by Tom Ruwitch
Smart marketers know they can attract leads, engage prospects and convert more sales if they deliver informative, entertaining content via email, social media, blogs and other media. But many small-business people struggle with content creation.
Producing original content can challenge even the most accomplished businessperson. I hear it often: “I don’t know what to write. I’m not a writer.”
With good planning, content creation can be much easier than you think. Better yet, you do not have to create all the content you publish. If you are a good content curator, you can deliver enormous value.
Here’s an example on my company’s blog: MarketVolt.com/curator. The post is about an article I read that describes how to create compelling email content. The article I reference contains data proving email marketing’s effectiveness.
This is information I want to share with my readers. Rather than delivering that information with content I compose from scratch, I deliver that information by curating someone else’s article.
The headline for my post reads: “Who Says Email’s Impact Has Declined?” The first sentence: “Here’s one of the best articles I’ve read in months about email marketing” (with a link to the article).
In my post, I put the article in context, noting why it is important. I summarize a few key points from the article, and I elaborate briefly on the key points. I spent less than 10 minutes writing the post.
A museum’s value stems not just from the work of the master artists; it also stems from the work of the curators who choose the art to display and who write the informative descriptions that describe the art and its context.
Think of your email newsletter, blog and social media as a museum of informative, valuable content. If you can, create some of the content yourself, but supplement that with curated content.
Where do you find content to share? Start with Google. I use google.com/blogsearch and google.com/news to find experts’ posts, industry news and trends related to my industry. I have set Google to deliver those search results to your email box each day. I also like to use technorati.com to search the blogosphere for content to curate.
On LinkedIn, I connect with other experts industry and occasionally share their content. On Twitter, I use twitter.com/search to find all posts about my industry and to find experts I can follow.
I subscribe to email newsletters and follow social media feeds of those who publish informative content and news in my industry.
You can find great content for your industry if you look. If you share it with your subscribers or visitors, you provide a service to them and your business will grow.
Tom Ruwitch is founder and president of MarketVolt, a St. Louis-based interactive marketing firm and ESP. For a free e-book that offers more detail on email marketing best practices, go to MarketVolt.com/hero.
Submitted 10 years 54 days ago