The topic for this blog post came to me in a dream. I woke up from my dream thinking, “Yes, it’s true. There really is one big mistake content creators make. I should tell others about it!”

I’m sorry this dream wasn’t more exciting or titillating. Maybe my other dreams will be a story for another day. Or not.

Before I reveal my dream-truth, I need to review a basic content marketing philosophy:

Content must be unleashed.

It doesn’t matter if you’re creating epic content or the best work of your lifetime if nobody sees it. The power in your content doesn’t from the content. It comes from the transmission of the content. We want our work to move, which leads to awareness, fans, subscribers and people who will buy things from us.

The biggest mistake content creators make

OK, let’s think this through.

You create great content. You post it everywhere. Somebody bites. They click on the link and what do they see when they arrive at your website?

A blog post? A video? A podcast episode?

Of course … but what else? If you’re like most people, the answer is … nothing. And this is the problem.

When I visit most blog posts or other web content, I can’t even tell who wrote it. I don’t know what this site is about. I don’t see a place to subscribe. I don’t see a place to share the content on social media if I like it. It’s a marketing dead end!

When people click on a link to your content, they don’t arrive at your home page. They arrive at your content. And if all you have on this page is your content, you’re missing a massive opportunity. In fact, this is by far the biggest mistake content creators make today.

In essence, your content page needs to be a mini-landing page for your business. You spend all this time bringing people to your business, but it’s not your business—it’s just a piece of content. They read it and leave. TRAGIC!

Here is your goal: Keep them on your website. You should put as much thought and design into your standard content page as your home page. The longer you keep them on the page, the bigger the chance they will subscribe to your content, share it, or even buy something from you. So don’t miss this opportunity.

Let’s learn how to do this …

The mini home page

If I were sitting with you over coffee, I would pull out my laptop and give you a demonstration. I would probably even buy you the coffee. But since we might be thousands of miles apart, I’ll walk you through it and owe you the coffee when we finally meet. Deal?

As I give you this lesson, it would be helpful to look at how I display my own work, the result of many years of testing. If you like, open up this blog post as you read the rest of my tutorial so you can visualize the lesson.

We’ll start at the top and learn how to make your content into a mini home page.

On my post, what’s the first thing you see under the headline? Social sharing buttons. I can’t believe how often I go to a site and have to work to figure out how to share the content.

Research shows your content will be shared 400% more if you simply add social sharing buttons. The total social shares displayed on my buttons isn’t accurate. It’s sort of a long story why they’re not, and it’s frustrating that nobody has worked that out, but put the buttons up there anyway. No excuses.

Next: An eye-catching graphic. If somebody sees your content shared on LinkedIn or Twitter, the first thing that grabs their attention is the graphic. Maybe you can stop them long enough to read the headline and get a click. The image that goes with your content is also an SEO boost because you can add meta tags to the photo to help Google figure out your content.

Let’s start looking at the right-hand column. You first see a call to action to spend time with me. Cool.

However, the next field, an invitation to subscribe, is the most essential item on the entire page. Why? Because a subscriber is opting in to you and what you do. They are volunteering to hear more. They are becoming members of your email list and possibly future customers.

You might be asking yourself, if the subscribe button is the most critical part of the page, why isn’t it at the top of the column? Heat map studies show that the top right corner of the web page is invisible to many people. I don’t know why, but the conclusion is consistent. So, the top of the column is sort of a throw-away item to get people to the next block which encourages them to subscribe.

As you go down the rest of the column, you’ll see:

• An opportunity to buy my book
• An invitation to attend my marketing retreat
• News about a class I am teaching
• An ability to search the site
• A little welcome message so people know who I am
• Boxes to search my posts by topic, date, or recent articles.

These are all things you might expect to see on a homepage. But most visitors who click on a link never see your home page. We need to fill that gap and give them lots of things to do. Remember, we want to keep them on the website.

Now let’s skip to the very bottom of the blog post. What have we here? A photo of me and further invitations to engage and connect. 

You might note that this page has lots of reasons to buy something from me, but I never sell within the content of the post. Some content gurus insist that you should sell something on every blog post, but I say phooey. I think that’s annoying and disrespectful. I wouldn’t want to subscribe to a constant sales pitch, would you?

But we’re not finished. Under my bio is another opportunity to share the post on social media because we want to get this content to move!

