by Simon Jones | Oct 15, 2018 | Business Strategy, Content Writing
Does your internal communications strategy incorporate storytelling as a tool? Prose that leads people to action can appear in the most unexpected places. A rare moment of poignancy from a tormented author. A whimsical sonnet scribed by a long-dead anonymous poet. Even a bare inner-city building can become a blank canvas for the literary-inclined – the legality of graffiti notwithstanding. Many of us hold a narrow view on where we should find moving phrases and flashes of verbal brilliance – in novels and memoirs, poetry and song. But what those people often forget is that we live in a hyper-digital world. Our pencil gave way to the keyboard years ago. Why, then, can’t we tell stories without pen and paper – why should it be reserved for fiction? Let’s go even further – beyond the explosion of online journalism, blogs, editorials and interactive novels. Why can’t we bring storytelling into the workplace? No one has ownership of business storytelling. And content marketing isn’t the only outlet to drive people to action. If you have a story to tell and you know how to tell it, why shouldn’t you drive that message home through your internal communications? After all, if a story about hobbits can lead universities the world over to create Lord of the Rings-specific courses, think what your business could achieve once you embrace storytelling. Internal communications can drive engagement The biggest corporate buzzword in recent years has been ‘engagement’. The C-suite wants every employee to be fully engaged while on the clock. Supervisors want to engage their teams on a personal level. But when you look at... 
by Leonie Seysan | Aug 2, 2018 | Content Marketing, Content Writing, Inbound Marketing
A content preferences survey in 2017 found that 78% of buyers prefer to use case studies over all other types of content when researching purchases. It’s easy to understand why they are such a valuable content format, but as many marketing managers could attest, the process of creating case studies them can be challenging. If you haven’t created case studies before, or you have but found the process challenging, I hope our seven tips below will make the task easier. Why do case studies work so well? A case study provides an overview of a positive business transaction with a client. Unlike a testimonial, it’s not just a review or report from a customer who supports your business. Instead, the goal is to offer a detailed account of how you were able to successfully solve a problem your client faced. Case studies can attract new customers and build trust in your business. They provide evidence that you care about the problems your clients face and find solutions. A good case study also breaks down the process for potential clients, familiarising them with the steps they may go through when working with your business. No matter what stage of the buyer journey potential clients are in, they can be drawn to the useful detail found case studies: Awareness Stage: How the client came upon your business and what sort of problems needed to be solved can resonate with readers facing similar situations. Consideration Stage: Details on your approach and any specific strategies you created for a client can appeal to potential customers with similar needs. Decision Stage: Reading how... 
by Leonie Seysan | Jan 29, 2018 | Content Marketing, Content Writing, Inbound Marketing
Are you aiming to write articles or blog posts that demonstrate thought leadership? It’s becoming a popular strategy for professionals, consultants and business owners, to increase visibility, build credibility, increase connections and even generate high level leads. But thought leadership writing isn’t as easy as it sounds, as you might have already discovered. The following 7 tips briefly cover some of the topics included in our recently launched Thought Leadership Writing Course for professionals, consultants and business owners. It’s the thought that counts – don’t forget to include yours The term ‘thought leadership’ defines itself, but I’ve recently created my own definition: Thought leaders are individuals who are forward-thinking experts in their field, who by sharing their views and perspectives, have the capacity to change the way we see something. To be a thought leader means you must stand out from the crowd of topic experts, by having a unique perspective, or be sharing something of greater value than most ‘experts’ are sharing. That means you won’t be simply repeating other people’s ideas. It means you’re not locked on the current way of doing things in your role or industry. You want to improve the way things are done. And you have an eye to the future. How are things changing? How might we be doing things in 5 years or 10 years from now? What changes or trends could impact our industry or the way we do things? How can we prepare for that? Back up your thoughts with facts – real ones For some topics, your personal experience and some compelling logic might suffice... 
