Instagram is by far my favorite social media outlet. I shamelessly could sit there for hours following tags, searching for new wellness accounts to follow, and seeing what people are up to. But the thing that always grabs my attention are the Instagram Stories. To me, they are by far the most engaging and intriguing part of Instagram.
Instagram Stories are a huge viewer engagement opportunity. They add a personal level that truly grabs your followers’ attention.
Involving your Audience
There are so many tools you can use on Instagram Stories to make your audience feel like they are a part of your journey or your daily life. Here are the top engaging tools that you can use to engage your viewers:
Poll
Ask me a Question
Countdowns
Swipe Up
Each of these tools either ask for an action step from your followers such as responding with a question of their own or giving you their opinion, or they encourage your followers to check back for the post/event that the countdown was for.
Poll
Poll is by far, my personal favorite when following stories. It gives me a chance to feel involved in the person’s post. Polls are great for hearing what your viewers want to see. Use polls to give options to them and see what they are interested in listening to. This will encourage them to continue following you and checking in for the content they feel they had a say in. As health professionals, there are so many topics to talk about so see what information is being asked for.
Ask a Question
This is a great tool for health and wellness companies. Most people that are interested in health have questions and if they are following you, they are interested in what you have to say. A trend right now for fitness/health professionals is a Q&A session via IG Stories using the “ask a question” feature. Set up a time to have your followers ask questions, post their questions in your stories and address their questions during the videos. This involves the person asking the question and gives your viewers answers to questions they may have as well. During these sessions, utilize hashtags and tags to increase engagement and give the viewers something to follow up on after your session is complete. You can also create the label for the question meaning you can dictate what direction you want the questions to go. This will keep the conversation and videos you make focused on your specialties.
Countdowns
The Countdown feature can be great for creating excitement for an upcoming event, product release, or follow up post. Blogs are great to use countdowns for as well. It creates a buzz about your content and with the help of another feature (see below), you can have the follow up post lead directly to your blog.
Swipe Up
This can be one of the most useful and easy features in terms of marketing. The Swipe Up feature is used to take a viewer directly to a site that you would like them to see. You can increase website traffic, send your viewers directly to a post you want to highlight, or for healthcare professionals, send viewers to a scheduling system to get started utilizing your business. Consumers want easy ways to find information and we love social media. The Swipe Up feature address both of these aspects. Please note that to utilize the “Swipe Up” feature, you must have a minimum number of 10,000 on your business account.
Using Stories to Increase Website Traffic
By utilizing these features, you engage your viewers, give them a voice, provide information, and direct them to the next step. These features create an interactive environment and spike curiosity in your business. It may start just as another Instagram account for them to follow, but, if you keep providing top information that is sought after and provide an engaging environment, those followers may become future clients.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/How-to-Use-Instagram-Stories-to-Engage-your-Health-Minded-Followers-1.png800800Amanda Andersonhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngAmanda Anderson2019-02-19 08:00:062019-02-19 21:21:12Using Instagram Story Tools to Engage your Viewers
At times, we all struggle to see results from your inbound marketing in health and wellness. Inbound marketing requires persistence and is not a strategy that leads to results immediately; it is a long-term digital marketing strategy that over time leads to an engaged and motivated audience.
Your business digital marketing strategy is the starting point to any content marketing or inbound strategy.
In this blog we’ll be taking a look at common KPI’s we see our health clients track, we discuss whether inbound marketing works for wellness practices, and the 5 keys to creating a strategy that works for your practice. Then the blog takes a quick look at technologies to use to manage your content marketing for healthcare and finishes up with an overview of how your content marketing strategy fits together with your content marketing plan.
A Content Marketing Strategy is Designed to Identify your Healthcare Goals.
We work with clients in healthcare and wellness and have found there to be some typical goals that are identified in their marketing strategies.
These goals, or key performance indicators of digital marketing (KPIs of digital marketing), commonly include:
Boost traffic to website
Increase trust
Increase qualified leads
Increase the number of repeat customers
Increase direct traffic from content
Once you have your goals identified for your content marketing strategy, it is important to put in place a tactical content marketing plan that identifies not only what types of content you will be creating for your wellness center, but also the frequency and who on your team is in charge of actually creating the content.
Typical tactical digital marketing plans include targeted content for:
Blogging
Social media
Email marketing, email campaigns, and email newsletters
Youtube videos
Podcasts
and more
Does inbound marketing for wellness practices work?
