Images are content marketing's magnetic force, driving social media efforts and activity that ultimately generates sales. Try these 10 tactics for integrating photographs in your content marketing to boost your success.

You don't want your content marketing efforts to go unnoticed like the quiet kid who sits in the back of the class. Learn how to transform your content marketing with super powers via its integration with social media, search, and sales.

With Facebook’s recent purchase of Instagram and Pinterest’s meteoric growth, photography has become the content marketing darling of 2012. In this post, we'll take a look at the usage of each of the hottest new photography sites and examine ways you can use photographs to expand your content marketing offerings.

Content is at the heart of social media. Here are seven social media-inspired content marketing lessons that can help you reach your goals for better engaging your audience.

According to CMI's recently-released B2B marketing study, marketers' biggest challenge is in producing the kind of content that engages their prospects. Heidi Cohen shares seven actionable tips for creating content that not only stands out from competing messages and pulls customers in, but also engages and informs them at each phase of the purchase process.

Content marketing supports B2B marketers’ top marketing goals: generating leads, converting qualified leads into paying customers, and building branding, reputation, and awareness. As a result, 45.3 percent of marketers plan to increase their content marketing spend (based on Bizo’s “Strategic Marketing Priorities” research). This shift is attributable to the fact that prospects are increasingly using web-based information to research purchases and vet suppliers and that content marketing-driven leads are more cost effective. The problem is that B2B marketer’s budgets aren’t properly aligned with channels’ use and effectiveness because most B2B marketers allocate 30 percent or less of their marketing budget to content creation and dissemination (according to Curata’s B2B Marketing Trends 2011 Survey Report). Continue reading

Is your marketing organization on the fence about using content marketing? If so, consider recent research from Cone Inc., which shows that across formats consumers are increasingly going online to find content that will help them make purchase decisions. While Cone Inc.’s research highlights that consumers continue to turn to ratings and reviews and that blogs have gained customer interest, the reality is content marketing can support every step of the purchase process. If you don’t provide useful content, your competitors, other consumers, and the public will. Continue reading

Help! I need content marketing and I don’t know where to start. Have you ever felt this way? If so, help is on the way. Content marketing can seem intimidating at first especially if you’re new to this marketing approach or if vacation season’s left you short handed. Your goal is to develop content that lures prospects in and engages them by: Answering their questions Showing them how to use your products Entertaining them without knocking them over the head with promotional messages. To this end, here are seven sure-fire ideas for creating content that grabs your target audience and connects with them.Continue reading

Small and medium-sized businesses tend to be challenged when it comes to content marketing. They often have a more limited headcount and fewer resources available to augment marketing that’s not directly linked to sales and promotions. While practical, this can be shortsighted because it overlooks how content can support the purchase process. To help your firm jump into content marketing in a way that fits your business and available budget, here are seven tips other businesses have used to effectively add content to a marketing plan. Continue reading

With the expanded use of content marketing, the big question for most companies is “Who will create the content?” Like any other business initiative, a good starting point is to look at your goals and related strategies in developing a well-crafted editorial plan for content creation. To produce the necessary content, it’s useful to assess the complete set of skills needed for robust content creation. You may well find that you need new employees, consultants, freelancers, agencies, or a combination of these options to meet your content creation and marketing strategy goals.Continue reading

Is your content marketing mobile-friendly? Before you answer, look at these five salient mobile marketing drivers.   Smartphone ownership rises U.S. Smartphone ownership is expected to reach a tipping point in the U.S., according to Nielsen.Continue reading

Before jumping onto the bandwagon that content marketing is just another cost, understand that Americans spend over 10 hours a day consuming content across media platforms. To reach your target audience, it’s critical to be where they are. Creating content across a variety of media formats that are integrated into an overall marketing plan can efficiently meet a range of prospect and customer needs while eliminating duplicate efforts and reducing costs.Continue reading