What Makes Content Go Viral? The book, Contagious: Why Things Catch On, by Malcolm Gladwell has some pretty fantastic research on how content goes viral. See what compels people to click and share content. Content consumption is relatively static compared to content generation, so there is only so much attention to go around. [Infographic] Leaderswest
Easier Recovery for Hacked Sites – Google adds new features to Webmaster Tools “Security Issues” to enable faster recovery if you’re hacked. Google Blog
Artsy Launches Innovative iPhone App for Art Lovers – Artsy have announced the launch of the Artsy App for iPhone and iPod touch that will give users access to more than 50,000 images from more than 600 of the world’s leading galleries art fairs, museums, private collections, foundations, and artists’ estates in 50 countries. Art Market Blog
Vine Adds Ability to Edit Videos, Save Sessions – With a new feature called “Time Travel,” users can now reorganize the various shots included in their videos. That means if a user wants to put the last clip he shot at the start of his video, he can simply drag it to the front before sharing. Los Angeles Times
Get Ready to Pay to Watch YouTube – YouTube is increasing its efforts to generate more revenue with its most popular video producers. Any video creator who has 10,000 subscribers and has been verified by YouTube will be able to set up a new paid channel and charge a fee for access to their content. Creators can set their own subscription rates, though YouTube has final authority to determine pricing. Time
Buffer’s Response to Hacking: A Study in Social Media Crisis Management – Social sharing start-up Buffer was hacked October 26th. In the hours their service was down, the Buffer team managed the crisis across social media and email channels like champs. Read about lessons learned in social media crisis management for brands. Search Engine Watch
LinkedIn Tops 250 Million Members – LinkedIn’s stock has more than doubled in the year to date, closing a few dollars shy of $250 per share. As of publication, the stock was up by nearly 2%. Mashable
Ads Set To Appear on Instagram Next Week – Starting with a very small, select group of advertisers (Adidas, Ben & Jerry’s, GE and a few more) Instagram will begin introducing high-quality brand-oriented ads into the news feed, these will include still imagery and video. Marketing Land
25%+ Young Internet Users Commenting On & Discovering TV Shows Via Social Media – 3 in 10 broadband internet users aged 15-17 say they occasionally post comments to social media sites about the TV shows they watch, a figure which remains relatively high (25%) among 18-34-year-olds, but drops to just 10% of respondents aged 35 and older, according to survey result from Horowitz Associates. Marketing Charts
5 Google AdWords Enhanced Campaign Tips – Early adopters may have had the first jump on Enhanced Campaigns, but it’s definitely not too late to take advantage. Read these five tips to help maximize performance and improve efficiency in your Google AdWords campaigns. Search Engine Watch
Foursquare Adds Analytics Tools For Publishers – Foursquare last week rolled out new tools for publishers that give them more insight on places popular with their followers and which of their tips on the social location app are resonating. MediaPost
15 Ways Ecommerce Sites Can Use Urgency to Increase Conversions – Through showing low stock levels, encouraging people to buy quickly for faster delivery, or by using email to pull customers into sales, urgency is a great selling tool. Check out more tips here. eConsultancy
4 Social Media Horror Stories and How to Avoid Them – Let these serve as a warning: What you say online can–and will–come back to hurt you. Inc.
An Easy Way to Upgrade to Google Universal Analytics – Google launches Universal Analytics upgrade, making it an easy two-step process to upgrade your existing properties from classic Google Analytics to Universal Analytics. Google Analytics Blog
LinkedIn Announces LinkedIntro App – The growth of mobile email is simply staggering. Four years ago, less than 4% of emails were read on mobile. Today, half of all emails are read on a mobile device. Enter ‘Intro’ which shows you LinkedIn profiles in your iPhone Mail app. Very cool! LinkedIn Blog
Google’s Matt Cutts: More Pages Does Not Equal Higher Rankings – In a new video by Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, we learn that the number of pages on a specific site does not have a direct ranking benefit; the more pages you have, the more chances you have to rank for different keywords. However, the more pages you have, the more likely you have more overall links and PageRank, which do directly impact your rankings. Did ya get all that? Search Engine Land
First Evidence of Google Smartphone Ranking Penalty Appears – If you are using smartphone error pages, this is your incentive to stop. It’s no longer just a worst practice and bad for your user. It will now make you less visible in Google search results. Marketing Land
Wrong Ways to Use Hashtags – Many people don’t seem to understand how #hashtags work, and they misuse the tool, which is a fast way to suffer a backlash, sometimes without even knowing it having happened. Here are a few common ways people abuse the hashtag system, and what you should do instead. SEO Chat
From the Online Community
This post promoting a free 214-page eBook from Lindex generated lengthy comments and great ideas from the community.
On “31 Top Marketers Agree: It’s Time to Rethink Your Content Marketing” Stephen Bateman said, Thanks for this Lee. My tip for content marketers is to start with the end in mind. Turn the process of content creation on its head, and decide first what you want your content users to do. Then, work through a systematic tried, tested and trusted content marketing planning methodology that gets results, not dissimilar to Rick’s http://slidesha.re/17eqJiJ
Rick Noel said, Excellent post Lee. My tips would be to follow a process which begins with building customer personas that could be used as a light house to guide your content marketing efforts. This is in support of your 2nd bullet above from your Chapter 1 recommendations. Second, document FAQs for those personas. This is what they care about and is related to their business goals. Third, find the gaps to addressing those questions in the existing Google index. Fourth, evaluate keywords used by target market to find the useful information you are contemplating creating. Pick keywords carefully and then be aware as you write, making sure to write naturally and don’t be overly focused on keyword density, just aware and all things being equal, the best words to use in each situation. Keyword research should guide your approach to fill those voids that are in demand and possible to rank based on current page 1. Factor in geographic scope (local, regional, national, international) and personalization when determining ability for organic rankings. Fifth, and perhaps most important, be prepared to create unique content that is better than everything else or takes a creative slant on the topic covered. Six, share strategically on social channels most relevant to your personas/target markets, ideally at times when they are likely to be using these social channels. This is key for reach and discovery. Sound like a tall order? To do it well for competitive markets, it is, especially as you are building audience and authority. We consider this process in driving ROI from Content Marketing, especially as it relates to search. Thanks for sharing.
On “Gamification as a Content Marketing Tactic: How Brands are Engaging Consumers,”
Brad Szollose said, In my own Cross-Generational work, I recommend Gamification to managers and executives. It is an excellent way to build in micro-incentives in order to achieve goals, helps to build a team environment and sets the tone for recognition & reward. Many Fortune 500 companies are using Gamification driven software over their intranets in order to keep project management transparent and on task.
3 Books I recommend are:
1) Got Game: How a New Gamer Generation is Reshaping Business Forever by John C. Beck and Mitchell Wade
2) What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy by Professor James Paul Gee
3) And of course my own work, Liquid Leadership: From Woodstock to Wikipedia.
We are entering a disruptive time in business and Gamification seems to be an incredible game changer for HR, and a great tool for employee evaluation. In Marketing, it’s a no-brainer. Thanks again Nicolette.
What’s Your Take?
Do you use negative or positive emotional language to tip the scales in social media? Will you pay to watch YouTube videos? Will ads on Instagram kill this popular app?
