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Why Do My Webcasts Suck? image

Webcast Checklist

Have you noticed that everyone, every competitor, every business-to-business brand is doing webcasts or webinars? Webcasts must be the “killer marketing app”, but then you produce a webcast and 5 people register for it, and 2 show up. Ok, perhaps some exaggeration, but for many marketers webcast success can be elusive. Which begs the question, how can webcasts be more effective? Answer: planning, execution, branding, promotion, and much more. How about a printable pdf of 57-Point Webcast Effectiveness Checklist more? Before we get to that checklist, please consider that unless you are a celebrity, or your company is a Unicorn, your product/service might be boring? Yet webcasts are used by lots of boring companies and services. So how are they successful? ...

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Smart Tactics for Organizing Infographics image

Organizing Infographics

We are swimming in a sea of information today. Companies are racing to provide content that engages and motivates their audiences. They are also constantly battling to prove their worth to clients, stakeholders, and even funding sources. All the while, statistics show that people are bombarded with up to 10,000 brand messages a day, have an attention span of just eight seconds, and are spending more than half their day consuming media content. It makes it tough to be seen in the marketplace. This is especially true if you need to present numbers and statistics, which often are pretty dull and boring. Into the spotlight steps, infographics, which offer a unique way to tell a visual story through numbers and ...

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Paid Infographic Sites: The Fastest Way to the Bottom image

How Paid Infographic Submissions Kill Search

Let’s start by saying how much we love infographics, and follow up by saying that infographic submissions do work, provided you take incredibly laborious steps to do it right (stay tuned for an upcoming blog on that). However, we can guarantee there is one way to do infographic submissions wrong: Using a paid infographic submission site. The Lies and Extortion of Paid Infographic Sites These have been around for a while. Some of them were once free, some of them were never free, and others won’t say they are charging until you receive an email that looks something (exactly) like this: This is an excerpt from communication with an infographic site I reached out to based on advice from a list (not ...

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B2B Content Marketing Survey Findings for 2014 image

How can you plan your Business to Content Marketing in 2014?  Through a recent survey by the Content Marketing Institute and MarketingProfs, this information provides guidelines and benchmarking information for content marketing strategy in 2014.  What did the survey find out? What should you expect in this year and beyond? Read more to see what will come of content marketing. We would like to thank  Joe Pulizzi of the Content Marketing Institute and Ann Handley of MarketingProfs for surveying individuals and providing this data.  To register for the CMI study, you can register and download the B2B Content Marketing Survey from CMI Website. Content Marketing Tactics Understanding content marketing is a valuable factor to developing a strategy.  Although the strategy and distribution ...

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Information Technology (IT) Marketing Infographic image

Our IT Marketing infographic shares IT expenditures in the United States, expenditures by category, marketing spend, an IT marketing checklist, and more. For further details, download the new whitepaper, IT Marketing: 10 Modern Best Practices. In our last blog post, we shared a checklist of the top 10 marketing best practices for IT marketing with detailed descriptions including: analysis and research, planning, brand image, brand awareness, website improvement and SEO, event marketing, thought leadership content, blogging, social media, and direct marketing. For more details, read Information Technology (IT) Marketing Best Practices. Before the infographic, let's look at 4 reasons IT firms should reconsider marketing: 4 Reasons IT Firms Should Reconsider Marketing Sourcing or selection of IT related products or services has shifted. Studies show that ...

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Top 20 Free Infographic Directories and Submission Tips image

An infographic is a visual image such as a chart or diagram that is used to represent complex information or data that can be quickly and easily consumed by an audience. And their use is exploding! Maybe you’ve even started to build your own infographics. But, if you build it, they won’t necessarily come. Infographics, though viral by nature, can reach a wider audience through the process of submitting them to infographic directories/blogs – while boosting your SEO at the same time. A misconception of infographics is that they do not have SEO value. While it is true that a search engine cannot derive the content of your infographic, your audience can. An infographics can benefit a SEO campaign if it ...

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Infographic Marketing Basics and Tips image

Unless you have been living under a rock, you have probably witnessed the infographic craze this past year. An infographic is a visual image such as a chart or diagram that is used to represent complex information or data that can be quickly and easily consumed by an audience. And their use is exploding! In just over 2 years, infographic search volumes have increased by over 800% (Unbounce). This blog will describe 4 benefits of using infographics, 3 tips for creating infographics, and 3 techniques for promoting your infographic. Of course, no primer on Infographics would be complete without some samples! 4 Benefits of Using Infographics in Your Content Marketing Strategy Preferences shifting towards visual Infographics are more eye-catching than printed words—their ability ...

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CMO vs. CIO: Clash in the Cubicle image

Only 10% of top marketing and IT executives believe collaboration between their corporate functions is sufficient. With increased popularity and demand for a digital marketing presence, and with marketing being increasingly reliant on technology, marketing and IT alignment is now a requirement for success. Customer relationship management (CRM), mobile applications, marketing automation, data warehousing, and social media are just a few marketing initiatives that can create an increased need for marketing-IT collaboration. And in the digital world, a disconnect could prove futile. Below we will share an infographic based on Accenture's 2013 study, The CMO-CIO Disconnect, detailing the divide between departments, and provide recommendations for improving the CMO-CIO relationship. CMO vs. CIO Tips For Marketing-IT Alignment Having shared goals and metrics encourages both ...

