#meta: what we learned from our own content marketing case study

#Meta: What We Learned From Our Own Content Marketing Case Study

#thinkcontent | @newscred

Marcus Stoll NewsCred – Demand Generation Specialist @stollyolly

Amber van Natten NewsCred – Managing Editor @moxieingreen

Agenda

•  The challenges we faced

•  Our goals and approach

•  Building our newsroom and distribution

•  The results of our efforts, and how you can set yourself up to track effectively

Our Challenges Our Goals and Approach

The Results of our Efforts

Building our Newsroom and Distribution

How can we stand apart in a crowded landscape?



We realized we needed to stop marketing to brands.


And instead, start connecting with people.


We needed to educate the market.

There’s been a fundamental shift in the way we create,

consume, and share content.

Every single day…

4.75 billion piece of content are shared

1.8 billion photos are uploaded and shared

500 million Tweets are posted

700 million Snapchats are sent

#thinkcontent

The content journey is the customer journey

70% of B2B and B2C buying decisions are made before a buyer ever reaches sales.

Sirius Decisions 2014

Our Goals and Approach



Our Goals and Approach Our Challenges

NewsCred Goals

Is our content reaching the right audience? Grow brand awareness with our target audience, measured by growth in social followers, traffic, and social engagement.



Are the right people engaging with our content? Grow number of influencers engaging with our content (people meaningful to our Sales Team).

NewsCred Goals




Is our content converting? Total subscribes to our blog, subscribers that convert to leads, % of people that convert from our blog to our main website.

NewsCred Goals




Is our content converting? Total subscribes to our blog, subscribers that convert to leads, % of people that convert from our blog to our main website.

Is our content driving the business forward? How many blog subscribes convert to actual leads and how does this trend over time? What is the conversion rate to opportunity stage and deal? And, for every sales deal and customer, how many (and which) pieces of content influence the customer journey?

NewsCred Goals


OLD WAY

Brand-led

Ad campaigns

Demographics

NEW WAY

Value-driven

Always-on content

The individual

We took a different approach.


NewsCred Brand Purpose

Fundamentally disrupting the marketing industry from the ground up by transforming the way brands connect with people. Content

Marketing BRAND

PURPOSE WHAT

CUSTOMERS WANT

Target Audience: Marketers

•  B2B and B2C marketers and executives from small businesses all the way to Fortune 500 companies.

•  Looking for help in doing their job better and delivering real results

The NewsCred blog: A destination filled with industry news, trends, and thought leadership to educate and provide value to marketers






Our Challenges

We built our marketing team with content at the core: -  Managing editor -  Social strategist -  2 designers -  8 freelance writers -  Employee contributors


Licensed Content Custom Content Social Content

Utilize The Right Mix of Content, and Scale it

Licensed Content Boost credibility, publishing cadence and direct traffic with a high-volume of fully-licensed, compliant content.

Custom Content Share on-brand stories and recipes which are created specifically for your brand.

Social Content Leverage snackable content through UGC that engages your target audience.

Custom Content Share on-brand stories and recipes which are created specifically for your brand.

Social Content Leverage snackable content through UGC that engages your target audience.

Licensed Content Boost credibility, publishing cadence, and direct traffic with a high-volume of fully-licensed, compliant content.


Content for Every Stage of the Buyer’s Journey

NewsCred’s best practices for utilizing content across buyer journey

Top of the Funnel

Quality, custom and licensed content focused on helping to answer our customer’s challenges and define the future of content marketing. Often focuses on longtail SEO keywords.

Middle of the Funnel

High value, original resources created for our Academy. Useful, timely, and also hits on niche topics specific to NewsCred’s offering and solutions.

Bottom of the Funnel

Custom content converting leads to customers: case studies, product offers, comparison guides, analyst reports, etc.

Customer Stage

Retaining customers with content specific to their industry and pain points, newsletters, product updates, and tutorials/training

Awareness

Retain

Evaluation

Purchase



We Take Design Seriously




Our Challenges


•  Digestible content: Top 2 posts are infographics.

•  The BuzzFeed effect: 4 of top 10 articles had headlines with words like: "top," "best," "most.”

•  Know your audience: 35% of top 20 articles have the mention of "content marketing" or "content

marketers.”

•  Stats matter: 70% of top 10 articles have numbers in the headline.

•  Stay familiar: 25% of top 20 articles have a brand name mentioned in the headline - Ello, Vice,

BuzzFeed, Nike, and Red Bull.


Newsletters are Vital for Identifying Trends and Takeaways

Our Social Marketing Best Practices


Best Practices: Twitter

–  Cadence: NewsCred shares 1 Tweet an hour, 7 days a week between 8am and 2am – an average of 18 tweets per day

–  Don’t be afraid to post the same

Tweet more than once – or with A/B variations*

–  Say thanks – it’s the most effective way to increase organic engagement + followers

*Companies who test are 75% more likely to show ROI for content marketing than those who fail to test their strategies.