Where many businesses fall short and don’t see results with their inbound marketing is when they view each part of this content marketing plan as a separate vertical or separate marketing channel. Viewing each as a separate campaign causes the attention to efforts to switch from being centralized on the goals of your business and causes teams to often forget to integrate national events and national observances in their content marketing.
In our experience we have found a few key determinants in creating a content marketing strategy that will work for your business.
5 Keys to Creating a Successful Content Marketing Strategy for your Healthcare Center
Don’t view content marketing as a campaign. Campaigns have start and end dates, campaigns aren’t long term, and campaigns focus only on one aspect of marketing. Content marketing is a tactic that can impact larger processes in your organization. It can aid your sales team in closing deals, keep your patients and clients coming back for more treatments, and satisfy long term goals such as education, building trust, and standing out in the community.
Ask for insights from other departments as you build your strategy. Above, I’ve listed off some common goals that our clients identify within their content marketing strategies. As a marketing team, there may be clear KPI’s that you can measure, but what you’re your board or management want to see measured? In addition, where are other bottlenecks in the larger organizational scope? Often times we see practitioners and MD’s provide patients with handouts and checklists – could these be used as marketing collateral?
Plan to integrate content, stories, and research from others within your organization. While you are creating your marketing strategy, get commitment from the individuals you would like to see participate. Just through everyday interactions, you may know one or two people in your organization who would just shine on camera or who can break down complex topics into easy to understand, education blog posts.
Encourage your patients to share their stories. Use marketing as a way to showcase the transformations of your patients.
In your marketing strategy, clearly identify your brand persona and voice. One tactic we use with our clients as a way to identify this is to create a Persona for your brand. Are you a super hero? A working mom? Etc. Then, think of the specific language you should use in your marketing. Do you want to encourage your team to use slang or to stick to professional and technical terminology? Additionally, think about if there are there any adjectives, verbs, or phrases that are commonly used in the office or with patients? You may want these to appear in marketing content. Having clear guidelines allows any member of your team to write in a similar voice or edit and approve content written by another member of the team.
Whatever your strategy, write it down! According to CoSchedule’s recent Marketing Report, Marketers who document strategy are 538% more likely to report success than those who don’t. [CoSchedule]
What technology is needed for Content Marketing Management?
Key software to use for inbound and content marketing include Hubspot inbound, CoSchedule, and other project management tools online. To get started, however, you really only need a WordPress (or other easy to update CRM) website and MailChimp. This allows the avenue to share information and grow your email list for ongoing communication.
You Content Marketing Strategy is the Why Behind the content your team produces
As mentioned in our blog last month (Is your Content Marketing Plan Failing your Business) we discussed how your digital marketing strategy really is the framework for your business to follow. Now, the second piece of this includes the tactics that you actually will follow to reach your goals. These tactics are identified within your Content Marketing Plan.
How I view marketing strategy vs marketing plan is that the strategy remains fairly stagnant for a set period of time. The plan, on the other hand, can be changed based on performance and progress towards reaching the identified KPI’s.
As you are implementing the content marketing plan, you will be able to measure results, decide what is working, and make adjustments for the future. With this said, however, we do recommend sticking to a tactical content marketing plan for at least 6-12 months.
Yes, you will at times publish a video, blog, or social media post that leads to immediate results, but in general, processes take time.
Let’s Chat about your Health Center’s Content Marketing
Social Speak specializes in helping marketing teams in health and wellness clearly identify their content marketing strategy. We create comprehensive content marketing strategies, identify who in the organization or on the marketing team is best suited to create different types of marketing collateral, build out a comprehensive editorial calendar for your team to follow, and are there by your side coaching your team monthly on best practices to capture more leads, convert new prospects, and re-engage existing or past clients.
If you are working to grow your center to the next level and are interested in learning how content marketing can help you see the results you need, let’s chat.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/How-to-Create-a-Content-Marketing-Plan-that-Works-your-Healthcare-Center.png450810Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-02-04 21:29:112019-02-04 21:29:11See Results From Inbound Marketing Strategy - How to Create a Content Marketing Plan that Works your Healthcare Center
As professionals, our days revolve around our work and to leave it can feel wrong or like you are going to miss something important. It can make things like vacation cause anxiety which can ruin well-deserved time off. And let’s face it, we deal with stress and anxiety at our jobs everyday so why wouldn’t we try to have a stress-free vacation?
The good news is, there are things we can do prior to leaving to ease our minds and ensure that our team has everything they need to continue to be productive.
