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Is It Time To Rethink Influencer Marketing?

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By Logan Godfrey    

Have you heard about the influencer marketing fiasco that occurred leading up to the 2017 Fyre Festival in the Bahamas? Probably not, but it’s something you need to know about if your company relies on influencer marketing to get the word out.

Brought to light in a new Netflix documentary, the Fyre Festival was a flop for the ages. It all started with rapper Ja Rule, who was brought in to be the star power behind the festival, encouraging famous social media influencers to post positive things about the event on their personal accounts.

The rapper said this was “going to create a small buzz, and that can be a big buzz, and it’s free press. You can’t pay for that kind of press.” Unfortunately, it was anything but free. Social media superstar and model Kendall Jenner was allegedly paid $250,000 for one post promoting the event on Instagram.

It got even worse. Everything about the Fyre Festival that was promised by prominent social media influencers turned out to be a farce. Instead of flying to paradise, people who attended the festival found themselves in a dump. That’s putting it lightly. The founder of the Fyre Festival, Billy McFarland, ended up in jail. Ja Rule, after the release of the Netflix documentary, said he was “bamboozled” by the event’s organizers.

What did this event teach us? Should we not rely on influencer marketing so much to get our messages across? Or, should we rethink the idea entirely?

Influencer Marketing Under the Microscope

The goal of influencer marketing has always been to get your company’s message across to your consumers and customers with help of influencers who have a large following, specifically on social media. In ENX2 Marketing’s case, it would be a law firm’s message that we would want to get across.

Your consumers and customers, who aren’t necessarily knowledgeable about your company and what you’re trying to advertise, may be more inclined to react to your message if it was coming from a celebrity rather than an ad you spent hundreds or thousands of dollars on. Maybe paying a celebrity or well-known influencer may not be a bad idea? Well, only if you aren’t giving the influencer a false message to spread like what happened with Ja Rule and the Fyre Festival.

That incident wasn’t solely responsible for putting influence marketers under the microscope though. Companies trying to pitch false narratives isn’t something new. New businesses sometimes try to overpromise in the beginning and end up falling short. When an influence marketer becomes involved, they could spread the company’s false message to millions of people. The company may not be prepared for something like that, even though their message made it seem like they were. This could lead to a very negative consumer experience and lots of trouble for your brand.

Small businesses, start-up companies, and brands as a whole should be cautious when it comes to reaching out to an influencer for marketing help. Not because it’s a bad idea, but because you may not be ready for the boom that might come with instant success. Never promise what you can’t guarantee.

By Logan Godfrey    

Sourced from Business 2 Community

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Google releases synthetic speech database to help ‘deep fake’ audio detection research

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By Abner Li

Speech synthesis technology has advanced a great deal in recent years, with neural networks from DeepMind doing an especially good job of creating realistic, human-like voices. Like with any technology, it can be abused and Google is working to advance state-of-the-art research on fake audio detection.

Last year, the Google News Initiative (GNI) announced that it wanted to help tackle “deep fakes” and other systems that try to bypass voice authentication systems.

Malicious actors may synthesize speech to try to fool voice authentication systems, or they may create forged audio recordings to defame public figures. Perhaps equally concerning, public awareness of “deep fakes” (audio or video clips generated by deep learning models) can be exploited to manipulate trust in media: as it becomes harder to distinguish real from tampered content, bad actors can more credibly claim that authentic data is fake.

Working with Google AI, GNI today released a body of synthetic speech containing thousands of phrases spoken by its deep learning text-to-speech (TTS) models. This corpus contains 68 synthetic “voices” from a variety of regional accents reading from English newspaper articles.

This dataset is available for participants of the 2019 ASVspoof challenge to create “countermeasures against fake (or “spoofed”) speech, with the goal of making automatic speaker verification (ASV) systems more secure.”

By training models on both real and computer-generated speech, ASVspoof participants can develop systems that learn to distinguish between the two. The results will be announced in September at the 2019 Interspeech conference in Graz, Austria.

This effort is also a part of Google’s AI Principles to ensure “strong safety practices to avoid unintended results that create risks of harm.”

By Abner Li

Sourced from 9 to 5 Google

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How Better Focus Can Bolster Your Business Development Efforts

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By Don Markland

Let’s first talk about apples. The story of apples is as almost as old as time. Many different historical stories and mythologies include apples. (And trust me, this isn’t a religion or history lesson or even some fruit allergy discussion.) But the apple can teach a valuable lesson about life, business, and leadership.

The apple can fill many purposes. For example, it can be sliced, pied, sugared, candied, drizzled in caramel, frozen and more. The possibilities are endless! Any way you slice it, an apple can be delicious to your taste.

