Here at Furlong PR, we are big believers in the pivotal role of expert content coupled with intelligent SEO on the bottom line. We have seen first-hand how content marketing can drive tangible results.

The gurus at Social Media Explorer (socialmediaexplorer.com) have already taken to their crystal balls, placing content marketing atop their social marketing trends for 2012.

So what’s new about content marketing? Social media pundits have been talking about this marketing discipline for years, but what has changed is buy-in at board level. Executives seem to have started to appreciate the positive impact that quality blog content, viral videos, white papers and the like can have on SEO and lead generation.

Content marketing requires quite a drastic rethink for many CMOs or CEO’s, in the sense that it asks brands to ‘be the media’ rather than feature ‘in the media’. The knee-jerk reaction has traditionally been that media=expensive=no thank you. But now that social media departments can begin to demonstrate the real business benefits of a strategy that incorporates content, budgets seem to be adapting to allow them to develop more sophisticated content strategies.

What does this mean for 2012? Socialmediaexplorer.com predicts that marketing departments will need to evolve their hiring strategies, seeking to match the demographics of content writers to their specific audiences. If 2012 really is the year that content marketing hits the mainstream, we expect to see a fresh focus on the creation and curation of quality content, which can only be a step forwards.

For the rest of Social Media Explorer’s social media trends for 2012, click here:

Everybody gets the importance of SEO to drive traffic to your blog; adding keywords is standard practice. But in a persuasive article for Clickz.com, Lee Odden argues that it is possible to become blinkered in the pursuit of top keywords.

Social media optimisation (SMO) – essentially optimising social content to drive direct traffic to blog content – can also push up search engine rankings for blog web pages.

But before you embark on making your blog (and website) social media friendly – here are six questions Odden suggests considering:

· Who is the blog intended to influence? Are you trying to reach prospects, customers, employees, industry analysts, reporters or fellow bloggers within your sector?

· What blog content will you offer to meet the needs of your target audience?

· How will you develop a structured blog content plan while addressing those customer needs and telling your brand’s story?

· What search keywords and social topics are relevant to your target audience?

· Where does your blog content fit in the customer lifecycle of communication with the brand?

· If the blog content is properly optimised and socialised, how will it influence (directly or indirectly) measurable business outcomes?

Remember, it’s one thing to attract people to read your blog, but getting them to engage and share your content is quite another challenge. Ask questions, invite your target audience to share content ideas, and always offer recognition to those who participate.

Once you stop focusing on your own brand story, and turn the spotlight onto your community – they will start to tell your story for you. And with the mechanics of social media working for you, so will their friends, and their friends’ friends – and the rest of their online networks and communities.

Picture this. You’re walking down the high street on a Saturday afternoon with your friend when hunger strikes. Two restaurants are coming up. One is crowded with diners filling their faces, windows steaming with the rising heat of plates of spaghetti bolognese. The other is empty, a bored-looking waitress drums her fingernails on the counter. Which one do you opt for?

You hit the bookshops next, searching for a Christmas present for your beloved. You skim the shelves, then pick up a book with a nice, catchy title. Splashed across the front are the words “bestseller” and numerous author and celebrity endorsements. Are you tempted?

Transfer this theory to the web, and think back to the last time you browsed blogs for your sector. Time is precious, and you only want to read something that’s worth it. Validation is key. Bullas calls this validation “social proof” – and urges you to provide it to attract users to your business blog above your competitors.

There are several ways to add social proof to your blog content, and thankfully they are simple. Consider adding widgets and banners such as Facebook Shares and Likes, blog or subscriber or Twitter follower numbers, retweet figures, LinkedIn shares, number of Google +1’s, monthly page views or even awards and ranking achievements.

Newspapers and magazines list their reader and subscriber figures to demonstrate social proof. Why? It validates each reader’s decision to purchase and ultimately sells more newspapers and magazines. Don’t be afraid to wear your credentials proudly to attract users to your blog.

Drowning in a sea of poor-quality, yet super-SEO posts is a very real risk. There is no point in crafting sublime copy if nobody is going to find it. Yet at Furlong PR, we are strong believers that the quality of your business blogs and other web content does not need to be compromised for the search engines.

