We’ve made it. We’re at the end of our brief journey through the first step of inbound marketing; Attract. In this last part we’re going to be discussing an aspect that most of us have become very comfortable with in recent years, at least in our personal lives; social publishing.
Social media has revolutionised our online lives. We are connected to our friends, our family and even people we’ve never met through our love of Facebook, Twitter and many other social networking platforms. We don’t think twice about sharing pictures of our latest holidays, next meal or nights out with friends.
We look forward to seeing the same thing shared by people we know and trust. It becomes a social barometer within our circles of friends. We trust that what they’re sharing will give us insight into something that will inform, educate or entertain us.
When it comes to inbound marketing, this familiarity we have with sharing content also stands us in good stead when it comes to our professional lives. We don’t send bland emails to thousands of people anymore through paid email lists. We ‘share’ because we want them, to come to us.
We’ve talked in previous articles about the power of new, original and compelling content and how it helps attract visitors to your site. Social publishing takes this one step further. You will, by now, understand the benefits of hosting blogs, articles, white papers and ebooks on your site.
This kind of engaging content is exactly what your potential (and current) customers are looking for when they go online. Thanks to this, your website becomes a flag-bearer for those who share your interests. We’ve also talked about how your efforts with search engine optimisation, or SEO, will lead to attracting people searching for exactly what you’re offering.
We’ve begun to turn those strangers into regular visitors. Now’ve you’ve got them hooked on the incredible content you offer, we want to be able to share it with our connections via social media and, where possible, we want visitors to share it with their contacts too through reposting and retweeting.
Put simply, we want to spread the word, to wave a banner and to allow others to promote your site to many other people.
With the rise of smartphones and tablets, people are using the internet almost everywhere they go. They don’t have to be sat at their desk, in the office, to be able to read your content. The way we consume digital content has been changing in recent years, so we have to change with it. As much as you might think people are only looking at their desktop computers, they’re on the move.
They’re mobile. Look around at conferences and networking events, people are checking their mobile devices more than ever. They’re checking in on Facebook, following events on Twitter, connecting on Google+ or they’re taking stock of their world via LinkedIn. It’s these people we want to attract. We not only want their business but potentially their contacts too. Repeat ad infinitum.
Promoting your content offers several amazing benefits, some with almost instant results. In the immediate short-term sharing your content gives you an easy way to promote your latest blog, or even your new landing page, to a worldwide audience including your growing army of followers via a platform everyone is already familiar with.
By using hashtags, you can also connect to thousands, if not millions, of people who you may not be currently connected to, but share an interest. Promoting your content, with an included link, will also help you increase traffic to your website, which benefits your SEO ranking. It’s joined-up thinking and it’s a win-win for everyone.
These benefits are just the start. When you combine the knowledge and experience of the team at Whitehat with the far-reaching power of the HubSpot platform we utilise, you know it can only help your business. It allows you to publish to all your social networks at once, delivering a standardised message, on message consistent with your brand. The messages can also be scheduled to be delivered to different platforms at different times. This is a great way to trail conferences, events or your latest special offer.
Not only that but once the messages are out, HubSpot allows us to track the effectiveness and reach of the messages to help you understand, hone and improve your strategy going forward.
Inbound marketing is helping to revolutionise the way businesses market themselves and their content and we are proud to be at the heart of it. If you want to talk to us about how we can help you share and publish your messages, just give our team a call.