Further, apples come in many varieties: They come in Golden Delicious, Gala, Fuji, McIntosh, Granny Smith and Honeycrisp varieties (my personal favorite), to name a few. In fact, according to the University of Illinois Extension, there are 7,500 types of varieties of apples grown throughout the world.

With these countless varieties and innumerable purposes, there is one commonality amongst all apples: When an apple is not used to its fullest potential, whether it’s used raw or in a pie, the apple will wither and die — its insides turn dark and mushy and become unusable. It’s here where I believe the apple mirrors all of us.

When we as leaders, entrepreneurs or managers don’t find focus and we sit dormant — regardless of our variety or personality type — we may dwindle, become discouraged and wither away.

Are any of these you?

• A manager who takes on all the duties of their team because you feel like you can only trust the way you do it

• An entrepreneur who makes endless daily task lists but never seems to get them done or make progress on them

• A leader who works countless hours but can’t find anyone else to “pick up the ball” and help

If so, I believe you need to learn how to find focus, and quickly, before you wither away.

The trick, to me, is making focus your obsession. The apple knows its purpose; you cannot generally be a part-time entrepreneur or a halfway-hobby leader. Make your focus what you are all about.

Here are three ways to crystallize focus daily.

1. Establish daily reading habits.

How much are you reading? Are you considered an expert in your office? Why not? You could be an expert on something if you became obsessed about it. Listen to audiobooks on your commute or while you cook dinner. Prioritize the time.

• As a sales leader, pick 20 sales books, like The 10X Rule, The Challenger Sale and Fanatical Prospecting. These books changed the way I looked at selling and are the first books I recommend to every salesperson.

• In marketing, you can become obsessed with strategies like digital marketing, social marketing, or SEO. Start with books like This is Marketing and Blue Ocean Strategy. Is a marketer, identifying your core and niche can make all the difference. These books can help get you started on that path.

• Are you an entrepreneur? Study some of the top books, like The Lean Startup, The Hard Thing About Hard Things, The Go-Giver, Can’t Hurt Me and more. I believe every entrepreneur should start with these books because they teach that entrepreneurship isn’t glamorous and takes real grit. These books can become a launchpad for your entrepreneurship journey.

By focusing on personal learning, you may find that your focus enhances.

2. Establish a daily practice.

How much are you practicing? Doctors, salespeople, mothers, teachers, entrepreneurs, athletes and even CEOs all still need to get better every day. In my experience, we only get better through disciplined practice and not performance. One 2014 study found that, in nearly every profession or sector studied, people that had deliberate practice in nearly every profession showed improvement in their performance. So how are you drilling the right behaviors to get better at them? How are you practicing? Here are some suggestions:

• As a salesperson, are you roleplaying objections with teammates?

• As a leader, do you film yourself giving a presentation and then practice areas for improvement where you struggle?

• As a manager, do you roleplay and practice handling difficult conversations or coaching conversations with challenging employees?

A Navy SEALs maxim says, “The more you sweat in training, the less you bleed on the battlefield.”

This applies to every job or career in the world. I still train nearly every morning with my own set of sales and leadership training modules, and so can you. Prioritize the time and enhance your focus.

3. Establish daily measurables.

Every job has things you can measure. In his book The Breakthrough Factor, Henry Marsh — the former American record-holder in the steeplechase — discusses the importance of focusing on your personal bests every single day instead of comparing to other runners. To be world class at anything, I believe you must measure your results every day. Identify how you can measure everything. Some daily things to measure that you might not realize improve your focus include:

• Customer calls: How many customers did you speak with today, and how were the interactions?

• Employee one-on-ones: One role of a leader is to interact with their teams. Are you stuck in your office too much or just moving from meeting to meeting? Get with your people. Engage. You can do this over the phone or in person. Measure these interactions.

• Partner calls: Every leader is part of business development. How many new partners or potential strategic partners did you talk to today?

Remember this simple formula: Measure to manage to grow. That is how you can focus and become your best self. Don’t run against other competitors, run against yourself.

All of us are like the apple: If we don’t focus on our purpose, we might wither away. Stay focused, stay obsessed, and win.

Feature Image Credit: Getty

By Don Markland

Don Markland is a wild global sales executive disrupting digital marketing. Learn how his company MoneySolver is changing lives every day.

Sourced from Forbes

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Five Key Social Media Trends For 2019

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By Claire Lancaster

Claire Lancaster, Head of Social Media at data driven creative agency IF Agency, starts the year with her prediction of the key trends that will define the next 12 months in social media, content and influencer marketing.

