by Kristina Smith on January 18, 2012 
As a marketer or business owner, you’re an expert on your product or service. You know your industry, the players, and you know your customers. You also know you need interesting, regular content for your website, blog, social networks, and email newsletters. And that’s where you start to panic.
But there is no reason that you (or your colleagues) have to be the ones writing, shooting, editing, and producing content. Sure, it costs less - but what are the costs in customer engagement and loyalty over time?
Delivering boring, irrelevant, repetitive content is worse than delivering none at all. So why not consider spending some of your budget on quality content production? Hire writers, hire videographers, hire bloggers, and work together on producing some great articles, web pages, posts, videos, and podcasts for your business.
Not sure where to start? Start where you want your future customers to – by referral. Ask fellow marketers and business owners who have the same type of budgets as you do who they like to work with. You can even put out some feelers on sites like craigslist or job boards.
Start small, but start. The more content you can put together, the more you can share, and the more you will start to see results from regular communication, where your fans and followers really start to look forward to the information you have to offer.
Next week: set up a social media schedule for all this great content!
by Kristina Smith on January 13, 2012
The average professional gets about 100 emails every single day. Almost half the U.S. population accesses email using their smartphones, quickly deleting anything that is not relevant with a swipe or tap of a finger.
This degree of volume and immediacy means people are looking only for the information they want and need – so, how do email marketers conquer the clutter to reach customers and drive ROI?
Take what you already know to work, and integrate these ideas to increase your email program’s relevance on smartphones.
The Subject Line: Still your BFF
Test subject lines for desktop and mobile devices – for example, you may find using shorter subject lines works better for mobile, while a contest resonates with desktop users.
Try also personalizing the message in the subject line itself, either with a first name or past purchase. Develop future subject lines based on these learnings.
Friendly From: Friendlier than an Email Address
When sending, consider from whom the message appears to be coming from. The from line usually appears first, in bold, or both - before the subject line and first couple lines of content.
Consider this: would you rather see an email from “Steve’s Audio and Video” … or emails@audiovideostevestore.com?
The Layout: Text or HTML?
You have a number of options here, and no one solution seems to fit all companies, so again, test and see what works best for your customers.
- Give your subscribers the option to receive text versions of your email instead of HTML.
- Design your HTML template to be narrow; increase the size of links and buttons for fingers.
- Use HTML to adapt to the size of the viewers’ screen – expanding for desktop and wrapping for mobile.
The Content: Short and Sweet
Especially for mobile, keep your copy short, to the point, and most of all, interesting and compelling. Write, edit, and rewrite. View it on a mobile device before sending. Test often, and hone your messages and offers based on the response.
