Today’s guest post is written by Tim Otis.

It’s no secret we’re overwhelmed with content.

But where is all the good content? How do you define it? And most importantly, how do you ensure you’re not consuming content that turns out to be a total waste of your time?

Stories come and go. And they become the inspiration for other stories strewn about people’s social feeds and channels.

What separates you from the last guy who just shared a link is you’re not buying into it right away because you understand your other role aside from “content strategist” – the role of an analyst. Continue Reading »

After hearing Martin Waxman recount the keynote Soledad O’Brien gave on the opening day of the PRSA conference (I was playing hooky), about storytelling, and having written about creating an online conversation just yesterday, I’ve been thinking a lot on the topic.

Once upon a time, storytelling was the way we passed information from generation to generation.

Before tweeting and Facebook and text messaging, we had only one way to tell stories: Long-form.

For millions of years stories have been told around campfires and in family rooms and at holidays. But in our world of fast everything, we’re losing the art of spinning a good yarn. Continue Reading »

Today’s guest post is written by Ken Mueller.

I’m a technical moron. (That sound you hear is Gini yelling, “A-freaking-men!”)

I spent 13 years in NYC, and part of my job was helping radio stations set up live broadcasts from our facility.

Their tech people would call me and ask technical questions. I would spout off a few specs, and quite often this was enough, until they started asking deeper questions.

Then I had to admit that I was merely parroting what my tech person had told me. I knew enough to be somewhat helpful, but it didn’t take long to realize I had no clue what I was talking about. I was giving them useful information, but I didn’t know what it all meant. Continue Reading »

This post is written by Lisa Gerber.

Bring me your case studies, your articles, your podcasts, and your webinars!

Two weeks ago, I shared with you How to Create an Editorial Calendar, based in part, on work we are doing for Spin Sucks Pro. We are creating a curriculum for digital marketing, strategic planning, inbound marketing, content marketing, and digital PR. And that’s just this year.

Much of the curriculum has been designed, and a great deal of content has been produced. But it’s never enough. And that is where you come in.

So I’m turning it over to you, Spin Sucks community, with an open call for your content. We have a powerful and smart community here representing a variety of areas of expertise, from a variety of industries.

If you are interested in contributing, please read on for details. Continue Reading »

Today’s guest post is written by Marianne Worley.

Not long ago, B2B companies thought customers wanted to buy from great companies. Marketers promoted products and services with self-important platitudes, such as:

1. We are the leader in the industry.
2. We were founded by the smartest engineer in the world.
3. Our products are unsurpassed.

Today, a few companies still cling to this old strategy, but the reality is it doesn’t work. Your customers don’t care how great your company and products are. They just want to be able to trust your company can solve their problems.

Business customers aren’t so different from consumers after all. The purchase process may be more complex and the sales cycle may be longer, but what it comes down to is this: People buy from people. You need to engage with your customers and build trusting relationships to win their business.

Continue Reading »

Guest post by Becky Johns, author of I’m Working On It.

The business world is obsessed with social media. It is obsessed with “conversation” and “engagement” and other such buzzwords.

Yes, the way people use the web in a social way allows better contact with customers and prospects. And, yes, it presents an opportunity to gather insightful information about consumer behavior.

But despite these realities, many companies are still simply broadcasting stale marketing messages. Media itself isn’t social; people are.

Remember why social media got its name in the first place? The important part is social. But it doesn’t work without messages worth sharing. Continue Reading »

A couple of weeks ago, I promised to write about the additional social media trends I’m seeing for 2011. If you missed the first four (content, FTC rulings, net neutrality, and customer engagement) you can find that Spin Sucks post here.

I’ve had a chance to review the post-it note I keep on my desk and following are four additional trends you should pay attention to as you plan for 2011.

1. Social commerce. Social who? In short, you can now sell on Facebook by letting your customers buy, but also letting them tell their friends. And letting their friends tell their friends. Even if you don’t offer ecommerce on your website, it’s now possible to provide that service through the social network. And it’s overly simple to set up.

2. Group buying. You’ve heard of sites, such as Groupon, that sell for discounts if you get your friends to “group” together to buy a product or service? Based on the $1 billion price tag Groupon received earlier this year, expect them and like-minded sites (such as LivingSocial, YouSwoop, and ScoutMom) to continue to grow, offering you a new way to reach different audiences. Continue Reading »

Guest post by Mark Schaefer, author of {grow}.

I was reading a blog post the other day and this comment captured my attention: “Content is NOT king. It is the conversation around that content that is king.”

I recently wrote about how many of these conversations we THINK are occurring on the social web that are not occurring at all. A blog comment is not a conversation. A tweet or a status update is not a conversation. Pushing a “like” button is not a conversation.

So if you accept that we rarely have real conversations around here, what ARE we doing and does it have any affect on sales? Yes, I said sales. Marketers do not exist to drive re-tweets or page views. We exist to sell more stuff to more people for more money. Continue Reading »

It might be too early in the year to write this post, but Patti Knight and I had a conversation yesterday about the future of brick and mortar offices and it got me thinking about trends for next year, let alone 10 years from now. So following are what I think are going to be the communication and marketing trends for 2011.

1. Content, content, content. Did I mention content? A lot of people will disagree with me – some think content is dead. I don’t think we’ve scratched the surface. All companies should become media companies, in that the content they provide is valuable, consistent, and non-salesy. This will be big for B2B companies while they figure out how to use, what they’ve always considered, intellectual property to attract new customers. Examples include white papers, enewsletters, podcasts, and videos. Continue Reading »

Catherine Novak over at WordSpring wrote a great post Tuesday on the merits of content versus conversation. As the word count on the comment I began to leave for her continued to grow, I realized I just might have a blog post of my own on my hands.

In her post, Catherine quotes Cory Doctorow (via Clay Shirky): “Conversation is King, content is just something to talk about.”

When I blog, my primary goal is to strike a conversation. Some people write for catharsis. Some to preach. Some to sell. I write for conversation.

“But this very post is published on a business blog,” you might be thinking. “Isn’t the point of a business blog to sell?”

And it would be difficult to argue with you – or with Joe Pulizzi, who wrote a solid post of his own on Tuesday entitled “Sales Is the Reason Your Content Exists.” But, wait, hear me out. Continue Reading »