Having focussed on the fabulous world of social media and digital marketing for the last decade and the one thing that is always constant is that social media is always changing! Claire has immersed herself in all things social, all the time, and actively follows the work and insights of global thought leaders, case studies and all the latest facts and figures. This, combined with her own experience as a social media marketing practitioner, Claire has identified the key focus areas in social media for the year ahead.

Claire summarises what’s to come in 2019, “I expect reach, dialogue and influencers to all reduce as brands embrace niche and more focused targeting. Creativity and campaigns will increase and vertical will become the new horizontal.”

Here are five key factors that will shape social media in 2019:

  1. Rebuilding Social Trust 

2018 represented a crisis year for trust on social media. Privacy issues, fake accounts and bought followers on social platforms seemed like continuous headlines. With overall trust compromised, there has been a wave of social scepticism and a swing back to endorsements from immediate friends, family and acquaintances.

2019 is the year to embrace authenticity and place that sentiment at the core of all activities. A study from Sprout Social discovered that 86% of consumers believe transparency from businesses is more important than ever before. Naturally as a consequence, social media activity in 2019 needs to respond, address and reassure these concerns. The stakes are even higher with a need for trust and genuine engagement.

With users increasingly conscious and curious about who they’re interacting with on social media. Brands will need to adapt and understand what successful engagement truly means. It’s less about reach and more about being real and fostering communities.

A key trend expected in 2019 is a rise of rivate Facebook community groups –  which allow for dialogue in a safe environment away from open broadcast feeds. These more niche groups can be a powerful way to bring interested users together for open and engaged discussion.

  1. Embracing One to One Social Messaging For Brands 

In an age where consumer trust is compromised, and social platforms become harder and more expensive to leverage embracing social messaging is a key opportunity.

Making brands more accessible and genuinely engaging with customers creates authentic word of mouth marketing that is naturally created face-to-face within communities. Expectations for high value and private interactions will increase in 2019. According to Twilio, 90% of consumers would like to use messaging to communicate with businesses. Successfully fulfilling this presents a delivery challenge for brands and businesses, one which the right agency partners, chatbots and AI are able to overcome.

Chatbots and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can offer replies that range from streamlining customer service queries/FAQs to providing real, helpful advice. Brands can highlight the availability of new services by running social media campaigns that incorporate messaging apps.

The key opportunity on social media platforms has always been branding. Overtime this has been overshadowed by a focus on promotions, beating algorithms and vanity metrics. Consumers don’t just care about products and price, they want to connect and engage with brands that reflect their values. One of the biggest opportunities in 2019 is to improve brands connecting with audiences through unique direct messaging facilitated by chatbots and AI.

  1. Nano-Influencers Are The Next Big Thing

Celebrities have lost their credibility, people are sceptical of posts from the big-time social media influencers. Likewise, micro-influencers, with followers ranging from the tens to hundreds of thousands, have become less trusted by audiences and for brands many have become increasingly demanding and expensive. Nano-influencers are the next big thing in influencer marketing.

Nano-influencers are typically those with less than 10K followers. Their comparably tiny follower count makes them a surprisingly valuable alternative to the internet famous however what they lack in initial reach, they make up for in more sincere-sounding opinions and higher engagement rates. Their lack of fame and ego is one of the qualities that make them approachable for brands and more authentic in the eyes of their followers.

Nano-influencers are a brilliant starting point for any brands completely new to influencer marketing. An initial campaign with 2-3 Nano-influencers is a low-investment way to test out the tactic. Their word-of-mouth holds great weight in consumer purchasing decisions, which can help to drive conversions for your brand. Significantly lower upfront investment means that even a moderately successful Nano-influencer activation can provide a solid return-on-investment (ROI).

  1. Accountability In Paid For Social Media

Social media is now a pay-to-play medium and a paid social strategy is the cornerstone of successful social media marketing. Competition is driving up prices and driving down cost efficiencies. In 2019 it will be harder and more expensive to achieve cut through with an audience whose attention spans are already fleeting.

Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter or any other paid for social ads do not have magical powers. Paid social ads are simply that – ads! They only work if the content is right and quality content has never been as critical as it will be in 2019. Paying entry into the target markets social feed is no guarantee they will take notice or take action.

For success in 2019, brands need to go beyond product and service and create ads that entertain and inspire. As a result I expect to see an increase in investment in planning time, creativity and smart targeting to the same level, if not greater, than the paid for media spend to achieve the best results.

  1. Rise Of Vertical Formats

Snapchat pioneered the vertical video content format back in 2014. The format has subsequently been adopted by Facebook, Instagram, Spotify and most recently YouTube in Sept 2018 with the launch of vertical video ads.