Next, there are a couple of prompts to send you to similar posts on my site. These are free WordPress apps that increase your time on my site by 18%. Huzzah!

And we wrap things up with another opportunity to connect with me on something like buying a book.

Just copy me

I just gave you some ideas for overcoming the biggest mistake content creators make today. My guess is that you have almost none of this on your page today. These ideas are easy to implement and can elevate your content immediately.

Everything I’ve covered here is free if you have a WordPress site. Nothing custom. Ask your web person to review my blog posts and copy my format. I’m happy to help you in that way.

It’s upsetting that so many people put their heart and soul into great content, only to have it languish on a boring, useless page.

I hope these ideas will give your content and business the boost they deserve.

Need a keynote speaker? Mark Schaefer is the most trusted voice in marketing. Your conference guests will buzz about his insights long after your event! Mark is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books, a college educator, and an advisor to many of the world’s largest brands. Contact Mark to have him bring a fun, meaningful, and memorable presentation to your company event or conference.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post The biggest mistake content creators make today appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Scottsboro, Alabama, (population 15,750) is a sleepy river town known for its First Monday craft fair, Payne’s Soda Fountain, and hot, muggy summers. It would not be considered a hotbed for influencer marketing. Well, not until Sarah Stahl made it into an influence marketing case study.

Sarah is the marketing director for ReTreet, a glamping (“glamorous + camping”) site in the woods outside of town. Faced with a 30% occupancy rate and a tiny marketing budget, she needed to build awareness on the cheap and turned to influencers to spread the word.

In what could be a travel industry first, Sarah created so much positive buzz around the tiny 17-site resort that influencers pay her to stay there. How in the world did she do that? In a word, attention to detail. Sarah delivers such an outstanding experience that influencers can’t wait to get there, even from distant states. Her approach includes:

• Partnerships with local attractions and restaurants that enhance the influencer’s storytelling possibilities and boost local tourism.
• Luxury amenities such as hot tubs, outdoor showers, saunas, and fire pits ensures visually appealing content.
• Founding a ReTreet influencer community so creators can stay in touch with each other and the resort. This community-driven approach has helped spur additional content creation and more bookings from their audience long after the initial stay.

Content is the key

Retreet resort post from influencer @petitemamalife

“I knew we needed quality content in volume,” she said, “and that consumers might not trust us or understand the idea of glamping at first. With a small startup budget, it would be tough to convince them without help, so working with trusted travel influencers was our best choice.

“I also knew that consistency is key. We’ve averaged about one influencer visit per week over 52 weeks. And as they shared their experiences, we’ve received more interest. We now have a three-month waitlist for content creators to stay with us. Since they are always looking for new angles for their audiences, the content about our resort is always fresh and relevant.

Results in Sarah’s first year:

• Revenue and occupancy doubled.
• The advertising budget was cut in half, and the ROI of their marketing spend more than doubled from $13 per dollar spent to $28 on each dollar spent.
• Increased ReTreet’s Instagram account by 650%, making it the top source of leads.
• Had Instagram Reels that reached 1 million views
• Each influencer visit resulted in an average of two more influencer requests for accommodation.
• Expanded the resort to include a glass dome event space.

Perhaps Sarah’s most important success is the rapid momentum she gained from the effective influencer content. “We’ve moved beyond the struggling startup phase,” she said. “We’re at a point where we’re expecting reservations to be made a year ahead of time.”

An influence marketing case study

Sarah Stahl at a Retreet tiny house

I love Sarah’s story because it’s so improbable. A resort in the middle of nowhere propelled by influencers? And yet the success is undeniable.

Most of the time, influence marketing is in the news for something silly, like a creator falling off a wall in search of the perfect selfie. But creators are crucial to our marketing future because they are believed and often adored. Chances are, your business is neither believed nor adored, so partnering with talented and trusted creators might make sense.

I asked Sarah if she’s ever had any problems with divas who were hard to work with. The creators who have come through her resort have been professional and appreciative. If you’re going to make it as an influencer these days, you’ll have to be business-savvy. I think Sarah’s experience reflects a growing professionalism among creators.

The creator economy is massive and growing. Is it time for your business to become an influence marketing case study?

