Tips to Create Shareable Content in 2019

Social media likes are a type of currency. But shares are where it’s at for growing your reach. A share will organically generate more views to your post. If you get one share on a blog or social media post, it can domino into another, then another, and another, building brand awareness, expanding your reach and data footprint. All you have to do is create content worth sharing. How do you do that? Follow along.

Quality Over Quantity – But Pay Attention to Quantity.

The Internet is chock-full of tips on creating shareable content— however, you may find that much of the advice made widely available is so generalized and ambiguous it may not be helpful at all. Phrases that you may find are things like, “Posting good content guarantees shares and increased traffic!” That’s not false by any means, but what exactly is the proverbial “good content”?

Quality is a no-brainer. Audiences will share content that is relevant and of value to themselves and their social media network. Relevant content is built on audience research. Who is your audience? Who is your audience’s audience? Who do they follow? What do they already share? With the answers to these questions, you can start generating potentially shareable content.

By posting your content online, you’re just starting a conversation with your audience. The key now is to establish a back-and-forth rapport (you post, your audiences share; they post, you share). Ultimately, when done right, this can establish an ongoing relationship.

Titles- Not Just For Books

There’s a lot of content on the Internet. Millions of blog posts are published every day. Social media users and platforms are constantly increasing, and all of these writers and social media users are generating, liking, and sharing content, all the time. You need your content to stand out in the crowd. A good first step is to give them a title that really hooks your audience.

Start small. Use your general topic to come up with a few specific working titles, which are whittled-down, enough to guide the direction of your post.

Now make that working title, fun and unique. Test bold and strong language against more conservative and direct titles, and find the balance between the two. If you need to workshop your titles don’t be afraid to ask for second opinions. Having another opinion is valuable; don’t waste the chances you have to get one.

There are rules, guidelines, and tips galore on the web for you to find. Choose what works for you and your audience.

Note: People love to scan titles especially on Twitter, using an RSS reader or otherwise. Get them to take the next step and click-through with a title that is short, succinct, and interesting.

What Kind of Content Matters Too

Simple content is hands above more shareable. The way blogs and social media posts work is by making use of tidbits and clickbait. People generally respond very well to short form copy like lists and listicles. Your audience is busy, and the quickest way they can go through interesting and valuable content, the happier they will be.

SEO FTW

Although clarity and (sometimes) brevity is key to sharable content, making sure your SEO is well thought out can be a huge plus for reaching those that are maybe not already part of your consistent audience. Keep in mind that trying to over optimize your titles or posts can often sound awkward, and make your words sound like they were automatically generated for optimization by an SEO tool.

In order to effectively use keywords in your blog or social media titles and posts, research your potential customer base: What are they searching for? What problems do they face? How can you either help them directly or help inform them of other solutions? With the answers to these questions, you can choose and use relevant keywords, which will help you to become more searchable.

Note: Keyword rank isn’t the biggest barometer for success in search anymore. See this previous post to learn why.

A Picture Says A Thousand Words… (Infographics, Videos, and Other Visuals Can Too)

It takes more than a snappy title and intro for a post to be truly shareable. Images, infographics, videos, charts, tables, and block quotes can dress up and increase the influence of an otherwise text-forward post. Any visual you choose must, like everything else, be accurate and relevant. Use visuals to promote content that offers solutions to your audiences’ problems, in useful and creative ways, so that you can garner shares and valuable comments.

Tip: Don’t forget to read comments on your content. They’re an excellent measure of post success.

Marketing Trend: Demographic Segmentation

To effectively market your product or service, you need to create content that truly speaks to your defined target market.

However, your target market may be so diverse that your marketing doesn’t hit home to anybody in it. There’s one way to change that, and this technique is called “Demographic Segmentation”

Demographic segmentation groups your target market into specific groups of people based on attributes like location, age, education, occupation, and income bracket. By using information from demographic segmentation, you can create personalized marketing campaigns for each part of your target market.