Stories will dominate social media in 2019. As viewers hold their phones upright and sift through mountains of content with the tap of a finger, brands have to produce Stories that grab attention from consumers in the moment. Relevance, authenticity and action are all important but even the most visually stunning story can fall flat if it doesn’t captivate. A successful vertical story starts with grabbing an audience’s attention while also letting the passion and character of people shine through.

The rise of vertical video presents both opportunities and challenges when it comes to brand storytelling. The vertical format requires a closer cropped, more refined take. In return the vertical orientation offers an intimate view, immediacy and interactivity with customers in a way that fits their viewing preferences with their touchscreen smartphone in the upright position.

So there you have it, IF Agency’s top five social media predictions for 2019.

By Claire Lancaster

Sourced from Digital Doughnut

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Best Practices in Engaging Mobile Customers: A Conversation With Dunkin’ Brands’ John Costello

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Sourced from CMO Council

 

In this video, John Costello, President of Global Marketing and Innovation at Dunkin’ Brands, shares his views on mobile relationship marketing and the criticality of customer centricity when advancing the mobile agenda. “Dunkin’s purpose is to help our customers get running in the morning and keep ’em running all day long, so mobile is the perfect device for us to really connect. So we have really adopted a mobile-centric strategy as a way for us to engage with our customers and also find out what’s on their mind as well,” Costello shares.

At Dunkin’, Costello has global responsibility for Dunkin’ Donuts and Baskin-Robbins advertising, marketing, consumer engagement, digital, mobile and social marketing, and consumer and business intelligence. He oversees research and product development, the culinary team and retail channel development efforts for both brands globally.

Sourced from CMO Council

 

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Hiring A Creative Professional? Look For These 15 Essential Traits

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Sourced from Forbes

Hiring new talent can be intimidating. You don’t want to make the wrong choice, but you also don’t want to spend weeks or even months sifting through resumes and conducting interviews.

To make the process more efficient and effective, it helps to make a list not only of the skills, but also of the traits a successful candidate must have. This is particularly important when you’re hiring for creative roles, where possessing characteristics like flexibility, empathy and the ability to accept feedback play a huge role in success.

We asked a panel of Forbes Agency Council experts about some lesser-known or even unexpected traits leaders should look for in creative team members, and why these characteristics are so crucial.

1. Entrepreneurial Spirit

Leaders should always be on the lookout for entrepreneurs — people who are curious risk-takers, inclined toward ingenuity. Entrepreneurs aren’t satisfied with the status quo, and they strive for innovation at all levels. Filling your organization — especially your creative team — with entrepreneurs means not just a better end product for clients, but a better culture overall. – Mimi Lettunich, Twenty Four 7

2. Honesty

Thought leaders who bring honesty to a creative team help foster transparency in the workplace. A company culture that celebrates and inspires honesty as a value creates an atmosphere of trust, confidence and loyalty. Management must be open to hearing the truth from employees, and employees must be open to constructive feedback from team members for continued growth. – Lauren Shirreffs, 2Social | The Social Media Agency

3. Strong Creative Writing Skills

It is amazing how often this is overlooked, especially if writing skill is not your strong suit or a particular interest. However, content, captions, advertising and marketing strategy is benefited by someone who can not only put words together, but put them together in a way that draws the reader in and truly engages them. Anyone can write a piece of content, but not everyone can write it well. – Brandon Stapper, Nonstop Signs

4. Collaborative Fit

For creative hires, we try to balance talent with that all-important “cultural fit” — a personality-chemistry and communication style that will complement our current team. We’ve found that “fit” can be measured in the recruiting process through both testing and behavioral interviewing. We invite candidates to a short creative collaboration to see how they communicate and work through conflict. – Megan Cunningham, Magnet Media, Inc.

5. Team History

One of the traits I always look for in our team members is their history with team sports or group organizations. More than any other advertising and marketing discipline, experiential is truly a team effort, with no room for egos. Making sure people have a strong background in working with others to overcome challenges and celebrate successes helps foster a stronger team culture. – Jessica Reznick, We’re Magnetic

6. Good Time Management

A creative person’s ability to get into the “creative zone” and then switch into execution mode can greatly impact the bottom line. We ask a lot of questions about their time management skills and how they’ve developed them throughout the years. Having the ability to get into the “creative zone” quickly and still produce high-quality work is definitely a learned skill. – Danielle Sabrina, Tribe Builder Media

7. Empathy

In today’s world empathy is an essential quality to understand the target audiences you are trying to reach and, at the same time, to build and nurture internal teams. Empathy is the ability to deeply understand the environment we are in. It can help us take better decisions, define better strategies and communicate more clearly. That’s why leaders should look for it in new hires. – Daniela Pavan, The Ad Store New York