Need a keynote speaker? Mark Schaefer is the most trusted voice in marketing. Your conference guests will buzz about his insights long after your event! Mark is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books, a college educator, and an advisor to many of the world’s largest brands. Contact Mark to have him bring a fun, meaningful, and memorable presentation to your company event or conference.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram

The post The ROI of creators: An inspiring influence marketing case study appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

OK, I’ve had enough of this. In four out of my last five coaching calls, the business leader on the other end of Zoom told me their main platform for content is LinkedIn. No blog. No content on a website. Just LinkedIn.

No, no, no. Also, no.

It’s time to stop the insanity. Today I’m turning you from the dark side and explaining why LinkedIn cannot be your primary content platform.

Back to basics: What are you doing?

Why are you creating content in the first place? There are two main reasons: Enhance your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) or build personal authority.

Increasingly, I favor the authority strategy because I believe SEO success is out of reach for many businesses.

Building authority means you don’t have to depend on SEO algorithms any more. You create content so worthy that people subscribe to it so they don’t miss a thing. In a virtual way, subscribers are saying, “I believe in you. I’m interested. Send me more content.”

That’s a beautiful thing. But it all depends on:

Your email strategy

When you publish on your website, or even a place like Substack, you own the email addresses. This, my friends, is probably the most valuable commercial asset in your business.

If you own the email list, you have the opportunity to directly grow relationships, announce commercial deals, and collect information that can be used to personalize offers.

How many email addresses do you own from the content you publish only on LinkedIn? None. So why is LinkedIn your content platform? They own your audience, and we don’t want that.

The SEO killer

Let’s say you’re one of those rare businesses or individuals who have a real chance to win the game of SEO roulette. You’re publishing your brains out on LinkedIn. Content every week. Maybe every day!

Now, if somebody wants to find you through search and give you their money, they go to Google and enter juicy keywords. What’s the chance they’re going to find some post you created on LinkedIn? Go ahead and try it. Do LinkedIn posts show up in any Google search? No.

But what about a blog post, or a YouTube video, or a podcast episode? Yes. That’s the content that fuels SEO on Google. When was the last time you ever had a post on LinkedIn go viral? That’s what I thought.

Oh, one more thing. Who owns LinkedIn? Microsoft. What else does Microsoft own? Bing. Google’s enemy. I don’t think Google is going to give LinkedIn a search assist.

And it gets worse …

AI and LinkedIn do not play well together

A friend is studying the impact of AI on search more closely than anyone I know. And she recently made a shocking observation.

When she queried AI bots about the top thought leaders in AI and search, none of the familiar experts posting through newsletters and LinkedIn showed up. In fact, all of the information provided by AI bots was absorbed from bloggers she had never heard of (but she is following them now!).

Her suggestion: Start a blog right away! At least for now, blogs on websites are driving the content on AI, not LinkedIn posts. This is the future of search.

Evaporation Station

There’s one other risk I should mention.

Do you remember when Facebook had a popular blogging platform? It was called Notes. In October 2020, Facebook eliminated this feature without warning. Millions of people lost their blog content in a moment.

Do we expect LinkedIn to do anything like that? Well … did we expect Facebook to do anything like that?

How to do LinkedIn right

Here’s where people get confused. LinkedIn is not a content platform. It’s a distribution system.

Your brand is fueled by four types of content: written, video, audio, or images (like Instagram). For most business professionals, there really are three: written, video, or a podcast. Pick one and put everything you have into it.

Now, once you have that content, you can use social media to deliver that content to your audience. For example, once you have a blog post ON YOUR WEBSITE, you can distribute it on LinkedIn, Substack, Twitter, and other places. But your website is the home base, the primary platform, always.

Here’s a strategy to create and distribute your content in a smart way on LinkedIn.

1. Research shows that text-based content does best on LinkedIn. Neither video nor podcasts are effective because those content forms do not start conversations in the comment section. Conversations mean dwell time for LinkedIn! So if LinkedIn is important to you, I would focus on blogging.
2. Publish a blog post on your website.
3. Publish this same post as an article (not a link) on LinkedIn two days after you publish it on your website. I post a little later to send a signal to Google that I am the author of the content. I am the original source. Send the search traffic to my website.
4. When you publish your article on LinkedIn, be sure to include an attractive graphic or photo. As people scan their LinkedIn feed, their eyes will be attracted to the image, then the headline, and then, if you’re lucky, the content. So images are important.
5. At this point, LinkedIn will expose your post to a small percentage of your followers. If you can attract comments (conversations) in the first hour after it is posted, LinkedIn will then expose it to the rest of your audience, and perhaps even people outside your followers. Huzzah!

