An Bui, Spelled An With 1 N

Apparently I need to clear my cache, because when I went back to Mack Collier’s blog, I didn’t get redirected to his new site.

Instead, I saw this title: “The idea that ‘content is king’ in blogging is total bullshit”

According to Mack, “Being Social is [king in blogging]”

The idea that good or even great content is not enough. Besides, “Good” or “Great” content isn’t even actionable - it’s too abstract. So let’s get concrete.

What makes good content?

1. Applies to your target audience

2. Findable or discoverable by your target audience

3. Helps or is otherwise useful to your target audience

For example, if you were trying to launch a new boutique geared towards teens/early 20’s demographic, you’d want to offer clothes they’d want to wear. You’d make your retail location accessible to them and you’d make it easy for them walk in by literally leaving your doors open.

One company that did this well? Abercrombie & Fitch, which changed its business from offering outdoors gear to offering clothing for the Tweens/Young Adult demographic. They even got a mention in LFO’s summer hit (’99), “Summer Girls”

Same deal with online marketing.

1. Provide germane (relevant) content - answer questions your audience may have or give them information they want to know.

2. Findability/searchability means that search engines can crawl AND index your content. If your content can’t be found, your audience can’t find you.

3. Helps or is otherwise useful - the call to action is so valuable for this reason. If you let people know what to do next and they want what you’re offering, you’ve lowered the barrier for purchase, adoption, etc.

So why does being social matter?

1. You get invaluable feedback loops from others - your content can improve based on customer/user feedback. You learn what resonates with people and what they think is worth repeating. Given the speed of publishing social media, you can iterate more quickly - concept to publishing no longer takes weeks or months.

2. You enable people to find out about you sooner, rather than later. Trust takes time. If you’re hanging out by yourself online generating amazing content, search is basically the only channel by which others can discover you. By leaving your blog, going to others’ and leaving insightful (not spammy!) comments, you’re creating other channels for people to discover you.

3. By adding or providing value (ie - being useful) you start building trust. Intention matters. Be open and honest about who you are, what interests you, and what you find interesting.

Good content is the minimum barrier to entry and great social content helps you learn, grow and refine your thinking.

Thanks to Deb Robison for the conversation that spawned this blog post and Mack Collier for his thoughts.

via flickr user welmo

My favorite memories of college were cross country and track practice. While XC and track both increase your fitness by running, the approaches were quite different. 

Cross country was more freeform. You’d go out on long runs and just run. You could run hills, through creeks, deal with trails. You adjusted on the fly and the key is going long and hard. Try running five miles at an average pace of eight minute miles. Interval training on varied terrain for 1 or 1.5k happened every week, and much of the work happened on the trails. 

via flickr user nocklebeast

In contrast, track workouts were interval based on a track. 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1000 meter repeats. Run, time, record. Try and hit consistent splits with every interval. 

Over time, your times get better. This was true in both XC and track. 

However, times in XC had more variance. Why? Courses were different. Some had more hills, turns, tree roots, rain, streams, hay bales than others. These factors affect your time.

Track times tended to be more consistent because a track is a more controlled racing environment. It’s 400m, outdoors. The surface may be cinder, rubber, or gravel. The turns’ tightness may vary, but it’s basically some form of oval.

Now what does this have to do with Social Media and PPC?

Social Media and PPC both help you reach your online marketing goals in different ways. 

Think of social media as XC. The landscape varies. Twitter, Facebook, blogs are all different. The interaction paradigms vary in part because of the content that is share and in part because of the people you can connect with. You can show up, listen and share information with people you connect with. It’s a long term marketing strategy.  

Think of PPC as track. You have the search engines. You buy your ads and keywords and you can calculate your PPC ROI and adjust over time. You try to hit your click through rates and lead gen goals. 

With both XC and track you get fit. Fitness from XC and track complement each other - you run better times for running both. 

Think that’s true for Social Media and PPC as well?

The lovely weather in Seattle inspired me to pull out my madras skirt. Madras is synonymous with “summer” to me. Seersucker is another one of those fabrics that whisper promises of sunshine, warmth and bbq. 

As lucky as I am to have both madras and seersucker in my closet, I wanted to know who else was searching for madras and seersucker:

Madras & Seersucker Search Volume 2006 - Present

I chose a longer time period because I wanted to see the seasonal effects, given that madras and seersucker are spring to summer fabrics. I was also curious to see if the current economic situation affected search volume. At this time, the data suggests a possible correlation. 

Let’s drill in to 2008:

Madras and Seersucker Search Volume 2008

Just as I suspected - searches for both peak from May to June. That’s prime bbq, picnic, garden party and crawfish boil time. Late enough in spring that you have confidence in nice weather, early enough in summer that the heat hasn’t peaked. 

And just where are these people searching for seersucker and madras?

Regional Interest in Seersucker 2008

Apparently, seersucker and madras are popular search terms in the South, South Atlantic and Massachusetts. The prime madras-seeking crowd centers are Massachusetts, Washington DC and Georgia. Those seeking seersucker are in South Carolina and Louisiana. 

Perhaps my time in both Massachusetts and Louisiana explains why seersucker and madras mean sunshine. For those curious, today’s a madras skirt day. My seersucker jacket’s staying in my closet. For now.

*update* for those curious as to what seersucker is…

From Flickr User dnkbdotcom

Want to know more about madras?

I spent the last week in Eastern Washington, at Learn About Web. Craig Sutton of Network Task and BrightWeb Marketing did an amazing job pulling together an event that spawned many conversations and enabled everyone, even the speakers, to learn at least one new thing.

Learn About Web, a conference for small and medium business owners, marketers, and consultants, focuses on leveraging web technologies and various applications to achieve various business goals and benefit the bottom line.

I spoke about Marketing to Generation Y, and got a great refresher on link building from Jennifer Laycock.

A highly informative overview of site architecture from Stoney DeGeyter and local search from Matt McGee. Mack Collier also shared an interesting business case of building a brand, which Tim Jackson did for Masi Bicycles with zero marketing dollars.

Learn About Web was a steal at $129.00 - lots of implementable action items, such as checking out what people are saying about you in Yelp, using the blogs to host conversations and understand the customer, or using Google alerts to know when someone has written about your company.

The next Learn About Web will be in either the spring or early fall - come out to Eastern Washington, the heart of the Washington wine country, and learn something new about using the web to increase revenue and/or cultivate your customer base.