Marketing Booster Shot

11 Oct 2011
Issue # 50

Paul Writer Marketing Booster Shot

Yo!

The master marketer Steve Jobs passed away last week. He made minimalism and good design not just fashionable, but profitable. We were having a discussion on whether elegant design works in India - and the feedback was yes, but among a very small, discerning audience. Do you think so? Or do you think that's only because we haven't had the opportunity yet to experience the benefits of "less is more"?

Last week also saw another good marketer, author Chetan Bhagat, categorize Infosys as a bodyshop (though he later amended that to the employees having hot bodies) and stir up a right good controversy. Did he mean it? Or was it just a way to get publicity for his book launch? Do fights work as a marketing prop? Read my post on this.

In this week's newsletter we also feature ITSMA's research on why social media success has little to do with social media.

Happy Reading!

5 Steps to Tracking and Monetizing Your Website Conversions

By Brody Dorland

Tracking and Monetizing Your Website Conversions

Most of you might have Google Analytics installed on your websites?

Some of you may have at least one "goal" set up within your account to track your conversions.

This post will show you a basic method for adjusting your Google Analytics settings so that you can start answering the following questions: Is your website content driving conversions? Which pages in those conversion paths are not "getting it done"? How much is a conversion actually worth... in dollars?

Which inbound marketing activities are delivering quality traffic that converts? Which social networks are driving conversions? And most importantly, how much more marketing budget can you ask for next year based on how well you made the connection between online marketing and revenue?

Click here to read more.

Quick Take - Pick a Fight, it's good marketing

By Jessie Paul

Narayana Murthy a co-founder of India's IT darling Infosys created ripples in the media by saying that the quality of IIT (the holy grail of Indian tech undergrads) alumni had dipped over the years. Oh, there's a lot of detail to it but it has set off a huge debate in mass media with various people piping up with a yay or a nay.

One of the big guns to enter the fray is Mr Chetan Bhagat, an IIT grad who is better known as the author of popular fiction. He slammed Infosys as a "body-shop".

If you're wondering why you - despite your obvious virtues - remain relatively unknown, the answer is perhaps that you are too goody-goody. Time to start a controversy.

Read on for more.

7 Reasons why Social Media Success has Nothing to do with Social Media

by Christopher Koch

ITSMA research shows that 66% of buyers seek information themselves rather than waiting to hear from providers. They seek that information through search: 79% of c-level executives do at least three searches per day.

They are more likely to encounter our content through search than through the social media channels themselves.

Likewise, businesspeople don't care how many Twitter followers you have. They care about the size, speed, and quality of the pipeline. In ITSMA's recent lead management survey, just 53% report consistent definitions of lead tracking that are adopted globally. Only 65% have defined the lead flow process.

Without a process for integrating social media into lead management, the ROI of social media in B2B will never move beyond brand awareness and website traffic.

Click here to read more.

Where and When Your Keywords Really Matter for Content Marketing and SEO

By David Reich

Keywords Matter for Content Marketing and SEO

In this post-Panda world, shallow content written for keywords rather than people won't just leave you with a website no one wants to read but could actually cause a decline in your rankings. You won't just see a decline for those pages with poor content but for your entire site!

Proper keyword use will always play an important role in content marketing and SEO. Even though you should no longer be writing for search engines, you obviously still want search engines to rank your content on the first page for your most important search terms. Keywords can and should be used strategically, but they should never be overused for SEO.

Read on to explore where and when keywords actually matter for search rankings and where and when they don't.

Enjoy!

Jessie Paul
CEO, Paul Writer
www.paulwriter.com - India's only community for B2B marketers
2500+ members | 50+ contributors | 250+ articles

Visuals sourced with thanks from Flick'r. Acknowledgement provided in the main article.