6 Ways to Repurpose Your Content

MailChimp is partnering with Facebook on their Boost Your Business tour, and I got to meet hundreds of small business owners at the last event in San Diego. I asked them about their challenges, and the most common response I heard was this:

“I have a million things to do. I don’t have time to create new content for email.”

Running a business is hard! It would be nice to have the time and resources to write lots of original content every day, but that’s not realistic for many marketers and business owners.

If you struggle with the same thing, keep in mind that your email content doesn’t always have to be new. You can reuse and repackage content you already have to create useful emails that are new to your subscribers.

Here are 6 ways you can repurpose existing content to create effective email marketing campaigns:

1. RSS-to-email: If you regularly update your blog, you can automatically send your subscribers new blog posts whenever you publish them. This makes it easy for customers who want to hear what you have to say, but don’t check your blog often. Set it up once, tell us how often you want new posts to go out, and we’ll take care of the rest. If you’re a busy entrepreneur, this is a great way to get the most out of your content without a lot of effort. And it’s nice for your customers, too, because that content is waiting for them in their inbox.

2. Roundups: Send your subscribers roundups of blog posts, articles, guides, and other existing content you have on hand. We do this with our quarterly MonkeyWrench newsletter. Every issue has a theme, and we combine existing content with original content that supports the theme to create a fresh newsletter.

3. Best sellers: If you sell products online, send periodic emails sharing your best sellers. You can even segment by customer behavior and purchase data to send your subscribers recommended products that are relevant to them. You can use an image and product description you already have on your site. It’s a great way to introduce your customers to items they might not think about while giving your best sellers a boost.

4. Curated newsletters: Are you a leader in your industry? Send out links to articles as recommended reading for your customers. If they look to you for insight and best practices, they’ll be interested in what you’re reading. Just make sure you source your links and give credit where it’s due.

5. Photos from social media: If you’ve got something new to show off, a photo and a quick caption may be all you need for a great campaign. Share photos of products, completed projects, or works in progress. With MailChimp Snap, you can create and send a photo campaign from your phone in moments. It’s practically as easy as sending a text message. You can even pull photos directly from Instagram if you’re already posting there.

6. Popular posts: Your email subscribers may not know about your most popular articles and blog posts. Show them what you have to offer. You could even use automation to welcome new readers by sending them an exclusive guide or whitepaper when they sign up for your newsletter.

You’ve probably got plenty of evergreen content sitting around that would be good as new to your email subscribers. Of course, you also have different audiences on different channels, so your newsletter subscribers might like a peek at what you share on your blog or social media. This can be a great way to fill in the gaps when you don’t have time to create original email marketing content. And if you click through the links above, you’ll see it can also be a great way to create blog posts about email marketing content!

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How To Put The UNIQUE In Your Unique Value Proposition

According to ConversionXL, value proposition is the #1 factor influencing whether a visitor to your website will “peace out” or continue reading.

In other words, it’s kind of a big deal.

When visitors reach your homepage, you have only a few seconds to catch their attention. This requires you to be something they haven’t seen 100 times before.

It requires you to be unique.

Most websites define “unique” as “clever.” Their strategy is to put catchy wording in their single headline, sub-headline, and 2-3 sentence explanatory paragraph.

If you want to learn how to write a traditional value proposition, check out this guide.

In this article, we are going to be looking at several unique examples that don’t follow the traditional format but still accomplish the goals of every good value proposition.

What Your Value Proposition ISN’T

You value proposition is a statement that communicates the unique value provided by your business to your target customers.

• Your value proposition is NOT a call to action.
• Your value proposition is NOT necessarily a headline + sub-headline.
• Your value proposition is NOT an explanation of your product.
• Your value proposition is NOT a rundown of every possible benefit your product can provide.
• Your value proposition is NOT an introduction to your business.

You value proposition is a statement that communicates the UNIQUE VALUE provided by your business to your TARGET CUSTOMERS.

Unique Value

What makes your business unique? If you can’t answer that, there’s a pretty firm cap on your growth.

Notice the question isn’t: What makes your business different?

I can virtually guarantee that you have competitors who offer a very similar product or service to your business. Perhaps you even started your business as a copy of an existing, successful business model.

So how can you make your value proposition unique?

There are 2 primary answers to that question:

1. Make your product better than the competition in at least one area.

You don't have to be the best all-round. You just have to be better at one thing. 

preferably the thing your target demographic is most passionate about. This is BY FAR the best way to offer a unique value proposition.

2. Use specific case studies from your business to frame the benefits you provide in a one-of-a-kind way.

If you insist on having an average product, use case study data to put a unique spin on your offer.