Going forward

Starting with a blog-first strategy provides many other benefits, of course. It might not be the sexiest content in our TikTok world, but for business professionals looking to stand out on LinkedIn, it makes a lot of sense.

A blog can also serve as a portfolio of your work. It provides a centralized location where potential employers, clients, or collaborators can see your expertise, writing style, and the topics you are passionate about. Whether you’re building a brand, looking for a job, or hiring somebody, eventually, people come to your website.

If you take one thing away from this post, I hope it is this: If you’re only posting your content on LinkedIn, you’re grotesquely sub-optimizing your personal branding and content marketing effort. LinkedIn and other social media platforms can play a crucial role in personal branding. But please post all of your content on your website first and then send it into the social media distribution system.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

Top photo courtesy Unsplash.com

The post Why you need to ditch LinkedIn as your content platform appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

social media addiction

Many times in my career, I’ve used a variation of this phrase: “I want this (product / content / service) to be so good people are addicted to it!”

In a way, that’s the ultimate dream. Sergio Zyman, ex-CMO for Coca-Cola, used to tell me the goal of marketing was to “sell more stuff, to more people, more often, for more money.”

The idea of being addicted to what you sell seems like an elegant goal that would make you strive to be the best at everything you do, especially when it comes to social media marketing.

Here’s the business case for social media platform success: Create a recommendation engine that delivers content so insanely relevant that people spend increasing amounts of time on the site. Use that engagement to collect personal information on preferences that lead to highly targeted ads.

In other words, create social media addiction … at all costs. Create addiction. That’s social media marketing success.

Here’s the problem. It’s working. And if you work in marketing, you’re probably playing a role in the global mental health crisis.

The algorithms win

A recent Gallup survey revealed significant insights into U.S. teenagers’ social media habits. More than 51% of teens spend an average of 4.8 hours daily on social platforms. Age and gender differences are evident: 13-year-olds average 4.1 hours, 17-year-olds reach 5.8 hours, and girls spend nearly an hour more than boys.

YouTube and TikTok are the dominant platforms, with usage times of 1.9 and 1.5 hours daily, respectively, while Instagram lags behind at 0.9 hours.

Adolescents with lower levels of self-control spend about 1.2 hours more on social media than their more conscientious counterparts. Those with strict parental screen time rules report 1.8 hours less time online.

Unsurprisingly, insights from the survey suggest that design strategies by tech companies that encourage prolonged use are working.

Should we be concerned? Here’s what Gallup had to say (slightly edited for brevity):

Amid declining teen mental health, many scholars have carefully investigated the role of social media. Studies have pointed out how technology companies manipulate users into spending more time on the apps through their designs. There is hard evidence to support this view. In a 2022 article published in the journal American Economic Review, economists reported the results of an experiment with young adults designed to affect their social media use; they conclude that 31% of time spent on social media stems from what the researchers describe as “self-control problems.”

Consistent with the literature on “social media addiction,” these data show that teens who spend more time on social media rate themselves as being less conscientious more generally and live with parents who are less likely to restrict screen time. This analysis reveals that these characteristics also predict poor mental health — and seem to explain at least some of the observed relationship between social media use and mental health problems.

The marketer’s responsibility

These addictive and compulsive behaviors are troubling. But even more disturbing is how the largest corporations in the world are investing billions in promoting and accelerating this compulsive use of their tech tools.

If you look at the 10 largest companies in the world, half of them are trying to create this addictive relationship to technology. The days when the dealer in addiction had to hide in the shadows are over. They now operate freely in your home, and every other sphere of your life.

I am sincerely conflicted by marketing’s role in this mess.

We absolutely have a responsibility to our customers. We need to cut through the noise and ideally earn more attention than competitors. We have this amazing tool at our disposal — social media algorithms — especially if your target market includes teens who live their lives online.

But isn’t there a higher goal? Do No Harm.

Incrementally, my individual marketing efforts won’t have any meaningful impact on social media addiction and the world’s mental health. In all good conscience, I can say that I’m not personally causing any problems.

But when every social media marketer is creating addiction and profiting from it, the cumulative effort is the root of the global problem. In fact, marketers are the entire problem because the purpose of creating addiction is to sell more stuff to more people, more often, for more money. Sergio would be overjoyed!

Social media addiction. What’s next?

