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• I think #2 should mention that the quality posts should be USEFUL to your customers. When I visit a companies social media page and it's full of several duplicate, self-serving posts, I immediately leave. I don't need to hear how wonderful they are. They need to give me content that is useful to ME.

  And #4 is definitely a winner. I can't remember how many companies I've posted messages to and they've never replied. Really...I don't remember who they are! :-) Same thing goes for email blasts where hitting Reply goes to an unmonitored account. You send me email, I reply to your email and get ignored? All because it's too difficult for you to put out the energy to monitor the email address you're spamming me with? Crazy way to do business. It's like sending out ads for people to visit your restaurant, but they arrive to find the doors locked.

  • Totally agree with you about your first point and, especially, your second one about emails. Great points!

    Question for you (since you're an SEO expert) -- I've been pondering going toward shorter blog posts, which readers prefer but Google penalizes. The thinking is that we genuinely live up to our 60 Second Marketer name by uploading posts that can be read in 60-ish seconds. (We'd still have 20% that would be long posts, but 80% would be shorter.

    Readers would like that, but Google might not. Do you have any thoughts on if shorter posts are a failed strategy? Or should I just buckle down and honor what the readers request and ignore Google?

    • Well, I generally work closely with clients in an advisory role, providing all the options and giving them my recommendations. More of a strategist than SEO expert. So I'll just ramble off some thoughts and ideas...

      (Disclaimer: Before I ramble, I have no idea what you've already tried and found to work or not work, and I don't have details on your target market, customers or anything else. So I'll just be rattling off some random thoughts and ideas.)

      The first "basic principle" of Google's Webmaster Guidelines states: "Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines." (https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769) If your readers don't like what you're posting, it doesn't really matter what Google thinks. :-) I know it's not as simple as that, because companies generally need to appear on Google to survive these days. But if you have quality, original content that readers want and share with their friends, that may be 10x better than a top spot in search results.

      Have you already tested the shorter vs. longer posts and found that shorter posts really don't work as well? Running some tests over time and watching what Google does could reveal some surprises. Or not. :-)

      Some different ideas that come to mind...

      First, go the old-school newspaper route, which seems to be forgotten in "journalism" today. (I think true journalism may be dead, but that's another discussion.) Newspaper articles used to front-load all the important stuff so the article could be quickly trimmed from the bottom and not lose the news. (Before computers they'd literally cut off the bottom of the article to make the strip of paper fit the available space.) So the first 60 seconds would provide a complete picture, and the rest of the copy would fill in more details of that picture.

      Perhaps your articles could have some TL;DR aspect to them. All the content is there for Google, but readers can get the important stuff in the first 60 seconds...and can spend longer sifting through the details if it makes sense for them.

      Something else that may be useful is to make a podcast out of these articles, and keep it at exactly 60 seconds--including intro and outro. Talk really fast when you need to. Give the relevant info and let people find the rest of the detail on your blog. We're at a time where the technical part is easy, but culling the article for 60 seconds of talk would be very challenging. Maybe even shoot for doing a :30 and pitch the podcast to radio stations.

      Or make a podcast where you very quickly--in 60 seconds--give all the info, then go longer to provide the full article. People can stop after the first minute, or continue listening if they're interested. Your guest posts could be done the same way. Actually, I'd always do the first 60 seconds myself (for branding) and have the guest poster record their full article for people to listen to.

      Well that's it for now. Time to grab another cup of coffee. Hopefully something in there was helpful for you.

      Oh, and one last thing. I've ignored several of your posts because they're just too long to read. Sorry. :-)

      • Two more thoughts came to mind.

        1) Break up articles into smaller pieces and trickle them out a day at a time. Not sure how Google will respond, but readers may respond well.

        2) Change the format a bit so it follows the TV model. Have each "episode" build off the previous and lead into the next, but still be able to stand on it's own. More of a "living document" on marketing that follows a common theme.

        3) Change the format to be more conversational. Similar to an interview format where you're "talking" with someone about a subject and they're providing a short bit of information, maybe with additional resources as links or downloads (like infographics, checklists, etc.).

        4) ...

        Yeah, I said 2 and then listed 3, while I just thought up a fourth. But I'll leave it for now. :-)

        • All of these are great ideas, Ty. Thank you for taking the time to share them.

          I particularly like the TL;DR idea. I'm going to see if there's a plugin for that. If not, I'll do it manually.

          Also, I'm doing more and more 60 second Facebook Live videos that summarize key ideas, so thanks for that suggestion (you have to follow my personal Facebook account to see those, which is here: https://www.facebook.com/jamie.turner1).

          Final question -- I suspect some of our readers might want to learn more about your services for their own companies. What's your web address? And what's the best way to reach you?

          Thanks, Jamie