Next year's goal: Top spot?

Christmas came a little early for ideaLaunch yesterday – we discovered that content marketer extraordinaire, Joe Pulizzi, and his gang at Junta42 awarded ideaLaunch the #19 position of the 313 marketing blogs they reviewed.

Woo!

We’re #19! We’re #19! As you can see to the right, it’s a crowning piece of flair on the site.

Seeing as ideaLaunch came in #31 the year before, it’s a marked improvement that the whole team is quite pleased with, especially as there was more competition this year. So how did this content marketing agency improve its rank and how can you get your blog on the radar of influencers in your industry?

• Make your content marketing a priority. Whether it’s your blog, vlog or social media interactions, make sure you can commit to a steady schedule of timely updates. For us, it’s generally a Monday to Friday daily update. Don’t let a week slip by (perhaps with exception on the holidays) without new content.
• Hire a freelance writer (… said the freelance writer). A freelance writer can be well-versed in your industry, have a way with words and has your schedule and deadlines as a prime focus. WriterAccess has a nice collection available writers, as does LifeTips, where you’ll find topic specialists.
• Welcome guests. Guest writers can breathe fresh air to your content marketing, bring added credibility to your brand and if they have a following, their audience might come along for the ride. What’s not to love? ideaLaunch has recently been graced by the wordsmithiness of Britt Reints and we’re better for it.
• Engage industry leaders. Read what they’re writing. Comment on their site. If you draw inspiration from their blog, say so and link back. Participate in social networking sites. Above all else – be genuine about it. There’s no need to be a suck-up – even online most people can see right through that.
• Bribery.
• Get down with the SEO. Understand the keywords that leaders in your industry would be searching with and use them effectively within your content marketing. Not sure how? Ta-da: Here are some free SEO tools.
• Have your own voice. It’s fine to pass along news, but more importantly, you should be adding value to the conversation. Throw in an opinion. Develop your own theories. Show your sense of humor. Don’t just parrot what others said two days before, instead, find your niche.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 12:59 pm and is filed under Content Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.