These more personalized approaches can lead to a better distribution of resources and more conversions because the specific messages resonate more than a non-direct generic message to your whole audience might.

There are 5 main demographics most businesses segment their audience with. This is how to leverage each one. 

Age

Harkening back to Generational Profiling, segmenting by age allows you to change a campaign so it resonates with who you need it to. The thing about generational segmentation is that each age group, from Baby Boomers to Gen Z, have unique experiences and references that tie them together. Music, celebrities, movies and other pop culture references can help campaigns with the nostalgia factor for each generation.

Education

Segmenting by education lets you divide your target market by school, area of study, and degree. Successful campaigns that have done this generally play into the loyalty many have for their alma mater.

Occupation

Certain types of professionals have more value to certain marketing campaigns and occupations segmentation can separate your target market by job function, job title, and job seniority. This is particularly useful for B2B brands, as occupation segmentation makes it easy to target individuals with buying power at a company.

Location/Geography

Geographic location is an easy way to split your target market based on what they need and what they’re interested in. Landscape, distance from locations and climate can impact the messages you send. Advertising shorts or sandals in the middle of a Minnesota winter just doesn’t work for us here.

Income Bracket

Income segmentation divides your target market by income. Knowing how much discretionary income your base has, allows you to market to those that can afford your product or service, help you to set or your prices in accordance to how much is realistic to expect your target market to spend, and may inspire pricing levels for each segment of your target market.

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Engagement Insights For Facebook Business Pages

In January, Facebook announced a change to its news feed algorithm that would prioritize personal content from family and friends over content from Pages, which caused panic for many businesses that rely on Page engagement for growing their brand and generating new leads. Buffer and BuzzSumo collaborated to analyze 43 million posts from the pages of the top 20,000 brands on Facebook, and this is what they found.

Page Engagement has dropped

It was broadly assumed that with the algorithmic changes there would be a decrease in brand engagement, but the amount of decline was up in the air. Now, after the changes, Buffer’s study discovered that engagement on brand pages has dropped over 50%, with post engagement falling nearly two-thirds from where it had been previously.

Page types hit with a drop in engagement

The study ranked ten-page categories to determine which type of page was hit with the largest engagement drop. Artist Pages were found to be affected the most with a 70.6% drop in engagement, and retail Pages were affected the least with less than a 50% drop.

Pictures not video content

There has been a huge push for video content, and Facebook is leading the charge on that with a focus on live video and original content streaming (both live and pre-recorded) through Facebook (Watch, IGTV); but this study found that the content that received the highest engagement was not video, but images. Despite that, interaction for all content types is down, with an over 63% drop in average per post engagement.

Post volume to combat decreased engagement

In the last year, the analyzed Pages have posted more content with posts per quarter up to 8.1 million from 6.5 million, which is a 24% increase. Quantity vs quality is still a hot debate, but there is a sweet spot for getting noticed.

How many times to post in a day

In that same vein, there are findings related to how frequently pages post and the following per post engagement as well as overall page engagement. The study found that Pages posting less than one time a day have the highest per-post engagement, but also have the lowest overall engagement. The optimal number of posts for longterm overall Page engagement was found to be right around 5 posts per day. This is not an end all be all strategy, but might be a good thing to try if you are looking to boost long-term metrics.

Learn more about what the analysis uncovered and read the full study here.

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Need to Know: eSports is Poised to be a Billion Dollar Industry

The eSports market is growing at an unsubstantiated rate, set to be an industry valued at more than a billion dollars in the next three years (in 2016, eSports was valued by Goldman Sachs at $500 million, and the market is expected to grow by 22% annually).

There has been a recent boom in commercial opportunities in the eSports industry, from merchandise to sponsorships to acquisitions of teams and leagues by networks, other gaming leagues, and team owners. This includes the new phenomena of having eSports matches being broadcast to sports networks, namely ESPN. The first night of the Overwatch grand finals was the first esports competition to be broadcast live on primetime television on July 27.

