Blog | Lead Generation Content & Social Media Marketing

There’s a lot of noise out there in the digital world, especially in the recruitment and HR spaces.

Companies are posting videos, blogs and social media updates each day about a wide range of topics in the hope of better connecting their business with both talent and prospective clients, and positioning themselves as an employer or recruiter of choice.

We all know the value of reaching out regularly to keep us relevant, but with the amount of material constantly flooding into cyberspace, it can be an intimidating thought. You'd be forgiven for thinking you're just posting the same stuff as everyone else and wondering why you’re even bothering.

So how do you dream up successful content ideas and then produce great content worthy of it, so that you're being different online? Let's start there...

Content Marketing has become a bit of a buzz concept today as people and organisations venture more online. But what does it actually mean? And how does it drive leads to your business?

Content has become the most critical ingredient in raising brand awareness and attracting potential customers into your sales funnel, so it’s super important your business is producing the right kinds of content, in the right form, and at the right time, to grow your lead channels and reach your goals.

Here’s all you need to know!

Did you know the number one use of the internet today is social media? Your potential customers are all there, checking updates hourly (or more!) and posting content several times a day.

You’ve heard all the hype about it, and your business has probably joined the fray, but it’s difficult to visualise how your brand will actually gain customers and a return on investment (ROI) from it all, especially when it can take up so much time.

Don’t worry- you’re not alone.

Many businesses know that they should be both present and active online, but can’t seem to work out how to harness its power to actually put some runs on the board.

But it is possible!

So here are the 3 ways to give more purpose to your posts, and turn those users into customers!

By now, we all know how important SEO is for our business, but with changes and updates constantly being made by search engines like Google, it can be hard to keep up. You'd be forgiven for thinking SEO must be some kind of fairy dust bestowed upon the elite websites of the world – or simply a mates-deal with Google.

It’s not.

So today we're demystifying SEO: what it is, why we need it, how it works, and how 'get it'.

Three more weeks to 2016! Two more weeks until Christmas! But has your business already gone on holidays?

It’s a bizarre time of year… Everyone’s exhausted. We can’t wait for the holidays; we all need a break; we all want a fresh new year and a fresh new start.

And the exhaustion is visible everywhere: clients have slowed down, staff are tired, business owners are lingering over coffee and the quarter’s turnover figures…

Is much productive getting done? What if Santa slowed down now??!

My advice? Don’t waste this “quiet time”. Instead...

Your business has a social media and online presence. You’re posting your ‘stuff’: blogs, industry information... You’re consistently posting. So why is your engagement down?

It could be a variety of many things, but today I’m focusing on one simple foundational element: soul.

In recruitment, when job-hunter numbers were low and vacancies high, we used the phrase, “a candidate’s market”. It’s commerce 101: supply and demand.

In sales and marketing, today’s is a “buyer’s market”. Suppliers are chosen by their buyers from a multitude of available options.

“Through all the social media marketing changes, one thing remains constant:
the more you teach, the more you reach.”

Remember Facebook in the mid-2000s? Pokes to say ‘hi’, hundreds of quiz apps to tell us which character of our favourite shows we were... I recall standing in a bar with friends Friday after work, an actual drink in hand, having a conversation about the virtual drinks we’d been sending earlier that afternoon.

Social media has come a long way since then. As it evolved businesses quickly took to social media marketing, wittingly infiltrating our personal time and lounge rooms with their marketing messages, and social media as a marketing channel became the must-have business tool of the time.

Some platforms fought to keep up with the supply of this overwhelming amount of content, juggling with the need to keep their platform relevant to its users. They reviewed analytics and tweaked algorithms ad infinitum so that only the best content would be delivered to only the most appropriate audience.

But through all the algorithm changes, one thing remained constant: the more you teach, the more you reach.

Great online and social media marketers become so because they provide on-time, trending and relevant content to their audiences.

But this doesn’t happen by accident. While it may appear seamless, they’re working a carefully brewed content marketing strategy.

From the types of content, to topics of the content, to the actual authors – and a whole range more – these content marketers are leaving little to chance with an online marketing strategy that tells their story and their values, and drives leads and sales.

Underperforming suppliers – or employees... What’s going wrong?