The other day, I littered. It was a bad choice, but I had a dirty, wet napkin in the car and I was miles away from a service station. Out the window it went. Perhaps this is the first time I’ve littered in my life. So despite my poor choice, the impact on the global pollution problem is near zero. Heck, the darn thing is biodegradable, right?

But if everybody littered like that, we would create an environmental disaster. And that’s where we are with marketing and social media. No individual TikTok ad hurts anything. But when it’s a way of life for millions of marketers reaching billions of people, it’s a disaster.

I can make a pledge to not pollute anymore through litter. It’s easy. No personal impact. But making a pledge to not market on social media is existential. With our advertising “litter,” many marketers no longer have a career.

Let this sink in: Social media marketing is directly contributing to social media addiction and the global mental health crisis. Perhaps YOU are directly contributing to the mental health crisis.

I thnk deep down we know this … but we never talk about it. Social media expert Arik Hansen said, “Some days I feel like I work for Big Tobacco.”

Anna Bravington, a UK marketing strategist, had this perspective: “Social media addiction and marketing is such an interesting dilemma, and balancing act. I think your thoughts in Belonging to the Brand about community seem like the best middle ground. In community, time spent online is quality and human, not artificial and forced. It feels like that approach is less addictive, and given the mental health side, the right community can be an asset rather than a burden.

I have no universal answer for this, but I needed to start a conversation about it. We can’t keep looking the other way.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post Who’s responsible for social media addiction? Me and you. appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

On the latest episode of The Marketing Companion, I decided to take a deep dive into the nooks and crannies of social media marketing, and there’s nobody better to accompany me than marketing genius Dennis Yu.

Dennis studies the art and science of social media success to the Nth degree and we get into some fascinating discussions that include:

• The ROI of a blue check mark
• The viral power of feel-good stories
• A social media platform that is killing it right now
• How social media platforms are using facial and image recognition to elevate content
• Why replay rate is the key to success on TikTok
• Insights into what’s happening with Meta and the metaverse

Dennis also shares a unique perspective on how search engines and social platforms are turning over information to the US government. But TikTok doesn’t have to … which could be influencing the government’s position with that platform.

Click here to listen to episode 270

Resources mentioned in this show

TikTok Advertising book

Blog post: Why hate is good for business

Ocean Spray cranberry juice case study

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post What is the ROI of a blue check mark? appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I received a message from a reader in the U.K. wondering if social media marketing still matters. She had read my book The Tao of Twitter (which is really about social media strategy) and wondered if the book’s main ideas were still relevant in a world where it is so difficult to earn attention and connect with customers.

The short answer is, yes — it still matters, but probably in a way that is much different than you think. I believe the essential nature of social media marketing has changed forever, and I will address that today.

Is it really marketing?

I have never really liked the phrase “social media marketing.” The power of social media is connection, and I can assure you that you people will not connect to you if all you do is “market” to them! However, if you come alongside people at their point of need and help, inform, or perhaps entertain them, there is a chance for a spark of new connection … and that is a great starting point.

Instead of viewing social media as “marketing,” I would like to reframe the strategy today and contend that it is a first step in a powerful marketing process. To take advantage of the wonderful opportunity of social media, you need to view it in the larger context of today’s consumer realities.

The role of emotion

To understand this process, let’s step back and identify the two types of marketing.

The first type is direct marketing — driving sales through ads, promotions, coupons, etc. Social media has some role in this transactional world, especially if you have “conditioned” followers to pay attention to your social media marketing for bargains and special offers. And, of course, social media plays a crucial role in customer service. Twitter is the homeroom for complaints!

But I contend the larger opportunity for marketing is brand marketing. A simple example of brand marketing is Coca-Cola. What comes to mind when I mention Coca-Cola? Probably this:

Coca-Cola spent billions of dollars over many decades to move your attention away from brown-colored sugar water to the emotional relevance of cuddly polar bears.

Brand marketing creates emotional meaning between you and your customers. It creates an expectation that you will have a certain feeling when you interact with a brand. You probably have wildly different emotional reactions to the following words, a result of decades of brand marketing:

• Harley Davidson
• Patagonia
• New York Yankees
• LEGO

Social media and content can also fuel the emotion behind your personal brand. I’ll talk about that more in a minute.

The emotional continuum

Social media can play an important role in brand marketing that creates long-term, loyal customers.