This is not the first eSports tournament to ever be played on an ESPN network, but this new broadcasting agreement does show a turn in the eSports world to a commitment for regular broadcasting eSPorts coverage on TV and digital platforms.

With the growth of streaming services like Twitch and the lucrative careers it has offered some of it’s more well-known streamers, like Ninja, Dr. DisRespect, Shroud, and others, eSports and video game viewership have been hotly discussed topics in the sports and entertainment world.

There is certainly a market for these streaming services, and if the primetime pickup of esports tournaments continues to grow, there may just be a space for those streamers that are not necessarily playing in tournaments.

The advertising and sponsorship community should be prepared for this, as the chances for these events to become as big as the Super Bowl may be just around the corner. Only time will tell if this will stay a consistent market, but we should all be ready to see a huge mainstream boom in the understanding of the potential that eSports have as a cultural staple and an economic opportunity.  

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SEO vs Social Media Marketing

When you’re trying to increase your web traffic you may be wondering which is better for growing your traffic organically, social media marketing (SMM) or Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Is one better than the other? Both methods are continually changing and evolving, so the answer can’t really be gleaned simply.

Long story short, SEO and SMM are able to be successful on their own, but when used together have the potential to have the most influence on traffic. Essentially, by sharing content to your social media channels you should be driving traffic to your site.

Throughout the last few years, there has been an exponential growth of social media pages (Facebook and Twitter primarily) in the top 100 on Google.  An article by PrimeView states, “…SMM blogs should be receiving the majority of their visitors from social media channels, as it is their area of expertise …SMM-focused blogs perform better in organic search than SEO-focused blogs. The high levels of engagement SMM blogs receive from social media allow them to get more backlinks and referral traffic, which, in turn, helps them rank higher organically.”

This goes against Google’s stance that rank and social media presence are not correlated, showing that links with more social engagement can lead to a higher ranking. This does not mean, however, that more social activity is a way to “hack” your SEO, in fact, pushing too much low-value content on your followers can annoy them, leading to followers ignoring your posts or even unfollowing you.

So, as important as it is to post consistently, again we find that quality over quantity is key to adding value to the content you’re publishing, and key to getting post engagements and therefore improved SEO. With that, make a note that SEO should not be the focus of your social strategy and that content is still king for getting you ranked, as quality is the number one factor for Google rank.

When trying to grow your site traffic and developing content for SMM, it is crucial to put the work into placing keywords and links correctly so that your content will garner more backlinks and get more referral traffic from your social media followers. SEO appeals to an algorithm, but SMM appeals to people, so to really harness the power of both you must understand how these two key components to your marketing strategy are almost complete opposites, but yet interdependent. Content that is high ranking will bring in more search traffic, and by the nature of how the world of social media works, this search traffic will drive shares, comments and follows on your social channels.

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Marketing Trend: Omni-Channel Marketing

Marketing is ever evolving, and consumers’ paths to purchasing are no longer as linear as they once were. Because marketers need to adapt to a changing climate, new techniques are constantly developed. Omni-Channel marketing is one such strategy that businesses are using to keep up with the trend of keeping things as simple as possible.

What is Omni-Channel Marketing?

“Omni-Channel”  is no doubt a marketing buzzword, but the concept adheres to a shift in the needs of both consumer and marketer. Omni-channel marketing is the answer to marketers needing to provide a consistent experience and path to purchase.

Because consumers now can engage with a brand and products on multiple platforms (physical store, app, website, catalog, social media), it is important that each experience with the product and brand complement the others.

Hubspot defines omni-channel marketing as “… a multi-channel approach to marketing, selling, and serving customers in a way that creates an integrated and cohesive customer experience no matter how or where a customer reaches out.” Read about some of their top examples of an Omni-Channel experience here.

How to implement Omni-Channel Marketing into your strategy

• Create a customer profile

Consolidating a customer profile can be a challenge, as customers are constantly interacting with a slew of different channels. By creating a broad and complete picture of your consumers, you can create a better overall customer experience. This can be done using collected data and applying it to your strategy. This article discusses how you can come up ahead of the competition by succeeding at cross-channel marketing.