Have a point-person
Most managers have one employee that they have confidence in and tend to trust with larger projects or important deadlines. When prepping for vacation, have a discussion with that employee to see if they would be willing to answer as a leader in your absence. The tasks for this employee can differ based on what you think is needed most. Examples of those tasks may be:
Conflict resolution
Scheduling for employees
Contact for clients
Responsible for goals set
Set Team Goals
By setting specific goals for your team in your absence, you help leave a focus for your team and ensure productivity stays high. These goals can be normal goals but setting new/short-term goals will give your team a new sense of motivation while also providing an end date. Picture coming back from vacation with a new goal met and your team proud of the work they have accomplished!
SMART GOALS
When setting team goals, even if they are short-term, you should always remember to follow: SMART goals
Specific: State clearly what you expect from your staff. Include your point-person when making the goals so you are both on the same page and they feel confident in the goal.
Measurable: Use metrics/numbers for your goals so there is no confusion on what the goal is.
Achievable: Make sure your team can hit the goal. If they hit it, morale will go up leaving your team proud of the work they accomplished.
Relevant: Setting a new goal can mean that you have your team tackle a project that has been put aside but make sure their goal is relevant to their long-term goals.
Time-bound: Give a firm timeline of when you expect the goal be accomplished.
Open Communication
Leading up to your vacation, make it known that you will be out of town. Give exact dates of when your last working day is and the first day back. By doing this, it will open communication between your team and encourage them to get their questions in before you go and know when they can connect with you when you get back. By opening communication, your team will hopefully bring to light any issues they are dealing with or foresee happening and can deal with it before vacation.
Schedule a Check-In Day
As much as most of us want to completely unplug during vacation, it is hard when you have work goals and a team trying to make them happen. To help ease your mind and make it easier to come back to work, schedule a check-in day (or two) with your point-person. Make this a quick 30 min call to address any issues, get updates on productivity, and re-assess temporary goals if needed. This call can put your mind at ease but make sure that it is short and to the point as you are supposed to be relaxing and trusting your point to take the lead.
Prioritize Any Issues
As much as we want to think no issues will arise and all will be fine, business is full of issues or situations that need to be addressed by the manager. In this case, if situations come up, you need to be able to prioritize them. Figure out which ones need attention ASAP, which ones you can delegate, and which ones can wait until you are back.
Conclusion
We all deserve a vacation and to be able to unplug. By taking these preparatory steps in order to set your team up for success, you will be able to enjoy your vacation and come back to a successful team. If you have tips that have helped you enjoy a stress-free vacation, send them our way so we can add them!
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Blog-Photo.png800800Amanda Andersonhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngAmanda Anderson2019-01-22 08:00:582019-01-19 00:36:27Preparing at Work for a Stress-Free Vacation
I feel like this year is different than other “New Years”, I always create a vision board, write down my goals for the year and what I want to change or implement for the New Year, but this year I am really focusing on creating healthy habits for my life.
2018 was a HUGE year for me personally just around personal growth.
After reading a ton of self-growth books, leadership books, business strategy books, and more, one thing that almost every book mentioned was to implement good habits and how it would play a big role in your personal life and flow over into your business life.
I have heard it takes at least 21 days to implement any habit.
Whether we are setting good habits or breaking bad habits, I know for a fact it is all about repetition and STOP procrastinating!
Today, I want to talk about the top 10 habits to have in your life, you will notice there are more personal than business.
Here are the top 10 habits to implement in this new year and continue every year:
1) The first thing first is creating a good morning routine.
This means waking up early, some entrepreneurs wake up between 4-5am, that is a little TOO early for me still, I get up between 6-6:20 am each morning.
If you feel you are not a morning person, a little tip is set your alarm 15 minutes earlier each day WITHOUT hitting Snooze, until you start getting up at that earlier time each day.
By getting up earlier allows you time to set your daily intentions, I do this through morning journaling, taking 5-10 min each morning to write down my thoughts, intentions, action items for the day. This is also a great time to get inspired by listening to a TED Talk, audiobook, meditation, affirmations, anything that inspires you for the day, rotate through your favorite things!
Tony Robbins has referred to the first part of your day as the magic hour, or where the magic happens, I have also heard this being called the power hour!
I know for myself if I have an hour of undisturbed time, no calls, kids, social media, meetings, etc it is AMAZING what I can get done in one hour. When I wake up early and after my morning routine I can get done almost half of my daily work before anyone even wakes up on a good day 🙂
2) Let’s talk about our Time Management
This piece is something we can all struggle with, being able to get everything done, or having those days where it’s 7 pm and we wonder what the heck did we accomplish today.
