It’s a new year, but that doesn’t always mean you need a complete marketing overhaul. For many organizations, the new year is the right time to implement just few new practices to enhance the existing marketing and PR strategy. Here are some ideas that businesses may want to consider.
Content marketing. No matter what anyone says, content is still king for digital marketing. Creating content that is relevant to an organization’s audience is the best way to attract new followers to its social media pages, which results in better brand recognition online in addition to enhancing search engine optimization. Short form blog posts are just one option; for businesses that want to communicate more detailed messages, longer articles may be the key to securing the attention of an information-hungry audience.
So, how long? Many web marketing experts define long form content as a blog post that is more than 1,000 words, with the standard blog post being 500 words or less. With that in mind, we recommend that clients try a content marketing or article marketing program where the word count is somewhere in between – anywhere from 600 to 750 words. It’s long enough to communicate a detailed message and remains SEO friendly without being overloaded.
Going viral. While there’s never any guarantee that a specific video will go viral, it is certainly advisable to give video a try. Viral videos are not only comprised of kids doing stunts and cats eating bananas; some of the most noteworthy videos of the past year were actually released by brands.
Now, were those videos designed strictly to be commercials? Definitely not! In all content marketing, something of value must be offered to the audience and videos are certainly no exception. At Desmond & Louis, one of our favorites is the “Will it Blend?” series by Blendtec. This viral marketing campaign series, where a host attempts to blend everything from an iPad to golf balls with a Blendtec blender, showcases the effectiveness of the brand like nothing else could.
Blendtec tapped into the audience’s need to be impressed, if not shocked, by the product – and they knew that traditional infomercial fruit blending wasn’t going to cut it. No one is suggesting that your videos reach Blendtec’s level of outrageousness, but in 2016, it’s worth considering how your brand can use video to get the audience’s attention.
Traditional PR. Although we perform web marketing services, Desmond & Louis is a firm that knows traditional PR will never go out of style. Without a dedicated and trained public relations department, a company can’t perform all the functions of a PR specialist. Many times, we find that clients have marketing departments which perform limited marketing duties quite well but are not entirely equipped to handle the delicate art of media relations (arguably the most important service offered in traditional PR). This doesn’t just apply to crisis management; it’s a reference to successfully securing print, digital and broadcast media opportunities. This is what a traditional PR firm is designed to do – and no matter how many digital services we add on, it will always be part of the package here at Desmond & Louis.
The new year is the best time to add on new marketing practices, and with February right around the corner, there’s no time to waste.