8. Emotional Intelligence

Emotional intelligence is something that is not out there very often. It is something that cannot be bought and that most people have no idea how to use or implement. It is one of those skills that is mission-critical to the success or failure of interactions with people and business. It is one of those things that must be learned by all members of management. – Jon James, Ignited Results

9. Improvisation Skills

To me, great idea and execution people are all amazing improvisers. They come up with the solution. Then the key performance indicator (KPI) changes and they flip the problem inside out to come up with something else. It’s always amazing to see it in action. The ability to think quickly and come up with more solutions based on moving targets is crucial, especially with how fast we work today. – Neal Sharma, DEG

10. Personality Fit

When it comes to hiring, of course look at an applicant’s portfolio and experience. However, since implementing the following question, we’ve seen a greater retention rate and better team dynamics. The question, “How would you smuggle an elephant up to the 20th floor of this building?” is silly, but it reveals both creative process and personality, and we are able to see if they will fit our team dynamics. – Jason Kulpa, UE.co

11. Introversion

Introversion is not a weakness. When we think of creative types, we often think extrovert, loud, openly expressive. However, introverts are highly valuable to the creative process in their ability to tell a rich, creative story. Introverts may think deeper about the context surrounding creative projects than extroverted creatives. Consider the power of introverts and their creative capabilities. – Bernard May, National Positions

12. Consistency

Consistency across personal presentation materials where the creative work is showcased is a must. From LinkedIn to Dribble, Behance and personal websites, different or disconnected portfolio examples, images, content and “about me’s” are a red flag. If a creative person can’t align their own brand impression to a potential employer, then how can the employer see them executing as a member of their team? – Eric Vardon, Arcane

13. An Eye On The Prize

One of the most important traits that we look for is the creative’s ability to put the outcome ahead of the process. They need to be able to not fall so in love with the creative process that they lose sight of the end goal — satisfying the customer and delivering quality on time. – A. Lee Judge, Content Monsta

14. The Ability To Learn From Mistakes

Hiring someone with a nicely designed resume is common. When hiring the best, look into the mistakes that your new player has made. Ask for three mistakes. If your candidate can come up with a mistake, it’s great. If they can list three mistakes and explain to you how they’ve overcome them and how it helped them progress, you’re in business. – Anthony Katz, iNexxus

15. Adaptability

In this fast, tech-driven era it’s important to find creatives who are adaptable rather than highly specialized in one aspect of creativity — someone who is flexible and excited about exploring new trends and technologies. Instead of focusing on past work achievements, find out what they know about industry trends and what they are hoping to try next. They will help push your company forward. – Hamid Ghanadan, Linus

Feature Image Credit: Members of Forbes Agency Council offer insights on must-have traits for creative professionals.Photos courtesy of the individual members.

Sourced from Forbes

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Four Things I’ve Learned About Fool Proof Marketing Techniques For Your Business

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Big, small, start-up, or long established, every business needs marketing to reach out to new and potential customers. It can be confusing as a business owner because of how many different routes you could take when it comes to marketing and trying to decide which one is right for your business. Luckily, there are some fool proof marketing techniques that will further the reach of your business in to time and also reduce the chance of you choosing the wrong type of marketing.

  1. Social media

With literally billions of people using social media each day, you’d be mad to pass up on the chance to use social media as a way of marketing your business. It doesn’t have to cost anything either, because with the power of clever content combined with a few shares on each platform, you can quickly gain new audiences. Here are some great ways of generating attention on social media:

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Sourced from The Good Men Project

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10 Reasons to Hire a Professional Photographer for Your Social Media

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By Mackenzie Z. Kennedy 

If you want more dates, a better career, or a shot at being an influencer, you should hire a professional photographer to boost your social media status.

As a former model, I can tell you that looks matter—even though they really shouldn’t. Denying that people judge everything on appearances is just downright foolish.

When we see attractive people and things, we gravitate towards them naturally. It’s a trait that is built into our very DNA. Even babies are proven to prefer good-looking people over those who aren’t quite as physically attractive.

Now that social media is king, it’s becoming even more real to the world around us that looks matter for everything. The power that a good social media presence can give you is insane.

Entire careers have been built on a well-constructed social media brand. People found love on Instagram. We discover new people, products, and services based on how they look when we’re flipping our way through Facebook and Snapchat.

That’s why I’m a firm believer that you should hire a professional photographer to handle your social media shots. It sounds insane for someone who’s not a model, but hear me out.

Even if you’re not in entertainment, I have some great reasons why it’s so important to get some pro shots in your social media profile.