Here is a graphic illustration from my book Belonging to the Brand, which simply depicts social media’s role in brand marketing.

We see that the emotional connection of social media is weak. It is ephemeral. Often, you might feel like posting is like throwing a message in a bottle into the ocean, hoping somebody will notice.

The true power of social media marketing is in its ability to connect us to a world of relevant new people — people who may want us, need us, and maybe even love us as loyal customers. In sales parlance, this is the top of the funnel, the beginning of a relationship and possible sales.

This real magic starts when you interact with people in a way that provokes their curiosity. Can you move them to your audience?

An audience is the group of people who subscribe to your content, like blogs, videos, podcasts, Instagram, and other opt-in channels.

When you have an audience of subscribers, you’ve achieved an entirely new level of emotional connection! Your message is no longer floating in the media ocean, you have reliable reach. A subscriber is telling you, “It’s OK to communicate with me. I’m interested.” This is also the fundamental strategy of personal branding.

Unfortunately, this is where most companies stop. They are falling short of the ultimate emotional connection with customers — community.

Social media marketing that leads to an audience

In my book Belonging to the Brand, I explain that community, characterized by 1) relationships between your fans or customers, 2) a shared purpose, and 3) evolving engagement, is unparalleled in its ability to create meaningful emotional bonds with customers.

In fact, an active and engaged community creates a layer of emotional switching costs. Your customers literally feel like they belong to your brand.

Here’s a small example of the emotional continuum in action. I will talk about myself and a personal brand, but I think you can see how this can apply to anyone or almost any company.

Case study of the process

If you add up my social media audience across all channels, it is somewhere around 500,000. Pretty cool.

If I put out a message on social media announcing that I have a new book, how many books will I sell? Almost none, and I’m speaking from experience! Even with this large audience and more than a decade of continuous engagement, I’m throwing a message into the ocean.

But I still post on social media and interact genuinely because I know many people will become curious enough to click my profile, visit my website, absorb my content and subscribe to my blog or podcast.

Oh happy day!

Maybe this was you? Or maybe you’re reading this post and discovering me for the first time? If you become part of my audience of subscribers, we’ll enter into a new emotional relationship. We’re getting to know each other and perhaps even develop a parasocial relationship where I feel like part of the family.

If I announce to my audience that I have a new book, how many will buy it? Lots. Because with every post and podcast episode, they form a tighter emotional bond and with people who want to support me.

But that’s not the end. The ultimate bond comes when members of the audience grow into a community.

Reimagining social media marketing as a process

The RISE community is a vibrant group of marketing geeks trying to discern the future of our profession together. And this is where I have my strongest bonds.

If my community knows I have a new book, how many will buy it? Everyone. And they will also review it, promote it, and give it away to their friends.

The bond of community means so much more than just reliable reach. It enables organic advocacy, which is the most incredible marketing you could ever wish for!

Waking up your strategy

I think this new characterization of social media — a top-of-the-funnel relationship that leads to audience and community — is the most accurate depiction of the role of social media marketing strategy today.

The problem is, most businesses are stuck on a view of social media marketing that emerged 15 years ago. The world was much different then. You could attract attention simply by having an interesting social media account — it was a novelty!

No longer. If the entirety of your social media strategy is posting content without a larger strategy that leads to audience and community, your organization needs to wake up and see the new world as it really works today.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant. The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak at your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram.

Illustration courtesy MidJourney

The post Does social media marketing still matter? Not like you think. appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I have fun helping people with their business and marketing strategies, and more often than not, I recommend some easy tweaks to their website. Most people are missing the same five key ingredients on their site.

I provide this advice so often that I thought I should put it a post. Are these changes you should be considering?

1. Tell them what you do and how you do it.

If you’re lucky enough to have a potential customer visit your website, you only have a few seconds to grab their attention. So you need to do this by 1) creating a captivating visual element and 2) telling them what problem you solve and how you uniquely solve it.

Here’s an example of how to do this from my friend Ruth Hartt, who is on a mission to shake up how arts organizations do their marketing.

This is what her homepage used to look like:

This doesn’t tell me anything specific about Ruth or what she does. I’m confused by what appears to be a giant cursor in the middle of the screen.

After a coaching call with me, Ruth immediately made this change:

Now we’re in business!

First, she added a nice visual element.

Then, she grabs your attention by stating EXACTLY the problem her customers have — operas, theaters, and symphonies are losing their audiences! And then she offers a solution, her unique service to help them.