by Tess Oliver | Feb 15, 2017 | Blog Writing, Content Writing, Small Business
Would you like to create the kind of content that draws in a crowd, generates engagement and results in new connections and opportunities? Of course you would! But how do you go about it? When you want to be a champion, one of the best things to do is to look to the real champions, and check out what they do and how they do it. Naturally you don’t want to plagiarise, but imitation is the greatest form of flattery after all, and there’s nothing wrong with picking up a few tips from the high flyers! CEOs who pull this off really well often have these things in common: They courageously tell it like it is – or at least how they see it. They use descriptive language to tell stories that people can relate to. They are generous in sharing their thoughts, ideas and experiences without asking for anything in return. They bring their personality with them so that you get a glimpse of it through their posts. To demonstrate, let’s turn to LinkedIn Pulse and look at three very different business owners who do this well, each in their own way – Mark Bouris, Moby Siddique, and Thang Ngo. Before we dive in, let me point out that Moby and Thang don’t yet have massive followings on Pulse, but they’re on the way with over 1200 and 1700 followers respectively, and if they continue to publish content with heart, (and in Moby’s case a little more often!) their followings are likely to grow substantially. As you might expect, with the advantage of being well known, Mark Bouris... 
by Leonie Seysan | May 13, 2016 | Blog Writing, Content Marketing, Content Writing, Marketing Online
As a content marketing tool, blogging can be very good for just about any type or size of business. Business blogging can help you to better connect with your customers, to provide them with valuable information on a topic, and to inject fresh content into your website. However, while just about anyone can write a few paragraphs on a topic, successful blogging involves a great deal more than that. Business blogging must be planned well, done wisely, and provide real value to target audiences. MORE: Choosing the Best Channels for Promoting Business Content In the sections below we cover some of the benefits of blogging, and provide tips on how to blog successfully. Keep in mind that if you don’t have blog writers on your in-house team, it’s possible to engage a professional business blog writing service. 7 Benefits of business blogging Creates fresh content: Search engines make a point of giving preference to quality websites that show signs of being active. This means that while you are not likely to update or change your web pages very often, blogging can give you the opportunity to regularly inject new, relevant content on your site and create new pages for search engine indexing and ranking. This can help to increase the likelihood of your content showing up in SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) than if your website was just left to go ‘stale’. Better connect with customers: Blogging allows you to create content that offers value to your target audiences and customers, and to connect with them by allowing comments, interaction and feedback. Provides opportunities for sharing and promotion: Your blogs can... 
by Pat Briscoe | May 4, 2016 | Content Marketing, Content Writing, Marketing Online, SEO Tips
One of our highly regarded friends and professional colleagues has given Article Writers high praise in his latest podcast examining the Ultimate Content Creation Tools Used By Agencies And Pros (above). Moby Siddique, head of strategy at Red Pandas, agrees with us – quality content creation is a key weapon in every marketer’s toolbox. “Sometimes you can’t go past outsourced local writers. My fourth tool would be a friend of mine who runs a content marketing agency in Sydney called Article Writers,” he says. “I’ve actually used these guys in a previous gig. The value is you get to speak to an account manager, of sorts, who can either suggest a process for you, based on your objectives, or possibly work within the parameters of your own process.” We’ve embedded Moby’s podcast above and copied his summary below so you can quickly reference the key takeaways. 1. Content Ideation a. Upcontent What is it? Content discovery tool that finds content, influencers and relationships between other content topics. Pro-tip: push to buffer from here! b. Keyword.io What is it? It is a long tail keyword finder. Keyword io is more persona aligned, it’s more directed to the types of questions they are asking themselves, friends and Google. c. Google AdWords Keyword Planner (accessible only to account holders) Key with keyword planner is using the right filters. Keywords to include “directory” for instance, gave me (2) keywords. Date range, in our example for March 2016 says there was a 20%+ increase in search year on year. 2. Content Creation Some pro tips There are no shortcuts when it comes to content so you will still...