If you think of the Internet as a huge market, there are lots of consumers out there. The lot is a potential market which can boost sales and brand popularity. Finding a way to reach the untapped market is what’s left to do.

When you engage with people, you put yourself out there. You let them know you are open and willing to listen as well as establish a relationship. It’s essential for a writer to know these things as they know the content piece well enough to explain them to end users.

2018 is the year and age of digital engagement. Here’s how writers become marketers during and after creating an engaging content piece.

1. The blog is a free and creative outlet.

Bloggers are modern-day poets while writers become digital strategists. Some of them set up a blog or two to express their thoughts no-holds-barred and share their interests. Others have one to further their online presence. A blog is a great avenue to attract new customers and set up a loyal base of followers. It’s also useful for widening a brand’s reach.

Use it as much as possible. Set up an account and make use of free hosted platforms. Most blog accounts have built-in comment sections. There are also share buttons and settings allowing you to boost your content to other platforms. Utilize all of them by replying to comments and publishing your content to the social profiles you have.

2. Baiting becomes a habit.

Online marketing has one goal – user engagement. The person who sees your content must be interested in the topic to click on the post. This part is where writing skills become handy. Writers must no only write for their satisfaction. They must also peak the interest of end-users, encourage them to explore the content, and consume it until the end.

Thus, you must create an attention-grabbing title and body to retain the users on the site. Click-baiting becomes a hobby especially when you prioritize search engine and social media analytics. However, baiting isn’t an invitation to create spammy and fraudulent content. A viral material can be a blessing or a curse. Consider your next steps wisely before settling on a decision that may disrupt your digital marketing campaign.

3. There are two options – serving the people or serving Google.

Choosing Google means SEO writing. SEO writing means using keywords and delving into topics that interest a group of people. Hence, most written pieces optimized for search engines are part of a niche or a target industry. An SEO company hell-bent to provide fast results so they end up with static and technical content.

If you want to earn the sympathy or organic traffic, you must also write for the people. Try not to avoid users from awkward keyword anchors and repetitive or outdated content. To hit two birds with a stone, take the customer service route. Write with the needs and queries of people in mind. That way, you bait the right people and make them loyal to the brand without sacrificing the keyword.

4. You take a lot of personalities and responsibilities.

Due to the broad topics under your wing, you take a lot of personalities. You become sweet and direct when creating a piece about Korean skincare. Other times, you take the long route to cover the basics of Google Analytics. Sometimes, you become a storyteller. The personalities you take on depends on the piece you are currently working.

Consequently, it becomes your job to publish the content piece. It also becomes your job to create a content plan. Most of all, you stretch your creative juices to come up with graphics, photos, and videos.

The style of writing, flow of words, and readability all influence users to consume a written content. Meanwhile, the visuals make their stay worth-while. All of these can result in a sale, an offer or a referral.

Online writing in the 21st century doesn’t center on words, grammar, and ideas. Content creation through writing has more to it than meets the eye. You have to maintain a blog, see that people visit the blog, and ensure they take corresponding actions.

The post A Writer Becomes a Marketer: Digital Engagement in the 21st Century appeared first on Internet Marketing Reach.

Among all the social media platforms, LinkedIn is considered as the leading avenue to connect with other industry professionals. Those who work in the digital industry are even more encouraged to utilize the platform to further their connections and find more opportunities for employment and partnership.

Sadly, only a few manage to use the full potential of the platform. Aside from providing one’s primary professional credentials, LinkedIn can also be used in publishing written content relevant to whatever field of expertise you have.

If you want to start posting, then these tips will help you boost your content’s overall value.

Refine your targeting

Before writing anything, your first job is to identify the specific profile of your readers. You cannot expect to gain high response if you attempt to impress everyone in your content. That’s just not possible. The best way to go is to create a clear profile of your readers. What is their demographics? What type of content do they need? What is their age range?

All of these questions will be helpful in narrowing down your topics to things that matter to your readers. Anything that falls outside of their interest must be taken out of your editorial calendar.

Reread some of your past content

Just because you’ve published about something does not mean that you cannot use it again. To propel future posts, you can always use them as your reference and create an improved entry using the information.

There is a higher chance that your new connections have not yet read your past entry. Do them the favor of writing about it again using a different angle.

