Does Content Live in a Silo? Hell NO!

The whole marketing industry is going crazy behind Content Marketing these days. But what actually content marketing is? Does it make sense to say that it’s a strategy to use content for great marketing results. But that’s not what it is.

Content does NOT live in silo. It only fetches results for businesses when used in combination with other marketing channels and innovative marketing practices. It’s one of the planets of the vast inbound marketing solar system. Confused? Read further.

Content can fall flat on its face (or be ineffective)  if NOT used with:

SEO – Many marketers think content marketing is all about creating more content and the easiest way to do that is through regular blogging. However even great content can deliver no value, if it goes unnoticed or if your target audiences are not able to find it. SEO is a surefire way to ensure that your remarkable content gets found and read by the right set of people i.e., your target audiences. Marketers should ensure that the helpful content that they create must be optimized well for keywords used by their target audiences to locate certain products or services on search engines. That’s how content attracts organic traffic.

Social Media – With social media euphoria gripping humans across all age groups, geographies and business sectors, almost every brand wants to tap this huge real estate and engage with their target audiences across varied social media channels. For enhanced content reach and visibility, it needs to be distributed imperatively across relevant social media sites (only those where your target market hangs out frequently). Popular social media channels such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc. are the online avenues, where readers love to share the infotaining content that you create. Hence as a smart marketer, make it easy for them to do so by integrating social media sharing buttons in each content piece that you push out on the Web. Not only does it increase your content’s reach or effectiveness, but can also help you engage with your target audiences easily and help them address their challenges with your useful content. If your content succeeds in solving their challenges/pain points, no wonder these readers can also become your brand evangelists. So keep feeding them with awesome content on their most favorite online destinations!

Email marketing – Some businesses see email marketing as the most powerful tool in their marketing arsenal to connect with their contact database. Email can really help your content get out there and grab many more eyeballs. Without email marketing, your content’s reach is constrained drastically and can make all your content creation efforts go waste.

It’s damn simple. Content forms the beating heart of your inbound marketing strategy but ONLY when it’s used along with other channels (a few of them listed above!). Don’t sandbox your content. Give it wings and let it soar high and wide to cover the complete horizon of your target audiences.

 

 

 

Censoring User Content on Social Networking Websites: Is It Justified?

Censor on social networking sites. What! Did you get startled on hearing this bit like me? Then I observed that I’m not the only one. This news piece has invoked almost all Indian users on sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. How can I air such a prediction? Well, it’s the huge scores of status updates, tweets, blogs links etc. that are a mirror of general disgust expressed by millions of social media users to such an imprudent suggestion from an honorable minister of the Government of India.

Censoring User Content on Social Networking Websites

In fact, this kindles a thought in me. How far can this government go on committing blunders? Overlooking 2G scam, CWG scam, maddening price rise, sabotaging Ramdev’s protest and exercising all tyrannical methods to curb the voice, followed by putting down Anna Hazare’s anti-corruption movement and then attacks on Team Anna’s members..And the list continues.

Now, the biggest blunder of coming up with the daffy idea of censoring user content on social networking websites. Rather, sealing our lips or smashing our fundamental right of expression. I’m surprised that how could the so-called Gandhian minister, who at even the slightest of incitement starts blabbering the articles and clauses of our Constitution, forget to shuffle the page of ‘Fundamental Rights’ while he was cramming each page of Constitution with a magnifying glass in his hand.

Do some of our politicians plan to bereave us of our voice after food & electricity?

While this suggestion has been shunned from the scratch by Big Daddies (like Google, Facebook) on the web landscape, it has staged a big interrogation mark on the intelligence set up of the government leading the nation. It’s sick that on one hand, we shout about being the largest democratic nation of the world and then one of the most reputed ministers tables his insane idea  and whim of choking our necks so that we can’t voice our opinions in public on these  sites.

To add to this, he’s beating the drums hard that machine/technology-driven screening of user content be replaced with manual monitoring of pages for reproachful, provocative or derogatory content. I guess the so-called minister, who is in the habit of commenting on all technological innovations and discoveries and bask in the glory of possessing the most tech-savvy brain among all, who walk into the Parliament does not have an account on Facebook. Or even if he has, might not be able to be active there by virtue of his busy schedule. Because if he was really aware of the humongous user base of Facebook in India, he would not have voiced this silly suggestion.

