My Blog My Blog

Your Blueprint to Create the Perfect Content Marketing Strategy

Content Planning
May 25, 2020/by
Your Blueprint to Create the Perfect Content Marketing Strategy Creating content can feel discouraging. For instance, you might spend hours producing something that's amazing, only to get little engagement, traffic, or leads. What's more, later, you'll have to explain that ROI to your boss — talk about a dreadful workday. If you're feeling frustrated or burnt out with your content creation process, you're in luck. Here, we've created a complete blueprint to a successful content marketing strategy. In this post, I'll walk you through the different aspects of the content blueprint and why each facet is so important for marketers to include in an overall strategy. For more information on content marketing strategies, we've created a content marketing workbook that's free to download. Otherwise, let's dive into creating a content marketing strategy that will bring you that ROI you're looking to earn. How to Develop and Implement a Successful Content Marketing Strategy We're going to look at three different stages that make up the blueprint. These stages will outline the main steps you can take to create your strategy. Then, we'll go into depth with details about making that happen. Let's start with step one — getting decision-makers on-board with your strategy. Stage 1: Getting buy-in from your stakeholders in order to green light your strategy. All great content marketing plans start with getting people within the company to buy into your vision — basically, the people who can give you the resources, budget, or information that's required to...
Read Full Story

19 Ways to Effectively Increase Your Conversion Rate

Conversion Rate Optimization
May 25, 2020/by
19 Ways to Effectively Increase Your Conversion Rate Have you ever heard the term "analysis paralysis"? It's the concept that too many choices can inhibit a person's ability to make a decision. It's like when a visitor is on your website and there are too many places to look or there's a confusing design. When this happens, visitors won't convert. As a marketer, it's important to remove any type of barrier to conversion. To do this, you should calculate your conversion rate and analyze why visitors aren't converting on your site. Whatever the reason, I'm sure you're wondering how you can improve your conversion rate. Below, let's review how to increase your conversion rate for both your desktop website and mobile site. Improving Your Website's Conversation Rate 1. Use a CRO planner. Getting started with conversion rate optimization can seem like a daunting task. The first step to improving your conversion rate? Use a CRO planner. With a CRO planner, you'll be able to analyze and develop a strategy for increasing your conversion rate. For example, with HubSpot CRO planner, you'll find instructions on how to conduct a site audit, identify areas to improve your conversion funnel, understand users on your site, and go through the process of A/B testing and experimentation. CRO planners can be helpful because they take through the entire process from A to Z. 2. Shorten your forms. One reason that users don't convert is because there's friction in the process. For...
Read Full Story

Deal Pipelines Gain Positive Momentum in Mid-May [COVID-19 Benchmark Data]

COVID-19 Benchmark Data
May 22, 2020/by
Deal Pipelines Gain Positive Momentum in Mid-May For the last few months, businesses around the world have had to rapidly adapt to the impact of COVID-19. In a time where it seems like things change every day, it can be difficult to gauge whether the challenges your business is facing are widespread. That's why we're publishing week-over-week benchmark data for core business metrics like website traffic, email send and open rates, sales engagements, close rates, and more. These core metrics are split by region, company size, and industry cuts, so you can explore data for companies most similar to yours. You can find the data, and more context on the dataset and sources, here. Because the data is aggregated from our customer base, please keep in mind that individual businesses, including HubSpot's, may differ based on their own markets, customer base, industry, geography, stage, and/or other factors. These insights are refreshed every Thursday morning ET, and will be accompanied by this short writeup. You can find past writeups using this timeline. We hope to establish useful benchmarks to measure your business against, and serve as an early indicator of when short- or long-term adjustments may be needed in your strategy. What We're Seeing Here are the three key takeaways from the most recent week's data: 1. Deals created and closed gain positive momentum as some industries and countries show encouraging performance towards mid-May. After a 6% increase during the week of May 4, global deals created rose...
Read Full Story

24 Data-Backed Reasons to Personalize Your Marketing

Data-Driven Marketing
May 22, 2020/by
24 Data-Backed Reasons to Personalize Your Marketing When Larry Drebes, CEO of Janrain, set out to study online consumer experiences earlier this summer, he knew that relevant content would be at the forefront of consumer minds. We've seen for years that emails which are personalized to the recipient do better than their generic counterparts. But perhaps what he could not have anticipated was just how much consumers have come to expect personalization at every stage in their buying process. In truth, nearly three-fourths of respondents in the national poll expressed frustration at content that does not recognize them and adapt to their interests. “These results that consumers have reached the tipping point when it comes to being shown content that isn’t relevant to them,” Drebes explained. “Consumers have been pretty consistent and clear in their feedback, the way to avoid alienating them is to give them what they want -- personalized, relevant content using their data in a responsible and transparent way.” To put it plainly, consumers don't just like personalized marketing experiences. They expect them. Here are 24 stats to prove why you need to embrace personalized marketing in 2020.  Benefits and Challenges of Personalized Marketing Message Personalization is the #1 tactic used by email marketers to increase engagement rates. (HubSpot) More than 20% of marketers say personalization can improve email engagement. (HubSpot) 99% of marketers say personalization helps advance customer relationships, with 78% claiming it has a“strong” or “extremely strong” impact. (Evergage) 80% of...
Read Full Story