A few things that can help us with managing our time:
one thing I have learned is time chunking, or time batching. This process is where you block out a certain amount of time to focus on one project or task at a time. Even us awesome multitaskers need to time batch to make sure we are putting 100% towards that task and not allowing distractions.
It helps to have a clear plan for each day, you can start by writing your intentions for the day or write the top 3 things you want to accomplish for the day are, rather than having a LONG to do list you can manage to check off 3 things per day, there is a great tool to help you accomplish this called the Eisenhower Matrix.
Some have also followed the “Eat That Frog” book by tackling the one thing you have been putting off and getting that done each day. It’s really about stopping the procrastination and checking things off your list.
3) The education
We never know everything and there is always room for growth! A part of being successful is learning new things, asking questions, and always educating yourself.
Be curious – even if you think you know the answer or how to do something ask someone or your team how they do. This is something people like myself AKA control freaks struggle with, we like things done our way and our way only, well with that mindset there is no room for growth. There can be many ways to get one thing accomplished.
Read – take time to read blogs both about your industry but also other topics that you have interest in, listen to audiobooks, podcasts, YouTube videos.
I know it sounds cliche, but learn something new every day
4) Set Boundaries
You need to have clear boundaries with your clients, customers, contractors, and employees, you are not around 24/7, they will respect this, trust me!
Technology – this is a BIG task for anyone with a computer, tablet, mobile device and also anyone that has email or social media. We are constantly drawn to our phones, checking emails, social media, the list goes on. Define your hours for these tasks.
Setting boundaries allows you the freedom and flexibility in your life. We need to respect our time.
5) Your Tribe
It’s important as a business owner/leader to create a good tribe of people in your life. This may mean you have different tribes like:
Friends and family
Co-workers or team
Networking or colleagues
Whoever you choose to be a part of your tribe make sure they are on the same page as you, they have similar core values, they are positive, uplifting, and most important supportive of you and your life.
We can get so bogged down with toxic people in our lives that tend to drain our energy, they don’t mean to do it on purpose, it’s just where they are in their lives. In order for us to succeed and step to that next level, we need to surround ourselves with positive and supportive people. AKA our Tribe.
6) Healthy Lifestyle
I know this can be on everyone’s New Year Resolutions list, but as I get older each year, I realize how important it is to take care of my body, this is the only body we get and the only mind, we need to stay sharp! We can accomplish this by
Eating healthier – being conscious of the food we put into our bodies
Drinking enough water – more than the normal 64 oz a day
Exercising or being active – walking, yoga, kayaking, hiking, biking, gym, etc. Keep your body moving
Taking control of your life – it’s too easy to get comfortable and slack, eat out, eat fast food, I am not saying to never do those things but in moderation.
To show up and give 100% every day we need to make sure we are giving our body the nutrients it needs to be able to do that!
7) Know Your WHY
This is something I honestly had struggled with until this year, I never thought of my Why or how it would impact my business along with my team. There is a tool called Why Institute this helped me discover my Why. It also relates to your core values.
Ask yourself these questions:
What impact do you want to have in the world, both small and large?
Why did you start your business?
What’s one thing that motivates you the most?
Why is it important to you to be successful?
What does success look like to you?
The deeper you dig the clearer your why will be, the more honest you are with yourself the better.
A few resources:
Simon Sinek “Imagine a world in which the vast majority of us wake up inspired, feel safe at work and return home fulfilled at the end of the day.”
I know this may sound a little selfish, and maybe it is, but this is a big piece that is often forgotten, especially if you are a woman business owner, we get so caught up is work, family, taking care of everything that we forget to take time for ourselves. This goes back to tip 6 about having a healthy lifestyle. Taking “Me Time” is apart of creating that lifestyle.
This can be things like:
Going on a walk
Reading a book
Grabbing a cup of coffee and reading
Unplugging from ALL devices and distractions
taking a bath
Traveling
Yoga
Meditation
This “Me Time” is all about feeding your soul!
You can also use this time to discover a hobby or interest, maybe you enjoy coloring, painting, making jewelry, etc. I know for myself when my daughter was born in 2012, I wanted to make her soap, shampoo, lotion, and use the best essential oils for her, her skin was sensitive, now I can’t bake or cook for the life of me, but making soaps, essential oil rollers, bug spray, lotion, and whatever else I found on Pinterest was very relaxing for me. It allowed me to take my mind off work and try something new, and still to this day I make our own goat milk soap and now I make it for all of our family members including my dad because they love it! It brings me joy to be able to make our own soap. This is “Me time”.