Although aimed at traditional publishers, many of the tips Barak offered are equally useful to marketers – and will help in the contest for eyeballs.

1. Use real time data to stay ahead of the curve

Look both on your website (for example, traffic coming from a specific keyword search) and elsewhere (Twitter’s trending topics are ideal) to maximise the web’s role as barometer for news and happenings as they unfold.

2. Optimise your content for social as well as search

Your business blog and other web content has to be incredibly easy to share. Use the most popular social sharing buttons for Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, or YouTube if you’re using video content.

3. Use multimedia content

Following on from tip 2, remember that Yahoo, Google and Bing all show multi-format results on their first search engine results page (SERP). Think beyond text content and you’ll improve the chances of that content being found and shared.

4. Optimise your titles to drive shares

Your blog titles will be the first thing users see on social networks and search engines. Ensure that they are keyword-optimised, snappy and make use of sound bites to encourage comments and sharing.

5. Target the right search personas

Join the marketers who now create search personas to gain a deeper understanding of how their ideal online customers search online. Once you have built a clear and accurate search persona, tailor your content and style to match their needs and interests.

Tips adapted from searchenginewatch.com, click here for the original article.

A brand new study of 2,500 participants from the New York Times in conjunction with Latitude Research reveals the top 9 reasons (or skip straight to the end for a somewhat surprising Key Takeaway):

1. Your customers don’t trust you

Corporate mistrust is rife. Globally, only 56% of people trust businesses “to do what is right” (Source: 2011 Edelman Trust Barometer), falling in the US, the UK and Japan from 2010 to 2011. People won’t share your content if there is a lack of trust, so use the social space to drive honest and open public conversations.

2. Customers don’t care about your brand

Sorry, but customers are a fickle bunch. If you don’t offer at a minimum: valuable information, great deals and a forum to meet other like-minded people, they will look elsewhere. Don’t just feed them what they want; actively exceed their expectations.

3. Your posts are boring

Intriguing and funny content gets the most shares. Look to Volkswagen for inspiration. Their Star-Wars spoof video ‘The Force’ racked up over 40 million views. Of course, it helps to have an established power brand behind you, but the principle is to create ‘got to share it’ content.

4. Your content lacks passion

Generally speaking, people care about causes more than brands. Whether it’s eradicating poverty, saving the Polar bears or helping a local charity, many people give their time and money to advance things they care about. Your brand may not have a humanitarian cause, but reveal the passion behind your product or service to get people excited about something bigger.

5. People share to build their social networks

Research has found that people value relationships with other people over relationships with brands. Since they’re seeking an online community, you can use your brand to help create a platform for that community. Offer content that facilitates people in finding kindred spirits and then staying connected to those people. Red Bull did just this recently, creating a weekend playlist and inviting people to share YouTube links to their own favourite dance tunes.

6. Consumers, like everyone, seek validation

We’re all still just insecure, gawky teenagers at heart. We want to build credibility in the eyes of our peers, and come across as experts – and content sharing is the perfect medium for both. Some 68% of the New York Times study respondents said they share content as an advertisement for themselves (or to better reveal who they are). Appeal to customers’ vanity by offering intelligent, cool content that will boost their kudos by sharing it.

7. People share to manage information

Social media marketing scientists have found that people process information more “deeply, thoroughly and thoughtfully” through sharing it, and also understand and process information better through reading others’ responses to it. Be sure to offer thought-provoking content and invite feedback and comments from your audience.

8. You’ve misunderstood your audience

Think back to marketing school and the concept of a marketing persona. The concept encourages understanding your audience by creating detailed pictures of your ideal target customer. The New York Times study came up with six sharing personas. Interestingly, five of these sharing types actually identified email alongside social channels as a preferred sharing tool.

9. People love to share content via email

This study confirms that social media users have by no means abandoned email. In fact, they see it as a valuable and personal means of sharing content. With this in mind, it may help to look back to last week’s post on integrating social marketing with email.

