I am one of those people who swears by research. I never use an appliance before I read the complete manual and I never do anything at work before I research the tried and tested best practices. So trust me when I say I did a lot of research to come up with this list of content promotion and I tested it out too.
Some people say you have to spend as much time promoting your content as you do writing. Others go further and say you have to spend 20% of your time writing and 80% promoting. Well, you get it—you can get better results with fewer pieces of content if you back them up with a solid promotion plan.
So here’s the content amplification list we use at Progress to make sure we never miss a content promotion opportunity. It lists owned, earned and paid channels to help build holistic promotion plans more quickly. Dig in and I hope you find it useful.
I know some of you might be thinking “Thank you, Captain Obvious!” but there’s a reason for me to put this on the list. I’ve seen many marketers severely underestimate the power of their company website. Skim down the list to see if you won’t find something interesting despite the obviousness of this tip:
As my marketing experience is in the B2B sector, I’ve mostly worked with Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Google+. I feel like these social media channels are a must for every business and are a great way for you to share content and reach your audience.
I’m hearing success stories on using Instagram and Snapchat for business, but by no means am I an expert on this topic. This is why I prefer to refer you to this podcast discussing Snapchat vs. Instagram Stories and how brands and people are using the platforms in unique ways.
Some companies could do better in regards to their social media channels by making sure they have a long-term dedication to every asset they create. Don’t just share an asset once. If it’s an evergreen piece, make sure you constantly share it in social media with different perspectives, quotes, images, etc. For specific recommendations, check out the article Why You Should Share Your Blog Post More Than Once on Social Media: The Case for Reposting Content.
Writing up a blog post on a relevant topic and linking to your main, preferably gated, asset is one of my favorite promotional tactics. Why? Because if you provide valuable information, your fans and third-party media will help spread the word about it. This way you get a lot of free additional exposure for your main asset and if it’s gated, this means free leads! Here are some ideas on content you can create for your blogs:
By definition newsletters exist to share content with your audience. If your company doesn’t have one and you create a lot of valuable content, think about putting one in place.
Another channel to reach your audience is YouTube. This is resource-intensive, but if you have a video producer in-house, you can put together a video teaser for your main asset’s topic to spark the interest of people to download/view/read it. Add a link to the asset in the video itself and in the video description.
If you have a valuable piece of content, which is going to generate a lot of industry interest, you can ask for the help of the PR expert on your team to reach out to media and pitch the topic. If your topic is approved, you can publish content on a third-party website and link to your main asset (if accepted by the media).
As the forefront of your company, they can include information about current valuable assets in their signatures or direct customers and prospects to the assets, if it addresses their questions/concerns.
Draft social media messages and reach out to your colleagues asking them to share in their networks if they find the content interesting. For large companies, underestimating the total workforce might result in a lot of untapped potential.
Identify where people talk about the topics you cover in your content and make sure you participate with your point of view. If it’s relevant and will be considered helpful from the community, post a link to your asset. Do an extensive research for conversations happening in industry forums, LinkedIn groups, Quora, etc.
Research people who create content on the same topic as your asset and identify opportunities for collaboration. If you can build a relationship with them, perhaps somewhere down the road they could:
These two booming content channels can do miracles for the right type of content, because they give enormous exposure. I really liked this example on what cross-posting can do for you: Why Every Blog Post Should Be Cross-Posted to LinkedIn and Medium.
You can repurpose your main asset into a presentation and post it on SlideShare. While SlideShare doesn’t allow live links to your website, you can add clickable URLs within the presentation itself. Adding a visual and written cue can help too. Here’s an example of a recent SlideShare we posted:
Companies like Outbrain, Taboola and ContentGain are becoming increasingly popular with content marketers, because they enable you to promote your articles on premium publishing sites in a native-like manner for their user experience. Let’s say I am reading one of these publishing websites. If I am the right target for your article, I will see it as recommended alongside other recommended articles from this site. And although your article will be labeled as “Sponsored,” users don’t seem to mind the ad, since the content is valuable.
Partner with media who will host and promote your asset on their properties and provide you with the list of leads they generate for you.
This is pretty self-explanatory—talk to media to either create content or post your content on their properties. Use this content to promote your main assets.
I hope my blog gave you an interesting perspective into how to go about promoting your content. What do you do for content promotion that I left off my list? Please contribute to my ever-developing research on the topic in the comments below. Happy promotion!
Paulina Tsolova has 6+ years of experience in different areas of B2B marketing, including product positioning and messaging, demand generation, digital campaign management and content marketing. Her biggest passion is looking for new target audience insights and applying them to the customer journey to increase conversions.
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