9) Focus on positivity and being grateful
With the world of technology, it is easy to get caught up in the social media scroll, looking at what everyone else is doing and we start to compare ourselves and get jealous. There is no need for this. This habit of focusing on positivity and being grateful will help elevate you to the next level. It is all about changing your mindset, and really implementing these habits are all about your mindset and commitment to yourself.
Start every day in your journaling routine to write down 3 things you are grateful for, do this each and every day. Look around and see your accomplishments, family, friends, a roof over your head, food on the table, it’s the little things we take for granted and those are the things we should be grateful for every day!
A few ways to increase your positive in your life:
Speak with positive words
Think positive thoughts
Come from a place of abundance
Say affirmations each day
Be kind to others
Give yourself grace and praise for what you have been able to accomplish
Work on visualization
Think before you speak
Compliment someone each day
Let go of the things you cannot control
By focusing on the positive things in your life you are raising your energy levels to focus on the good and reach your idea of success.
10) Evaluate, Reflect, and Improve
As you journal, and start to implement these good healthy habits in your life take a moment at the end of each day to reflect and evaluate your day:
How did it go?
What conflicts did you have?
What did you like most about your day?
What was a challenge you had?
Successful business owners are always looking to see what they missed or how they can improve their character. Even if you have a day where you didn’t feel you accomplished much, or maybe didn’t have much communication or interaction with anyone, still take time for self-reflection. It can be very useful to jot down these reflections to be able to look back and evaluate them and then the following year you can continue to improve them. Just to be clear, this is NOT the time to beat yourself up or point out the wrong things you did or didn’t do, but to simply reflect on your day and see where there is room for improvement.
This gives your mind that mental clarity, feel free to discuss with someone from your tribe if you need to talk through something.
Conclusion
I have outline 10 awesome good, healthy, positive habits to start implementing into your daily life and I would love to see how they have changed your life, or which ones you are implementing. I am working on all of these myself, so we are in this together!
Cheers to a healthy lifestyle, successful habits, and truly creating the life you have always desired!
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Implementing-good-habits-for-business-owners-and-their-teams-1.png800800Amber Irwinhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngAmber Irwin2019-01-15 08:00:312019-01-17 21:28:43Implementing good habits for business owners and their teams
This blog breaks down the difference between a Content Marketing Strategy and a Content Plan. It then dives into National Observances that your team should consider integrating into its content or editorial calendar.
As we’ve worked with hundreds of businesses as they work with digital marketing to reach their business goals, we’ve found that more often than not there is a disconnect between what they are trying to accomplish and what actually gets done.
The reason?
A lack of planning for how to implement the content strategy causes content to be created in a vacuum. The content is not written to achieve a specific goal.
Originally I was going to write this blog to only focus on the difference between a Content Marketing Strategy and a Content Marketing Plan, but keeping your sights on external and national events is critical to participating as a relevant source of information in the digital world.
Let’s start by diving into a Content Marketing Strategy.
What is a Content Marketing Strategy?
A content marketing strategy is the Why behind the content you are creating. It includes identifying why your team is creating content, it is the vision you have for future content that is to be created.
This strategy should also identify who you are marking content for. Are some pieces of content designed specifically for prospects, referral partners, or clients? How can you differentiate between them? What are the goals of them? How will you position and use them online?
How to Create a Content Marketing Strategy
To start creating your Content Marketing Strategy, set your goals.
We recommend thinking first about the issues you may be facing as an organization and then set the goals as a way to solve these.
For example, we’ve worked with clients in the past who wished to use digital marketing to fill their schedule. After diving deeper, we recognized that they weren’t remarketing to or rebooking current clients as effectively as they could. As a way to capture low-hanging fruit, rather than creating content to educate and gain interest from folks whom had never heard of the client, we redesigned the content marketing strategy to focus on engaging with current and past clients.
Common goals of a Content Marketing Strategy include:
Increasing Revenue
Attracting leads
Lower costs
Better customers
Build an audience
Educate
Once you have identified a need in the organization and set a goal, it is easier to recognize alternative solutions to reach the goal.
