In today’s business world, the standard for social marketing should be set to “high”. Yet, while many companies are very active with their outbound social marketing initiatives, how much attention is being paid to their overall inbound social marketing strategies?
Inbound marketing draws in traffic without unconcealed or blatant outreach (which would be outbound marketing). Examples of inbound marketing include: streaming podcasts, videos (hopefully viral) and blogging, plus techniques to make sure that a company’s content is easy to find including search engine optimization. After you draw in potential consumers, what makes them STICK to become a “supporter”, “fan” or a “follower”? The answer is GOOD CONTENT. In regards to a website’s “stickiness”, Ann Capps of Artipot.com (@artipot @anncapps) writes: “Driving customers to your site is one thing, but without compelling content they have no reason to stay.”
Blogs with “sticky” content are blogs with quality, worthwhile, reliable, and perhaps most importantly, relevant content. Of course, these adjectives are all subjective, and that’s why a blogger must know who he/she wants to reach and influence. But just hoping that people will come across your content isn’t enough! A well thought-out strategy is necessary for your content to tally views and for your blog (thus your business) to see tremendous gains. Inbound marketing involves actively, consistently and strategically putting content on the internet for other people to come across while they are doing their own personal searching and browsing.
Now…how do we get the blog seen more? People already searching for something will come across your blog organically if you offer/are writing about what they have searched for and need. This can be done by well thought-out keyword entry, tagging, backlinking (be sure to look for a Part II of this post for tips and tricks on the aforementioned techniques). The right keywords, meta-tags, and linking drives traffic to the blog, and then optimizing in the blog can enhance your SEO standing!
Another great tip is to build relationships with other bloggers: making genuine comments on another blogger’s posts (a blogger who you actually want to be connected with) is one great way to catch that blogger’s attention. After a while, said blogger may link to you from their website. Yes, we’re reaching out, but our actual technique for gaining traffic is a draw-in: blog readers see a link to your blog from a page that they already find credible and are already using, making it easier to gain views because there is, for one thing, less risk of wasted time when someone is recommended another “expert” from an already accredited and trusted source of theirs.
Well, we’ve covered why blogs are so important, and in Part II, we will discuss in further detail how to keep people sticking around you and your content (hence the term “sticky” content). As we said above: “Blogs with ‘sticky’ content are blogs with quality, worthwhile, reliable, and, perhaps most importantly, relevant content. Of course, these adjectives are all subjective, and that’s why a blogger must know who he/she wants to reach and influence.” What’s your favorite blog, and why is it your favorite? Hey—you can even let us know how you found that favorite blog of yours. These things, you’ll find, are interesting to observe in retrospect.