Content Marketing Services

Content Curation – What, Why When?

Unlike the common assumption, content curation is not same as content creation. Content curation is essentially finding other people’s work and sharing it with your own audience via blog, social media, or any other online platform you frequent. It takes far less time than creating content from the scratch.

That sounds rather simple, but the impact it can have is profound. Digital marketing experts agree that focusing too much on self-promotion damages your chances of building or keeping a readership. Likewise, successfully curating content can lead to scores of new followers and new opportunities for you in your discipline.

Captivating content curation can be tricky, especially for newcomers. It’s easy to be drowned out by the constant roar of social media and share random stuff that barely offers any value to readers. Here are six steps to help you effectively curate content and make an impact on your followers and your brand:

Know How You Are Curating Your Content 

There are two basic styles of content curation to choose from:

1) Sharing links to other people’s articles from your social media profiles; or

2) Writing an article that is specifically about someone else’s blog post, using it as the foundation for your own thoughts.

Both are valid and have a place on your pages; it is up to your discretion to know which style will have the most impact for a given piece.

It is important to note that the latter style provides for opportunities to quote directly from the piece. These can help you rank well with Google and get a higher response rate from you audience. However, you have to make it is obvious to Google that it is not duplicate content by linking to the original source and articulating your own thoughts and quotes.

Curate Content Organically  

Even the professional content curators disagree on the optimal ratio of curated content to original content. Some say your pages should feature more original content. Others contend having more curated content yields greater rewards. Most likely, the best answer is the one that makes the most sense for your site.

Therefore, you should always take care to curate your content organically. Similar to content creation, you should adhere to a schedule with content curation as well. Every piece of curated content should carry with it the wonder of discovery—if you’re excited about an article, your audience will know and respond to it accordingly.

Here are a couple of more handy tips that will help you to curate content organically:

• Capitalize on content creators’ research: There are so many content creators out there who conduct comprehensive research to come up with unique content. Make sure to follow them on social media or subtribe their newsletters to come across the ideal curated content for your audience.
• Pick an experienced content creator to curate content: Content curation is a not a cakewalk. It involves a lot of hard work as well as skills. By assigning this role to a non-professional, you may not be able to make the most of it. We would recommend you take a professional content creation expert on board for the reasonability.

Curate Worthwhile, Relevant Content

Content “curation” is a different animal to everyday sharing. The term “curation” alone implies a level of sophistication and thoughtfulness behind every retweet and re post. As a result, you should take care to only re-post articles pertaining to your chosen subject and by authors or publications with authority.

However, simply riposting from your discipline’s largest website isn’t going to impress your audience. Most likely they will have already seen and shared that source’s pieces. Great content curation should provide a new dimension to the conversation and should wow with a new perspective.

Don’t Neglect Your Own Writing

Content curation isn’t meant to supplant developing and publishing original content creation. The consensus among prominent content curators is that it shouldn’t obscure or overpower your own work but instead highlight it. Put another way, content curation is not a substitute for genuine insight. If you spend all your time parroting the authorities in your field, you’ll be unable to establish yourself as one and will give readers no reason to listen to you. Learn how content marketing works.

Content curation is partially meant to give much needed context about your discipline to your followers. The key is to use that context to position yourself as a unique voice on the subject. Content curation is a scaffolding to your own creative process, not the endpoint.

Frame Curated Content in Your Own Voice

Perhaps the most important piece of advice that every content curation expert expresses is to frame curated content in your own voice. Part of that is ensuring that the content you’re sharing reflects you, your brand, and what you’re building, but it also means so much more.

When curating content, you must ask yourself why this piece matters to you, and if it matters to your audience. The answers to those questions should be shared as prominently as the content itself. Whether you make an argument for or against it, muse on a tangential topic, or even crack a joke about it, what’s important is that you explore why this piece resonates.

Take Away

There is no denying that content creation is certainly a powerful digital marketing tool. But that does not mean you should overlook the importance of content curation to accomplish business goals. Similar to content creation, content curation shows our audiences that we are not mired in hubris or stuck in self-imposed isolation in our fields. Remember the ultimate goal of content curation is to show why you are to be trusted as an authority in your field. Riposting mutely will not accomplish that—only by sharing your thoughts as well as your curated content will lead to success. Speak to one of our experts today

As a keen fan of content marketing, it should come as no shock to you when you hear ‘content is king’.

