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Showing posts from November, 2019

Digital Marketing News: Twitter Test Tweet Scheduling, Google’s Dynamic Gmail Refresh, Facebook’s Lookalike Changes, & Snapchat Grows

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The post Digital Marketing News: Twitter Test Tweet Scheduling, Google’s Dynamic Gmail Refresh, Facebook’s Lookalike Changes, & Snapchat Grows appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank® . from Online Marketing Blog – TopRank® https://ift.tt/33ujW2L

Grateful and Glad: What the TopRank Marketing Team is Most Thankful For

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For centuries, American families and friends have come together on Thanksgiving Day to feast and give thanks for all of life’s beautiful gifts. But I’ve said it once , and I’ll say it again—Thanksgiving isn’t limited to one day in the TopRank Marketing realm. Every day, I see attitudes of gratitude . To date in 2019, our team has typed the words “thank you” in Slack communications a whopping 7,737 times, and “thanks” 4,113 times. ? via GIPHY As is TopRank Marketing tradition, I’ve asked team members to share what they’re most thankful for in work and  in life. Here’s what many had to say. What the TopRank Marketing Team is Most Thankful for in 2019 Lee Odden CEO The B2B marketing industry brings together an amazing collection of disciplines, technologies and people from the analytical to the creative. When marketing works to connect people with the right solutions, it really can have a positive impact on the world. I am very thankful to be a part of that industry and es...

5 Smart B2C Tactics To Boost Your B2B Brand

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B2B marketing is swiftly embracing techniques that were once only for B2C, and we’ve got five smart B2C tactics to add to your B2B plans for 2020 and well beyond. Influencer marketing, engaging interactive content, awards events, chatbots, and podcasting are just some of the ways that today's savvy B2B marketers can add a healthy dose of the B2C experience to your business marketing efforts. #1 - Influencer Marketing Even though influencer marketing is still largely associated with the B2C world, you’ve likely noticed that it’s being increasingly used by smart marketers as a highly successful go-to B2B tactic. Influencer marketing has already accounted for over $2 billion in annual marketing spending in the U.S. alone , and annual growth rates are predicted to from 41 percent all the way to 95 percent. ( AdAge ) B2C influencer marketing has relied heavily on celebrity influencers, a combination that has faced a growing backlash and played a part in diminishing trust in market...

Break Free B2B Series: Janine Wegner on Building Brand Thought Leadership With the Help of Influencers

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Influencer marketing is in a state of flux. In the past 10 days alone, I’ve seen suggestions that paid influencers are out , and that “influencer marketing — in the traditional sense — is in the midst of an irreversible fail from grace .” Neither of these arguments is off the mark, per se, but they both frame the concept in outdated B2C-centric terms (the authors more or less acknowledge this with their qualifiers). No one can deny that the impact of hired celebrity influencers, transparently shilling products or services, is waning. It’s not an approach that builds trust or credibility.  However, strategic B2B influencer marketing is still very much on the rise, and nowhere near its peak yet. When done right, this practice isn’t about celebrity status, nor solely about paying for influence (although that can be part of the equation). It’s about building mutually beneficial relationships with established thought leaders in your space, founded on the focus of delivering va...

For a More Effective B2B Content Strategy, T.H.I.N.K.

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What would you do with an unlimited content marketing budget? Oh, the eBooks and infographics and blog posts you could make! Video and audio, whitepapers, research papers, guides galore… endless money means endless possibilities. Okay. Deep breath. Snap back to reality. We’re all working with limited resources to create a finite amount of content to fit into a crowded editorial calendar.  So how can you make sure you’re making the most of what you have? How can you know for sure that a proposed content project is worth your while — worth time spent researching, creating, amplifying and optimizing? It’s simple: T.H.I.N.K.! Let me explain. My wife is a middle school teacher (a moment of silence for her service). She has this poster on prominent display in her classroom: In the classroom, it’s an attempt to get middle-schoolers to stop cyberbullying each other. But these same five criteria can make sure your content is essential, valuable, and worthy of the time it takes t...

Digital Marketing News: Twitter’s New Publisher Dashboard, Why We Follow Influencers, Snapchat’s Unskippable Ads, & TikTok’s Social Commerce

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The post Digital Marketing News: Twitter’s New Publisher Dashboard, Why We Follow Influencers, Snapchat’s Unskippable Ads, & TikTok’s Social Commerce appeared first on Online Marketing Blog - TopRank® . from Online Marketing Blog – TopRank® https://ift.tt/2D8kRes

B2B Podcasting: 20 Stats that Make the Marketing Case

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Good grief, Josh, why can’t you shut up about B2B podcasting ? Does the world really need another think piece, blog post, or webinar about the potential? Don’t people get it already? I hear you, theoretical reader. And yet, I persevere.  B2B podcasting today is where content marketing was a decade ago. It’s emerging as a marketing discipline. People are starting to get sophisticated about deploying and measuring podcasts. We’re seeing new tools to make it easier to launch, promote, and monetize. And despite the thousands of hours of audio out there already, there’s no sign that the market is satiated.  I believe that if you’re not already thinking about podcasting for your B2B brand, you should be. But if my beautiful words can’t convince you, let the data tell the story: B2B Podcasting: 20 Stats that Make the Case These statistics come from five different reports , all released in the last year. When you look at all five together, the picture is clear: We’re nowh...

Hiding Out: How B2B Marketers Can Adapt to Hidden Like Counts

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Doesn't anyone like me? Where have all my likes gone? Likes on Instagram are being hidden, as the Facebook-owned firm recently began expanding a test program hiding the number of likes — or more accurately the small heart buttons we click to show support — that posts on the platform receive, showing the total number only to the person or brand who authored the post. via GIPHY Instagram head Adam Mosseri recently appeared on CBS This Morning and said, "We don't want Instagram to be such a competition. We want it to be a place where people spend more of their energy connecting with the people that they love and the things that they care about.” The change brought to some U.S. users what Instagram has had in the works since 2018, when it began testing hidden likes for certain users in Australia, Brazil, Canada, Ireland, Italy, Japan and New Zealand. The tests have brought praise from some, outrage from others, and caused some to voice concern that hiding like counts cou...