21 Interactive Content Stats That Marketers Need to Know in 2020

Marketing Trends
May 22, 2020/by
21 Interactive Content Stats That Marketers Need to Know in 2020 In December 2018, Netflix viewers were introduced to the platform's first interactive film, Black Mirror: Bandersnatch. Bandersnatch followed a character named Stefan, a tormented game developer who was forced to make a number of simple and tough decisions to release a video game. Each time Stefan had to make a decision -- such as eating Sugar Puffs or Frosties for breakfast -- two options would appear on the screen. Stefan's fate was then in the Netflix viewers' hands as they could choose what happened next. The choose-your-own-adventure film -- which allowed viewers to go down one of nearly one trillion paths based on their choices -- was a viral hit. Bandersnatch generated a ton of buzz on social media for Netflix, and the streaming giant was also able to use data from the decisions viewers selected. At one point, the streaming site released data to show which choices users commonly made. Since Bandersnatch's success, the entertainment industry and brands have continued to jump on the interactive content bandwagon with high-priced AR/VR and even video-game based campaigns. But, as a small or medium-sized business marketer who isn't ready to dabble in AR/VR just yet, you might be wondering, "Is interactive content really worth its price?" Yes, interactive content is highly engaging, attracts customers, and provides value. But, you don't necessarily need expertise in emerging technology to leverage it. Below are 21 stats that highlight how interactive content is growing,...
Read Full Story

How to Launch a Successful Multichannel Marketing Strategy

Content Marketing
May 21, 2020/by
How to Launch a Successful Multichannel Marketing Strategy If you're even a casual reader of the business blogosphere, you've probably heard more than once about this great big shift in how consumers buy. And although we have plenty of jargon in the marketing world, another term is rising in popularity in response to that shift: multi-channel marketing. What Is Multi-Channel Marketing? Multi-channel marketing is defined by many organizations, unsurprisingly, as communicating with and marketing to prospects and customers across many channels, online and offline. That means instead of running a single start-and-stop campaign or using one marketing tactic, like TV or email, marketers today are pacing with how consumers operate: in lots of places all at once. Think about your own habits: We have enormous choices facing us every day, between thousands of TV channels, numerous screens and devices, and millions of websites and individual pieces of content. That means you might want to perform research and execute a purchase in a lot of different places — by reading a blog post on your tablet,by checking for deals in your inbox,or by visiting a store so you can speak to someone in-person. Multi-channel marketers,then,are ones who identify the channels their target customers are usingand understand how their target customers move from one channel to another to create a congruous experience. What Are the Hallmarks of Great Multi-Channel Marketing Strategies? Multi-channel marketing seeks to establish a marketer's presence across these many places. Online, that includes search engines, blogs, social networks,...
Read Full Story

Adjusting Digital Media Strategies in a Changing Business Climate

Advertising
May 20, 2020/by
Adjusting Digital Media Strategies in a Changing Business Climate We've all been experiencing recent lifestyle changes in 2020 — both personally and professionally. For marketers, the resulting shift in business landscape has required us to review our previous strategies and make adjustments that will allow our clients to continue thriving in the wake of unforeseen circumstances. The good news is that current challenges can translate into tremendous opportunity if we can find an effective way to continue reaching our audiences. While each business is different and there are many factors to consider, understanding current media trends is an important step in adjusting your approach to advertising. Here, we're going to explore whether or not you should be advertising at all, where you should focus your advertising efforts, and shifting paid priorities in 2020. Should you be advertising in 2020? The big question a lot of advertisers are asking themselves – "Should I be advertising right now?" — has a wide range of answers that vary depending on your circumstance. The airline and hospitality industries are facing serious challenges at the moment, but at the same time this changing business climate presents unique opportunities for brands focused on other verticals. While job security and unemployment has become an unfortunate reality for many, there are also a significant number of consumers who are benefiting from increased disposable incomes due to cancelled events and forced lifestyle changes. For ecommerce brands, this can translate into increased sales from both new and existing...
Read Full Story