Case studies are inherently unique. No two business-client relationships will yield the exact same results. By utilizing case study results in your value proposition, you can offer something specific no one else is offering.

Target Customers

Your value proposition should be directed at your target customers, and ONLY your target customers.

This isn’t the place to list all your benefits. It’s the place to list value and benefits appealing specifically to the intended audience.

Everyone else can go home.

1. Know your target audience.
2. Speak to your target audience.
3. Ignore everyone else.

That’s the basic framework. Display the unique value your business provides to your target customers.

Let’s look at two unique examples.

Unique Example #1: SumoMe

SumoMe offers an app called Share for sharing web content withe social audiences. It’s one of 5 billion and half other social share apps/plugins/bars available on the web.

In other words, there’s a lot of competition. So how do they stand out?

To start, they decided to focus on something very few other share bars were focusing on: mobile. They offer a share bar that shows up on your phone and hangs out at the bottom of the screen as readers scroll through your content, giving those readers the ability to share your content at any time.

As a result, this mobile focus has had great results for SumoMe users like Bryan Harris.

Now, this unique value would go to waste if it wasn’t described in the value proposition. So let’s take a look at the landing page for Share.

Wait a second? They don’t talk about mobile.

You’re right, and that’s why I said at the beginning that your value proposition is NOT necessarily a headline + sub-headline. You’ll notice that instead of talking about it, SumoMe depicts the product in use on a mobile device.

They use an image to display the unique value offered and then use their headline to describe EXACTLY what it will accomplish for its users.

Get 20% more traffic.

Who doesn’t want 20% more traffic?

Where does SumoMe get this number? I don’t know. It could be a specific case study. It could be an average. It could simply be a number that sounds appealing yet attainable.

Regardless, if you’re a reader interested in 20% more traffic (aka the target customer), you’re going to either click the CTA or scroll down, and the moment you scroll down, you are greeted with the second half of the traditional value proposition

Want I want to highlight here is the first line.

“Share makes it stupid-easy for your visitors to share your content…”

This is a more traditional value proposition: It fills in the missing pieces for visitors who scroll down. But SumoMe continues to be unique by using the phrase “stupid-easy.” You don’t see the word “stupid” often on marketing pages, so it catches your attention, which as I mentioned before, is exactly what you want from your value proposition.

Let’s look at another example.

Unique Example #2: Crazy Egg

Like SumoMe, Crazy Egg doesn’t utilize a traditional value proposition format. When you land on the home page, you are asked a question.

This question serves to narrow in on their target audience — website owners wanting to understand their user behavior. If you don’t own a website or if you don’t have any interest in understanding your visitor behavior, your only option is to leave.

The sub-heading explains what will happen if you enter your website: “Find out by seeing how users click and scroll through your website.”

Simple and to the point, but as Billy Mays once told me, “Wait, there’s more!”

If you don’t enter your address within a few seconds, the second part (you might even say “the real value proposition”) pops up on your screen.

Here we see the traditional value proposition, a headline describing the benefit offered to customers.

For most websites, the information in this popup makes up their landing page. The above shot is essentially their homepage.

And that’s great. There are a lot of headline + sub-headline + CTA homepages for a reason. But what Crazy Egg has done is create a unique value proposition incorporating all the same elements but in a different presentation.

It’s a unique user experience that offers them only one direction. Either they hop in the top of the sales funnel or they move along their merry way.

Conclusion

If you want to be “unique,” you have to be willing to do things differently. You have to be willing to try something new instead of purchasing a one-click landing page.

Template services are great if you don’t have the time or money to lead the way in every area, but they won’t make your value proposition particularly unique.

To really excel, use all the crucial elements of a successful value proposition — display the unique value you offer your target customers — but change up the order. Play with the delivery.

Don’t be afraid to take the game-winning shot.

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5 Digital Marketing Trends That Will Disrupt Your Business

You have been running your business for a long time. Life is good. Sales are holding up.

The admin processes and technology systems are nailed. You have your eye on your competitors and the industry. The business model is stable.

Or is it?

A small start-up starts selling direct online to your customers. From London….

A potential competitor doesn’t do distribution like you do. They go straight to your end customer….

This digital disintermediation model is only going to get worse…if you are a traditional business.

The frog thought things were cool when it jumped into that pot and was just chilling. The water was a pleasant swimming temperature. Did a few laps.

But someone had started a small fire.

A raging digital fire

It was only few years ago and  the web, technology and business started changing faster than ever before. Social media was ignored by most except the teenagers and the early adopters.

Facebook was frivolous.