If you want to be an influencer, your photos will be everything.

 

Though I am a writer, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that people are visual creatures. These days, words alone are not enough to make a writer famous.

You need to be able to be an influencer. You need to captivate your audience, get them to relate to you, and also get them to relate to the topics you write about.

People are visual creatures, and we all know that adage that pictures are worth a thousand words. If you want to gain followers and become an influencer, you need to hire a professional photographer to take those shots—or become handy with a DSLR yourself!

I mean, look at this photo by Simone Bramante, a professional photographer. He tells a story about Barilla pasta and captivates his audience in a way that words would fail to match up with.

It will help your networking.

Having a degree isn’t enough to get you a job in a prestigious place these days. People want to see that you eat, sleep, and breathe your brand. They want to see what you are capable of—and what you want to show the world.

When you have a social media account that looks professional and also gives people a good idea of your brand, companies that want to hire you will start to reach out. This is why professional photographers need to embrace a changing world if they haven’t already, too. Social media is the best advertising both you and a photographer can have, if you each put equal effort into it.

Getting professional shots can also help you figure out your look.

When I was a model, I was forever thankful to photographers who were willing to do TFP. TFP stands for “Time for Portfolio,” and it’s when a model works for free in exchange for shots and practice time.

Spending a little time in front of the camera is a great way to figure out which outfits really flatter you and which look bad. It’s also a good way to learn how to take a better photo.

The model in this photo did TFP and posted the shots to her Instagram. I can assure you that she learned more about her best poses and wardrobe from her shoot.

Most of us are not pro models, which means that you will need to hire a professional photographer to do this. Thankfully, there are some affordable ones out there—and art schools love casual models.

A good photo or two can help you look more put-together, even when you’re not.

No matter who you are, you need to make it look like you have your shit together on social media. No one wants to associate with someone who looks like their lives are a mess, especially if they wear that look online. It’s cringe-inducing.

We all do what we can to try to cover up flaws. There’s only so much those Instagram filters can do, and in many cases, they come off as trying too hard. A good photographer will give you shots that will help you look great, effortlessly.

Professionals know how to work lighting, angles, and composure into a better shot. That’s why professional shots look better than a typical selfie.

Let’s face it, it’ll help your dating life.

There’s a reason why so many people joke about others “sliding into the DMs” on sites like Instagram and Facebook. People legitimately get dates this way, and some even find love through social media.

When you’re looking for a date on social media, the first thing you’re going to notice are the photos. Good shots that are taken with quality hair and makeup will get you more dates than casual shots.

Back when I worked as a pickup coach, I told guys they should hire a professional photographer and work on their looks for their social media accounts. People are shallow these days, and sadly, it will affect your love life.

The people who are most successful on social media are the ones who cultivate a brand that makes them look physically attractive, professional, and yet also adventurous. It makes sense; it shows they have a lot to offer.

It can help you sell things on your store.

I can’t express how important having a social media campaign is for business owners. A good social media marketing campaign can make or break your ability to turn a profit on a regular basis.

A lot of brands got their break on Instagram’s ads, but they wouldn’t have gotten so far without good shots. Dolls Kill, for example, is known for their amazing shoots, and owes a lot of their success to their active social media marketing.

Going to shoots is a confidence booster.

When I first got into modeling, I did it because I felt insecure. I needed to gain confidence, and I felt that being a model would help me see my beauty inside. To a point, it worked. I felt better and people treated me better.

Taking the time to hire a professional photographer and working on a photoshoot is an amazing experience. It’s something that will put you in touch with a side of yourself you didn’t know you had.

It will make you feel like a star, and you’ll be shocked at how much better you feel.

Professional photography can help you express your creativity.

If you’re creative like me, you probably use social media as an outlet for your imagination. Many creatives have images and art they want to make, but don’t have the skill to fully make those concepts come to life. This is doubly true with visual arts like photography.

A pro will have the equipment, knowledge, and skill to make your ideal images come to life. Those who want to flaunt their creative side would be wise to hire a professional photographer—or at least, pair up with them for a series.

For example, a shot like this wouldn’t be possible with yourself, the best professional online photography courses to up your game, and a selfie stick.

You don’t have to look too far to find a photographer that’s affordable.

Most people who want to hire a photographer think of wedding photography prices and wince. It’s true; most wedding photographers are pretty expensive.

However, that doesn’t mean you can’t afford a pro—or someone damn close to it. Student photographers are often less expensive, and at times, will be willing to work for free in exchange for practice sessions.

This beautiful photo was taken by a student photographer. Need I say any more?

It will help others see you in a new light.

