digital marketing Archives - Page 4 of 14

Declining online traffic? Stop blaming SEO

By Patrick Gant

Photo for Stop blaming SEO: Everybody looking for something, by Mimmo Pellicola

Photo by Mimmo Pellicola on 500px

There has been plenty of talk lately about important changes that Google has been making to how it ranks websites. Those changes involve Google’s closely guarded algorithm, which is the magic juice behind how its search engine produces accurate results.

As I have been covering in greater detail in my newsletter, the most recent of these updates is code-named Penguin. It’s designed to give more weight to good quality content and down-rank the stuff that isn’t.

Penguin has also made a few people unhappy. [Read more…]

Be real: the importance of authenticity in what you say

By Patrick Gant

Photo: i'll make ya famous by Roof Topper

Photo by Roof Topper on 500px

Organizations of all sizes in both the private and public sectors are working harder than ever today to be more service focussed.

That includes the messages they develop when communicating directly with customers and clients.

It’s rooted in good intentions.

But far too often, people fall short in delivering on what ought to be the underlying promise of good service: being useful and authentic.

“Have you found everything you’re looking for?” I’ll bet you’ve been asked that countless times at the checkout counter at a chain store. I hear that question so often now that I answer “yes” almost like an involuntary reflex…even in cases where, in fact, I haven’t found everything I was looking for.

I’ll bet you’ve done the same thing.

What’s worse is when you instead say “no” and it quickly becomes apparent that the person who cheerfully asked you that question in the first place hasn’t a clue what to do when someone indicates they actually have not found all that they were looking for.

Efforts at being useful stop being meaningful when they’re perceived as something that people have to do rather than want to do.

Too often, businesses get too caught up trying to turn good service into a process: a series of methodical steps that everyone is expected to follow on every transaction.

There are two problems with that approach. First, processes are designed to give you identical results every time. Sure, we all like to see consistent good service, but the real test of that kind of promise takes place when things aren’t working the way they should.

What do you do when that customer hasn’t found what they were looking for, or something in your transaction hasn’t gone the way that it should? Your next step there matters far more than adhering to any kind of process.

If all you have to rely on is a batch of template messages, your customers or clients will tune into this faster than you’ll ever anticipate.

They will become conditioned to ignore what you’re saying.

The second problem is that processes strip away the kind of sincerity that you ought to be building with your clients and customers.

People like to be made to feel special.

They like it when you notice things before you even have to ask. And they’re far more likely to respond in kind when you demonstrate with actions that service is something you work hard at providing, rather than just repeating something that you’ve been told to say.

There’s no substitute for being real.

What you can learn from Budweiser’s Super Bowl ad

By Patrick Gant

In case you haven’t seen it yet, Budweiser’s Super Bowl ad—slated to run only on the Canadian broadcast of the main event—has gone viral in a big way online.

Here’s the setup.

Two amateur Canadian hockey teams think they’ve been invited to be part of a documentary. Instead they’re treated to a mega flash-mob and get to live out what every kid who plays hockey (or any sport, really) dreams of.

It closes with “Good times are waiting. Why not grab some buds.”

A lot of people have liked it on Facebook, tweeted it and +1’d it on Google+.

You don’t have to enjoy beer or hockey to connect with the message behind the ad. [Read more…]

A lesson about content, mass audience and failure

By Patrick Gant

You are a broadcaster (photo by cogdog on flickr)

I’m in the middle of doing some in-depth research for an important project, and I find myself thinking a lot these days about the nearly lost legacy of Charles Herrold.

It’s okay if you have no idea who he was. I hadn’t a clue either until I started reading up on the early history of radio.

Charles Herrold was a radio pioneer.

He coined the terms broadcasting and narrowcasting—possibly as early as 1909, and well before the eventual rise of radio’s golden age in the 1930s and 40s, by which time these were household names.

Like so many great words, broadcasting and narrowcasting were borrowed ideas: terms that were used to describe the farming method of sowing seeds from a container that spun outwards in all directions rather than in neat rows.

In choosing these words to describe the scattering approach of this new medium, Herrold showed that he understood the enormous potential of radio as an all-new way of reaching a lot more people than ever before, all at once.

Not just the select literate few of society, as was the case in the 18th and 19th centuries with book publishing and newspapers. All people. Not just with one program, but many.

Through radio and the way that Herrold (among others) saw its application, message became content.

Content became programming. And eventually, programming found a mass audience.

So why then is Herrold such a lesser-known in broadcasting history?

Most mentions of him indicate that he never made a profit from the industry that he helped pioneer.

Professor Mike Adams of San Jose State University summed up the problem this way: “He was in the right place at the right time” but he had the wrong technology.”

Herrold’s broadcasting was based on what engineers call the arc method, while others opted for a method involving vacuum tubes. I’ll spare you the technical details here.

What’s important to know about the arc method of broadcasting was that it sounded awful.

His audience couldn’t hear him as well as they could have. So they went elsewhere.

According to several public records, Herrold died in relative obscurity. Meanwhile, his radio counterpart, Frank Conrad went on to be celebrated in the New York Times as the “father of radio broadcasting.”

There are valuable lessons in this story that you can apply to your business and marketing efforts today.

First, it’s not enough to have good ideas or even to see the potential of something ahead of others.

Execution is everything.

Second, if you’re in the people business (and odds are very good that you are), you are a broadcaster. You can’t build an audience if people can’t hear you properly.