Another aspect of the Content Strategy is identifying what tone you wish to take. For small businesses with only one or two content creators this can be easy. Do you speak in the first person, do you use past or present tense, are there branded keywords you should incorporate?
The last part of the content strategy is identifying which digital marketing networks to pursue and who to target on each network.
What is a Content Marketing Plan?
A content marketing plan is tactical – these are the actual steps you will take to implement the marketing strategy. In general, we never recommend creating a digital marketing content plan without first creating the strategy.
Why? You may realize after 6 months that the content you are creating has nothing to do with the goals you are trying to achieve!
We see this often with teams.
The director states that each week a blog needs to be written and at least 3 social media posts need to be published each week. However, the marketing experts creating the content don’t clearly understand how their piece fits in with the larger marketing strategy. What is the end goal of the content?
Key aspects to a Content Marketing Plan
The content marketing plan should include topics to cover, calls to action to include, specific promotions, who is responsible to creating various pieces of content, and how content will be published.
In our work, specifically the Roadmap to Digital Marketing, we recommend formatting the bulk of a content marketing plan like an editorial calendar.
An editorial calendar for digital marketing allows your team to easily see how content fits together and what topics should be talked about at certain times during the year (hence my inclusion of the National Observances list below).
Content Strategy and Content Marketing Working Together
As described above, a Content Strategy always comes first and the Content Marketing Plan is built based on the goals identified in the strategy.
One of my favorite examples of how a strategy and a plan work together is if an issue within an organization is that the close rate for new sales is lower than the industry average. The goal here may be to increase the close rate, boosting the bottom line.
After researching and surveying clients and prospects that decided to pursue another option, it becomes clear that the alternative tends to be a business with more name recognition.
How can content marketing help to shift the perspective and gain more trust? Here the strategy is to increase brand recognition and trust. The plan could be to create more videos with leadership and to incorporate blog posts that dive into company values.
This brings us to using relevant topics as a part of your marketing plan.
Being Relevant with your Content Marketing Increases the Effectiveness of your Digital Marketing Plan
If you are like 98% of our clients, one of the key goals identified in your content marketing strategy is to increase brand recognition and position your organization as an industry influencer.
Incorporating National Observances into your Marketing Plan is a key tactical decision your company can make to achieve this. Of course it is up to you and your team to decide which ones to highlight and how to incorporate them (podcasts, Instagram, Facebook, Youtube, promotions and sales, etc).
Some, such as New Years, Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, and Christmas may all seem like obvious choices, but are they actually identified in a calendar?
Does someone on your team know that they are responsible for creating content 3-6 months in advance of these dates?
Then there are industry-specific days, weeks, and months. For example, if you are a health center and realize in February that it is American Heart Month, you are already late to the game.
You’ve missed the opportunity to reach new audiences by being a guest on a Podcast or having a guest blog post published in an industry journal.
Yes, you can still publish a last-minute blog to share on social media, but think of the opportunities you may have missed by not planning ahead.
National Observances to Consider for your Business
Here I’ve identified the top 3-5 National Observances for you to consider integrating into your marketing plan each month. The ones I’ve identified here are important, though some are a bit random. Our complete list of National Observances includes events for any type of business or industry.
Please enter your name and email for access to our full list of National Observances for 2019.
January Observances:
January 1: New Years Day
January 5: National Keto Day
January 24: National Compliment Day
3rd week in January: National Mocktail Week
National Blood Donor Month
February Observances:
February 4: National Hemp Day
February 14: Valentine’s Day
February 22: National Margarita Day
American Heart Month
Black History Month
March Observances:
National Employee Appreciation Day – First Friday in March
March 14: National Pi Day
March 26: National Spinach Day
Endometriosis Awareness Week – (First full week – Monday through Sunday)
National Brain Injury Awareness Month
National Women’s History Month
April Observances:
April 1: April Fools Day
April 8: National Zoo Lovers Day
April 21: Easter
National Child Abuse Awareness Month
National Parkinson’s Awareness Month
May Observances:
May 12: Mother’s Day
May 18: National HIV Vaccine Awareness Day
May 27: Memorial Day
Small Business Week – First Week in May
Celiac Disease Awareness Month
Melanoma Awareness Month
June Observances:
June 1: National Go Barefoot Day
June 12: National Peanut Butter Cookie Day
June 16: Father’s Day
LGBTQIA Pride Month
Men’s Health Month
July Observances:
July 4: Independence Day
July 12: National Simplicity Day
July 31: National Avocado Day
National Grilling Month
National Ice Cream Month
August Observances:
August 1: Respect for Parents Day
August 3: International Beer Day
August 19: National Soft Ice Cream Day
Simplify Your Life Week – First Week
Family Fun Month
September Observances:
September 2: Labor Day
September 8: National Suicide Prevention Month
September 13: National Kids Take over the Kitchen Day
September 30: National Chewing Gum Day
National Chewing Gum Day
National Suicide Prevention Month
October Observances:
October 28: National Chocolate Day
October 31: Halloween
Adopt A Shelter Dog Month
Breast Cancer Awareness Month
National Chiropractic Month
November Observances:
November 11: Veterans Day
November 22: Thanksgiving
November 24: Small Business Saturday
November 26: Cyber Monday
Adopt A Senior Pet Month
Gluten-Free Diet Awareness Month
National Alzheimer’s Disease Month
December Observances:
December 2: Chanukah
December 4: National Cookie Day
December 21: Winter Solstice
December 25: Christmas
National Human Rights Month
National Tie Month
As you build out your Digital Marketing Plan, we recommend downloading our complete list of National Observances. Start by deleting any cells or events that don’t apply to your business. Be sure, however, to think outside of the box.