• Interact on preferred channels

Consumers are moving back and forth on devices and platforms just for a single transaction. Be sure to keep all lines of communication open for a seamless experience. This includes, but is not limited to social media, email support, video chat, web chatbots, texting, and calling.

• Use aggregated data

Compiling data is already important, but in order to use omni-channel marketing, data is everything. From creating your customer profile to understanding how to adapt to market changes and adding platforms, data will help you gain insight into how to make your marketing strategy work for you.

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The Fall of Facebook?: the Aftermath of the Cambridge Analytica Scandal

Facebook has been heavily profiled in the news lately, due to a massive questioning of how users’ data is handled, after political data firm Cambridge Analytica had access to over 50 million Facebook users’ private data, which was, in turn, able to use the data in their work for the Trump campaign in 2016. The backlash against Facebook has been substantial, with companies, celebrities, and everyday users leaving the site and speaking out against misinformation of privacy policies and misuse and mishandling of personal data. But how did we get here? This scandal is years in the making.

Background:

In 2010, Facebook launched the original version of their Open Graph API, allowing third-party app developers access to user data, following this, Facebook signed a decree with the US Federal Trade Commission, consenting that user data will not be shared without the user’s permission. In 2013, Cambridge Analytica is founded by UK strategy company Strategic Communication Laboratories Group as a US branch. The founding was orchestrated by Steve Bannon, and funded in part by the Mercer family, a Republican donor and Breitbart News backer.

How did Cambridge Analytica get the data?

Cambridge University researcher Aleksandr Kogan created a personality test (for Cambridge Analytica) similar to one created by the University’s Psychometric Quiz that had been gathering Facebook data since 2007, which the University refused to share with Cambridge Analytica. Through the new test created by Kogan, the data firm collected 270,000 people’s data with their knowledge, but against Facebook’s terms, the app also collects the information of those original 270,000 users’ friends without their consent or knowledge.  Cambridge Analytica now has over 50 million profiles in its database.

What is happening now?

Christopher Wylie, a former data scientist for Cambridge Analytica becomes a whistleblower on the company’s activity and triggered the investigations into Cambridge Analytica and Facebook from governments around the world.

There is a movement to delete Facebook, which has been joined by Cher, Will Ferrell, WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton, and Tesla founder/CEO Elon Musk, as well as Musk having the SpaceX and Tesla Facebook pages deleted. There are multiple businesses canceling their ads, and removing themselves from the platform, and investors are nervous as stocks fall.

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has since responded to public outcry, first saying that the main issues have already been resolved, and then in a second statement saying that he takes minimal issue with regulating Facebook more heavily. Zuckerberg has refused to testify about the privacy violation and misuse of content in front of UK MPs but will testify before Congress in the coming months.

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Event Profile: SXSW 2018

South by Southwest (SXSW) in Austin, Texas has become a cultural mecca for music and film buffs, as well as a place for hosting interactive events that cover a range of topics from everything new in technology, to entertainment and advertising. There is always a huge amount of news coming from this week-long event, so here is a breakdown of what we’ve seen so far.

SXSW Trust Barometer

Every year, festival attendees are polled for the Trust Barometer, which measures the general feelings those attending have towards technology, business, and media. The results of this year’s poll brought up interesting discussions, as there is a very low amount of trust in emerging technology, one of SXSW’s biggest draws.

Most of the distrust comes from a shift towards a need for more human elements in technological interactions, and a distrust in blockchain technology, virtual reality, and autonomous vehicles. Discussions about smaller, more personal social media platforms were held, as well as conversations about the widespread use of bots and voice assistants and how the reactions to these technologies have become more and more personal, with users sometimes treating bots as though they were chatting with another human being. There is without a doubt a need to shift to more personal communication methods and develop an understanding of how emotional attachments can tie into interacting with these responsive communication technologies.