Have a look at your posts’ analytics

Just like other social media networks, LinkedIn also has its analytics. Utilize the tool to get a clearer assessment of the performance of your posts. This should tell you the number of likes, comments, and shares that a particular post has.

By understanding the analytics, it also helps you find out what type of content appeals to your readers better.

Learn from the experts

Since you are trying to share content to co-professionals, might as well learn from those individuals who are considered as an authority in your field. Search and connect with them on LinkedIn and see what type of topics they share with their network.

You can use them as the reference in crafting your editorial calendar. Plus, you will get the chance on knowing other personalities who might be among your target reader based on a post’s response.

Focus on topics you have expertise at.

Lastly, provide content on topics that you have mastery on. Whether you admit it or not, your expertise in a certain field will be reflected in the kind of content you produce. The tone of writing or delivery will also be reflective of your knowledge on the topic you wish to write about.

It’s always an advantage to go for topics you are familiar with especially those which you have hands on experience.

Aside from being an avenue to meet new people who work in the same industry as you do, LinkedIn can also be a chance to establish your professional credibility by publishing written works about your area of specialization. One may not find it as efficient as starting an official website, but considering the quality of people who are likely to read your content, it is safe to say that you’ll have the better chance of boosting your credentials on your field.

Target your readers well, learn from the masters and start creating your content!

The post Tips to Create Better Content in LinkedIn appeared first on Internet Marketing Reach.

Guest blogging remains to be the topmost choice of the creators. However, there is one important strategy that these creators forgot about: syndication. No, this is not about paid networks, but rather the organic channels syndicating the RSS feed of your blog.

Syndication is the process of republishing contents as is on other websites with proper credit to the content’s original author. Syndication has various benefits, some of which are:

• More traffic
• Wider reach and sharing
• Content exposure to new audiences
• Obtain expert status
• Obtain quality links
• Better search ranking

Further, syndication is often frowned upon by creators because of the following reasons:

1) Duplicate content

Google penalizes duplicate content; we all know that. However, the attribution will make it clear to Google bots which is the original article actually. Ranking authority (or link juice) will be passed onto the right website. This is the reason you should syndicate contents on reputable syndication networks, putting a link that points to the original article.

If, in case, you have a reputable network in hand but will not link the article, simply put a canonical URL. You can do this through Yoast SEO plugin, advanced setting in WordPress. Go to the editable blog post and input the canonical link.

2) Stagnant traffic

Traffic will stay on the syndicated network and won’t necessarily flow back to the actual website. To continue with the above, traffic will pick up because of the link back to the original article. Such a link is regarded as a quality link.

Further, syndicated contents allow the readers to know more about the topic, clicking through the entire website is possible.

3) Status dilution

If you already have an expert status, this might be diluted and spread too thin on the syndicated networks. This won’t happen as long as you get to share your contents to those who will find value in it. Keeping it in one place is kind of selfish.

Oppositely, if you have yet to establish your credibility and authority, syndication could be the perfect venue.

Come to think of it, we painstakingly create contents. The next best thing for us is to have as many people as possible to read such content. On the other end, we should not treat syndication as a panacea. We shall all proceed with caution.

Anyhow, here are some of the content syndication best practices.

• Choose only the highest quality sites possible
• Make sure the site manually reviews every post
• Make sure the site is not using RSS feeds automation
• Ensure the fit between your content and the site
• Publish regularly for at least three months prior to contacting the site
• Make sure the site checks for blogging consistency
• Write about consistent themes
• Write following a concrete, well-planned editorial guidelines
• Provide adequate internal links to the to-be syndicated contents
• Ensure the existence of relevant conversion elements on your site

Here are some of the best sites to syndicate content:

1.         Quora
2.         Reddit
3.         AllBusiness
4.         BizSugar
5.         Huffington Post
6.         Business Insider
7.         Social Media Today
8.         Business2Community
9.         The Social Customer

Original content is still king. We all love that phrase. So, don’t go overboard with content syndication. Make sure that the contents you will syndicate offer great value to whoever will read it otherwise the purpose of syndication will be futile. What will it be – to syndicate or not to syndicate?

The post Content Syndication… Really? appeared first on Internet Marketing Reach.