You want to know the biggest reason why you should hire a professional photographer to take photos of you once in a while? People notice the impacts of photography and social media. Professional shots show people that you mean business. It shows people that you are working towards something—and that you demand a certain level of respect.

By Mackenzie Z. Kennedy 

Sourced from PHOTOGRAPHY

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3 Tools to Make Your Editorial Calendar More Effective

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By Ann Smarty

A few short years ago, simply writing useful articles regularly was enough to keep your audience engaged and see your SEO rankings steadily grow.

Now, consumers are more demanding and the Google algorithm is more advanced. To accommodate both, you need to be always testing new tools and tactics.

With content marketing becoming more complicated and integrated, your editorial calendar should grow up too. It’s no longer enough to document your planned content assets. Today’s editorial calendar should involve team collaboration aspects and advanced analytics steps to make higher-level content management possible.

Your editorial calendar should involve collaboration, analytics #tools, and more, says @seosmarty. Click To TweetThis roundup features three innovative tools to create a new content marketing routine to better adapt to an ever-changing digital marketing world.

HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT: Editorial Calendar Tools and Templates

1. Use ContentCal to diversify content you market

Creating and marketing diverse content is a necessity. You always must surprise your audience, as well as find new ways to engage your readers. Some out-of-the-box content types include:

With all those multiple and diverse content assets being created and so many (remote) teams being involved, how can you ensure that each of them is marketed effectively?

ContentCal (free and paid versions) is a good way to keep your team involved as well as to ensure that your weekly and monthly calendars are diverse and balanced:

.@ContentCal_io can help ensure that your weekly & monthly editorial calendars are diverse and balanced, says @seosmarty Click To Tweet

  • Your team can add updates to your calendar using the “Pinboard,” then you (or your social media manager) can drag and drop updates throughout the calendar ensuring both content diversity and balance. It’s helpful because the Pinboard can be the central point for each team member to craft updates for each content asset they are responsible for (press releases, interviews, videos, articles, etc.).
  • The calendar uses color coding to help you quickly see how your content types and assets are spread out throughout a week or a month.

Once updates go live, you see your content tags in the reports and can filter your reports by the content type, making it easier to distinguish the most successful content formats based on social media engagement:

Overall, ContentCal provides a clutter-free dashboard encouraging you to build both diverse and balanced editorial calendars.

HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT: 5 Brands Share Their Content Marketing Process

2. Use Rankedy to track all your content changes and updates (and their impact)

Content marketing involves so many tasks and steps (e.g., planning, outreach, writing, link acquisition outreach, social media promotion), that it can be hard to identify the steps that really impact your ROI. Not many solutions can collect, aggregate, and analyze all your data in a way that allows you to understand which of your micro-tactics work.

The only solution I have found is Rankedy’s Journal feature, which records all the little things happening to your site and content and shows Google ranking movements after each change.

Rankedy lets you see how Google rankings change when you make changes to your site & content. @seosmarty #tools Click To TweetTo use Rankedy Journal for content analysis:

  • Record all your changes and updates to your site and content you are implementing
  • Watch the Google position movement for your keyword

Rankedy also uses color coding to help you easily distinguish between content formats you created and change types you implemented.

This feature makes it easy to find micro-tactics that work for your content and capitalize on those.

HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT: 50 of the Best Social Media Tools Selected by Top Marketers

3. Use Alter to personalize in-content CTAs and learn from engagement metrics

Content marketing offers great lead-generation opportunities. Many customers who discover your brand through your content are not ready to buy but may be willing to opt in to download your brochure or white paper.

How can you catch or keep their attention? Advanced (content) personalization is the answer. In fact, Segment found that half of consumers expect a personalized experience when interacting with brands. Personalizing your content means meeting your customers’ expectations.

50% of consumers expect a personalized experience when interacting w/ brands via @segment. Click To TweetYet, a report by Pure360 revealed that most brands still fall behind in marketing personalization, so now is a good time to boost your digital marketing performance with personalization.

Alter (paid version) is a new solution for small businesses allowing you to easily create and integrate personalized user experience sitewide (including your home page, landing pages, content pages and more).

.@AlterSoftware lets you easily integrate personalized user experiences sitewide, says @seosmarty. #tools Click To TweetIt’s a good idea to use Alter in two ways:

  • To personalize your best performing content pages (to test, collect data, and boost their performance)
  • To use the collected data to better plan your content (Alter tracks which personalization tactic drives more engagement)

To use Alter, simply create a trial account, add its tracking code to the site, and use the visual editor to personalize your pages. Alter has an incredible number of parameters to define your audience for personalization. Examples include traffic sources, users’ interaction with the site (e.g., how many pages they viewed), users’ interaction with a specific link or call to action, their devices, etc. You can combine any of these parameters to create even more tailored experiences.

