The Benefits of a Planned Social Media Strategy It is vastly easier to implement and manage a social media plan if you work consistently with an editorial calendar in mind. Using automation to simplify posting to your channels will also make executing your plan much, much easier. Consistent Scheduling Generally, interaction with your social media […]
Creating a Social Media Plan: The Basics Read More »
A friend recently asked what kind of projects I’d seen that were effective at bumping up traffic. The site he manages had recently started to plateau and he needed ideas. I said that in most cases execution was as important as the type of campaign, but I’d send him a brief list. Once I started
Audience Development: What Drives Digital Growth? Read More »
In the past two years, many large media properties have begun focusing on delivering “sharable” content — articles aimed at increasing links in social media. This is somewhat in contrast to a common strategy of the previous years: creating “searchable” content, aimed at increasing an article’s presence in search. However, in spite of the emphasis,
Delivering ‘Likeable’ Content NPR-Style Read More »
Google Insights is no more. It has been absorbed by Google Trends. Both Trends and Insights have been useful tools for writers and editors looking to improve their articles’ SEO. Google Trends also lends itself nicely to a game I call “Celine Dion or Torture?” where you put in phrases until you find an unrelated,
Google Trends Eats Google Insights, Also “Celine Dion or Torture?” Read More »
It may seem self-evident, but, by definition, there are only three paths to digital growth: More new visitors More visits per visitor More page views/engagement per visit That’s it. If you don’t have focused strategies around each path, you can’t sustain growth. Examples of Growth Strategies More new visitors Search (SEO/SEM) Strategic partnerships Advertising
There Are Only Three Digital Growth Strategies Read More »
This may be my favorite cartoon ever. The marvelous webcomic XKCD explains in one simple diagram what is wrong with most websites: They aren’t about what the users want. Has this always been so? In 1981’s “The Soul of a New Machine,” Pulitzer-Prize winner Tracy Kidder describes an engineer examining Digital Equipment Corp’s new
Why Your Site Fails To Attract The Audience It Deserves Read More »
Slate’s excellent Farhad Manjoo has written a very funny (because it’s true) piece on how to create content that will instantly go viral. He did his research by studying the most viral posts on Buzzfeed.com and attempting to puzzle out the secret of their virality. It turns out that the Buzzfeed’s secret is easy. They
Buzzfeed’s No-Fail Secret to Creating Viral Content Read More »
In an essay entitled “The Age of Criticism,” Randall Jarrell said that most critics’ attitudes toward living poets was, “Go away, pig! What do you know about bacon?” When you plan new projects, launch new products or market your site, how much do you listen to your users?
Listening to Users: “Go Away Pig, What Do You Know About Bacon?” Read More »
According to New York Times reporter Charles Duhigg, almost 40 percent of our daily behavior isn’t intentional. We don’t think about it. We get up, have breakfast, go to work, attend meetings, write email, surf the web, make plans, all without being particularly aware of we are doing. It’s just habit. And changing our habits
Audience Development, Weight-Loss, and ‘The Power of Habit’ Read More »
With one sentence, The Atlantic Wire changed their editorial direction and, in the last six months, their traffic has exploded. According to digital director, Bob Cohn, this is the secret: “No More Stories That No One Will Read.” Simple. Bob Cohn via MediaBistro
The Atlantic’s One Sentence Traffic Growth Secret Read More »