point, you are generating leads, you are getting your content found, and you are getting traffic.
So in your mailer you want to have a string call to action. For instance you could have a call to action something like this:
Go to www.yourwebsite.com to get your free report on how to start generating leads for your business online.
or
Go to www.yourwebsite.com to get a coupon with 25% off you next order with us!
These are obviously fairly simplified for example purposes, but sometimes simple is the best route. One thing that I would suggest is having a date as to when the information will be available until, or the discount is good until. It will encourage the recipient to act faster.
- Then you need to capture their information. To do this you need an email autoresponder/broadcast system such as Aweber. So when someone visits your site to get your offer, I would recommend having them fill out a form to get it. Pending on the information that you need will determine your conversion rate. The more information you ask for the less conversion you will have, but the better qualified the lead will be.
For instance, just asking for an email address with get better results than asking for a name and email, and asking for a name and email will get better results than asking for a name, email and phone number. This again is where you have to decide what direction you want to go in.
Obviously having a name, email, and phone number is the best case scenario, because you know they are a very qualified lead to have given you that much info about them, but if you want higher opt-ins you should ask for less. You can always test different opt in forms to see what works best for you.
You are going to have people that don’t opt in at all, that’s life, but at the very least least you got them to visit your site to get your traffic numbers up.
- Once the person opts in this is where your content marketing kicks in. This person is now on your list so you can market to them directly. You can share your expertise with them, and get them to know like and trust you (don’t spam). If you are just using an email marketing system such as Aweber then you can write a post on your site, and send out an email to everyone on your list notifying them of the new post. Again, almost instant traffic to your site that the search engines are going to take notice of. You can also tell them about news, updates, new services and products, and offer them more discounts and free reports, to help build that relationship and convert sales all with one email and a click of a button.
Sounds simple? That’s because it is. Don’t be fooled by people trying to make it look harder than it is, and try to sell you expensive products and services that don’t work. Marketing comes down to a few simple principles:
- Having a well thought out plan of attack.
- Working with a company that can put and execute that plan.
- Sticking to the plan, and being consistent.
- Following up with new leads on a regular basis.
- Keep it simple.
Why don’t I market directly to them instead of guiding them to my online properties?
You can. There is nothing wrong with that at all. For instance if you just want to promote a discount you can send out a mailer with the coupon printed right on it, and the recipient can bring the mailer to your store, or if you are holding a seminar, you can use that mailer as the actual ticket, and skip the second step of having them go to your website or landing page. In some cases this will be the best approach to get the the highest response.
The reason I described the marketing plan with using the website as a “middle man” is for a few reasons:
- It brings traffic to your site, giving it authority and helping to rank it higher in the search engines, so you are accomplishing two goals with one action. You are generating leads and you are building traffic and site visitors.
- It gets the recipient in the habit of taking some sort of action when they receive and offer from you.
- It collects their info when they opt-in so you can now market to them using two different channels of communication (direct mail and email)
There is one other reason you may want to direct people to your website or landing page. I don’t recommend it personally, but it is an option if you want to save money in the long run, but this isn’t the most effective method in my opinion.
Once someone opts-in to your list, you can take them off your mailing list. You can save the money on postage and the cost of the postcard this way, because now you can market to them through email marketing. However, where many business owner will want to save money, it is always better to market to someone using as many communication channels as possible. The cost of the postcard and the postage adds up to pennies so it’s not huge savings, but just wanted to mention it as an option. Not the best method, but that decision is up to you.
The biggest reason of all why content marketing shouldn’t be your main method of marketing and lead generation.
I’m going to finish up this post with what is probably the most important statistic you need to know. According to the 2012 Channel Preference Survey, which collects data on how consumers and buyers prefer to be contacted by businesses with their offers and marketing messages, as i mentioned earlier 86% of consumers prefer to receive promotional messages from companies via email or direct mail.
That is just proof positive why using the simple two step marketing process described above is the best way to market. Because you are marketing to your audience in the way they prefer. If you are marketing to them in a way they don’t like then no matter how good your offer is, how good your content is, or how much your products or services can help them, the message will not work because you are approaching them in the wrong way, and you are already at a disadvantage.
By taking these simple steps necessary to create a solid marketing system for your businesses and putting them into action, you will see an increase in web traffic, leads, and sales.
Also, don’t forget to signup to our newsletter list by entering your email into the form on the right hand side for marketing advice, news, and company updates and specials that can benefit you and your business.
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Source: http://www.bostonprintingservices.net/warning-content-marketing-doesnt-work/
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