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Cause Marketing 101 – Infographic image

In our last blog post we shared 6 tips for effective cause marketing. Is there a business case to be made for such efforts? 278 million Americans want to know what a company is doing to benefit a cause. The following infographic shares the types of cause marketing, projections of cause marketing spend, who is using, how it influences purchasing behavior, the leading issues consumers think companies should address, and 6 tips for effective cause marketing. For more information on cause marketing, be sure to read our whitepaper, How Brands Can Use Cause Marketing For Results. You can share/embed the infographic on your website using the embed code below. Cause Marketing Infographic (click to view full size) How Brands Can Use ...

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Native Ads vs. Banner Ads image

You are more likely to die in a plane crash or win the lottery than click on a banner ad. You may have heard these statistics being discussed around the web, see more here. So, is native advertising any more effective? Lately there has been a lot of excitement surrounding native advertising. Below we will explore the effectiveness of native advertising beginning with the difference between native and banner ads, followed by an infographic that details the effectiveness of each, and an example of a controversial native advertisement from The Atlantic! What is Native Advertising? Native advertising uses text, photo, or video ads and integrates directly within content that is being viewed online, as opposed to banner ads which are off to ...

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Valentine’s Day Marketing For B2B Companies image

Valentine’s day is a cash cow for the greeting card, flower, candy, jewelry, and the retail gift industry. The average annual Valentine’s Day spending is $13.19 billion, with over 180 million Valentine’s Day cards exchanged annually, and 196 million roses produced for the special day (StatisticBrain). Notoriously a consumer holiday, is there any opportunity for B2B brands to have Valentine’s Day promotions? Below we will share the pros and cons of Valentine’s Day marketing, 6 B2B Valentine’s Day marketing ideas, and a Valentine’s Day infographic. The Pros and Cons of Valentine's Day Marketing Valentine’s day marketing is a given for some companies (jewelry, flowers, etc.), but perhaps not so obvious for others (B2B). Before your B2B company starts to plan your campaign, ...

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Capital Equipment Marketing – Infographic image

This blog will share a capital equipment marketing infographic that visually represents capital equipment expenditures in the U.S., top capital equipment categories, marketing spend by top capital equipment categories, and a marketing checklist. In our last blog post, we shared a checklist of the top 10 marketing best practices for capital equipment marketing with detailed descriptions including: analysis and research, planning, brand image, brand awareness, website improvement and SEO, event marketing, thought leadership content, blogging, social media, and direct marketing. For more details, read Marketing Capital Equipment Checklist. Other content in this capital equipment marketing best practices series include 3 Capital Equipment Marketing Considerations and 4 Aspects of Capital Equipment Purchasing. In this post, we offer our experience and insight about capital equipment marketing ...

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Channel Partner Marketing – Top 10 Best Practices image

In the not so distant past,  marketing of software systems, hardware or IT services by channel partners or value-added resellers (VARs), was secondary in importance to sales and business development. Today, changing marketing dynamics have forced channel partners, vendors, and publishers to reconsider and elevate marketing to mission critical status. This blog will identify four (4) reasons that effective channel partner marketing is more important than ever, followed by  Top 10 Marketing Best Practices for Channel Partners, a channel partner marketing infographic, and links to additional resources. 4 Reasons Channel Partners Should Reconsider Marketing  First, sourcing or selection IT related products or services has shifted. Studies show that up to 90% of technology products and professional services sourcing begin with or use ...

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Inbound Marketing vs. Outbound Marketing – Infographic image

Inbound Marketing is hugely popular thanks to the tireless efforts of marketing automation software publishers including Hubspot, Marketo, Eloqua and Pardot, each with a different spin on what constitutes effective Inbound Marketing. Still, each of these sources is selling software, so there is clear bias for Inbound Marketing, and bias against many Traditional or Outbound Marketing techniques. In some cases, this bias is so exaggerated, that it borders on conspiracy! Now that we have your attention, consider a recent study by Hubspot (The State of Inbound Marketing in 2012) that compares Inbound to Traditional or Outbound marketing, identifying lower costs and greater effectiveness of Inbound. The conspiracy? Hubspot defines Outbound marketing as trade shows, direct mail and telemarketing. Ok, what about ...

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Modern Marketing Defined—Marketing Mix Infographic image

What is Modern Marketing? Glad you asked. To provide some context, let's go down memory lane. The internet launched circa 1995. Prior to that, advertising was the lead marketing strategy and tactic. In 1960, marketing professor and author E. Jerome McCarthy defined marketing as the Four P's: Product, Promotion, Price and Place. As recent as 1973, Webster's dictionary defined marketing as the advertising of products and services. To reference a famous tagline, "You've come a long way baby." Today, advertising is a secondary tactic for all but the biggest brands, primarily consumer and retail. Internet marketing and social media have become integral to the modern marketing mix. Let's take a closer look at modern marketing, inbound vs. outbound, traditional vs. digital. Our Modern Marketing Mix ...

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