Mobiles were for the corporate chiefs and senior executives. The devices were nicknamed “Crack Berries”

Apple brought out the iPod, iTunes and the iPhone. Vinyl died and businesses disappeared.

A digital fire had started.

Those little icons downloaded to your smartphone hide powerful technology and new business models.

Apps are now redefining business….

Uber’s app has the taxi monopolies and authorities running scared.  But their business model is not just about technology…. it is much more about building a trust network and adding more value.

Here is a quick comparison between a taxi in DC and UberX

Source: Districtsource.com

On demand apps are pushing into many industries. Is yours next?

Capture the data

Facebook captured almost every intimate detail from your relationship status, to brand preference, gender, location and much more.

It collected the data and now they sell it back to us.

Granular data will give you the power to do what seems to be “one to one” marketing. When visiting websites are you seeing the same banner ad popping up. It’s no coincidence. You have been targeted!

Here are some digital marketing trends that will disrupt your business, whether you are disrupting yourself or you are being disrupted.

Don’t ignore them.

1. Digital marketing automation platforms

The splintering of media has made marketing at scale a nightmare. There is..

More media..

More digital channels…

More social networks…

Yes, there is lot of moving parts. But there is a solution.

Technology….

Marketing used to be a creative pursuit. That has changed. It is much more. You need a digital marketing platform. A new approach called “marketing automation“.

Image Source: Responsive inbound marketing

The race is on to own the platform. The players?…many. Hubspot, Ontraport, Infusionsoft. Then you have Social Sprout, Marketo and Hootsuite. The list is growing…fast

 The marketing automation race

It doesn’t matter whether you are a…

content marketer..

social media marketer..

blogger who wants to scale and monetize their platform..

or just a digital marketer…

You will need a marketing platform sooner rather than later.

This scramble for the high ground and platform domination is coming from start-ups and the established Enterprise technology giants.

It is a challenge for big and small.  But the the complexity increases at the big end of town.

To manage marketing at scale in a digital world requires a new breed of marketer. The data scientist. Previously they were kept in a cave and tossed scraps.

Now they will be your secret Ninja weapon.

2. Big data for personalization and identifying influencers

As the web exploded, the tools to manage and measure the noise and information were non-existent. We cobbled together software, technology and amateurs. You need professionals. And you need to capture the data.

Data is going to be your secret weapon.

Knowing more about your customer than they know about themselves is marketing power. Natural language processing will identify influencers, customer preferences and content that works and is viral. There is another aspect to this.

Identifying influencers

Identifying global influencers in your industry or niche is starting to go mainstream.

I was surprised the other day to find that technology that sifts through 6 million web properties per day over 90 days had identified me as the “#1 content marketing influencer”. This technology big data engine called “Appinions” has been developed over 10 years at Cornell University. It provides insights into what is influence in a digital world.

Apparently influence is not based on my amazing smile or good looks but “data”.

Data source: Appinions

Platforms such as BuzzSumo, Appinions and Simply Measured are all using data to help you calculate your next marketing move. It also includes identifying and creating great content.

Personalization

Enterprise platforms like Teradata allow companies with 10 million customers like the Qantas Frequent Flyer Loyalty program to dissect the data. Then they target them with an email or even that print piece in the snail mail that is relevant and personal.

Expect the smaller end of town to use data more effectively to produce powerful marketing results. Let’s look at an example.

When someone registers for a LinkedIn Webinar. Then they are maybe in the market for a LinkedIn course, lead generation or other relevant training. It should be tagged by your marketing system and used for future targeted campaigns.

But it’s not the data that is important…

It’s what you do with the data…

3. Paid social media advertising

When Facebook wound back its organic reach the game changed.

Building likes wasn’t as important anymore. But using its paid and very targeted advertising data now is.

We are moving on from just chasing fluffy likes.

Now re-targeting and Facebook custom audiences allows you to get a good return on your advertising dollars. Facebook is now dominating the social media advertising budget. It’s on target to hit over $14 billion in advertising revenue in 2015.

It is now becoming a serious rival to Google.

Source: Wordstream.com

Return on investment

But what it means is that if you are spending $10 on an “Ad” you better be sure it is making money not losing dollars. So measurement of ROI is gaining serious attention.

Google+ tried to disrupt Facebook’s social network domination but failed.

Twitter has it’s place in paid but it doesn’t have Facebook’s discrete data. It is more about creating top of the funnel brand awareness, driving traffic, breaking news and powering viral content.

Don’t ignore this trend.

Targeted social advertising on desktop and mobile is here to stay and some of your competitors are already using it..