You know the power it can drive for your whole sales funnel.

But if this is the case, why do so many struggle with the advanced content marketing strategies?

Could it be because they don’t know the benefits of content marketing?

I doubt that.

It’s more likely the case you know the benefits but don’t know how content marketing tips will work for your industry.

What is content marketing?

Content marketing is anything from web content, eBooks, blog posts, white papers, infographics, videos, webinars. Anything you produce that educates entertains, inspires or informs your target customer is the form advanced content marketing.

In this post, we’re going to discuss the blueprint for getting your content marketing plan together.  

Before we dive in, let’s look at some of the reasons why there maybe hesitation.  

Firstly, it’s often hard to see the direct results of content marketing compared to other marketing efforts: paid search for example.

Another reason people might not jump on the content marketing bandwagon is they’re following the wrong metrics.

Without scoping out a proper plan, you’re not sure which metrics matter to you. Because you don’t know which metrics you should be following.

Understanding the value of content marketing in Canada

If you really want to get the right plan for content marketing you need to make sure you understand the value of it.

Now I don’t mean reciting exciting facts about how great content marketing is.

Remember, most people already know the stats.

You need to understand the true benefit for your own niche or business.

The object or goal of content marketing should be to gravitate people towards your service or product. To provide enough value that your audience recognizes likes and trusts your brand enough to want to do business with you. See our absolute guide to content marketing. This is highly valuable, and if done correctly, can have astronomical results for your business.

Working Out Your Own Value

Whilst outbound marketing is all about pushing people towards taking an action, like signing up for a free trial watching a demo, or downloading a free guide. Inbound marketing is all about pulling people in to get to know you better. Creating the right type of content for your audience is timeless. The more people who discover your content, the more chance you have of it being shared. This means generating endless results over time.

Customer relationships change all the time. When these relationships change you need to rely on audience-centric content marketing. Audience-centric content means putting your audience first. When your audience’s needs change, so does your content. It gives you an opportunity to stay in touch with your audience, even if the relationships change and allows you to keep all communication channels open.

Look At Other Brands In Your Own Niche Who Are Winning With A Content Marketing Strategy

Set realistic expectations that suggest when you’ll expect to see measurable results. Is there any value in doing content marketing if you won’t see any results for 10 years?

The best content marketing tips are the ones that realize the bottom-line outcomes. You need to create the connection between the two. The way to do that is to create a performance-driven content marketing strategy.

Presenting That Value

If you want people to engage in your advanced content marketing, then you need to produce convincing data and quantify your content marketing process.

Speak In Their Language

You might think you have a great idea for a piece of content, but if you want buy-in that shouldn’t be what you focus on. Instead, focus on the aims and the goals of the content – Why is it good for your audience? How will the company benefit from producing this content? That is what every seasoned content marketing agency does.

It’s the classic case of show, don’t tell. Prove your points through data analysis and case studies from your own niche. When trying to appeal to people to get buy-in for content marketing, it’s imperative you make it relatable.

Think about it, even a salesperson doesn’t just push a service or a product.

If you want to come across likable through, let’s say, content marketing blog, then you need to do more than just sell, you need to tell a story and content marketing is a great way to do just that. This way you can connect your tactics to the entire organizational end goals.

You need to realign your content marketing strategy with what they care about, or what they worry about.

Making Content Marketing Blog Work For You

If you already doing content marketing but want to take it to the next level, it’s important to analyze the content you already have. There are a few ways to look at your results:

Short term and long term results.

Short term content marketing involves looking at -value metrics such as social shares on Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin etc.

Long term result involves looking at things like leads that have come directly from your content marketing efforts.

Compare it to your current cost per lead. Like with traditional marketing efforts, such as display ads or sponsored posts, content marketing doesn’t have any recurring costs.

Content marketing costs 62% less than outbound marketing, it generates more than three times as many leads. Meaning, it’s a lower cost per lead over time. However, you can even reduce costs by collaborating with professional content marketing services in Toronto.

Content marketing allows you to take your readers on an organic journey teaching them about your brand, without being too salesy. People dislike being sold to.