Let me repeat that…

“If you’re in the people business, you are a broadcaster. You can’t build an audience if people can’t hear you properly.”
Click to tweet this.

Make sure you have the right tools that cut through the noise. And remember: you have less time than you think to capture and maintain your audience’s attention.

Third, create great content just as you would build any other exceptional product in your business. Get it into the hands of your audience in a way that is most convenient for them.

These matter ahead of all things when you’re in the people business.

The habit of ideas and 10 more places I go for creative inspiration

By Patrick Gant

Where do you get your ideas from?

Writers get asked this often and more often than not, the answer can be distilled to this: I don’t really know. They just come to me.

Ideas are like luck. You can believe they just happen and that you’re just fortunate to be there when they materialze. But that’s a pretty fanciful notion, isn’t it?

Here’s what I know as someone who has been in the idea business for more than 10 years on my own, and more than 20 in the writing trade: luck and ideas come from practice.

You have to make a habit of being there—of showing up and doing the thing that needs to get done to get the things you really want. There is no shortcut.

I like what Neil Gaiman says about this: “You get ideas all the time. The only difference between writers and other people is we notice when we’re doing it.”

Part of the habit of ideas is to feed your appetite for more of them. I’ve talked before about 21 places for creative inspiration.

I want to share with you 10 more. The list is varied, but what they all have in common is an unyielding devotion to showing up regularly with great writing and solid ideas.

Who’s on your favourite list for creative inspiration? Let me know.

James Altucher
His positions on a lot of things might raise your eyebrows. He and I disagree, for instance, on the importance of voting (I see it as a civic duty in Canada, but I can see why he feels the way he does, living where he lives). But there’s a strange genius to what James does. I admire that, not to mention his deep sincerity. He also happens to be a prolific storyteller who understands the intimate bond between reader and writer. More than just teaching the value of not holding back at all in your writing, he also writes killer headlines. How can you help but click on a story called How I Screwed Yasser Arafat out of $2mm? I never miss a thing this guy writes.

Dan Zarella
I value a handful of field-tested research more than a truckload of opinions, and that’s why I read social media scientist Dan Zarella’s blog regularly (as well as his latest book). The takeway is more than just for social media. There’s insight here you can apply to all aspects of marketing and selling. As a direct result of Dan’s work—and his generosity in sharing his findings online—there’s a lot more certainty to writing for the web than ever before. Be sceptical of the opinionated. Act on verifiable data.

rob mclennan
Poetry is what reminds me that there are no easy answers to creative problems. As I say so often: simple is hard. I turn to many poets often for advice through their words. One in particular is rob mclennan, whom I’ve know since the days of Bard poetry readings in the basement of a downtown bar here in Ottawa. His blog isn’t just a platform for his own elegant prose, but for others, too.

Leo Babauta
As much as I’m a stickler for evidence-based research, one place where that can’t help much is in learning the mastery of living the good life in the fine sense that Aristotle once spoke of. The path to happiness is not through data, but through wisdom earned through practice. It’s that easy. And that hard. This is why I keep coming back to ZenHabits for more.

Colleen Francis
Wait, I know what you’re going to say. “Hey you’re plugging her because she’s a client!” Well, that’s partly true (I’ve been writing for Colleen for many, many years). But there’s an even more important reason. Colleen is one of the industry’s best speakers and coaches, teaching business owners and sales people to increase sales the smart way. I learn something new on every job I work on for her. If you want to be a better speaker, a better business owner and even just be smarter about working with people, Colleen has the world by the tail. So I’m happy to share her wisdom with you, dear reader.

Jane Friedman
Jane Friedman of the University of Cincinatti shares my passion for the future of publishing and has some very thoughtful things to say about that. She does a great job of helping to teach writers to think more like entrepreneurs. There are also valuable takeaways for everyone—not just writers–in search of advice and encouragement on keeping their creativity muscles well-exercised.

Jeff Goins
This is a recent find for me. Jeff’s a writer for writers. His blog is pitched at those who care about “writing, creativity, and changing the world.” And he does a great job of delivering on that. His stuff glows with an infectious positive energy and that’s why I subscribe to his updates. Bonus points for being a fellow guitar enthusiast.

Lisa Larter
She practices what she preaches about how businesses can do a better job of using social media in their marketing activities. Her post on why business owners need a “stop-doing” list helped give me a push in the right direction in 2011 and I’ve been reading her ever since. Lisa gets bonus marks for being a fellow resident of Ottawa–where a one-time non-existent entrepreneurial culture is growing today, thanks to the people who put in the time to make it happen.

Roger Ebert
Gone from us far too soon, and a giant in film review, Roger Ebert was a writer first…and one who just happened to talk about film. His ideas often touched on things that transcend cinema. He built a rather fine career on his considerable writing talents, and yet in the last several years of his life, his considerable skills somehow grew even mightier. Maybe it was in defiance of his illness and the cruel losses he suffered, but that passion he had for words was really something else. Unafraid to colour outside the lines, Ebert reminded us all that there is endless satisfaction in digging deeper into your thinking and to not just settle for what comes quickly.

Artie Isaac
I was first drawn to Artie because of his speaking style, which I admire greatly (and that includes his trademark bowtie). He’s a powerful advocate for anyone who is in the ideas business. What I’ve found has really been keeping me coming back, however, is his emphasis on ethics. He’s also a fan of Thich Nhat Hanh. So again, bonus points.

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