Best Practices: Twitter

–  Interact with your audience on a personal level.

–  Be visual: Tweets with photos are 150% more likely to be retweeted (78% of user engagement with a brand’s tweets is via retweeting)

–  Tell a story: 120-130 character tweets get the most engagement but you have 1 second to get their attention


Best Practices: Facebook

–  Cadence: NewsCred posts 2x per day, 5-7 days per week

–  Visuals are the most crucial

element to Facebook posts – posts with photos get 53% more likes, 104% comments, 84% click-throughs

–  Content: should be varied, cultural + educational


Best Practices: LinkedIn

–  Cadence: NewsCred posts 2x per day, 5-7 days per week

–  Content: must have content in addition to company updates and recruiting posts > High value content works very well here

–  Voice: most authoritative of the three platforms due to demographics


Distribution Recommendations •  4-1-1 Rule: 4 of your posts, 1 influencer post, 1 publisher post •  Follow and mention influencers, publishers as often as possible •  Test paid distribution •  Think of social as a two-way street

Client Influencer Publisher


1 original and 5 licensed posts/week

5 original and 5 licensed posts/ week

By Increasing our Original Content Production Our Traffic Jumped


BEFORE AFTER April 2014



___ Unique visitors increase

By Increasing our Original Content Production Our Traffic Jumped



49%

2-5 new articles shared/ week across social channels

~2 new articles and 20 recycled articles shared/ day

Our Social Sharing Drove Increases in Reach and Engagement





Our Social Sharing Drove Increases in Reach and Engagement



___ Social traffic jump

60% ___ Social share increase

2.6x

-

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

$-

$1,000

$2,000

$3,000

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep

Social promotion ($) Social Shares

-

20,000

40,000

60,000

$-

$1,000

$2,000

$3,000

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep

Social promotion ($) Reach (uniques)

Social Ad Spend Directly Related to Reach + Engagement (duh!)




But How Did This Translate Into Conversions?



___ Blog subscribe increase

30% ___ Of our normal MQL cost

50%


&


&


We Carefully Optimize Our Blog for Conversions

High value content plays a huge role as well. These pieces are our best way to turn blog subscribes into more than just an email address.

–  On average, one whitepaper drives:

2,000 leads

400 leads (20%) in our target demographic*

3 opportunities

–  Including costs around paid distribution, the ROI for one of our

whitepapers is nearly 800%

That’s about $8 back for every $1 we put in

* our target demographic is a Marketing Director or above at a company with $700m+ in annual revenue

But it’s not Just About More Blog Articles



Our Targeted Landing Pages Convert at Over 40%

Our Promotion Strategies

•  Sponsored emails •  Sponsored webinars

•  Native ads

•  Events

•  Paid social updates

•  Organic social updates

•  SEM/SEO

•  Direct traffic

•  Internal emails (sales + distro)


How We Are Tracking ROI

•  Marketing automation + CRM •  UTM parameters on our links

•  Campaigns for each effort Track total cost + leads

•  External “warehouse” to roll up your programs


Measure Everything – From Lead to the Sale

Measure revenue •  Deals closed •  Monthly Revenue •  MRR / Customer

Track costs •  Cost •  CPL •  CAC

Understand value •  Monthly Profit •  Months to break even •  LTV •  LTV/ CAC


But That’s Only First-Touch, What About Multi-Touch Attribution? •  Lead Source tracking: Original AND Recent

•  Field for # of pieces of content engaged with (1, 2, 3…)

Can segment this out – guides, articles, emails, etc

•  Sequence of 5 blank fields

As someone downloads a new piece, these fields start filling out: 1 – Ed. Calendar

2 – ROI Guide

3 – Strategy Webinar

From there, lists and filtering!

•  Software bolt-ons to Salesforce


Leads that have engaged with content are twice as likely to accept a meeting with us.


Leads that have engaged with content are twice as likely to accept a meeting with us.

…and once they turn into a client



Client Engagement w/ Content = Loyalty & Renewals

___ Higher renewal rate

41% ___ More likely to be upsold

33% ___ Higher MRR than average

24%


Our content directly influenced over $72M in customer lifetime

value in 2014.

Want to learn how to apply similar strategies for your brand?



We can help. Our end-to-end software platform and strategy team are built to help you create and execute on content people love.



We can help. Our end-to-end software platform and strategy team are built to help you create and execute on content people love.

Trusted by the world’s leading brands

[email protected] [email protected]

[email protected]


Questions?

Let’s build something incredible. [email protected]

#meta: what we learned from our own content marketing case study

Marketing

content journey

content people meaningful

pieces of content

piece of content

challenges newscred

right people

right audience

social followers