Twitter is a Firehose

Digital publishing platforms, and the internet in general, have given everyone the ability to have a voice online. This very fact is revolutionizing our lives and culture, but unfortunately, all these voices just turn into noise because we’re all talking at the same time. Twitter, with it’s 140 character format, global reach and multitude of mobile apps, is among the easiest and most efficient platforms to utilize. Users can easily fire off anything and everything that is happening in their worlds (insert what I had for breakfast here). The firehose is wide open and it’s not surprising that Twitter newbies (often my clients) quickly get blown away by the relentless stream of irrelevant content and conversations that fill their profiles. 

After a few visits to the platform, many people walk right up to me and this conversation ensues:

“Brody, I don’t get Twitter.”

“Ok. Do you have a Twitter strategy? Are you following the right people? What are the relevant hashtags within your industry? Has anyone ever shown you how to search or create relevant lists?” I ask.

“Uh…no.”

A Twitter of Hope

In the next five posts on this blog, I’m going to do a deep dive into Twitter strategy and try to help you tame this savage, noisy bird. I’ll also probably turn this series into an eBook after it’s finished, so I’d love to get your comments and questions to include within the content. Here’s a quick outline of what I’ll cover:

• Twitter Profile & Content Strategy
• Proactive, Targeted Following & Engagement
• Twitter Management Tools, Tips & Tricks
• Searching Twitter for Golden (and Local) Nuggets
• Creating / Using Twitter Lists to Turn the Firehose into a Targeted Trickle

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A New Process, A New Template

When I think back upon that same group of clients, I’m also reminded of the education that was required to help them learn how to blog effectively. Some picked it up naturally. Others needed significant coaching. All of them needed to figure out their own process for regular blog post ideation, planning and production. To continue supporting them, and perhaps you, I’ve created a new template that is designed to help you create thoughtful, purposeful content that is of value to your customers and ideally formated for effectiveness.

Download the Blog Post Writing Template

Website Content Template Components

Pre-writing questions: The best blog posts are those that address a specific question or problem, and they do it by telling a story. Put yourself in the shoes of your target audience and help them relate to the situation. Do your best to narrow down your response to three main points, but try not to completely solve the problem within your post. Provoke further action and find ways to tie your discussion back to your products or services. Provide clear direction on what the reader should do next. Are there specific, target keywords that relate to your post topic? Try to work them in as you write.

Typical Blog Post Structure and Formatting Guidelines

After years of experimenting, most of us bloggers have the best practices of blog writing nailed down, and I feel like this template covers the bases. Here are a few key elements:

• Post Headline: As with most media, the headline can make or break your post. But specific to web content, it’s important to remember the SEO aspects. Try to integrate a major keyword/phrase into your headline and surround it with an <h1> tag to get the most Google juice possible.
• Opening Story: The more often you can open with a story that sets up the topic, the better. If no story, give the reader some context by identifying the question or problem you’re trying to solve, and tying that problem to a specific audience. Readers should understand the “who”, “what” and “why it matters” after reading this opener.
• Blog Post Image: I’ve always had an interest in neuropsychology, and I couldn’t help but devour Susan Weinschenk’s book, Neuro Web Design back in 2009. Throughout the book she talks about how we subconsciously process everything we see on a website, but she summarizes that “stories and pictures are the most powerful ways to get and hold our attention and persuade us to take action.” Let’s also not forget about Google. Optimizing your image’s file name and alt tag with a keyword/phrase provides the context Google needs and validates the relevance of your blog post content.
• Sub-Headlines: Realize that most people who land on your blog post aren’t going to just start reading from the top. Most are going to do an initial skim. If your post just looks like a huge blog of text, they’ll likely bounce. Using the previously mentioned format of three main points, start each section with a large, bold subhead that summarizes each main point. The idea being that if someone only reads the headline, subheads and call-to-action, they will still get value out of your article.
• Bulleted and numbered lists: I love bulleted lists, and evidently you do too since you’re still reading this! Lists make content much easier to digest. Even the slightest indention and bullet will draw the reader’s eye. Oh, and Google likes these too.
• Calls to action: Despite the intelligence level of your blog readers, people don’t want to have to think when they are browsing websites. Obvious, command-oriented calls to action are key to communicating what you want a reader to do next. And don’t be scared to make the call to action a BIG BUTTON. Bigger is better, but don’t make it look like a banner.

