@ckilgs Digital Marketing Blog

Keeping on the interview kick I have been on over the past couple of months, I recently had the pleasure to conduct one with the CEO and President of Compendium, Frank Dale. Compendium is a content marketing platform for organizations and you can see exactly how it works here. I recently started following Frank and his work with Compendium and am very impressed thus far and look forward to learning more about Compendium and their platform.

Frank was more than willing to take the time out of his busy schedule to answer some questions about content marketing, marketing tools and advice to fellow digital marketers. Enjoy!

Craig: Frank, for those that do not follow you or are unfamiliar with your work, when and why did you get into content marketing?

Frank: In some ways I’ve been in the content marketing business my whole career. Before receiving my MBA, I earned a masters degree in ethics. As a marketer, I was always looking for ways to impact my audience without using some of the gimmicks or tricks for which marketing is famous. I believe that marketing should be about understanding and solving customer needs and problems, and content marketing lives up to this promise.

Craig: What is it about content marketing that intrigues you?

Frank: Content marketing is what marketing should be about: it informs without manipulating. Really, the only way to do content marketing well is to focus on what the customer needs. It has to be done from their perspective, not yours. We’ve all read the business books that demonstrate how people respond to stimulus and how to use this to influence people to buy products or services. But marketers don’t need to do that to succeed and I don’t think they feel good about those tactics. In a sense, content marketing is the purest form of marketing, because it allows companies and their customers to tell stories that are true and to educate prospects so they can make a choice. This approach works for all kinds of marketing, including brand marketing, because it focuses on knowing the customer, understanding the pain points and developing good information that answers questions. I am especially intrigued by all the different ways to share content–blogs, videos, white papers, slide decks. The opportunity is unlimited.

Craig: It is my understanding that you implemented the “Pomodoro Technique” at Compendium. What exactly is the Pomodoro Technique and what made you want to implement it?

Frank: The Pomodoro Technique is a time management method that takes the best processes in software development and marries them with how the brain works. There have been many studies that show most people cannot effectively multitask, and this technique allows me to focus on one thing at a time. It has a built-in feedback loop that helps me understand how I’m using my time and where I can improve. If I set out to accomplish six things in a day and only accomplish four of them, it’s important to understand why. Is it that I underestimated the time required to accomplish a task? Perhaps I am pulled into too many unnecessary meetings. Or maybe I didn’t get enough sleep. Knowing what’s preventing me from being as productive as possible helps me get better at planning my day, reduces unnecessary tasks and forces me to take good care of myself.

Craig: Many would agree that coming up with creative ideas is one of the more difficult parts of the content marketing process. How do you overcome creativity barriers when they arise personally or within your company?

Frank: Breaking it down into smaller steps can make it easier to tackle. The important thing is to get out of your comfort zone and get started. Once you do, you can see the next step or begin to identify options you didn’t know you had. Forward motion eliminates uncertainty. Another thing I believe is you have to talk to customers, spend time to get to know them. Learn about their challenges and observe how they work. Doing this provides a lot of content material.

Craig: What are some of your favorite content marketing tools?

Frank: Of course my favorite tool is Compendium, because it really makes it easy to create, capture and distribute stories online. I also like SlideShare, which allows marketers to turn just about any content into a slideshow presentation that can be shared with customers and prospects. Wistia is a great way to share video content. They have a tool that transcribes the video, so you can offer the content as a video or an article, which helps with SEO. 

Craig: I have asked this question in one of my past interviews but would be interested in hearing your take — How do you think small businesses / small budgets can incorporate something like Coca Cola’s “Content 2020” into their marketing campaign?

Frank: From a resource perspective, this isn’t a strategy that will translate well to small businesses. But what does translate is the importance of getting to know the customer. The lesson is that companies need to understand their customer well, communicate information through stories that are authentic and truthful, and use channels that the customer is receptive to. Small businesses often do talk to their customers, which gives them a chance to do this right.

Craig: Lastly, what is Compendium and how can it help content marketers/businesses?

Frank: Compendium is a content marketing platform that helps organizations capture and create original content in a branded hub for distribution to any marketing channel. Compendium’s software makes the process of content marketing easy–from inspiration through distribution–by helping marketers capture, create and organize stories to attract their audience. This is especially important today because buyers have changed the way they shop for products and services, looking for sources of information through social media and online peer sharing before ever searching on the brand’s website. Your organization’s content is a ticket to the conversation.