I also like how she emphasized the word “audience.” I would not have thought of that, but it’s an inspired touch Ruth came up with.

2. Give them something to do

Now that you have their attention, keep them on your site. The longer people stay on your site, the better the chances they will connect to you and perhaps buy something.

When people scroll down, show them examples of your blog, your podcast, or what content you’re creating. Offer a free whitepaper, webinar, or consultation. Get them to click on something!

3. Show your human side

About 95 percent of the “About” pages I see are simply a story about the person’s work history and accomplishments.

I hate to pop your bubble, but nobody really cares.

Here’s what people want to see: A short video explaining why you are the best person to solve their problem. This does two things. First, it differentiates you from the competitors who also have an About page that looks like a resume. Second, you show your face, your smile, your passion, and let people know how much you care.

This is especially important in a personal services business. People probably won’t buy from a nice-looking website, but they will buy from a person who shows how much they care. Show them that you’re a person!

4. The second landing page of your website

If you do a good job creating and promoting your content, people will start finding it through search or the social share of a friend. That means when people click on the link, they will arrive at your site on a piece of content, not your home page. Essentially, this piece of content now also serves as the first thing a person sees when they come to your site.

Each piece of your content can be the home page for new visitors!

Another very common mistake is that this huge opportunity is ignored. If people are on your blog post, use the side margins beside the content to tell them what you do, what free offers you have to keep them on the site, and notifications about other content.

And PLEASE, give them an opportunity to subscribe, search your content, and share it with the outside world through social sharing buttons! I can’t believe how many content creators don’t have social sharing buttons on their sites.

5. Add testimonies to your website

You should have testimonies prominently displayed on almost every page of your website. This is easy to do and so often overlooked.

Testimonies help people feel safe. It reinforces the idea that they are on a reputable website created by a reputable business.

Don’t make the testimonies too long. People will ignore a big block of gray type. Just use short sentences like, “The best business experience I have ever had.”

That’s it. Take a look at your website. How many of these things have you overlooked?

If you need some help with your business, you can always reach me. Anybody can sign up for an hour of my time! 

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram. Discover his $RISE creator community.

Illustration courtesy Unsplash.com

The post Five things you need to change on your website right now appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

Today I’m going to discuss a possible trend and business opportunity. My views here are subjective because there is really no way to prove my observations. I could be completely wrong. But if I’m right, the time could be ripe for reimagining success with organic social media.

Here is my premise.

Point 1: Few are focusing on organic social media

In general, companies have given up on any kind of meaningful organic social media strategy. All the attention is on paid media, which is getting more expensive and competitive because where else are you going to advertise these days? In general, organic has become a grind — a box to be checked — with no real strategy behind it (with the exception of customer service).

How do I know that this is the state of social media? I don’t for sure. As I said, this is subjective. But when was the last time you saw an organic social media campaign that made you go WOW? I’ve been immersed in the social media marketing field since the beginning and I think we are in the Death Valley of social creativity right now. Engagement is so low most have given up on it.

Point 2: Everything is difficult

Another general observation is that every marketing-related development these days seems like bad news. Costs are going up, effectiveness is going down. Consumers are skipping our ads and blocking us out. Privacy regulations (a good thing in the long term) may eliminate many practices currently at the heart of the marketing practice.

In summary, marketing is really, really HARD. I’ve argued that it’s probably more difficult to succeed than ever. So, whatever we do, it’s going to take a lot of exceptional creative work to break through the noise.

So we need some fresh energy, some new ideas.

My conclusion: A comeback for organic social media

With digital ad prices soaring, why not take a fresh look at organic? If you suggest this idea to your boss, she will say, “But that is so hard to do!”

And she would be correct. But ALL marketing is hard to do right now, and I think competing through organic social media might be a “less-hard” option because it’s virtually an open space with no innovation taking place. This is an abandoned space.

Great marketing isn’t about conforming to what everybody else is doing. It’s about non-conformity and finding a niche to leverage.

Why keep putting your money into over-crowded and costly spaces? Organic might be a wide-open opportunity.

But there’s a hook

In the early days of social media, everything was a novelty, so anybody could post anything and it would go viral.

Alas, those days are long gone. In fact, probably no one will believe anything you say on social media any way. But we do believe our friends and family. So any success with organic social media has to be focused on UGC — User Generated Content. We need to create something so audacious and unmissable that our customers will carry the story forward.

