Articles Written By:

Laura Elizabeth Saunders

Content marketing: How to get started

If you’re like a lot of organizations, you’re already practicing content marketing – kind of. You may have a blog that you post to regularly, or perhaps you’re active on social media. But despite this activity, do you have a strategy? Are you making progress? And toward what?  If you’re not sure, here’s how to refine your content marketing program when you’ve already been producing content. This blog post is right for you if you’re already producing content (e.g. blog posts), but your posting schedule…

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Five tips to improve productivity and stay focused on big picture marketing goals

We’re halfway through the year, making July a fitting time to revisit your goals for 2019. Here are a few tips to ensure you don’t get lost in the weeds executing your strategy, and instead, are able to home in on your big picture marketing goals. What could you eliminate? Answering this question will force you to prioritize your to do list. Are there reports you’re drafting weekly that would serve the same purpose if you delivered them monthly? Be honest with yourself, and your…

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How to prioritize resources and stay on track to meet your big picture marketing, PR goals

I’m a big proponent of taking time to think about the big picture when it comes to establishing and working toward your marketing, PR and overall business goals. After the New Year comes and goes, too often we’re all guilty of letting go of those big picture goals that we had set out for the year.  All too often, we find ourselves getting trapped in the weeds of the day to day. Big picture goals, of course, aren’t tactical goals like posting on your blog…

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Four Considerations When Revisiting Your Public Relations Strategy

A public relations strategy is like the stretch of I-95 between Richmond and Washington, D.C. No, really, stay with me on this one. It’s never really finished. It’s a work in progress. You’ll always work from Point A to Point B, but occasionally, you’ll take some detours, try new things, evaluate what works and what doesn’t and apply your learnings the next time you travel. A public relations strategy is similar in that you often know your starting point and ending point. And while you…

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How much should you be blogging?

Call it the great blogging debate. Should you post short, topical posts at a high frequency like multiple times a day? Or is it better to post in-depth posts with only the most highly-targeted information less frequently? The answer lies somewhere in between. What you want are quality blog posts in a quantity that drives traffic to your website, converts that traffic into leads, establishes your brand as an authority and drives long-term results. Blog frequently. Frequent blogging really does drive traffic. It also improves…

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Marketing KPIs for earned, owned and paid

Performance data for specific channels will help you gauge how engaged your audience is, based on the type of action they’re taking. However, tracking, analyzing and reporting marketing campaign success can be tricky. There’s a wealth of data you can pull from your website, blog and social channels. So instead of leaving your team to guess which metrics are important, use these KPIs as a guide for earned, owned and paid content. Paid social media metrics Social advertising platforms have become increasingly informative. Marketers can…

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5 Tips for Creating Buyer Personas

Yes, understanding your business (think: value proposition, mission statement) is important. But I’d argue that truly understanding your customers is even more crucial. If you don’t know your target customers, how can you successfully market and sell your products and services? Creating buyer personas, a semi-fictional representation of your ideal customer, is one of the best ways to generate leads and ultimately close sales. There are dozens of questions you could ask yourself, your team and your customers to help develop buyer personas. To keep…

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Corporate Social Responsibility

CSR 101: Corporate Social Responsibility

Forbes recently announced the companies with the best Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reputations, and Lego earned the No. 1 spot on the roster. How did they get there? According to the study compiled by the Reputation Institute, Lego behaves ethically, conducts business fairly, operates transparently, protects the environment and supports worthy causes. What is Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)? There are seemingly infinite definitions for CSR. Here are a couple: CSR promotes a vision of business accountability to a wide range of stakeholders, besides shareholders and…

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Inbound marketing: Clicks vs. leads

There’s a significant difference between clicks to your website and true inbound lead generation. While it may be tempting to report those larger web traffic numbers as “leads,” the reality is that you can’t be certain that those folks are actually prospective customers. Website traffic is important Don’t get me wrong, traffic to your site is important. After all, it’s the first step in generating customers though online marketing efforts. But if your end goal is lead generation, it’s essential to consider clicks and leads…

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5 signs you need a marketing audit

Clients come to us for a variety of reasons – from wanting press coverage for a new product to helping generate new business leads. Sometimes they know which tactics would move the needle, but more often, it’s not so clear. That’s where a marketing audit comes in. A marketing audit is a comprehensive review of an organization’s materials, messaging, audiences and competitors using internal, external and third-party research. The result: a deep understanding of key buyer personas and recommendations for a strategic path toward achieving…

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Lead scoring 201: Using data to improve marketing ROI

Lead scoring assigns points to a person based on their likelihood to buy your product or service. Our last blog post on lead scoring – Lead scoring 101: Lead scoring & why it’s important– also explains how lead scoring can be used to align marketing and sales, save valuable resources and increase sales close rates. Now, let’s get into the science of lead scoring: the data that indicates a lead is likely – or unlikely – to buy and how to get started developing a…

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Lead scoring 101: Lead scoring & why it’s important

Driving sales. It’s the No. 1 goal of any inbound marketing plan. But it takes more than big budgets, lots of time, great writers or even sheer luck to deliver quality prospects to your sales team. In fact, 80 percent of marketers report their lead-generation efforts are only slightly or somewhat effective (BrightTALK, 2015). To deliver quality prospects, you must define what a “quality, qualified lead” is. And that begins with understanding and developing a lead scoring system. What is a lead? Let’s start with…

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