I recently attended a presentation by Drew McLellan, author of 99.3 Random Acts of Marketing, the Drew’s Marketing Minute blog and agency principal of McLellan Marketing Group in Des Moines, Iowa.
Drew shared his insights on how to succeed with online marketing and lead generation for professional services organizations today.
Drew’s experience is backed up with some impressive statistics that demonstrate he’s not just posing as another new media expert.
His chops include:
- | Over 7000 blog subscribers
- | Each posts receives 9-10 comments on average
- | Thousands and thousands of backlinks gained over 5 yrs
- | Recognized top blogger by AdAge Power 150, CMI, SmartBrief, Alltop + more
- | And most important, attributing revenue growth to his consistent + frequent blogging
By his analysis, 34% of Drew’s agency revenue over the last 20 yrs can be directly attributed to the content created for his blog. As Drew explains, how you market a professional services practice online today is everything.
Even the best don’t always get it right.
While his blog’s metrics are impressive by any measure, Drew acknowledged one critical flaw in his online marketing strategy. He created his blog under a separate domain that was different than the domain of his company website. Who cares and why does this matter?
All of the SEO value that his targeted keywords, comments, backlinks, domain authority, and search results that his blog generates actually link visitors to a different website that Drew had intended. How is this possible?
Even recognized experts mess up. Especially when they’re experimenting with and adopting the new and continually changing requirements of today’s online marketing.
In Drew’s case, if he ever attempted to export his blog’s data and put it under the domain of his agency website, all of the search results that are delivering the high traffic and amazing statistics that he claims would vanish in a blink.
A checklist for Content Marketing success.
What best practices can you follow if you want to market your professional services online without getting tripped up?
Start with this list.
| Define a clear strategy on what you want to accomplish online
| Start measuring business goals— not social goals such as likes or shares
| Build your web site + your blog under one domain
| Blog regularly + frequently
| Integrate a Subscribe link to your blog—Not just an RSS feed
| Have social icons that link to your unique social channels
| Avoid creating or sharing content that’s all about you
| Don’t just curate + share content from others
| Start the long-term process of presenting thought leadership + client value
| Demonstrate the walk you talk by example
| Don’t repeat yourself with one great sentence, theme or thought
| Integrate a subscription to your email Newsletter in your blog
Like never before, the Kimono is always open.
Make no mistake, prospects and potential clients will give you a serious look over online before they ever consider you or reach out to connect with you. Today, you’re exposed like never before and everyone can judge and evaluate your online presence virtually everywhere. So if you’re not continuously delivering help and value online, you might as well hand over opportunities to your competitors.
It’s time to consider an online marketing hub and how to spread your unique value through the many online platforms where your customers hang out.
All of this effort should focus on driving prospects back to your integrated website + blog. The result over time becomes a two way pushing out and pulling in process of attraction and credibility building to increase the perceived and monetary value of your business.
Marketing online today is a long-term marathon, not a sprint. And for every day that you wait to begin the journey, your competitor will pull further ahead of you.
So if you want to help and inform your website visitors, then convert them into qualified leads to grow your business, you need to create and consistently publish quality content to get there.
What about you?
How’s your online marketing working for you? Are you realizing success? Or is there room for improvement? Let’s hear from you.
As president and creative director of TeamworksCom, Paul develops brand strategy, engineers content to express customer value and creates integrated online and content marketing solutions to help businesses succeed. Connect with Paul, send an Email, or just call 415.789.5830.
Paul,
Thanks for the shout out. As we’ve discussed — your readers need to remember that if there’s not a business reason for them (and they aren’t measuring for those goals) to be spending time on social media/blogging — then they shouldn’t do it.
They need to set business (not social) goals and then decide which tools will help them achieve those goals. You’ve provided them with a great road map in this post to either get started or do some “remodeling” of their current efforts!
Drew
Thanks for your comment Drew.
What may be an eye opener for many is that the “remodeling” is not just a one time event.
Additions, and the investment in them, appear to be the digital future.