Self-regulation: A preaching from many

The latest news that I saw this morning that Google has slammed the idea by commenting that they’re on a rigorous spree of screening the content. So, any expression that abides by the law won’t be removed just because it’s inflammatory. More so, it’s vague to decide what is or is not profane or derogatory.

It’s great to see such tepid response from all segments – social networking sites, business communities, individual users – to an inane idea of censoring user content on social networking websites.

Social Media ROI? A Billion Dollar Question!

Almost every brand, every marketer has joined the social media wave today. Each of them seems to be in a desperate spree to peep into the secret social media ROI closet of competitors.

When the year commenced, a great pie of marketing honchos had predicted that the year 2011 will be commemorated as the year of some real hard Social Media ROIs. But has this prediction come out true? Are we now well versed with handling the barometric performance of our social media endeavors? Or, did we harbor an illusion?

Is Social Media ROI Measurable?

I’m not taking potshots at the Goliaths of the industry but being a social media marketing professional myself, I’m of the opinion that this prediction has been on the wane. Indeed, it’s a big mystery. Fluctuating social media trends further compound the situation.

I still don’t see any standard tool that can effectively lay out the metrics to estimate exact or even near social media ROIs. But we, as marketers, have to justify our social media initiatives.  How do we do that? There’s no one standard formula but still we can try to touch the concept of social media ROI and scratch it a bit.

Do you identify Facebook or Twitter as ‘Mecca of Social Media’? Let me put it like this. Is it your ultimate goal on the Web? If yes, then my dear friends it’s a wake-up call. You’ve to start looking upon social media as a vehicle, an intermediary link between your business objectives and ROIs. But you need to constantly ride this bandwagon. And not just sit and think of enjoying the ride. In simple words, you need to be consistent on social media to keep your target audiences glued to your brands since social media users are brand hungry. Make a sincere attempt to be friends with ‘FRANDS’ (friends, who are hungry for brands).

I recently came across a very interesting article ‘The value of a Facebook fan’. I read it thoroughly but still am not convinced that it’s actually possible to measure the potential of a social media fan or social media ROI for that matter.

Though measuring the conversion or rather success rate of traditional marketing initiatives is relatively easier, but a thoughtful approach can be taken for social media ROI too and not make it look like a Herculean task. We can streamline social media task chart and fragment it into specific activities, and then look for calculating the ROIs for each of them.

Is it just the revenue that matters? Or social engagement?

Another treasure trove that we can dig out of social media is the conversation streams generated. We can use these user-generated content streams to reap their optimum use for each of the departments and organization as a whole. Don’t rant more about statistics, though you may utilize the same for devising your future strategy.

It’s time to flaunt your intelligence by using social media in a way that matches best to your ultimate business goals., and not just being another sheep in the pastures (of social media). Optimize your social media strategy for each of the departments, and then measure its success based on specific performance metrics. I think social media success measurement should not be filtered from the way we measure the success of offline marketing initiatives.

Though I’ve jotted down my thoughts about social media ROIs here, it’s your turn to be vocal about your views on social media ROIs.

Look forward to seeing your share your thoughts in the comment box below.

Why Should you Upgrade to iOS 5?

Do you love Apple products? Are you an iPhone/iPod/iPad fanatic? Do you know what’s the latest iOS news doing the rounds?

Apple products: groundbreaking computing and technology inventions

Well, it’s time for me to give you a wake-up call or rather a shake-up call that iOS 5 has stepped into the big battleground of operating systems, and is now available for you guys. Huge multitudes of passionate iOS 5 freaks have already outpaced you in downloading and updated their devices to the recent entrant in operating systems war, iOS 5. But then some questions must have popped up in your mind by now—‘Why should I upgrade to iOS 5?’ ‘What’s so good about it?’ ‘What outstanding features does it have?’ 

iOS 5: Exceptionally polished & equipped with glaring features

It’s time to take a tour of some  of its upgrade worthy features.

Notifications. This feature is undoubtedly the most prominent visual change that iPhone freaks had been craving for until now. Apple has, however, integrated this concept its own way. This new feature is especially more enticing since the apps can refine what and how to show you on the screen. I bet the users are going to love the notification access to a wide array of interesting widgets like weather and stock tickers.

Next amazing feature is iMessage. Though it’s not any new story on the board, the fascinating angle to it is that it functions across all iOS devices, over 100 million units sold until now. Aren’t these humongous numbers? Using this new feature, you can easily send across text messages to your friends or groups using any iOS device you possess, iPod or iPhone or iPad? Trust me, it’s going be a new and delightful communication experience for you altogether.