I watched several separate situations unfold over the past year, each reminding me of the 80’s digital handheld game, “Mickey & Donald”. Not mentioned in its title – perhaps underlining his contribution level – was the character Goofy.

The three were tasked with putting out a building fire. As the gamer, you told Donald where to point the water hose, and directed Mickey to spend his time either (a) plugging up leaks in the hose, or (b) watching over and ordering Goofy to run the pump. If Goofy was not being watched, he would get lazy and pump slower causing less water to flow and creating a higher risk of the building burning and Donald dying.

They all had their part to play in the team, but Mickey’s role was tricky because he was responsible for the performance of a non-performing team member.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t Goofy who suffered the consequences of his weakness to their team. His performance – or lack of – added pressure on Mickey’s already critical role; but moreover, it was other members of the team who bore the fatal consequences of this teammate’s lethargy and lack of passion.

As needs-based consumers, we generally go through some routine stages prior to purchase.

We begin with the identification of a ‘need’: from something as simple as being invited to a BYO party (“I need to buy drinks to take with me”) to more complex purchases for your business (“I need to market my business better”).

We call this “the buyer’s journey” and simply put it’s the active research process a buyer goes through trying to solve a problem they have, leading up to a purchase. It is a model that helps businesses keep the buyer’s behaviour, information, needs and pain points central to any activity in sales and marketing divisions.

You’ve heard it before, “You should blog,” “You really need to blog,” “Don’t you have a blog?!”

You’re not sure what the purpose of blogging is, but on your commute you’re motivated to write that 600-word story – about how no one stood up for a disabled passenger and the impact of the aloof, disengaged culture we have become.

Your story’s great; well written, delivers an inspired message - to anyone who finds it. But which of your prospective buyers is typing into Google, “What’s the impact of the aloof and disengaged on society?" Not many, I bet. 

And which part of your service or product offering serves as a solution this problem?

So what’s going on? Your prospects aren’t finding your blogs through search, and while you can still post links to your blog on forums and social media, if the topic isn’t meeting the needs ('pain points') of your prospective buyer, they’re unlikely to click through on it. “Ain’t nobody got time for that!” 

You're not blogging for business and if part of your strategy is to increase the number of visitors to your site or increase your lead conversion rate, you’re probably going to be disappointed by the results of this kind of blogging and simply give it up.

But don't do that yet! Here are my tips to writing relevant blog posts that will bring you the stats you're after:

The thread, “The fact that I’ve been on your website for more than 25 seconds DOES NOT MEAN that I want your free e-book in exchange for my name and my email address,” sparked an interesting question:

“Were pop-up ads on your website something that still generated leads, or did they serve to simply turn your prospects off?”

“Everyone is doing them,” “…annoying,” “…rarely sign up,” “…on too fast.”

Does a one-stop, collect-all style content marketing solution work for every type of buyer at every stage of their purchase journey? Or are you missing information about pop-up advertising that might be more relevant to your buyers?

First, some pop-up ad facts:

Buyer personas are the foundation to all marketing activities. 

Let’s say you have a great product: you design and sell fashion contact lenses with rock band logos on them. You know it’s the next big thing and you start to market your product. You’ve decided on a few marketing initiatives and are reaching a lot of people: CEOs, managers, sales staff, accountants, tradies, local neighbours, members of networking groups, mums, dads, grandparents…

But no one’s buying in. You’re not getting any new sales. Why? They don’t need it; they don’t want it; they can’t use it; they aren’t interested.

It’s not because your product isn’t great; it is! Just not for the people you're reaching.

I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase about selling ice to Eskimos. 

Does your online brand have multiple personalities?

As I observed a client drift aimlessly from ‘Social Media Manager’ to ‘Social Media Manager’, constantly unhappy with her ROI, a couple of things dawned on me.

Firstly, like a lot of business owners, she wasn’t entirely clear on what she wanted out of her social media marketing – or anything much to do with her digital marketing or inbound marketing strategies – aside from ‘increasing sales’. It stood to reason of course: her specialty wasn’t in social media marketing. It wasn’t in inbound or content driven marketing, nor any form of digital marketing at all. Her speciality was in the services her business provided.

The second thing that dawned on me was… her brand appeared to be suffering a distinct form of dissociative identity disorder.