Experiential Exhibitions: ‘Westworld’ and ‘Ready Player One’

HBO hit-show Westworld and Steven Spielberg’s ‘Ready Player One’ both partnered with creative agency Giant Spoon to bring the worlds of the screen to life for festival attendees. These immersive exhibits allow you to step into the ‘Westworld’ town of Sweetwater and the Oasis of  ‘Ready Player One’ interacting with environments, actors in character, and becoming a character yourself. Read a review of the ‘Westworld’ exhibit on Forbes and Business Insider and see a walkthrough of Sweetwater here and the ‘Ready Player One’ exhibit here.

Speeches

SXSW is focused on cultivating the creative and entrepreneurial spirit throughout the world, and each day speakers from convergence, music, technology, and film focused paths present their take on various topics. The hope is to generate meaningful conversations about the state of the world in each of SXSW’s featured verticals. Notable speakers this year include Elon Musk, Melinda Gates, Darren Aronofsky, Sadiq Khan, and Esther Perel.

SXSW ends this Saturday, so there is bound to be more excitement in the last few days of the festival. For more SXSW news and live streams of keynotes and other events, visit sxsw.com.

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Business Podcasts to Subscribe to in 2018

Continued education doesn’t have to come in the form of classrooms and textbooks, you can glean knowledge from many sources. One of the most popular ways to continue learning is listening to podcasts. Podcasts can cover a wide range of subjects from pop culture to politics to business practices. The following podcast recommendations cover topics from entrepreneurship, marketing, and business.

School of Greatness

Host Lewis Howes has overcome his share of adversity. This podcast launched in 2013 and has grown to be one of iTunes’ top-rated Business and Self-Development podcasts. The mission on ‘School of Greatness’ is to empowerer listeners to achieve success in the face of adversity, and he shares not only his story but the stories of the guests that come on the show.

Cool Things Entrepreneurs Do

Thom Singer started this podcast hoping to enable a new generation of leaders to use his knowledge of business relationships, sales, networking and more, including fitness, trends, and entrepreneurial spirit.

Product Hunt Radio

Product Hunt is great for the B2C business person, and those interested in current product trends. It focuses on physical products and how they’re created, the marketing behind them that turns them into global brands, and guests’ takes on productivity, management and investment.

Rocketship.fm

With big-name guests, this weekly podcast covers everything about building a startup from developing a product to finding and converting a customer base. This show is great for anyone in the B2B or B2C world.

The Influencer Podcast

Julie Solomon, marketing strategist, publisher and influencer hosts this show and brings in guests to talk about their experiences in the world of influencer marketing, as well as sharing insights into how to grow, engage with and persuade an audience.

Smart Passive Income

Learn how Pat Flynn author of The Smart Passive Income Blog uses all of his online blog and business strategies, as well as marketing tips and income sources which will help you take the next steps forward with your online businesses, blogs and more.

Copyblogger FM

In a world where content is king, it never hurts to strive for an improved approach to writing and content marketing. Host Sonia Simone and a rotating panel of experts discuss news, trends, and updates in copywriting, email marketing, conversion, content marketing and more.

The Science of Social Media

Buffer has a great blog, and the podcast they produce is just as influential. The content presented covers everything from the state of social media marketing, new algorithms, and third-party tools to maximize your social media management. This is a great podcast for everyone from beginners to the well seasoned social media practitioner.

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Vero: The “New Instagram”?

Social media platforms come and go as we have seen with Yik Yak, Bebo, Vine, and Ello. But there is a platform making waves right now that many are calling the “new Instagram”.  Vero was launched in 2015, and the app is quickly gaining popularity, recently seeing a flood of users starting to download and use the app, as many influencers have posted about their move to the platform.

Vero has positioned itself as the “True Social” social media platform, aimed towards those looking for “a safe, genuine reflection of their real-life relationships in an online setting”.  This is what you need to know about the “Instagram Killer”.