Post-Buy-In

You need to consistently show the value of the content you’re putting together. The best way to do that is through testing and reporting. Come up with hypotheses and test and report back.

The elephant in the room with content marketing is which metric do I follow. The answer is: you follow the ones that make sense for you. When you plan your content marketing blog it should be aligned with your overall strategy.

Takeaways

You need to understand the value your content marketing has for your business. Once you’ve started your content marketing process, the hard work doesn’t stop there. You need to continually find ways to showcase your results in order to prove the benefits your content marketing is having on your bottom line.Connect with one of our experts today to start building your blueprint

Trends from Digital Marketing Agencies in Canada to Skyrocket your brand

Digital marketing is thriving in 2021. It is critical to any business. 2020 became a significant defining moment for digital marketing. With internet business hitting record tops and traditional marketing strategies have had to shift, advanced advertisers needed to discover imaginative approaches to draw in, convert, and hold customers. Yet, uncertainty remains. So after considering the whirlwind that was 2020, we look forward to another year loaded with favorable circumstances and difficulties for organizations hoping to develop their customer base. If you don’t have relevant customers for your product, you won’t be able to run your business. We have seen numerous digital marketing experts from USA, Toronto, and worldwide coming up with game changing yet exceptional strategies to expand their customer base. Some of the reputed companies experience backlash in getting relevant customer. To effectively explore these obstructions, here are five digital marketing trends that you should watch out for in 2021.

Voice Search

Search is quite possibly the most crucial intersections of the consumer journey. It is the place where dynamic consumer expectation addresses a fulfilling issue item. The adequacy of this exchange is the driver that makes this progression so significant for organizations to block. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a strategy that has ruled advanced promoting systems at this point, however one that should adjust to the presentation of voice search. As voice search gains more traction, organizations should hire SEO service in Canada or should adapt their SEO strategies to coordinate with the channel.

Google checked postings for local SEO 

The pandemic has constrained numerous nearby organizations to change to digital platforms and channels to promote their services. One viable and straightforward approach to do that is by checking your business and its area through Google My Business. In expansion, Google My Business gives data that can help drive customers towards landing pages. The two strategies are brilliant drivers of client engagement.

Visual Content Creation

As an ever-increasing number of organizations contend across digital marketing channels, ventures should stand apart through their visual content nature. Dynamic pictures, illustrations, and recordings are extraordinary approaches to get clients to visit landing pages and convert on their clicks. Many SEO service in Canada and USA are emphasizing on creating catchy visuals to generate leads for their customers. The entirety of this content can profit SEO however much it CRO through keyword-centered alt text, captions, and titles.

Inclusivity – Brand Awareness

Customers are getting more conscious of brand leadership and how brands line up with their qualities and personalities. In a new advanced advertising report, 41% of customers stayed away from retailers that didn’t reflect their center perspectives and convictions. Also, 29% of purchasers said they would switch retailers if they didn’t show good variety. Both of these demonstrate a purchaser inclination for obvious inclusivity in the brands they support.

Intuitive content

By coordinating more interactive content—, for example, tests, intelligent infographics, statistics, work process of digital marketing experts from USA, Toronto or worldwide, interactive movement — you can upgrade your general client experience (UX). A superior UX makes worth and improves the probability of change. As indicated by Content Marketing Institute, 81% of advertisers concurred that intuitive content was a more compelling strategy for commanding and holding visitor attention.

Not all trends are significant or attainable for a business to execute. Seeing how, when, and where to market your organization requires long periods of information and experience. Zand Marketing specializes in a suite of digital marketing strategies. Our industry expertise can digitally activate your brand and drive your business forward.

Looking for a top-notch digital marketing service company in Canada, USA or anywhere in the world? Zand Marketing is just a call away.

Can in touch with us today and stat transforming your business.

No matter what your business is, having an SEO strategy in place is critical. Over 89% of marketers, believe that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) provides one of the highest ROI ‘s among all marketing channels. Current market conditions call on all businesses to have a strong online presence to be able to reach and connect with their audiences the way they want to be engaged.

With the right strategy you have the ability to generate and drive the right traffic and visitors to your website.