Key Takeaway:

People’s primary motivation for sharing content is the relationships they have with one another. Therefore, aim to create content that enhances consumers’ relationships with one another rather than with your brand.

Source: Socialmediaexaminer.com

While the L.A. Times isn’t necessarily about to outpace the New York Times or Huffington Post in terms of readers, it has enjoyed a 5.4% year-on-year increase in uniques over June. Meanwhile, the Washington Post saw a decrease of 9%, the New York Times slumped by 18.8% and the Wall Street Journal by a hefty 20.5%. So, it’s time to take notice of a social media strategy that’s clearly working for the L.A. Times.

The cornerstone is a ramped up blogging strategy that has, according to niemanlab.org, “opened new doors for reader engagement”. Weaving news into blog content and even breaking stories within blogs, has fuelled engagement. Add to the mix a new SEO chief, optimising search-friendly headlines for the web, and traffic from search has leapt by 65% from this time last year. Combine the next ingredient, enhanced Facebook marketing to drive reader comments, and the result is a happy vicious circle. A larger community creates more traffic which creates more conversation and sharing around the Times’ content…and so on.

Orr puts the blogs’ recent traffic-driving success down to excellent content writers and high frequency posting. A recent move to integrate Facebook commenting has also driven quality comments as well as driving traffic from Facebook. In fact, since adding Facebook comments to about 50% of the site, including most blogs, latimes.com is now getting 450% more traffic referred from Facebook than this time last year.

All in all, the latimes.com is a welcome success story within a climate in which many organisations, news and other, are struggling to attract all-important traffic. While the paper is still on a learning curve as it adapts to online, Orr sounds positive about the migration: “There is a misperception that when you put something up on the web, it’s a crapshoot whether people are going to see this or not going to see this,” he said. “In reality, you are much more in control of whether your story is read than many people think.”

Do a lot more giving and a lot less selling

A company needs to create unmissable content before it can make any money from blogging. Your audience wants value and information, not more advertising. Many companies with something to sell haven’t tapped into this yet.

Be a person first

This can be particularly tricky for a big company comprised of individuals with different ideas of what the business is about. But ensure you have a unified voice within social media marketing, and most importantly, that you come across as human.

Know what you want to achieve

Even a huge audience won’t create ROI magically. Know exactly what kind of content will attract people to your business before posting anything. Understand what people want, focus on giving it to them and understand you’ll achieve your goals on the back-side of that.

Think of SEO and social media as one process…with two results

You have to attract traffic and links before you can rank well in search engines. Social media is a great way to drive direct traffic, but remember you can also rank for targeted terms with search that will drive even more valuable, focussed traffic.

Social media creates immediate and lucrative benefits, but SEO offers a longer-term, ‘evergreen’, advantage.

Write ‘cornerstone content’

Serve up what your readers most need to know to make use of your website and ultimately to do business with you. Then provide a whole lot of value around that content so people like it and link to it.

Get re-tweeted

The real-time web is king of relevance, and Google needs to be relevant to stay in business. Twitter is a fantastic content redistribution system, and Google is most definitely paying attention. Get your content re-tweeted as much as possible, and pretty soon Google will index you faster.

Given that there were some 152 million blogs live at the last count (BlogPulse: December 2010), the bad news is that most people will never find you online. Follow these 10 steps, however, by Demian Farnworth for copyblogger.com, and the good news is you can beat online obscurity for once and for all…

1. Dominate LinkedIn groups

Joining LinkedIn groups in itself isn’t enough. Embark on a posting and commenting spree and the potential to become an online influencer is vast – even from groups that you haven’t started.

2. Give away content for nothing

Remember, visibility and exposure are the most important things for a nascent business blog. Farnworth cites online powerhouses Seth Godin, Hugh MacLeod and Leo Babauta among those who started off by giving away a large part of their best stuff for free.

3. Write guest articles (with a twist)

It takes time for a new website or blog to gain traction and reach the critical mass where people are returning regularly. While it’s naturally tempting to keep all the best content for your own blog, Farnworth suggests putting the best stuff on other established blogs to gain all-important exposure. The risk of using more mediocre blog content yourself is, he suggests, far outweighed by the risk of online obscurity.