No paid or boosted ads

Vero has no paid advertisements, which clears up users’ feeds for posts from their connections and community. “You see what has been shared with you when it’s been shared with you. You won’t have to pay to ‘boost your post’, or ‘reach your audience’,” says Vero. That doesn’t mean that there are no ads, though. Companies can link to external sites, unlike the Instagram model, and there is an integrated “Buy now” button that can be purchased. Part of Vero’s revenue will come from a portion of every sale made on the platform.

First million users- free access for life

Currently, Vero is being offered for free to the first million members, but once that threshold has been reached, anyone that joins will have to pay an annual fee. This is pretty much common knowledge, but is perhaps the fear of missing out on this opportunity driving the platform’s spike in popularity? When the free accounts are spoken for and those late to the game must pay, there will no doubt be more news to be heard about this platform.

Connection types

Vero’s commitment to an authentic social experience is based on the argument that other social media platforms leave users with a false sense of connection with followers and friends that causes more intrinsic loneliness. The app has implemented controls that allow you to segment your connections so that users can share posts and interact with one another in a way the platform calls more natural. In the app, you can segment your connections into the following groups: “close friends”, “friends”, “acquaintances”, and “followers”. Each post you make can be shared to all or to a portion of these groups.

Chronological feed

In a world of algorithmic feeds, Vero breaks the mold by showing all posts chronologically. There is nothing that will cause one post to be promoted over another. Vero says, “We don’t curate it, manipulate it, insert advertising in it, or hold back posts. You see what has been shared with you when it’s been shared with you.”

Read more opinions about Vero here and here, and the Vero manifesto, then let me know what you think of this new platform.

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Essential Guide to Instagram for Business

Instagram is a valuable marketing tool for any business, which many marketers have known since the app was released. We’ve seen brands leverage the community to build their influence and brand awareness as well as increasing sales. But in early 2016, a new feature was released just for these businesses. Instagram for business allows marketers to leverage real data and account insights as well as create ads and targeted posts.These tips and tricks will help you leverage your Instagram business page today.

Get creative

Show off what your business does by creating content that isn’t expected. Focus on the solutions your products can provide for your customers, not just the products themselves. Sharing insider views of how your business functions on a day to day basis, and keeping up with what’s going on in the world and relating it back to what you’re doing is key, as well as keeping in mind that Instagram is a primarily visual platform. That means you need to keep your posts clean and well composed.  

Instagram Stories

If you aren’t already using Instagram Stories to further your content, you need to re-evaluate and work them into your marketing strategy. Stories are a great way to share things that are going on in your company that may not be worth creating a full post for but are also great for showcasing events, going more in-depth about what your posts are about.

Create consistent and authentic content

The content you create can and should be beautiful on its own, but it also needs to be consistent. Consistency means making sure you’re posting on regular basis or on a pre-set schedule, but also that each individual post fits in with the rest of your content. Paying close attention to your color palette is key to this, as well as posting content that is consistent with your brand’s image and communication style.

Respond to your followers

Customer service is a huge part of owning a business. You wouldn’t leave a customer to sit with an unanswered question in person, so making sure you’re engaging with your followers and people commenting on your posts or sending you direct messages. Communicating outside of just the posts you make is huge for projecting a good public image of your business to the outside world. Let your followers know that you are invested in them, so they feel they should invest their time caring about you.

Targeting Ads

If you’re familiar with Facebook ads and targeting through the Facebook ad management platform, you’re in luck. Instagram ads (specifically for business accounts) are managed in the same place and are set up in the same way. This includes location, demographics, and interests targeting, which ensures that your ads are being seen by exactly who you want.  

User-generated content or contests

Engage with your customers by hosting contests, giveaways or other incentive-based “events”. If you have customers post photos with your specific contest hashtags, you can easily track engagement and participation. Another great way to include your user base is to post user-generated content, either by reposting (and crediting) others’ posts or by having a channel “takeover” where an influencer or other user is able to post on your profile as themselves as sponsored by you.

Instagram is a valuable tool for marketers, and it’s easy to get started today. See how this always expanding social media platform can help you grow your business.

