Latest News from Newt Barrett

Write Less, Say More: The Power of Brevity | Lifehacker

Fri, 11 May 2012 11:39:01 EDT

When it comes to great writing, less is more. But even if you’re familiar with the mantra to “omit needless words,” tightening your writing is harder that it looks. Which words should you omit? How can you write more clearly? Danny Rubin, a national news consultant and former television news reporter, demonstrates—with examples—the power of [...]

Why Business Executives Fear Social Media Marketing | Social Media Today

Fri, 11 May 2012 10:49:41 EDT

Written by Chris Horton. This post was born out of a fascinating and revealing conversation our CEO recently had with a business executive of a prominent Minneapolis-area car dealership who absolutely refused to entertain the idea of social media marketing in general, and Twitter in particular. A marketing director, she was convinced that her fairly [...]

How to Attract an Audience by Integrating Content, Social, and Search | Copyblogger

Fri, 11 May 2012 10:45:47 EDT

Written by Robert Bruce. Google’s been pissing people off lately. Panda, Penguin, Parakeet (okay, I made that last one up), who knows what’s next … Then there are the social networking evangelists whose entire fortunes are deep in Zuckerberg’s asset.And finally, the faithful content producers, who labor slowly and quietly to build their businesses one [...]

When Your Products Rock, Don’t Diminish Them with a Mediocre eNewsletter

Wed, 09 May 2012 12:07:54 EDT

Dragon Dictate and Dragon Naturally Speaking Deliver Awesome Results for Users. Their eNewsletter. Not So Much. In perhaps the ultimate irony, I am using Dragon Dictate from Nuance to write this blog post which criticizes their eNewsletters. I use Dragon Dictate to compose 80 to 90% of everything that I write from blog posts to [...]

Jennifer Sheahan: Cracking the Facebook Code | Social Media Today

Tue, 08 May 2012 15:24:00 EDT

While more than 900 million people worldwide have active accounts, few businesses take full advantage of this enormous marketplace. For most, this is not due to a lack of desire—it stems from a lack of knowledge. When industry stalwarts such as Anthony Robbins and Frank Kern sought to leverage Facebook’s tremendous reach and recognized their limited ability for effectively making this happen, they turned to Jennifer Sheahan. Jennifer has cracked the Facebook code and created powerful strategies that are neither complex nor expensive. To affect a veritable Facebook frenzy and drive this powerful, captive audience towards your products and services, of her many strategies, Jennifer recommends beginning with these two.

Give Your Customers Uplifting Content to Kick Off Each Monday

Mon, 07 May 2012 11:48:05 EDT

Lynda McNutt Foster Delivers with Her Weekly Launch List Lynda overflows with brains, enthusiasm, creativity, and fun. So, I wasn’t surprised to find her new weekly newsletter unique in its approach to its recipients. The ‘Launch List’ is a quick read that delivers much-needed Monday morning inspiration. Although it reflects Linda’s positive personality, it’s [...]

Why You May Be Screwed If You Don’t Take Google+ Seriously

Sun, 06 May 2012 10:00:00 EDT

If you have recently checked your category’s Google search results, you may well have been as surprised as was when I recently checked our first page placement in the ‘content marketing’ topic.

“Creativity Is Just Connecting Things” via LifeHacker

Wed, 02 May 2012 09:21:33 EDT

Written by Adam Dachis. “Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while.” ~ Steve Jobs. It’s compelling to believe there’s a route to true creative thinking, [...]

Inbound Marketing: How to Make It More Effective via Inc.

Sat, 28 Apr 2012 14:54:26 EDT

Written by Geoffrey James. With inbound marketing, the customer comes to you, but you still have to move the opportunity forward. Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard of “inbound marketing”–the concept that you should attract prospective customers by offering useful (on a website, for instance). Inbound marketing is contrasted with outbound [...]

Why the Massive Move to Mobile Computing Changes Content Marketing Rules

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 06:00:00 EDT

Rethink Your Content Marketing by Aiming at Billions of Buyers on the Move For those of us who been around computing since the early days of PCs, the consumer move to mobile devices and away from desktop and even laptop computers is astonishing–and maybe a little terrifying. Smartphones Soar First, smartphones such as the Blackberry, [...]

Missing the Mobile Inflection Point! Disruptions: With New Comforts, Growing Complacent

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 11:49:39 EDT

Written by Nick Bilton on the NYT Bits Blog. Google and Facebook are being left behind in the shift toward mobile, and the amenities available to their employees might offer some explanation for a slow transition. Google and Facebook, young and successful companies that they are, risk being left behind as technology shifts from PCs [...]

LinkedIn Will Outlive Facebook. Here’s Why via Inc.com

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 10:19:32 EDT

Written by Geoffry James. Facebook’s latest $1 billion acquisition smacks of a desperation that LinkedIn consistently manages to avoid. With all due respect to Facebook, paying $1 billion for Instagram smacks of desperation. It’s as if CEO Mark Zuckerberg is terrified of becoming irrelevant and is willing to spend insane amounts of money in order [...]