There you have it, my interview with Compendium’s CEO and President, Frank Dale. I would like to take the time to thank Frank for his time and willingness to share his advice, experiences and some useful tools with my readers. If you would like to connect with Frank, you can do so on Twitter, Linkedin and Google+.

About the Author: Craig Kilgore is a digital marketer with Mainstreethost and currently heads up their R&D department. Craig’s interests include SEO, paid search, content marketing, social media marketing and business development. You can find Craig on Twitter, Google+ and Linkedin.

If you are ever looking for a go to source for SEO, UX, link building or development information, Mike King is the man. Mike, aka iPullRank is very well known throughout the SEO community and is looked at as an expert to many, including myself. Mike is an SEO Manager with Publicis Modem and a Global Associate at SEOmoz. He is also a recording artist going by the name of MiC K!NG aka iCON the Mic King.

I started following Mike on Twitter about 6 months ago and since then have been overly impressed with the quality of his work, his opinions, tips and the creativity found in all of his publications especially after reading “Just How Smart Are Search Robots?” which was featured on SEOmoz back in November of 2011.

(Mike speaking at SMX East in 2011)

Mike was kind enough to take some time to answer a few questions I prepared for him. See his answers below:

Craig: How and why did you get involved in SEO?

Mike: Aww man, I wish I could somehow make this story cooler. I started doing SEO in 2006 after I got into a bicycle accident and had to pay my medical bills. I was a full-time rapper at that time and I didn’t have any health insurance. I’ve been building websites since 1995 and coding in various languages since 1992 so it was pretty easy to make the jump into a technical analyst role. From there I went in-house for a company that makes basement waterproofing products. After that I went to Razorfish and now I’m the SEO lead at Publicis Modem. I’m really excited for what the future holds.

Craig: With the growing importance of creative content marketing strategies and community building, who is more valuable in your opinion, a creative content marketer/SEO strategists or a more technical oriented SEO?

Mike: Well, you can’t teach imagination. If I had to choose I’d rather work with a creative strategist than a technical strategist. However luckily I am both so I don’t have to choose! I was on a panel at SMX West and we talked about how SEO needs to be sexy and make cool shit and I think a creative strategist is going to be much better at that than a technical strategist. Technical stuff can easily be learned, creativity not so much.

Craig: As I stated in my intro, I am a follower of yours on Twitter. A tweet of yours caught my attention rather recently. You tweeted — “all the link building strategy you’ll ever need. You Ready? Make news and make friends. Good night.”

Here’s all the link building strategy you’ll ever need. You ready? Make News and make friends. Good night.

— MyCool King (@iPullRank) February 13, 2012

For emerging digital marketers and link builders, what is one piece of advice you would give them to getting started with this process?

Mike: People tend to think of link building as a numbers game. Really link building is about getting people to take a real world action on the web that benefits you so unless you’re doing a bunch of link dropping or paying for links all of these tactics are essentially ways that you are making news or making friends. Making news is your content-based link building, making friends is your outreach. My one tip would be to use social media for both things to be more effective. Social will quickly allow you to get ideas for the content that you’re creating and also make your outreach easier because it’s the space where people are expecting to hear from people they don’t know. Context is King.

Craig: As I mentioned in my intro, you are also a rapper, and a very talented one in my opinion. How do you find the time to balance two highly demanding careers and do you feel that your music background gives you an edge when it comes to creating creative content?

Mike: Thanks Craig, I appreciate that! Honestly, I don’t. People oftentimes ask me how I came out of nowhere in the SEO scene and the reality is I have been doing it for about 6 years. Early in my SEO career it was just a job to me because I was a musician first. I hated how my day job occupied so much of my mind and how I couldn’t turn it off because I wanted to be able to leave work and then go jump in the studio and create. I don’t really have that ability to fully shift gears so it’s either one thing or the other. Since late 2010, I’ve been more focused on Search and as a result I have only done things here and there for music. Somehow in 2011 I still put out 14 songs due to guest appearances I’d recorded prior. All that said I’m actively trying to achieve a better balance and work on music regularly now. It’s pretty cool that since I’m no longer a full time musician I only take the gigs that I really want to do since I don’t have to worry about paying my bills. The next thing I want to do is make it so whenever I go somewhere for a conference I do a concert around the same time.

Without further ado, I present to you, Dinosaur’s Anthem by iCON the Mic King:

Check out some more iCON the Mic King videos.