4. Reply to comments

You cannot afford not to have a voice in the comment section of your blog. Rather than think of it as a time-consuming courtesy, see it as an absolute necessity. Ensure your comments are thought-provoking and always ask questions to lead the conversation.

5. Promote other experts in your industry

The first rule of blogging is to forget one’s fascination with oneself. Nobody really cares. But wherever you see excellence in others, spread the word. Use their case studies within your blog posts and spread exemplary work via Twitter or LinkedIn.

6. Facebook is your research laboratory

Ask questions, and then remember to listen. People like to be asked their opinions, and you can boost both popularity and visibility by working those questions and comments.

7. Follow 237 Twitter power users who follow back

Check out Social Media Watch’s list of Twitter users who will follow you if you follow them. It will take some time, but ask yourself whether you can spare an hour or two to see serious results in your Twitter marketing. Having rounded up the followers, maximise the relationship by asking questions and re-tweeting often.

8. Email key influencers

According to Farnworth, every single famous person that he emailed during the past ten years responded to him. Email works as a gateway into the minds of great people who can often help you. Don’t be shy.

9. Create SEO-friendly videos

Take a leaf from 20 year-old MC Lil B’s book, whose web repertoire appears lifted from a beginners guide to SEO. Constant tweeting, video dialogue with his fanbase and spars with other celebrities fire up his fans to make YouTube responses to his songs. Stick to the fundamentals of SEO (content, keywords and linking) to start showing up on more searches.

10. Wear an eye patch

Not literally, but think back to Ogilvy’s 1951 ‘The Man in the Hathaway Shirt’ campaign. For those that may have forgotten, Ogilvy put an eyepatch on its Russian aristocrat protagonist, and with that simple twist made his ad stand out from hundreds of others for men’s shirts. The point in all this: think unique, useful, urgent and ultra-specific to make your blog content stand out from the crowd.

But it’s not as simple as inviting owners of popular blogs to exchange links. Warner Carter, blogging for Technorati, suggests approaching link exchange similarly to a business deal or interview.

Branding is a critical starting point. This means investing in a unique blog design rather than opting for a free template. Think of it as dressing to impress for a job interview to make yourself stand out from the crowd.

Other blog owners will also scrutinise your blog content to assess your proposition. Carter advises creating at least 15 quality posts before embarking on a link-building campaign. It demonstrates commitment and dedication both as a blogger and a business.

Though it can take time, a solid network makes for a more appealing blog. Promote your blog before launching into link building, inviting comments and threaded conversations to lure target readers.

It’s worth considering that many blog owners will avoid linking with standalone business blogs. A high-ranking main business website demands respect, so it pays to invest in website optimisation as part of a broader digital strategy.

Remember, link building with non-related business is a total waste of time. It pays to seek out companies that will extend your network, boost traffic and ultimately bring in interested customers.

In the first instance, the report confirmed that social media use and blog consumption are both on the rise in the US. The number of Facebook users climbed from 80% of online Americans last year to 87% this year, closing the gap between Facebookers and consumers of offline television (93%). BlogHer also found that 40% of online Americans read blogs (up from 37% in 2010) and 22% use Twitter (up from 16% last year).

A striking trend revealed by the study is the impact that blogs now have on online shopping habits. Around half (53%) of respondents (88% of those who describe themselves as active blog readers) said that they trust the information supplied in blogs that they visit regularly, with nearly one-quarter of the US population (24%) indicating that they make purchases based on blog content – rising to 53% of active blog readers.

What’s more, women tend to respond better to endorsements by trusted bloggers than by well-known celebrities when it comes to learning more about a product or making a purchase.

It’s worth noting that blogs and Facebook combine to form a powerful media pairing for BlogHer’s respondents, who cited both as the media channels that they consume regularly and are ‘passionate’ about. Integrating a business blog into a multi-faceted social media strategy is one potentially effective method of reaching this audience where they are most engaged.

BlogHer’s fourth annual study into women’s social media use patterns compared two samples: one comprised of women from the general population (via partner Nielsen) and one gathered from the BlogHer community of active blog consumers.