Infographic | The Gold Standard of Content Marketing via NewsReach

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 10:10:31 EDT

Content Marketing is about the most effective way to harness content’s ubiquity and power. Individual pieces of content work to attract and engage web users, but when the pieces are combined, the effect can be dramatic. Just as gold must be sourced, mined, processed, shaped and hallmarked to become desirable pieces, so too must high-quality [...]

Where Is the Future of Social Media Marketing? [Research] | ClickZ

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:32:36 EDT

In today’s online world, mass can be reached in months, not years. For proof, all you have to do is look at Pinterest’s explosion over the last six months, becoming the fastest standalone site to surpass the 10 million unique monthly visitors mark. So why haven’t location-based social networks had this kind of explosive growth? [...]

The Real Magic Behind Content Marketing | Social Media Today

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 08:30:00 EDT

You’ve heard the term buzzing around the Internet. You may even consider it part of your online strategy. But have you ever stopped to think about just what it is and why this social media phenomenon is so influential? Content marketing is as simple as it sounds: provide high quality content for your users, partners, followers and/or consumers and you will increase participation, sales, and loyalty. The concept is intuitive and (almost) appears to represent the idea that marketing is headed in a positive direction. The objective behind content marketing is not to spam potential clients or collaborators or to bombard them with pitches and useless brand ideology. Content marketing is the means by which you provide substance your target group can utilize.

The Future of Effective Content Marketing – Long Term Personas

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 09:45:16 EDT

Unless you have had your head buried in the sand in recent months you’ll know that content marketing and outreach is THE critical off page technique to ensure the long-term success of your business. A lot has been written about how to use various cool techniques to do it, whether you’re a fan of ego [...]

Small Businesses Increase Online Marketing Efforts

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 09:11:45 EDT

Great Video from AT&T Illustrating the Contents of Their New Research As the study indicates, inexpensive, modern grassroots marketing techniques — both online and offline — have grown to be among the most popular for small businesses in the past several years likely due to ease of use and general affordability. According to the 2012 [...]

New Example of B2B Content Marketing at Work

Fri, 30 Mar 2012 09:06:51 EDT

Written by Amanda Maksymiw I am always on the lookout for new killer examples of content marketing at work, especially in a B2B setting. A couple of weeks ago I heard that my friend Michael Brenner has been working full throttle to release a content site from SAP. Business Innovation at SAP features informational and [...]

Great Content Marketing Ideas for Using Google Plus

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 15:05:00 EDT

When Google+ was unveiled last year, a lot of content marketers wondered if they really needed another social media platform to develop and maintain. But, with the more recent introduction of Search Plus Your World, Google+ is getting harder to ignore. So if you’re still figuring out how to make Google+ part of your content strategy, it might be helpful to take a look at a couple of examples of popular and engaging Google+ pages. I’ve chosen Dell — which has embraced Google+ and is doing some really interesting stuff with its profile — and also “Wired” magazine. Unlike Dell, “Wired” produces content as its core business; but like Dell, it has invested time and resources in its Google+ brand page and has quickly built a large following.

Catching Up With Amanda Maksymiw of OpenView Venture Partners

Thu, 22 Mar 2012 11:05:13 EDT

Amanda Maksymiw of OpenView Venture Partners shares her inspiration and advice on content marketing. In 2009, the Boston-based venture capital firm OpenView Venture Partners was not satisfied with its branding. Rather than hiring a marketing firm, OpenView founder Scott Maxwell found his solution in a book called Get Content Get Customers.(co-authored by Newt Barrett) He was [...]

Moneyball Principles for Content Marketing | Blogging and Content Creation | Social Media Consulting – Convince & Convert

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 10:57:57 EDT

Moneyball Content Marketing. The math-oriented principles from the book and movie Moneyball can be applied to content marketing to achieve greater success. By now you have likely seen, read or heard about the story of the Oakland A’s baseball teams of the early 2000s. Led by General Manager, Billy Beane, the club had limited resources [...]

Make An iPhone, Android App Without Knowing A Line Of Code | Fast Company

Wed, 21 Mar 2012 10:44:44 EDT

JamPot’s new AppBuilder asks a series of questions and spits out a genuine, though limited-function, app. It could blow the market wide open. With JamPot’s AppBuilder, you can build a genuine iPhone or Android app in mere minutes for free–according to the company’s own website. The young company, savvy to the ever-shifting smartphone market, says [...]

Facebook’s New Business Pages Means Marketers Must Evolve | DigitalNext

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 11:54:10 EDT

The new Facebook Business Page is not only a visual transformation of the site, it is a game changer for the marketing function. The fact that Facebook will automatically transition existing business pages to the new format over the next thirty days means that marketers will have no choice but to evolve from the static [...]

Is Clever Better? Witty versus Search-Engine-Optimized Headlines–Kuno Creative

Sun, 18 Mar 2012 16:02:12 EDT

Written by Brianne Carlon A good goal for headlines is to evoke emotion in some way. Whether it is amusement, curiosity, joy or sorrow, intriguing a reader is the biggest responsibility of a headline. And there have been some good ones over the past few years: “No Happy Ending” from Daily News when Brett [...]