The reports are enlightening, giving you a glimpse into what helps and what hurts content performance:

HANDPICKED RELATED CONTENT: 12 Expert Ideas to Improve Your Content Marketing for Better Leads

Bonus: Use Serpstat to include these tools in your content planning routine

ContentCal, Rankedly, and Alter are new tools in the industry and provide a fresh look into how you can manage and analyze content. Adding these micro-management tasks to your regular to-do list is the best way to ensure that the tools will help you rethink and reestablish your content marketing routine to the maximum capacity.

If your team is smaller, you can manage this system with a reusable planner in Google Spreadsheets or simpler to-do list management tools.

For larger team management, you may need a more advanced collaborative solution. I use Serpstat (paid versions) checklists. You can create and reuse a template for each upcoming content asset and the team can check off their tasks until everything is done.

In-team collaboration makes content asset planning easier because:

  • A new checklist – based on the same template – is set up for each project (e.g., an article, an infographic, an influencer interview).
  • You can break each checklist into sections to cover all the steps before, during, and after the publication process (e.g., keyword research, writing, designing graphics, proofreading, social media marketing, and outreach). Once everything gets checked off, the project is considered complete.

You can read more about Serpstat checklists here.

Are there innovative content marketing tools you’ve discovered lately? Which ones get you most excited? Please share them in the comments.

Please note: All tools included in our blog posts are suggested by authors, not the CMI editorial team. No one post can provide all relevant tools in the space. Feel free to include additional tools in the comments (from your company or ones that you have used).

Feature Image Credit: Joseph Kalinowski/Content Marketing Institute

By Ann Smarty

Sourced from Content Marketing Institute

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5 Statistics to Guide Your Marketing Resource Decisions in 2019

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Resource decisions are some of the most important and difficult decisions that a marketing leader must make. Do I have the right people doing the right things? Should I use in-house resources, external resources, a combination of the two, or just punt that great idea into another quarter and hope that the decision magically takes care of itself?

Planning and deploying a marketing strategy will benefit from an objective point of view and skills that may not be available in-house.

But how will you choose the right resources to optimize results? A new Ascend2 research study, Marketing Resource Effectiveness Survey Summary Report, provides valuable insight to help companies make critical resource decisions in 2019.

Here are a few noteworthy findings from the research study:

Finding #1: Collaborate on Planning and Deployment

About three-quarters of marketing professionals consider a collaboration between outsourced and in-house resources a valuable combination of objective and subjective insights for both planning and deploying a marketing strategy.

There is great value in having a fresh perspective as you create your marketing plan. To get the most value from the ideas and input from external resources, make sure to have an open mind when you receive their contribution. It is also important to get data and input from your audience on what they want and how they want it. But make sure you do more than ask; it is critical that you listen.

Finding #2: Begin by Determining Your Objectives

To determine the appropriate resources you need, you should first determine your primary objectives. Increasing the number of leads, sales prospects and customers acquired, and improving brand awareness, are all primary objectives for a marketing strategy according to a majority of marketing professionals.

 

Finding #3: Most Effective Tactics Used

With so many marketing tactics that you can do, an important step is to determine what you should do based on what works. Social media marketing, content marketing, and SEO are effective tactics for 53%, 48% and 47% of marketing professionals respectively. While email has been integrated into virtually every form of digital marketing, it no longer tops the chart as a stand-alone tactic.

 

When deciding on the resources that you need, consider how your resources understand the individual tactics that they will work on as well as how all the pieces fit together. You want your resources to be flexible and strategic.

Finding #4: Seek Outside Resources to Lead Your Most Difficult Tactics

While the previous chart shows only 25% of marketing professionals consider data and artificial intelligence-driven marketing to be a most effective tactic, 49% consider it a difficult tactic to deploy. This may be a case of difficulty impacting effective use. You may need to seek outside resources to lead your most difficult tactics, as compared to not doing those tactics.

Finding #5: How Effectiveness is Changing

As marketers become more proficient in all forms of digital marketing practices and technologies, the effectiveness of the tactics used is increasing. A total of 94% of marketing professionals believe that the effectiveness of tactics is improving to some extent. A key reason that effectiveness is improving is the improved skills of marketing professionals, continuing education (online courses, certification courses, webinars, reading online resources, etc.), and advancements in technology.

 

When faced with a difficult decision, I always look for research that can help guide my decision. Research can also be used to sell my plan to the management team, and make an adjustment to my current strategy.

Get more research insights by downloading the entire study, Marketing Resource Effectiveness Survey Summary Report.

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Sourced from Convince & Convert

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