Most small businesses face challenges with brand building. SEO enables you to build a powerful brand and authority. Having a search engine optimization agency from Toronto will help you reach your desired goals.  Driving your business forward, buy highlighting your biggest asset your website. It has the power to improve your bottom-line drastically provided it’s done right. Also provided that your current website is delivering a cutting edge UX & UI experience for your customer.

Key Components of an SEO Strategy from local SEO services in Canada,

Enabling an SEO strategy has many key components, some of which are listed here:

1. Keyword Research
2. Creating top-notch content
3. On-Page/Off – Page Optimization
4. Link building
5. Technical SEO
6. Competitive Analysis

Here’s a Local SEO checklist for your reference.

Why Should a Marketing Agency Oversee Your SEO Efforts?

Here is why our search engine optimization agency from Toronto should oversee your SEO efforts.

Better Results and Returns

SEO takes both time and money. Unless you’re a seasoned marketing SEO specialist all of your efforts and investments won’t necessarily produce the results your aiming for due to lack of expertise. A marketing agency can guarantee far better results and returns, thanks to their proven strategies and experience.

Save Money and Time

Working with a marketing agency that can deliver a comprehensive approach to your SEO strategy maximizes your budget and time. It is far more financially beneficial to focus on your business and let the SEO experts optimize your website.

Complete Optimization and Improvement

Zand Marketing is among the top rated marketing and search engine optimization agency in Toronto. We at Zand Marketing believe that the SEO landscape is always evolving and changing. SEO is a continuous process of  refining, improving, and analyzing all strategies over time.

Using SEO and PPC in Tandem

PPC and SEO work together to give you a more targeted approach. Here’s why:

More Visibility

On most money keywords, there are already paid results on the top, pushing organic listings down to lower positions. The only way to rank No.1 for these keywords is by using PPC. Combine this with your SEO strategy and you’ve grabbed two spots for your target keyword.

As per search engine optimization agency from Toronto, on most money keywords, there are already paid results on the top, pushing organic listings down to lower positions. The only way to rank No.1 for these keywords is by using PPC. Combine this with your SEO strategy and you’ve grabbed two spots for your target keyword.

Sharing Data and Testing Strategies

PPC gives you tons of reliable data, including your best-performing keywords. When you know your best keywords, you can include them in your SEO strategy and rank there organically.

Similarly, you can test multiple ad copies, designs, and CTA strategies with PPC giving you more insights on implementing the tried-and-true strategies on your entire website. If you find you are not getting the results you need than connect with Zand Marketing, a top-notch digital marketing and search engine optimization agency in Toronto

Different Types of SEO

Every business has different needs and hence different SEO strategies. The most common are:

E-Commerce SEO

The purpose of E-Commerce SEO is to rank a website’s product pages on transactional keywords.

Local SEO

Local SEO helps small businesses rank for area-specific keywords (e.g., accounting service in Milton) that generates leads. Looking for the best local SEO services in Canada? Get in touch with Zand Marketing.

Mobile SEO

Mobile SEO makes your website mobile-friendly and boosts rankings, as Google has a mobile-first indexing policy in place.

Content SEO

Targeting informational keywords to build brand and authority is done by publishing SEO-optimized content.

Here’s our 2 Cents:

We offer premium search engine optimization services. Whether you are in Toronto, USA,  or anywhere in the world we have got you covered. Zand Marketing can help you achieve your optimization goals. We specialize in growing your online presence. We stay ahead of google trends and only deploy white hat proven techniques we get you on top and continue to find ways to drive more traffic that converts every day. Our SEO strategies always focus on getting your business ranked and generating leads.

Marketing automation is the process of using software to complete repetitive marketing tasks designed to nurture sales leads, personalize marketing messages and content and in the process. By automating many of these tasks, users can more effectively send the right message to the right user at the right time. This saves marketers’ time, money and effort.

How agencies and marketers benefits from marketing automation software?