Craig: When did you start rapping and who inspires you musically?

Mike: I started rhyming when I was 14. I’d bought a copy of Method Man’s first album and decided I could do it too. So I’ve always been very inspired by WuTang, Organized Konfusion, and a bunch of independent rappers that are what me and my circle call “playground legends.” 

Craig: What is one piece of advice you would give to emerging professionals (doesn’t have to be an SEO) who are looking to make an impact within their organizations or community and ultimately make a name for themselves.

Mike: I’ve got two. 1. Be authentic and original.  2. Always be learning. 

Craig: For those that would like to watch you speak, where can they find you in 2012? And to follow up on that question, what is the best SEO conference you have ever attended (whether as an attendee or as a speaker)?

Mike: Well unfortunately you might have already missed me at SMX Israel and SMX West but as of now I’m speaking at SES New York, LinkLove London and SMX Sydney. Not sure if I’ll be speaking at MozCon, but I’ll be in attendance either way. It was easy the best conference I’ve attended so far with SearchLove NY being a close second.

I would like to thank Mike for taking the time out of his busy schedule to answer my questions and for sharing some advice for up and coming digital marketers. For all of you SEOs, marketers and web developers, if you’ve yet to read any of these posts by Mike, it’s worth the time:

The New SEO Process (Quit Being Kanye)

The Cat in The Hat Teaches SEO

8 Tactics for Defending the SERPs when Synergy is not an Option

Throw Away Your Form Letters (or Five Principles to Better Outreach Link Building)

About the Author: Craig Kilgore is a digital marketer with Mainstreethost and currently heads up their R&D department. Craig’s interests include SEO, paid search, content marketing, social media marketing and business development. You can find Craig on Twitter, Google+ and Linkedin.

If you’ve been following all of the recent changes Facebook announced at their marketing conference held in New York City, you already know about new business page layouts, marketing features and tools and the new admin panel. Marketers have been hard at work over the last couple of days preparing their pages for the new layout while researching and looking for cutting edge Facebook marketing techniques.

Since Facebook first launched their business pages, admins did not have the ability to change their page name once it was set. Well it looks like that has changed.

I stumbled across some exciting news via Pagemodo tonight.

It Looks Like You Can Now Change Your Facebook Business Page Name!

Just follow this link: https://www.facebook.com/help/contact_us.php?id=262629790471076

If you have tried the link with no luck, please reach out to me on Twitter @ckilgs so I can investigate the news further and update the post accordingly.

I had the pleasure of representing Mainstreethost with a couple of my colleagues at the Social Media Biz Summit in Buffalo, NY held by Ruby Marketing Communications and Canisius College’s Women’s Business Center and would like to share with you my key takeaways from the event.

[PHOTOS] Check out photos from the event courtesy of Mila Araujo.

[VIDEOS] You can also check out a recording of the event here.

I’ve attended a few SEO and social media conferences in the past and was surprised and very pleased with the quality of speakers and the quality of their presentations. On a side note, Buffalo seems to have a very talented group of younger marketing professionals from what I observed which is always good to see.

The Social Media Biz Summit speakers were as follows:

Ramon DeLeon of Domino’s Pizza

Deb Weinstein co-founder of Strategic Objectives

Sam Fiorella of Sensei Marketing

Josepf Haslam of DragonSearch

Jennifer Cisney of Kodak

Sean McGinnis of DotCO Law Marketing

Also in attendance for a moderated talk and group Q&A sessions were:

Dr. Gregory Wood of Canisius College

Brian Wheeler of New Era Cap

Gregg Pastore of the Buffalo Bills

Brent Rossi of the Buffalo Sabres

Samantha Hicks of the Buffalo Sabres

Shelly Cieslak of Fairfield Marriott

Speakers, Topics, Q/A and “Social Media Speed Dating”:

Ramon DeLeon: The Move of the Day Award goes to whoever created the speaking times. Ramon DeLeon of Dominos is a very energetic individual and got me excited for the rest of the day within the first 30 seconds of his talk. I have written in the past about Dominos reputation management and customer service and Ramon just reinforced my past thoughts. Ramon shared with the audience that it would be impossible for Dominos to make money selling pizzas for a dollar but the amount of social buzz it creates helps you create long-term brand advocates and gets people sharing and talking about your product. Ramon also gave what in my opinion was the quote of the day when he said that “social media fire needs to be put out with social media water”. This gives those involved with social media marketing and reputation management something to think about. He also reinforced the fact that content can be created out of almost anything, even toilet paper in his particular example. I feel that the overall message Ramon was trying to share was that no matter what it is that you do, have fun doing it and let your customers or audience see that which will eventually lead them to sharing it.

