Blink. Blink. Blink. It’s the dreaded cursor-on-a-blank-screen experience that all writers — amateur or professional, aspiring or experienced — know and dread. And of all times for it to occur, it seems to plague us the most when trying to write an introduction.
I mean, you already have a blog post you want to write. Can’t you just dive in and write it? Why all the pomp and circumstance with this dag-blasted introduction?
Some of the greatest discoveries of all time came to fruition at the intersection between two ideas. Think about it: Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, pajama jeans, and sporks … just to name a few.
This week, Instagram proved the power of cross-pollinating ideas once more when it announced the addition of live video on Instagram Stories and disappearing photos and videos in Instagram Direct.
Data-driven content strategies are a hot marketing industry trend at the moment, but this is a trend that has some legs. After all, why not make all the data you gather from current and potential customers work for you?
You see, data is the real MVP of marketing: It can be used to measure the effectiveness of your campaigns, track the overall health of your brand, and (when used properly) it can help to spark new content ideas.
Content marketing continues to dominate as a key component of a successful marketing strategy, but to see strong results, you need to regularly produce content — specifically content with a high-viral potential.
Most marketers would argue that no one can predict whether or not something will go viral, but a lot of these same individuals simply aren’t satisfied with run-of-the-mill results.
Search engine optimization (SEO) isn’t all about focusing on keywords anymore. Search engines are getting smarter and better at understanding a searcher’s intent and how they can provide them with meaningful content.
Over the past few years, marketers have lived through everything from changes in search behavior (like the serious increase in mobile search queries) to search engine algorithm updates (like Google’s rewarding more secure websites).
I was ready to buy. My finger hovered over the “Add to Cart” button. But I still wasn’t sure.
While all the images on the site were professional and inspiring, not one of them was user-generated or showed an outfit on an average-sized human being. If I’m spending a couple hundred dollars on a dress, I want to know it will be flattering on my body (and I’m not a size zero — who is?). That conversion didn’t happen. I’m shopping elsewhere.
Even with all of the resources available for content strategy and amplification, we know there’s no magic formula for making content go viral.
And while many businesses aren’t trying to compete with celebrity gossip in the virality arena, they are looking for links and conversions to drive their goals forward. In other words, getting a lot of eyes on your content is key.
Stagnant organic traffic is the last thing you want to see when reviewing metrics, but it’s an issue that every marketer deals with at some point.
Those dips and plateaus in traffic can come from industry changes, how your audience digests content, the amount (and quality) of new content you’re producing, or how relevant your older content is.
If you’re growing a company, chances are you’re challenged with choosing the right tools to help you grow.
Both at HubSpot and at other businesses I’ve helped advise, I’ve seen marketing and sales teams experiment with all sorts of different tools they’ve hoped would drive growth. Some of these tools did help the team grow. Others slowed growth down or blocked it altogether.
Content marketing has seen a lot of changes over the past few years, in particular around the way that marketers have went about actually developing their content. A lot of this has come down to the rapidly evolving search engine landscape, as well as a huge shift in the way that people are discovering content.
What does being in a “content rut” mean to you?
Perhaps the words remind you of writer’s block, when you couldn’t think of fresh topic ideas. (We’ve all been there.) Or maybe it makes you think of those days, weeks, or even — horror of horrors — months when your content seems to be falling kind of flat.
They say a picture is worth 1,000 words. In reality, a picture is worth closer to 84.1 words depending on a variety of other factors, but let’s face it, that’s not as catchy.
The original point of the saying still stands, though: Images communicate information more effectively than text alone, and they’re best when working together.
![How to Run Successful LinkedIn Ads [Free Two-Week Planner]](https://blog.hubspot.com/hubfs/LinkedIn%20Sponsored%20Content.png?t=1478000318625)
LinkedIn is the #1 social media platform for B2B content distribution. That makes it a key platform to generate leads, build professional relationships, and drive leads.
But it’s not enough to use LinkedIn just to build an organic following. If you want to effectively expand your content’s reach and get it in front of the right eyes, you should be using LinkedIn’s Sponsored Content feature.
It’s been a year since Twitter polls became an option for users to engage, entertain, and survey their social media audience. And just recently we’ve found ourselves asking, “Are there any brands out there that are really using Twitter Polls well?”
In the not-so ancient past, Twitter users used to tweet out makeshift polls and use likes, retweets, or replies to get their “results.”