To help you understand the importance of marketing automation, here’s a collection of lead generation statistics that testify to the value of implementation:

• 28% of marketers saw an increase in revenue per sale attributable to marketing automation – Chief Marketer
• 75% of companies using marketing automation and marketing automation software to see ROI within 12 months, 44% within 6 months – Focus Research
• Marketing automation drives a 14.5% increase in sales productivity and a 12.2% reduction in marketing overhead – Nucleus Research
• 70% companies declare that marketing automation met or exceeded ROI expectations – Focus Research
• Companies using marketing automation for nurturing experience a 451% increase in qualified leads – The Annuitas Group
• 350% return on investment and 100% annual revenue growth while saving $400K and generating $2MM in incremental gross revenue – Acteva
• Marketing automation provides 225% increase in prospect volume that convert to sales opportunities – ShipServ
• Marketing automation reduces ignored leads from 80% to 25% – Bulldog Solutions
• Companies that automate lead management see over 10% increase in revenue in 6-9 months – Gartner Research
• 47% of marketing automation-nurtured leads make larger purchases than non-nurtured leads – The Annuitas Group
• Companies achieve a 15% savings on creative productions with marketing automation – Gartner Research
• Marketing automation-generated personalized emails improve click-through rates by 14% and conversion rates over 10% – The Aberdeen Group

Truth is in the numbers

Independent organizations are reporting some very impressive results from companies that are implementing marketing automation and utilizing marketing automation software.

According to Ascend2’s 2016 Marketing Automation Trends survey, 71% of companies use marketing automation. Most of the companies that aren’t using it plan to do so in the foreseeable future.

On average, 49% of companies are currently using Marketing Automation. With more than half of B2B companies (55%) adopting the technology. Emailmonday

Marketing Automation – Your Sales Specialist

Marketing Automation drives a 14.5% increase in sales productivity. Proving the effectiveness of marketing automation, Nucleus Research conducted a study that revealed sales productivity grew by 14.5% when automation software was used. And this isn’t at the cost of increased resources, but in fact the opposite – the same report also found that companies using marketing automation and its software enjoyed an average 12.2% reduction in marketing overheads.

63% of companies outgrowing their competitors are using automation. Online competition will always be tough, but with automation, Lenskold’s Lead Generation Marketing Effectiveness Study has shown that companies can have the edge. Of the companies that are growing larger than their competitors, 63% utilize automation in their marketing strategies.

Nearly two thirds of companies surveyed (63%) expect to realize the benefits of their marketing automation system within six months of implementation. Ascend2 Marketing Automations Trends Survey

Let’s have a look at a quick case study to see how some of these marketing automation, software and numbers translate into business for Thomson Reuters. Thomson Reuters increased revenue from marketing leads by 175%

Thomson Reuters is a good example of a business that used marketing automation to improve its targeted messaging. Email marketing was producing a high number of leads but not all were of the highest quality, so sales had begun running their own lead generation activities.

Marketing automation technology enabled Thomson Reuters to realign the sales and marketing teams, improve segmentation and targeting through a system of lead scoring, and create ideal customer profiles.

As a result of using the new software:

• The number of leads sent to sales increased by 23%.
• With marketing automation software, lead conversion time dropped by 72%.
• The amount of revenue attributed to marketing leads increased by 175%.

Conclusion

Good marketing has the ability to set you apart from your competition. But it can be hard to keep up with what tactics work and which ones don’t. And even when you do, it’s hard to focus on all of them at once. You don’t always have the time or energy to do it.

Thankfully, marketing automation tools exist to make marketing easier for you and your team. By automating, you can spend your time and attention focusing on other efforts that will increase your company’s success.

If you are not using a marketing automation software or any platform then please consider SmartDesk. Our team can help guide you through the setup and ongoing support you will need to succeed.

If you are using another platform contact us today to do a cost and features comparison. We would love to have an opportunity to show you what we can do for you.

In the context of ROI (return on investment), does email marketing stand a chance against some of the big boys: Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram? Google Ads? In this blog we will take a close look and see if good ole fashion still has a place in this ever expanding digital world.

First let’s set the tone for what all the other social media and digital marketing channels have to compete against. Email was the first means of communication in the new digital world that we entered into in the mid 1990’s. Email actually has a longer history going back to the 1960’s with ARPANET, but only became commercially viable in the 90’s with the growth of the home computer. Ok no more nerd talk, back to marketing.

As per online marketing companies in Toronto, today 3.8 Billion people are using email. That is a big number, but is it an effective means of getting your marketing message out?