Did I mention that this is also HARD to do? But if I were a creative marketing leader at an agency somewhere, I would be thinking about developing some content or experience that was so bold and inventive that the world will be eager to spread it.

This is a key point to any organic success. The algorithms probably won’t let your content through. So the content has to come through others. This demands a whole new mindset and approach to organic social media and it’s really the only way to achieve to success.

There is no easy path for any marketing success, so we can only hope for a less-hard path. Maybe that means dusting off the organic social media playbook. What do you think?

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram. Discover his $RISE creator community.

Illustration courtesy Unsplash.com

The post Is there a renaissance ahead for organic social media? appeared first on Schaefer Marketing Solutions: We Help Businesses {grow}.

I’ve been blogging for more than a decade and I realized I’ve never answered this question — the most-asked question I receive — “What is the best social media channel for my business?”

So I will try to answer it today.

I normally cringe when I hear this question because to give a very specific answer, I would need to know a lot more about the company, competition, etc. The optimal marketing mix might be different for every business.

But I do have a general answer … and it might surprise you.

Is it really about the best social media channel?

When somebody asks this question, it’s normally because they are just starting out with social media — and they’re overwhelmed! They have some inclination that their business needs to be on Facebook or LinkedIn and they don’t know where to start.

Here is the place to start: You’re asking the wrong question.

You see, the real value in marketing is driven by content. The content is the fuel behind the social media engine. Social media is simply the distribution system for the content. So the first question isn’t “What is the best social media channel for my business?” It’s “What is the best content for my business?”

Again, it might seem overwhelming, but it’s not.

If you’re asking this question, you’re probably a small company with limited resources. So, you can’t do everything and be everywhere. To keep it simple, you basically have four content choices:

• Writing something like a blog
• Recording audio like a podcast
• Creating video as you would see on YouTube or live-streamed
• Visual content suitable for Instagram or Pinterest.

To stand out on the web you can’t be great in 10 places. So if you have limited resources, my recommendation is to focus on one content form, master it, and build an audience. Create something meaningful at least once a week.

Which content form do you choose? There are many considerations like competition and customers, but in the end, I recommend choosing something you enjoy because you will have to stick with it for a long time to have success.

Social media is a distribution system

Are you creating great content? Now you have some fuel to power your social media engine.

• Once you have a blog, for example, you can now post this in multiple places like LinkedIn, Twitter, Substack, and Medium.
• If you have a video, you can publish all or part of it on YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, and Instagram, to name a few.
• Likewise, a podcast can be distributed in many creative ways. YouTube is actually a huge discovery engine for podcasts.

Many of these activities can be automated, assigned to a virtual assistant, or you can do it yourself once you have the content.

What is the best social media channel for my business?

Now let’s get more specific.

With limited resources, you can probably only succeed in a limited number of places. Let’s focus on your GOALS.

I recently had a student who managed social media for a high-end private athletic club. You might think they need to be posting on LinkedIn, or perhaps Facebook.

But we had to consider the GOAL.

All their memberships were sold out. Their biggest goal right now is finding enough workers for their kitchen staff. So they are considering content on TikTok showing what a fun place it is for employees. On the surface, the teen-oriented TikTok seems like a strange place for this elite business … but not when you consider the needs of the club right now.

That’s why it’s hard for me to be prescriptive in any general way about the best social media channel without knowing many details about the goals of the business and the competitive landscape.

What are your short-term and long-term goals? Don’t post just to post. Serve the goals of the business.

Best social media channel strategy

I think if you follow the three steps I’ve discussed today, you’ll get your company in the ballpark when choosing the best social media channel:

1. Keep focused on the short-term and long-term business goals
2. Commit to consistent content to fuel social media
3. Regard social media as the distribution channel for your content

Now, this post only addresses an organic (non-advertising) social media strategy. There would be another set of considerations for a paid strategy, and most businesses need that too. But in general, I think this should help you sort through the best social media channel for your business on a macro level.

Mark Schaefer is the executive director of Schaefer Marketing Solutions. He is the author of some of the world’s bestselling digital marketing books and is an acclaimed keynote speaker, college educator, and business consultant.  The Marketing Companion podcast is among the top business podcasts in the world. Contact Mark to have him speak to your company event or conference soon.

Follow Mark on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram. Discover his $RISE creator community.

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