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Conferences For Entrepreneurs, Marketers & More in 2018

One of the best ways to learn and get involved in a community built around your work is to attend a conference, summit or keynote.  Whether your work is marketing, content creation, entrepreneurship or technology focused, there will be an event that fits your list of needs. Check some of these events out to get started exploring the world of conferences.

No Longer Virtual– Denver, February 22-23

This conference focused on improving your personal communication, sales, and leadership skills is one of the most exclusive events this year, as there is a registration limit of 50 people. NLV is being called a “can’t miss” by Forbes. Because attendance is limited, those who participate are able to work more one on one with other attendees, make more meaningful connections, and attendees contribute to sessions rather than keynote speakers being the main focus.

Forbes Under 30 Summit– Boston, October TBD

The 30 Under 30 Summit is Forbes showcase event of their “Under 30” listmakers. With over 6,000 in attendance and participants that work in fields that range from tech to content marketing, this event is heralded as “the greatest gathering of world changers and entrepreneurs ever.” Complete with musical performances and a food festival, this summit is more than just inspiring speakers. Listmakers are always welcome, but if you haven’t found your name on one just yet, you can request a premium pass to attend this event.

GrowthHackers– San Diego, February 6

For those looking to grow their businesses, a great way to “Kickstart your growth” is to attend the GrowthHackers Conference, hosted by Sean Ellis and Dani Hart of GrowthHackers. With speakers from LinkedIn to ClassPass and everything in between, GrowthHackers can help push your business to the next level. Past speakers have included Larry Kim of Wordstream, Eleana Verna of Survey Monkey, and Chris More of Mozilla, to name a few.

Social Media Marketing World– San Diego, February 28- March 2

Social Media Examiner is presenting a three-day conference this year that will help you to master social media for your business this year. With over 120 training sessions from some of the world’s leaders in social media and content creation, you can learn everything you need to succeed with social media while connecting with influencers, customers, and other marketers. Join speakers Mari Smith, Gary Vaynerchuk, Jay Baer and more in sessions tailored to the needs of both marketers and content creators.

This is only a handful of the great events that you can take advantage of this year, and there are more that are yet to be announced. Keep your eyes open for more conferences that suit the needs of your business.

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Content Marketing Tools to Boost Your Strategy

Content marketing is becoming more important to everyone’s marketing strategies than ever before, but it can be hard to keep up with for many, with both time and creative needs to manage, especially for those without dedicated content teams. Use these tools to create, curate, manage and schedule all of your content for maximum effectiveness.

Feedly

Streamline your searching and content curation by using this tool to find articles and posts that match your interests. Choose sites to follow, verticals to focus on and mark the things you’ve already read. Feedly also has the option to integrate with your workflow with IFTTT automation. See how IFTTT recipes work here.

Canva

Create everything from business cards to logos and resumes that are built to impress, even if you aren’t a professional designer. With Canva you can use one of the many provided templates, or you can create your own design from scratch.

Airtable

Create a content database that will link similar content, share with your team, filter and sort your content in multiple arrangements and at the same time make a more visually streamlined content calendar and pipeline for ease of access. Airtable also allows you to create IFTTT recipes and integrate this database with many of the apps you might already be using including MailChimp, Evernote, Facebook, LinkedIn and more.

Contently

Master your content strategy with the Contently platform. If you’re looking for a one-stop shop, then this is your best bet. From content generation and scaling to insights and strategy, Contently allows you to create a strategy that will have visible and transparent results, with built-in analytics and a holistic approach to digital content. See how it works here.

Buffer

Manage your social media quickly from one simple hub. Buffer allows you to create and schedule your social media content while measuring key metrics and performance analytics. By allowing all of your social content to flow from one dashboard, you have complete control of your posts and how they look and sound without having to move from platform to platform.

Visual.ly

If content development is not your thing and you need a team that can handle that for you, visually can help you achieve great content without needing an in-house team. Simply discuss what you need for your project with a Visually representative for a quote, talk about the goals you hope to achieve with the content and get matched with a team of creatives that will develop everything you need. Learn more about the Visually process here.

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