Post-Writing Checklist

Finally, the template includes a checklist of items and reminders you can use to ensure your blog post is good to go. Of these items, I think the most important one is to just get another set of eyeballs on it. If you’re writing the post, you’re now too close to it and no longer qualified to edit it.

Final Thoughts

If you start using this template, realize that not every blog post has to follow this exact format. Feel free to vary the structure and formatting of your posts. Also note that the majority of your blog visitors will always be first-time visitors. Don’t worry about covering the same or similar topics repeatedly.

If we’ve missed anything that you feel needs to be included in this template, please tell me in the comments.

Our Biggest Marketing Challenge

Jayme and I just returned from Content Marketing World 2012. During the opening keynote at the show, Joe Pulizzi shared some new data regarding the biggest challenges that marketers face today. The biggest challenge that marketers face today, #1 on the list, is producing enough content to feed their marketing, online and social media channels. I feel that. For us and most small businesses, it’s easy to point the finger at “there just aren’t enough hours in the day.” But at CMWorld, Jayme and I gave a presentation on how to adjust your internal team structure and processes so that you start to act and consistently deliver more like traditional publishers. Think about that…Traditional publishers create high quality content every day. Why can’t we at least kick something solid out once a week? Three reasons:

1. We aren’t planning correctly - You’ve all heard it…”Failure to plan is a plan to fail.” Proper planning breeds success and it’s amazing how many of us fail to plan consistently. In our presentation, we talk about planning like a publisher. Make it a regular part of your week (or day). Have an agenda. Make sure your team knows what they need to bring to the planning table. Make all this a habit.
2. We don’t have a production schedule or consistent workflow process - Publishers know exactly the amount and types of content they need to create on any given day/week/month. Then they have people and processes in place to get it done. We should do the same (on a smaller scale). If you need to come up with one blog post, 5 tweets, 3 Facebook posts and one new Instagram photo per week (just an example), then make sure you and/or your team knows the schedule and who is going to be responsible for what. This is not rocket science people.
3. We aren’t making it a priority – This is probably the biggest issue and it’s also the toughest hurdle to overcome. If you publish a new piece of content and suddenly the cash register dings, it’s easy to shift one’s priorities. Most of the time, content marketing doesn’t work that fast. But it does work. I’ve witnessed first hand over the last year, both with Divvy and Allure clients, just how much of an asset content can become. It pays long-term dividends that you may not realize for over a year. I’ll provide examples of this in future posts. Those who make content marketing a priority over the long term will reap the benefits for years to come.

If I were you, I’d sure hope my competitors haven’t made it a priority yet. But they’ll figure it out soon. 

Our New Plan – Practice What We Preach

As for us…we’re making consistent content production a priority. We’re going to plan regularly (we have a great content planning tool that helps). We’re going to make the time and execute our workflow. You’ll see new stuff coming from us both on this blog and also on the Divvy blog (which has been our focus for the past year). The Allure blog is going to focus heavily on the how-tos of content strategy, content marketing, social media marketing and all the tips, tricks and tools in between. If you’d like to stay informed of new content, please sign up to receive our content via email (email subscription form in the right column).

See? That wasn’t so hard. This is a comfy saddle.

Last summer (2011), we had the opportunity to speak at the inaugural Wordcamp KC conference and we had a lot of fun with our presentation. It’s now available online via WordPress.tv. Click the image or title below.

WordPress: The Engine that Drives Your Online Marketing Machine

The Launch of DivvyHQ™ Offers an Exciting New Solution to Content Marketers

Creators aim to solve inefficiencies and frustrations of current content planning tool: the 26-year-old spreadsheet

CLEVELAND, OH – DivvyHQ™ announced the official launch of its beta version on Wednesday, Sept. 7 at Content Marketing World in Cleveland, Ohio. Kansas City-based software company, Alluresoft, labels the application, DivvyHQ™, as the content marketing industry’s first comprehensive, spreadsheet-free editorial calendar application. The content marketing industry has experienced explosive growth in recent years as companies focus more on using content to connect with customers rather than traditional advertising. This growth has put content planning and strategy at the forefront of discussion, and with that, advice about utilizing spreadsheets (an often cumbersome method) to plan, organize and manage editorial calendars.