Check out Ramon’s kick-off party video and you will get an idea of how energetic this guy is:

Ramon’s Presentation:

Video streaming by Ustream

Deb Weinstein: Next up was Deb Weinstein of Strategic Objectives talking about corporate social responsibility (CSR). Deb shared a lot of her experiences with the audience and gave a few tips which stood out to me. The first was that PR should be finding and making the trends, not following them. This is a good piece of advice for almost anyone but closely pertains to marketing and social media based professions. You can do good by doing good and when it comes to your social audience, you always want to listen, join and participate. Deb shared a couple of interesting stats – 70% of consumers will purchase from a socially responsible brand and 90% of young professionals would prefer to work for a socially responsible company. This just reiterates the importance of PR and social media and how it should be consuming more and more of company’s marketing strategies.

Video streaming by Ustream

Sam Fiorella: After a short break, Sam Fiorella of Sensei Marketing and gave a presentation entitled “Is Your Company Ready for Social Media?” Sam got into talking about why it is important to measure social media ROI and briefly got into how you can measure the ROI on conversation (social media). He stressed the importance of companies aligning each of their departments’ social media strategies to the company’s overall strategy and that it is crucial to pinpoint your social media goals while creating a path to get you there. Before measuring return and results, you need a goal and a plan designated to getting you to that goal. One of the most useful pieces of advice in my opinion was the statement that companies should give their employees social media enablement policies (this is what you can do) as opposed to policing policies (do this and get fired). After all, your employees are your biggest brand advocates!

Video streaming by Ustream

Josepf Haslam: Next up was Josepf Haslam of DragonSearch. Josepf has a bold presentation entitled “Get Social or Die” and reiterated to some the importance of owning your properties and presences on the web. He gave the “what” and “why” on social media’s business influences and stated that you need to understand who your influencers are and who is out engaging. Have an action plan and desired outcome and use execution, measuring and reinvention to help you reach those outcomes. Josepf shared a couple of cool stats that included that 71-83% of people will use customer reviews to influence their purchasing decisions and that 80% of people will change their decision of purchasing a product after reading or seeing negative reviews. He also gave his opinion on what the new SEO is describing it as broader long tail, relationships and relevant connections. This replaces the “old” SEO which he shared in his presentation you can see here.

Jennifer Cisney: After breaking for lunch, conference attendees had the honor of listening to Jennifer Cisney of Kodak talk about leveraging social media for brand awareness. Jennifer gave what was one of the best presentations in my opinion. Jennifer gave examples of how she handles parts of Kodak’s social media through blogs and various social networks. She shared with audience a couple of stats including that 78% of consumers trust peer recommendations while only 14% trust advertisement. Jennifer stressed the importance of being transparent and taking criticism as a way of bettering your product / service. Other topics of conversation included going to where your customers are to engage with them and the importance of being timely. Overall, Jennifer gave a great presentation. 

Video streaming by Ustream

Moderated Panel / Q&A:

A panel, being moderated by Dr. Gregory Wood covered something that I have been involved with quite a bit lately, a reputation management discussion. Titled “Social Media CRM: Handling Complaints on Social Media”, Dr. Wood presented a panel made up of Brian Wheeler, Gregg Pastore, Brent Rossi, Samantha Hicks and Shelly Cieslak with some questions pertaining to online reputation management and more specifically, social media based reputation management. The panel covered the importance of keeping the human factor present even when dealing with customers via the internet and social networks. They also stressed the importance of reacting to negativity instead of ignoring it or even deleting it. You want your audience to share their thoughts on your own pages (blogs, Facebook, Google+) and you deter them from doing so when there is lack of communication or when you close the lines of communication (deleting bad comments for example). You have more control over your own presences in the end so it is always in your best interest to keep the communication channels open all of the time.

Overall, the panel was a great addition and a good way to get multiple opinions on multiple reputation management topics. 