Twitter integration with iOS 5 makes share your activities via a Tweet extremely easy.

And now the bandwagon that almost each one of us has jumped on to. Yes, you guessed it right! It’s Twitter. The new iOS 5 has Twitter integrated into the system that has a big repository of features like camera roll, maps etc. Now if you wish to share a photograph with your friend, you need to prod that image and tap on to it to tweet the same. And, you’re DONE!

Let me touch the topic that would interest you to the hilt. We’re always looking out for opportunities to reconnect with our school/college days friends; friends we loved hanging out with and sharing our day-to-day experiences with. The exciting app released by Apple, Find My Friends, needs iOS to function, and lets you share your status and location updates with your buddies. Isn’t it cool?

iCloud: A marquee feature of iOS 5

Another captivating feature that deserves your attention is iCloud that lets you use an iOS device without any need of Mac, and maintain a repository or backup of  photos, documents and other app settings.

Well, these are some of the ones that I’ve liked. Welcome your comments, insights and experiences of using the new features of iOS 5 once you try them out.

Until then keep eating Apple, a lovely gift from Sir Steve Jobs to all of us!

Are You a Slave to Web? It’s Time to Free Yourself from Addiction!

Web Addiction: A Disorder on the Rise

It’s different. Enough of stories about drug or alcohol addiction. It’s a new entrant in our lives, a new form of addiction that has engulfed many of us. It’s Web Addiction. Are you a victim too?

Though you may think that the blogger (that’s me!) is herself a web addict since she gives you a diet of a blog every day, even two sometimes, why is she preaching about web addiction? Well to be candid, I’m not a web junkie. It’s my passion to write, and my mind is always flooded with blog ideas, which trigger me to pen down my thoughts regularly. Also, it’s my means of livelihood. So, I really can’t free myself from the habit of being online every day.

But I can handhold you if you wish to find out if you have been swallowed by the online world or not. There’s a thin line between being web-savvy and web addict. Which one are you? To find an answer to this, there is, however, a pre-requisite. And that is, you need to dig out deeper into your web habits with an open mind and readiness to accept the results, even if they’re not in your favor.

If your answer is ‘YES’, then let’s take a step further.

Web Addiction: Are You @ Risk?

Here are a few questions as I shoot them at you, you need to answer each one in plain Yes/No. Be honest here!

• Is your significant other complaining about you getting emotionally distant with each passing day?
• Are you so consumed with the online world that you’re unknowingly evading your prime responsibilities in your personal life?
• Apart from work & other professional commitments, do you spend more than 3-4 hours on web even when at home?
• Do you check these websites as soon as you log on to your computers—Facebook/Twitter/Gmail/YouTube?
• Do you check these websites multiple times a day?
• Do you leave your work to check the status update of your friend(s) as soon as you get the alert in your Inbox?
• Do you hit the ‘Refresh button’ many a times when online?
• Do you access web many times on your smartphones when not able to check the same on computers?

If your answer is ‘Yes’ for most of these questions, my dear friend I regret to inform you that you’re a Web Addict. Indeed, you are a slave to Web. It’s hard to accept but it’s true.

Now that you know you’re a proven web addict, would you like to do something to free yourself from the chains of this slavery or let your computer rule your heart & mind all day and night?

Hooked on Internet? Help is a just a click away.

If you’re ready to cut back your web addiction, here are some tips.

Strong Will Power: To accomplish any uphill task, you need to possess a strong will power. It’s needed much more when it’s the case of attaining freedom from web addiction. When at work, shut down all social media tabs and attend all your assignments with rapt attention. While at home, try to do all web activities during your time for coffee, watching television or listening to music so that your family time does not go waste.

Time Management: You’re your best judge when it comes to managing your most valuable asset—time. You need to split your time between your online & real life. Don’t kill your productive hours. Remember each hour counts. So don’t just fritter away time in web slavery. Work hard and party even harder by rewarding yourself with dedicated ‘web leisure’ time, and try not to exceed that time limit, no matter how much tempted you are.

Free yourself from Web addiction & devote proper time to your interests, recreational activities & social obligations.

Technology has overwhelmed your life, my life. It has bred Digital world, which is fascinating but addiction is bad. Confession of Digital Addiction is wise but Freedom from this Slavery is vital for a happy and prosperous life.

In the end, wish you all a very happy Vijayadashami & fun-filled, web-free Dussehra!!