Daily Bytes: Weekly To Do’s
Posted on Mon, Nov 16, 2009
Ok, after catching up on Friday’s post, my To Do list for this week is to make sure I post Daily Bytes every day! The prior week and the end of the week before were a complete blur and all consuming as I had three significant presentations. Preparation absorbed all of my waking hours and cut into my already limited sleeping hours! All l I can say is that I am happy that they both went well and look forward to discussing them at the appropriate time.
In the meantime, my off-blogging time gave me perspective on how I want to reorder my blog posts for each week:
- Monday – Weekly To Do’s
- Tuesday – Digital Strategy Insights
- Wednesday – Digital Implementation Insights
- Thursday – Digital Training
- Friday – Recap Thoughts on the Week
So, without further ado, here are some recommended to do’s for this week:
Consider Content for Your Business’s Website: Three Ways to Use Content to Engage Your Audience
As I have mentioned in this post from time to time, I come from the content business and think that a business’s ability to tell a story and provide ongoing content updates to its customers is a winning combination. For example, if you are a restaurant, why wouldn’t you write about the inspiration behind your menu? If you are a manufacturing company, why wouldn’t you write about how you are working on improving the performance of your products? If you are a hotel, why wouldn’t you feature written posts from guests and their experiences at your hotel? I am often surprised that so many businesses don’t look to do this – especially in that people will inevitably come to your website if they are interested in your services. Why not be there waiting to engage them.
This post from Heidi Cohen in ClickZ today goes further on this topic and gives three cost-effective ways to use content to build your customer relationships and your business. The three tips are:
- Socialize with your customers: use your social media presence to enhance your communication
- Reach out to bloggers: bloggers in your business can be an amazing resource for extending your reach. [As an aside example on this recommendation, I always like to reference David Meerman Scott's description of how the marketing executive for the new Harry Potter ride at Universal Theme Park chose to reach out to the top Harry Potter bloggers versus spending all of her healthy marketing budget] Heidi also rightfully points out that businesses must exercise care in their approach. She recommends reading B.L. Ochman’s Blogger Outreach Manifesto. I have read it and agree with her recommendation.
- Barter for content: alliances with publishers seeking to extend their audience using your business’s content. It sounds a bit like “barter advertorial”! Yet with the right alliances and contextual placement, this can also be a content winner to consider.
Heidi also points out some ways to measure the impact of these content efforts: 1) track the number of unique visitors to the new content areas of your site; 2) monitor the number of comments and the content of the comments and 3) count the number of referrals to your site.
Hiring Marketing Professionals: The 3 Marketing Personas You Should Hire Today
The HubSpot blog describes three personas against the DARC hiring framework that they have developed for evaluating inbound marketing professional candidates. DARC stands for:
D = Hire Digital Citizens
A = Hire for Analytical Chops
R = Hire for Web Reach
C = Hire Content Creators
The three personas profiled are: 1) Evangelical Networkers, 2) Content Creators and 3) Organization Gurus. If you are in need of strengthened inbound marketing efforts, this post provides a great road map for what positions to hire for, how to interview candidates and score their DARC rating.
Read a Book: Six Pixels of Separation
I actually listened to Six Pixels of Separation, the recently published first book from marketing professional, Mitch Joel, on Audible. Mitch narrates his book and you can get the audiobook version here.
Why do I recommend this book? Mitch helps bring a business understanding of the power of digital and social media through the lens of our own personal experiences. He shares great anecdotes to drive home the power of the connected economy with relevant success stories the profile of Chris Penn, who used podcasts to great impact to build the student loan business. For a more thorough overview of the book and why you should read it, I refer you to The Client Side blog’s review of the book. And if you don’t have time to read the full book, I am going to plug Audible one more time – download the book to listen to it. Also, you will find yourself relistening to relevant parts for your business.