3 Steps to a Stronger Personal Brand

Recently, I earned my 35,000th social media follower. If you are one of the internet famous set, you might not be impressed those numbers. Although they are significant for me, it’s true that lots of influencers have much bigger networks than I do (and non-influencers have considerably fewer). But, if the size of my following doesn’t blow you away, the kind of engagement I get might.

Should You Look For Inspiration on Competitor Websites?

Where do you find inspiration for your next website design? If you’re like many business owners and marketers we meet with, it might come from studying the competition.

Does Your Business Actually Need SEO?

"Do everything you can to rank on Google” is often the first thing we think about when it comes to promoting our websites. Certainly, search engine optimization is important to most website campaigns. But, should we always take it as a given that SEO needs to be our top priority?

Secure Your Own Mask First

If you’ve ever traveled on an airplane, you’ve heard the advice to “secure your own mask before attempting to help another passenger.” That’s a simple reminder we should take with ourselves more often.

How New Mobile Apps Fail: Shrinking Social Engagement

It is generally a given that a larger number of mobile web users translates into increased social engagement. The notion is incredibly straightforward: when we all have access to Facebook, Twitter, Google Plus and other platforms on our phones and tablets, it’s much easier to comment, interact, and follow our favourite connections.

4 Reasons Content Scrapers Are Too Stupid to Worry About

Just a few mornings ago, I was contacted privately by a colleague on Google Plus. Knowing that I create a lot of content, books and articles, he wanted to get my opinion on an unfortunate situation. Namely, that he’d caught a competitor “borrowing” content from his site… and by borrowing, I mean lifting it word-for-word (try the Copyscape Checker).

Turning Pay per Click into Clicks that Pay

Recently, I talked about the hidden costs of PPC management and the companies that deploy a managed/commissioned approach to them. The art of attracting paid search traffic is a huge topic, though, and there is another side to the coin. Use AdWords intelligently, and you can discover a useful tool for bringing valuable visitors to your website.

Is Content Shock Real?

Ever since Mark Schaefer coined the term “Content Shock,” along with the concept behind it, we’ve been getting steady news of its ever-increasing creep. Can’t get search traffic or engagement on your articles? It must be content shock, so there’s nothing you can do…

What You Should Know Before Outsourcing PPC Management

If you are like most marketers we meet, the idea of managing pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns on top of your marketing duties might seem a bit overwhelming. So you'll be forgiven if you choose to delegate the task to an PPC/SEO firm. And, you probably have plenty of other things to do, right? (Not to mention the fact you may not feel confident that you can get the same kind of results a professional would.)

Dial In Your Marketing Personas

To make the most of your marketing efforts for 2016, you'll want to focus your efforts on your very best prospects – the ones who are most likely to do business with you soon, and keep buying from you well into the future. Gain insights into what your prospects are looking for with this free tool from the people at KAYAK.

The Sweet Taste of a Curious Collaboration

As many clients and friends already know, I’m a #craftbeerfan. It’s not just that I enjoy drinking craft (although I very much do), but I do love how the brewers offer some pretty out-of-the-box ideas. Craft brewers aren’t afraid to do things differently, and sometimes make seemingly mismatched ingredients work together in fun and interesting ways. Isn’t that really the essence of creativity, regardless of the canvas?

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Blogging, Engagement, and Editorial Calendar Strategy

Your blog is the centrepiece of a well constructed content and lead-generation strategy. But making the most of yours involves more than dashing off the occasional article and posting it online. True content marketing success requires focus, consistency, and an eye towards what’s really important for your audience.

Yup, You're Stressing Your Clients Out

Somewhere around a decade ago, I was enjoying one of my regular coffee chats with my elderly uncle Wally. He's an exceptional fine artist who has spent 70-plus years painting some of the most incredibly detailed wilderness scenes you'll ever encounter. We generally talked about family, art, business, and people as well.

Is Marketing Magical or Simply Sensational?

For all the ways that digital media has changed the marketing world in the past few decades, it has done very little to alter the way that designers, agencies, and marketing firms themselves actually work. With a handful of notable exceptions, most still follow an old-world approach that was prevalent in the ’40s and ’50s… and probably even earlier than that.

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90% of All Blogs Aren’t Read. This is How You Join The Other 10%

Last week, Rand Fishkin of Moz released a study by BuzzSumo revealing the engagement data on 757k blog posts. Of those less than 10% actually received links and most received very few views. If you’ve received either, you are one of the lucky few, and it’s likely your content was pretty darn good.

Digital marketing insights.

Insights from Randy Milanovic, awarded Buzz Sumo's Top 100 Digital Marketing Influencer.