Seeing a need for a better, more advanced industry-specific solution, creators Jayme Thomason, Brody Dorland and Brock Stechman developed the cloud-based application to solve what they feel are some of the biggest issues content marketers face with the current spreadsheet toolset, including:

• The time involved with setting up and customizing the document for every client/campaign
• The laborious process of having to move everything around when you make a tiny change
• The headache of making sure your whole team is looking at the most recent version

“While building this tool, we stayed fiercely committed to making it a valuable solution, specifically for people (like us) who are tasked with churning out high quality content on a frequent, consistent basis for their companies and clients,” said Jayme Thomason, Founder and CEO.

According to the company, a few of the key features of DivvyHQ include:

• Divvy allows you to manage your content ideas, editorial team, production process and deadlines – all within one, easy-to-use application.
• It does the heavy lifting of reminding your team of their deadlines, so you don’t have to.
• The application allows you to manage multiple clients, companies, product lines and websites, simply and efficiently.
• Divvy gives you a 360-degree “snapshot” of everything you have going on.

“If I had to sum up DivvyHQ in one sentence, I would say that what it does best, is allows you to focus more on producing great content, and less on complicated spreadsheets and clunky processes,” said Thomason.

People can sign up for the free beta version by going to DivvyHQ.com. The company plans to offer the beta version for three to four weeks, hoping to leverage the userbase to build out additional functionality. The company does plan to charge a monthly subscription of between $15 and $175 per month depending on plan level, however, each plan will come with a free 30-day trial.

Video by Epipheo Studios

Are you resisting? Besides the time commitment, what else is holding you back?

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In this episode, we discuss whether companies should consider hiring recent college grads to manage their social media presence and Ahava Leibtag shares some content marketing lessons from the world of Healthcare.

Don’t forget to subscribe either via iTunes or RSS to be automatically notified when new episodes are available for download. Leave us a review on iTunes if you like what you hear!

Listen Now!

In this episode, we talk about the recent story of the Alamo Drafthouse, how they turned a flaming voicemail message into a PSA, and then an interview with Joe Pulizzi dives into the challenges we’re facing as businesses in this new world of content marketing.

Don’t forget to subscribe either via iTunes or RSS to be automatically notified when new episodes are available for download. Leave us a review on iTunes if you like what you hear!

• Epsiode 1: What is RSS and Why Does Your Company Need It?
• Episode 2: How to Use an RSS Reader
• Episode 3: Using RSS to Monitor Your Industry & Your Brand Reputation
• Episode 4: Using RSS for Content Curation

Episode 5: How to Syndicate Your Blog Content to Social Media Websites

Can’t see this video? Click here to view it on Vimeo. Click the full screen button above if you want a better view.

In video #5 of our series on RSS technology, I show you how to take your blog’s RSS feed URL and connect it to your social media profiles so that your blog content will auto-publish to those sites. I walk step-by-step through the process of getting your blog feed connected to your LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter profiles, as well as publishing your content to Ning-based social networks.

We hope you enjoy this video!

Stay tuned (subscribe in the top right) for video #6 where we’ll show you how to use RSS to pull sales opportunities out of social networking websites.

That’s what we call ourselves when attending Wordcamp, the conference dedicated to all things WordPress. For those of you who have been hiding under a rock, WordPress is probably the most popular website and blog development platform out there right now and we swear by it. Therefore, we were ecstatic to get the opportunity to speak at the first annual Wordcamp Kansas City this past weekend (6/11 – 6/12).

A roudy bunch (225 attendees) of bloggers, designers, developers and tweeter gathered at JCCC to geek out on all the latest tips, tricks and plugins that WordPress has to offer. We had a great time and can’t wait for next year.

Here’s our presentation (NASCAR THEME INCLUDED) for those who might be interested. If the presentation isn’t loading in the space below, hit refresh, or view it on Prezi.com.