4. Mobile assets and advertising

We knew sort of knew how important mobile was. But as the second screen has become the first screen we are scrambling to adapt.

The growth of mobile advertising is stratospheric.

Here are the predictions by emarketer.com on where mobile is heading compared to desktop.

Some more perspective on the scale of where this is heading.

73% of Facebook’s $14 billion this year comes just from mobile advertising….that is over $10.2 billion from mobile alone.

Facebook also has barely tapped mobile advertising on its 1 billion users on WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger platforms.

Look for that to change over the next few years.

So what is important here?

Making mobile a priority in your marketing and media focus.

What you will also need to consider is that mobile requires a different approach in how you create your digital assets and use the screen to display media and calls to action.

With mobile less is more. What are you wanting them to achieve?

Read..

View a video..

Capture an email…

Contact you..

Maybe those four are enough for mobile. You cannot do everything on mobile that you can do on a desktop. You need to focus on what is the most important and prfioritize.

5. Visual media

We have been watching it for a few years now but images, photos, embedded video in social networks and now streaming video (Meerkat and Periscope) is changing the engagement landscape.

This has happened because of the rapid rise of mobiles with cameras that are fast rivalling professional Digital SLR’s.

How important is visual content?

I grabbed this chart off my “Simply Measured” tool the other day that measures the metrics for social media networks. It shows an increase of 59% more engagement when a tweet includes an image.

This trend will only continue to consolidate as more people move to mobile as their primary screen as developing countries purchase smartphones. India is predicted to have more mobiles than the USA in the next couple of years.

Over to you

So what marketing automation platforms are you considering? Is mobile on your radar? Are you already personalising advertising and using Facebook’s targeted Ads?

Look forward to reading your insights and stories in the comments below.

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Top 7 Free Photo Editing Apps

Photo editing apps are huge right now, and for good reason. According toresearch on internet trends, we post somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.8 BILLION photos to the internet every single day. That is A LOT of images to edit!

So it is no surprise that new photo editing apps are coming out nearly constantly. I have combed through the App Store and Google Play to find 7 of the best FREE photo editing apps out there. Please add your favorite photo editing app in the comments below!

Top 7 Photo Editing Apps…

1. Fotor Photo Editor

Currently the 9th most popular free app in the App Store, Fotor lets you edit your images, make collages or even design and share your own greeting cards. Simple to use but with tons of useful features, Fotor is a great choice for newbies and professionals alike. Also offers batch processing, making it easier to edit multiple photos at once.

2. Snapseed

Available for both Apple and Android devices, Snapseed offers a variety of features to perfect your mobile images:

• All the basic photo editing features: cropping, rotating, tuning, spot repair, etc.
• A variety of filters to add drama or flare to your photos
• Stacks: These make editing even simpler by allowing you to copy and apply edits to multiple photos, re-edit filters, and more.

3. VSCO Cam

A favorite among professional photographers, VSCO is one of the most advanced mobile photo editing apps available today. It comes with a built-in photo feed of curated (absolutely gorgeous) images other users have created, giving you inspiration for your own photos. The interface is simple, and according to many users, the filters and effects are some of the best out there.

4. Panorama 360

If you are looking for a way to take your images to a whole new level, you might want to check out Panorama 360. It lets you to take stunning, high-res 360 degree panoramas, and then share them with your social media followers or the app’s 4 million registered users. Offers unique features like 3D effects, the ability to add sound and geo-tagging.

5. Photo Lab

If you are looking for a way to have a little FUN with your photos, look no further than Photo Lab. With 500 built-in effects, you can do everything from putting your face on a magazine cover to airbrushing it into a luxury sports car.

6. Autodesk Pixlr (formerly Pixlr Express)

If you have used the desktop version of Pixlr, you already know it is a great, all purpose photo editing app. Easy to use, yet jam packed with features, Autodesk Pixlr could be the only photo app you need. Layer on text and stickers, or create photo collages in seconds. Offers unique features like focal blur, color splash and the ability to turn your photos into drawings or sketches.

7. Photo Editor by Aviary

A great app for basic photo edits like cropping, filters and touch-ups, but also comes with some fun options like whimsical frames and stickers. One of the New York Times’ “Best apps for iOS 7”, this is a great option for quick touch ups or advanced edits alike.

Whether you are looking for basic photo editing features or more advanced, professional-quality edits, the 7 apps above should help.

Looking for more help with your images? Check out these helpful posts:

How To Create Amazing Graphics With Phone Apps

6 Free Tools To Create Amazing Eye Catching Graphics

I would love to hear what your favorite free photo editing apps are…please share a link in the comments below!

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