Could you celebrate National Chocolate Chip Cookie day with the office?
Does anyone on your team support organizations that rely on the exposure of these National Observances?
Once observances have been identified for your business to highlight in the Content Plan, be sure to assign the observance to an individual. Make sure they consider the goals of creating content for the observance, specific promotions related to the day, partners to approach for joint marketing efforts, etc.
And of course, if this has been helpful for you, or if you’ve considered outside the box ideas to incorporate National Observances into your content plan, leave a comment below!
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Is-your-Content-Marketing-Plan-Failing-your-Business.png10801080Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2019-01-07 09:31:022019-01-14 21:20:52Is your Content Marketing Plan Failing your Business [Plus - 2019 National Observances Calendar]
With all the tools out there it can be difficult to know which content marketing strategy tool you and your marketing team should be utilizing to make sure everybody is moving in the same direction.
In this blog we take a look at the most prominent content marketing calendar apps that are available for many different sized businesses. For small businesses, including those with just one marketing manager, you can get away with organizing your ideas in a Word document or a Google sheet.
However, once you have multiple people working towards that same goal of making sure your business is found and sharing the correct message in your marketing strategy, it is important to consider upgrading to a scheduling and management interface that allows everybody to clearly see where their piece of the pie fits in with the larger content strategy.
To keep you from signing up for each of these tools, I’ve taken a look at:
What type of organization it is best for
The main features
How you can implement it easily into your team
The price point.
Many of the applications discussed including Monday.com, HubSpot, CoSchedule, and MeetEdgar have a variety of price points. Again, in our experience, if it is just you, typically you can get away with organizing your ideas on a spreadsheet.
So, let’s dive into there popular content management platforms.
CoSchedule Technology for Digital Marketing Management
The first application that we are going to discuss is CoSchedule. CoSchedule creates One calendar that allows everybody to be on the same page, it allows everybody to communicate in one place.
Additionally, with the more advanced plans of CoSchedule, you can organize everything from event planning through to email marketing, social media, and blogging. CoSchedule is incredible tool for large teams and complex marketing organization. One of my favorite aspects of CoSchedule is the ability to create ongoing follow-up social media links to blog posts in one or two clicks.
CoSchedule for Solopreneurs
For solopreneurs, CoSchedule is a little More expensive than other options. Solo plans do start at $0 to $20 per month, with most individuals looking at the $40 per month option – typically a spreadsheet along with one of the less expensive tools will do the trick.
Where CoSchedule really shines is with in-house marketing teams looking to manage full-scale campaigns.
The professional plan starts at $400 per month, and allows workflows approval flows multiple calendars and comes with a dedicated account manager. From a project management standpoint, this plan reduces the need for multiple individuals providing guidance on any given combination of marketing strategies.
HubSpot for Content Marketing Management
Many of us are very familiar with HubSpot. HubSpot has a combination of three tools and complete inbound marketing management resources. HubSpot places the emphasis on collecting inbound leads from your social media and digital marketing content. Though there are numerous tools that you can use to create the same systems and processes, HubSpot’s value proposition is that everything is in one place.
HubSpot for Larger Teams
Our favorite plan within HubSpot, is again there professional plan. Though the Enterprise option has much more advanced settings such as predictive lead scoring, it is a much higher investment. With the professional plan at $800/month, you have access to SEO and content strategy, social media, calls to action and landing pages.
