INBOUND ACCELERATOR

When Pan Communications asked CMO and top marketing experts from around the country and globe what they see as the most important skillsets, challenges, and budget priorities for this year, some pointed to new advancements such as AI and martech, and how to manage all of the data that goes along with those developments, but many others circled back to the very basics: great writing skills, storytelling, and great content that connects with others.

The infographic below includes a ton of great information to think about, but I want to touch on a few of the key skillsets and challenges these top marketing experts are watching for 2020.

Allow me to date myself a bit. Obviously, if I’m offering insights into 15 years of owning my own marketing firm (plus my years with other agencies and in-house before that), I’ve been around a little while, though 20 years, or even a bit more, truly doesn’t feel like all that long.

Until, that is, I think about the changes in how we do, well, almost everything, as it relates to telecommunications.

No marketing or public relations campaign is completed when the last of the content is published and promoted. There is still one important step to undertake in order to maximize the results of your next campaign: analysis.

It is important to know as much as you can about your content and campaign, and the results it yields, in order to improve the next time around. That means monitoring key metrics, digging through the data, and uncovering what Spiralytics calls content intelligence in this infographic.

Congratulations! Another year full of successes celebrated and lessons learned has passed, and the next round of opportunities lies ahead. It’s been busy, hasn’t it?

If you are like me, you missed a few things along the way — I get it. With more than 100 new posts on the Inbound Accelerator, I doubt you had time to read every one. But there are a few I think you really need to see, so I’ve rounded them up together. These are the posts our visitors and followers read the most, and for good reason. This top 10 list touches on social media, contributed articles, how to create great content, and how to use that content in a complete integrated public relations and inbound marketing program.

Successful content or inbound marketing requires working from an established strategy to create comprehensive campaigns that touch on all content distribution channels to reach the most potential sales prospects and engage them in ways that generate qualified leads and closed deals.

There was a time when every conversation around search engine optimization focused on one specific topic: keywords. How to choose keywords (such as selecting keywords that have a high search rating, but are ones that allow you to be competitive). Where to place keywords in the structure of your website (also called on-page SEO). How to work keywords into your content.

Is your content marketing coming up short? Doesn’t quite have the energy and strength you’d like to see (or that you remember from a few years ago, when you were more diligent)?

When Walker Sands talked to 300 marketers and company leaders earlier this year about the role of content marketing, they found some interesting results.

Not surprisingly, content is nearly universally accepted as a part of B2B marketing: 98 percent of respondents say its performance justifies its cost.

What if you could move a prospect from “lead” to “customer” more quickly, shortening the sales cycle and improving your marketing efficiency? You can, by nurturing leads with an automated series of offers and emails that are targeted and relevant.

Market2Lead found that nurtured leads generally have a 23 percent shorter sales cycle. Lead nurturing combined with closed loop marketing also provides vital information back to your team that pinpoints actions leads take when they are nearing a decision. This means you don’t send leads on to the sales team until they are qualified, improving your sales closing rate as well.

According to a survey by Zazzle Media, marketers are finally becoming almost completely comfortable with content marketing and all that it entails.

Nearly 9 in 10 surveyed in 2019 say they feel their content marketing strategy is linked to all other parts of their business, compared to fewer than half of respondents just a year ago. The proportion of marketers who say they know the best practices for implementing content marketing has also jumped in the last year.