According to McKinsey , email is 40 times more effective at acquiring new customers than Facebook or Twitter. When you want to grow your company, grow your customer base, get your message out to new prospects, you turn to email. Why? Because email delivers better results than any other channe

An email communication to your prospects is 5x more likely to be seen than viewed on Facebook. Social Media has given the digital marketing experts in Toronto and all over the world a new way to connect with customers and prospects but email still remains as a trusted source to get your message out.

Understanding email can also be a lot simpler than becoming an effective social media marketer. Essentially there are three metrics to wrap your head around to know if your email strategy is working. They are: Open rate, CTR (Click-Through Rate), and ROI.

For every $1 spent on email marketing $44 is made in return, according to a study by CampaignMonitor.

In my years of working with clients and online marketing companies in Toronto, email marketing is last on the list of channels that are effectively being used. Most of my clients are in the SMB market, and until now marketing automation and similar tools have been a little too complicated for the average business owner. More on that later…

Open Rate

Your email open rate is calculated by dividing the number of unique opens by the amount of emails sent, minus the number of email that bounce (aka: bad or non-existent email addresses):

Open Rate = Unique Opens / (Number of Emails Sent – Bounces)

According to mailchimp statistics, most industries have an open rate of 21% and a click-through rate of about 2%. Several digital marketing experts in Toronto are using Mailchimp. Mailchimp on average produces much lower numbers than a company using a email marketing platform integrated into a marketing automation strategy. MailChimp is largely used as a email “blast” tool. Although that can be effective it is not the ideal way to communicate with your prospects.

What Digital marketing services in Canada has to say for Click-Through Rate (CTR)?

Click through rate is the measure of how many people clicked on a hyperlink within the body of your email. It’s important to note that CTR is a somewhat variable number, which can fluctuate depending on the content of your email as well as many other different factors, but generally, a healthy rate falls in the 5 to 8% range.

Here is an amazing example from online marketing companies in Toronto.

If you had an 8% click-through rate, it would mean that for every 100 people who opened your email, 8 people went on to click a link within that campaign.

Email Engagement vs Social Media Engagement – Digital Marketing service in Canada’s perspective.

Email today is largely an opt-in methodology so users likely are getting messages that they are interested in. The industry average for opt-outs of email communication is well under 1%. Spam is always a problem, but is much more under control than a decade or more ago. Digital marketing experts in Toronto knows better laws against spam, software is much better at filtering it out, and spam just doesn’t work, so companies are not pursuing it as a viable means of marketing.

Statista shows that more than 2.5 billion people use social media every month. So it makes perfect sense for companies to spend their marketing dollars in this area. However, it’s a mistake to think that social media is the only way to reach consumers.

According to Statista, there are 5.6 billion active email users around the globe in 2019. In fact, research compiled by Campaign Monitor indicates that 72 percent of people would rather receive brand content through email, while just 17 percent prefer to receive their brand messages from social media platforms.

What social media marketing service companies in Canada claim?

Online and social media marketing companies in Toronto claims that 72% people prefer to receive promotional content through email, compared to 17% who prefer social media.

Why does social media have such a lower number? It is simple, it comes down to solicited vs unsolicited. People opted-in to email communication and even though Facebook does a “good job” of profiling me to understand my interested, the ad is still unsolicited… and for some people they find that a little creepy. With Email you get the be the bouncer, and your inbox is the nightclub.

Market Adoption

If you haven’t started an effective email marketing campaign yet you have a flip of the coin chance of being behind your competition. Only 50% of SMB are using marketing automation.

Looking for a reliable and result-driven online marketing companies in Toronto? Get in touch with us today!

50%of small and medium-sized business use their marketing automation software to send email drip campaigns. – Statista

If you are not convinced that email marketing is something that your organization should be doing then I think I need to repeat myself.

Email marketing is the king of the castle with a 4400% ROI!

This blog isn’t about choosing email over social media marketing, it is about understand where you will be the most effective.

Social media marketing is an excellent tool when your goal is to expand your reach and engagement.To connect with new prospects and introduce your brand to the world.

Email marketing is just better at driving sales. Let’s connect with Zand Marketing. We are your digital marketing expert in Toronto.