Want to Get Hits on Your Blog? Make Yourself Useful

Let’s start by being honest, right up front: You want your blog to go viral, right?

It’s totally ok to admit it. We all do. I don’t know anyone who started a blog just to keep a diary or to share some cute baby pictures with distant relatives. And, Dear Reader, if you reply, “Oh, no, I really just want my own little corner of the internet to share my opinions on politics and a few recipes. I would never want the world to read it all, blah blah self-deprecating blah,” I have a bridge to sell you.

I’ll bet that, as you are typing away, you have a little vision of waking up the next morning to find that your little funny blog post is all over Facebook. A celeb you follow has retweeted you. You get an interview on GMA and launch your lifestyle show on HGTV.

Am I close?

How My Small-Potatoes Gardening Blog Grew

I tapped away at my little gardening blog for over a year before I hit on my most successful post.

3 Ways to Scale Successful Omni-Channel Marketing Campaigns

Lest you think the marketing world hasn’t undergone a major change in the past decade or so, consider the process of learning to ride a bike.

If you learned as a child, suggested Redekah Radice, CMO of Post Planner, you may have been worried about it, but you tackled it all by yourself.

If you had to learn today, though, you’d probably go to Facebook for advice and search online for an article or two to help you get started. You’d then see several bicycles popup later while you surfed the web, further reinforcing your decisions about what equipment to buy as you set out on your new adventures.

“That’s the seamless experience that omni-channel marketing creates for the audience,” Rebekah said at the outset of her Inbound talk, “How to Scale Successful Omni-Channel Marketing Campaigns.”

Custom Stickers Are EVERYWHERE. Here’s Why.

If you've walked into a coffee shop recently, you've probably noticed that there's a lot more color around to catch your eye. It's not that they've redecorated -- it's that every laptop is covered in a smattering of bright, fun stickers. From classic brand logos to cute characters, stickers are BACK.

Why Are Stickers a Thing?

In a word, Millennials. While Gen-Xers may have casually traded scratch and sniff stickers in the 1980s, Millennials were all in on stickers as kids. Remember Lisa Frank's rainbows and doe-eyed animals? These were must-haves for kids growing up in the '90s, and odds are good that their teachers were using them as rewards, too. So there's strong nostalgia for the good old days when it comes to getting a sticker: When someone gives you one, you just feel good. They must care about you, and think you're doing something right.

Gen Z Goes to College

Millennial brands may be the ones who brought stickers back by including them in their subscription boxes and product packaging, but Gen Z (born between 1996 and 2010) has taken the trend from quirky to cool.

How to Ask Clients for Online Reviews

Online reviews have become increasingly important for law firms. Today’s clients find everything on the internet, so it’s crucial for law firms to make sure they stand out in Google, Yelp, Avvo.com, Lawyers.com and other searches and have compelling reviews posted on the most trusted sites. 

The first step to getting more reviews is to ask. By creating a protocol for reviews, you can make sure that every satisfied client is given the tools they need to write a review that gets your firm noticed. Here’s how to get started.

Create a Process for Online Reviews

Soliciting reviews works in very much the same way as a sales pitch does. Great sales professionals know that it’s a numbers game, and you need to cast a wide net to get results. For this reason, your firm needs to develop a system for discussing reviews with every client.

Marketing to Educators? You Need a Teacher to Write for You

Whether you’re an EdTech company with a revolutionary new product or a consultant with a great idea to help teachers improve their practice, it’s harder than you think to reach an audience of educators with content. Teachers have seen loads fads come and go, and they’re highly skeptical of innovations that promise the world. You would be skeptical, too, if you had to upend your working practices every two years to start an initiative that you knew would be replaced before you got your next raise.

The best way to break through teachers’ natural resistance to taking on yet another new “best practice” is to hire a teacher to write for you. Here’s why.

You Need to Get the Voice Right

If you work in EdTech, the emphasis is almost certainly on the tech in your daily experience of your job. For example, you probably work with software engineers or have meeting with sales and marketing pros to fine-tune your product. You have a language all your own, and it’s likely filled with phrases like “ROI” and “churn” and “disruption”.

A Promotion Pyramid: How and When to Take Content to a Wider Audience

Content marketing is crucial to promote your brand and let influencers show off your best looks, but successful fashion marketers don't just throw blog posts out to the public and hope they stick. There are actually four different tiers of your audience to target with promotions. Hit these groups in order and evaluate your content along the way to streamline your content marketing plan.

Tier One: Your Loyalty Loop

These are your existing contacts - the ones who already love you! Your loyal fans are your current shoppers and rewards program members, plus any influencers you have a good relationship with. To reach them, use your email list to alert them to your content, whether it's a fun new video or a blog post about #fashionweek. This is also a great way to show off your expertise on coming trends in apparel.