Video streaming by Ustream

Social Media “Speed Dating”:

Social Media Biz Summit did something pretty interesting and it broke the day up perfectly. They did a little social media “speed dating” session where a group of attendees would be assigned to a table and every 8 minutes, a new speaker would enter the table for discussion. This was an excellent way to get to know the speakers a little bit better and also to run questions and ideas past them. The fact that attendees were put into groups also allowed them to network amongst themselves. The only downfall was that it became a little rocky when time for the speakers to switch groups but it was handled very well and certainly expected with the first time event.

Sean McGinnis: Following the panel and the social media speed dating session, Sean McGinnis closed out the conference with an awesome presentation titled “Awesome finds awesome! Creating shareable content in a social SEO world” which I thought was incredible. What stood out the most in Sean’s presentation was when he stated that nothing beats a great community. He stated that if you aren’t creating great content, you should be curating it given the shift of search and how social it is becoming. Even in the B2B area, businesses should not be scared of creativity and should promote being different whether it be through content or social media marketing campaigns. Keep in mind that nothing beats having a great community and you are on your way to doing good things.

Video streaming by Ustream

Hope to See More in the Future!

All in all this was a GREAT conference and I am looking forward to seeing many more of this kind in the Buffalo, NY area. The event was well organized with a few minor glitches here and there but nothing you wouldn’t expect. They had a very helpful volunteer staff that kept things running exceptionally smoothly, and a nice little networking dinner event at the hotel. Here is a list of the event’s sponsors. I will attend again in the future for sure.

Oh yea, on top of everything, they left everyone with a pretty awesome gift bag!

Check back, I will add slide decks and any other media to this post as they become available.

Here’s a link to Social Media Biz Summits’ Facebook page.

Being in the SEO field for the last 5 years has taught me quite a bit. In this post, I will share with you what I feel to be the top 10 tips for those of you just starting an SEO career or attempting to tackle SEO for your own website. For now, these are just cut and dry tips but stay tuned for some follow-up posts where I will share some tools and tactics you can implement along the way.

This list is in no particular order.

1. Don’t believe everything you read (except for this of course)! There is plenty out there, so know where your information is coming from. You know your situation and marketing needs / goals the best. If you are interested in learning and are willing to put the time into it, I recommend following some of these individuals and websites — Search Engine Journal, Search Engine Land, SEOmoz, Distilled and of course, Google’s blog.

2. Remember the basics. It is easy to get caught up in what’s cutting edge and forget about the basics. By no means am I implying that you shouldn’t test new ideas, just don’t forget about what got you to where you are.

3. User experience should be on the forefront. You can have the best rankings and get traffic but if you aren’t capturing your visitors’ attention, you probably aren’t converting.

4. Measure conversions. Next to user experience on the importance scale are conversions and measuring conversions. What is the purpose of each visit? Is it to sell a product? Capture contact information? No matter what the reason is, make sure you have one! And once you have one (or more), MAKE SURE YOU ARE MEASURING THEM!

5. Content marketing is a must. For a lot of SEO’s, especially the more technical / analytical ones, content marketing was probably on the backburner for the last few years. With the advancements in social media sharing and search engine rankings being influenced by this social data, a well planned, strategic content marketing campaign is a MUST!

6. Social media marketing is a must. Right up there with content marketing is a social media strategy. Whether you need to tackle this on your own or have the means to develop a team of social media specialists, do what you have to do to get out there and engage with your audience(s).

7. Continuously conduct keyword research. Keyword research is not a “one and done” and is something that should be addressed fairly frequently (depending on your vertical). Keep track of your keywords, their search volumes and how well they perform for you. Revisit this from time to time.

8. Study your competitors. If you know what works for them and you can implement it (ethically) on your end, why not? To expand on this, don’t copy your competitors mistakes (yes, this does happen).

9. Don’t be afraid of data. When it comes to SEO, both on-site and off, there are massive amounts of data at your disposal and too often, we shy away from these hard numbers. Whether this is due to the old “what I don’t know won’t hurt me” idea or just pure lack of knowledge, you should do what you can to familiarize yourself with the data out there and how you can use it to improve your marketing efforts.

10. Be ready for change. Don’t just be ready for it though, be willing to embrace it and adapt to it. Now you are probably thinking to yourself, didn’t he just say to remember the basics? If you know anything about technology and the web, you know that it changes. Being able to adapt to changes while remembering the basics will make you a more well rounded SEO / inbound marketer.

That is it for now. Stay tuned for some follow-up posts discussing some of my favorite tools and sites to help you along your way!