Additionally, there is a/b testing marketing automation, smart content, and the ability to add teams.
The workflows are easy to set up, and create very systematized automation within your marketing and strategy. This tool, HubSpot, is a great option for businesses that have a marketing team, and want to make sure that every aspect of their marketing is working together. Again, HubSpot places inbound leads at the forefront of all of their software.
Next up, is Monday.com.
Monday.com to Organize your Content
Monday allows you to customize your workflow and dealt out strategies to multiple different teams. Monday is a great project management tool, however we found it a little difficult to manage a Content strategy and editorial calendar. The use of Gandt charts seems like a great idea, but it made projects difficult to understand exactly what steps needed to be completed and if we were on track. Many of our processes tend to be one or two steps, so again it seemed like a little too much for social media management.
Monday for Project Management
With plans starting at $25 per month, and unlimited boards, Monday is a great opportunity to integrate into your workflow if you need to do more project management rather than content creation and syndication. Because there is no central calendar, it can be difficult at times to see how each of the boards really work together.
Another positive for Monday, is the time tracking capabilities, so each member of your team can have a clear understanding of the time spent on each task. This allows you to easily understand if some aspect of marketing is taking much longer than others.
Additionally, Monday.com could be used for larger marketing promotions, however, most businesses need a tool that also works for day-to-day management.
The next tool we will take a look at is Edgar.
Edgar for Content Marketing Organization
Edgar is a great option for businesses looking for a simple tool to manage their social media posting. Typically, we recommend you create a database of content. The content strategy video below, provides tips for places we recommend Gathering content ideas. Once you have all of the content, click go and Edgar will talk into action.
MeetEdgar for Small Business Social Media Management
We recommend small businesses and solopreneurs look at Edgar as an option for their social media management. One issue with this, is that it does not allow you to clearly see the complete marketing strategy picture.
Each aspect of your digital marketing content calendar and content strategy still exists in its own space. Meet Edgar is a great tool for teams to use that do not have very complex marketing promotions in place. If you are one person team it can be an excellent resource for you.
Because I mentioned meet Edgar, I also should mention that for social media management, we utilize at such as Tailwind, Later App, Buffer, and HootSuite. I won’t go into it because he’s here, because they are more for just social media management.
Our blog on Social Media Content Strategy shares additional information regarding how to use each of these tools and where they fit into your social media marketing management strategy.
Create Clear Goals for What you want to accomplish with a content marketing technology
Before settling on a tool and diving into figuring out the setup and on-boarding your team, make sure you are clear about the goals you hope to achieve through using the software. Remember, choosing a tool to help keep track of marketing campaigns and content creation still requires that you understand what topics you plan to discuss and having your team actually write the content.
We have other blogs and videos that cover how to identify key topics to include in your content marketing editorial calendar, as well as a structure to follow for creating your editorial calendar. We often recommend starting with a word doc or spreadsheet rather than immediately hoping into the software you choose. Again, this helps to make sure your team is all on the same page as you move forward with your inbound marketing strategy.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/YouTube-Video-Covers-continued-2.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2018-12-11 10:18:342018-12-31 21:26:54Social Media Post Ideas for 2019
How to write a blog for beginners. You’ve been told that you need to write blogs for your business, you now understand these blogs need to be 2,500+ words, but how do you find the time in your schedule to actually write a good blog post?
Everything in marketing always comes back to finding systems that will work for your schedule to write an educational and informative blog post quickly.
In this video I’ll be going through my top tips for writing a good blog post quickly.
If you find this helpful, don’t forget to leave a comment below and click subscribe to receive notifications about new videos we publish.
https://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/YouTube-Video-Covers-8.png7201280Caitlin McDonaldhttps://socialspeaknetwork.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/SocialSpeak-Logo.pngCaitlin McDonald2018-12-07 14:39:082018-12-31 21:30:44How to easily write a business blog post in 2019
Every year social media changes so much, that is a piece of our business I love, because it never gets boring! In 2018 I feel like social media changed A LOT, and moving into 2019, there are new changes. I feel like social media will be more about building relationships and trust with your audience.
You can also sign up for the webinar from Hootsuite to hear more details of the trends for social media in 2019 https://hootsuite.com/webinars/social-trends-you-can-put-into-practice-in-2019
If you are interested in joining our online community and learning more about digital marketing join our Facebook group today https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1976390555959557&ref=br_rs