4 Surprisingly Easy Ways to Generate Awesome B2B Content | Marketri

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 12:20:55 EDT

Committing to blogging and the process of content marketing is often a big hurdle for our clients. They see the benefits of blogging but it takes some time to achieve buy-in. While beginning a new content marketing campaign may a big step for B2B companies and may pose a challenge in getting firm wide buy-in, [...]

That lift-off sound? Yep, that would be social media ad spending | SMI

Fri, 16 Mar 2012 12:17:13 EDT

In November, we told you the latest forecast – that social network advertising would top $10 billion by 2013 and that Facebook was on its way to pull in over $5.5 billion this year in ad revenues. A new survey from ad buyers suggest that those figures are too modest, that the demand for social [...]

Be Compelling In Your Advertising Message | B Squared Ads

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 18:16:34 EDT

Did you ever look at a company’s brand and think, that’s stupid, or that’s weird? Or maybe you’ve wondered what on earth they’re trying to say.Don’t look now, but people could be saying that about your own brand message.A compelling message gets attention. Creating such a message boils down to one simple thing: you need [...]

11 Secrets of Viral Videos: What’s Buzzing at SXSW – Forbes

Mon, 12 Mar 2012 04:46:51 EDT

What makes some Web videos go viral, while others languish? Prerna Gupta — a digital music entrepreneur who has helped create YouTube videos with more than 180 million page views — told the SXSW Interactive conference that eleven secrets make all the difference. Gupta describes herself as a “former YouTube stalker,” who spent the summer [...]

How To Integrate Your Inbound & Outbound B2B Marketing Tactics

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 21:15:46 EDT

How To Integrate Your Inbound & Outbound B2B Marketing Tactics Posted by Chris Fell on Thu, Mar 08, 2012 @ 07:20 PM Email Article inShare 7 A B2B marketers’ life is tough! Keeping up in an industry where ‘so many tactics and not enough resources’ is the constant catch cry, can be extremely challenging. When we [...]

Need Google Plus and Twitter content? Go old school | SEO Copywriting

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 21:13:28 EDT

. Once upon a time, long before Twitter, Google + and Facebook, there was a powerful piece of marketing collateral that’s all but ignored now. The “tips” booklet. Companies would pay a lot of money for writers to pour through their past articles and ferret out tip-worthy content. These tips were typically turned into a [...]

Who Advertises on News Sites and How Much Those Ads are Targeted | Project for Excellence in Journalism (PEJ)

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 16:37:06 EST

With digital ad revenue projected to overtake all other platforms by 2016, it is the key to the financial future of news. Are news organizations transitioning their legacy advertisers to online platforms? Between 2011 and 2015, revenue from digital advertising in the United States is expected to grow by 40% and to overtake all other [...]

7 New Facebook Changes Impacting Businesses

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 08:03:54 EST

Here is an overview of the changes and how brands can take advantage of some of the new features. Cover Photo and Profile Image Obviously one of the biggest changes that we all knew was coming was the cover photo. No more photo strip across the top. You now have one large image to showcase [...]

What Dr. Seuss can teach you about copywriting | SEO Copywriting

Thu, 08 Mar 2012 15:07:57 EST

Written by Heather Lloyd-Martin. Looking for some writing inspiration? Why not check out some Dr. Seuss books. Learn what Dr. Seuss can teach you about good copywriting. Confession time: I love Dr. Seuss. The words to One Fish, Two Fish are stuck in my brain. I have a Dr. Seuss watch. I have Dr. Seuss [...]

6 Things Your Home Page Must Do (to Keep from Sucking) | A Better User Experience

Wed, 07 Mar 2012 08:43:14 EST

Home pages. If you have a website, you have one of these bad boys. And no matter whether you’re selling real estate or racoon prevention (that’s really the entire spectrum there, right?) there are certain things that your home page MUST do if you hope to sell your product or service. Let’s break it down. [...]

SweetBay: Shocking Shopping Cart Content Marketing Secrets

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 18:40:53 EST

It’s All About Making It Easier for the Customer to Buy OK, I’ll admit it. I not the primary grocery shopper in the family. But, I’m always happy to hop over to Publix, Fresh Market, Whole Foods or SweetBay to buy stuff. Since I’m not a grocery aisle guru, it usually takes me way too [...]

Effective Communication Tips for Web Designers

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 16:11:18 EST

Whether it’s in the design of a user interface or talking with clients and users, communication is an essential component of being a web designer. We lay increasing importance on doing things in the user’s best interest and meeting their expectations, but we often forget that content and design is the window to a website’s [...]

B2B Marketing Directions: Why Provocative Content Works Best for Acquiring Leads

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 13:32:29 EST

Consistently acquiring enough new leads has become a major challenge for many B2B companies. Business buyers now have access to a wealth of online information, and they can easily perform research and gather information about products and services whenever they want, on their own terms. Therefore, they are less likely to respond to lead generation [...]

17 tips for choosing a B2B content marketing agency

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 08:50:13 EST

As content marketing leaps ‘the chasm’ and lands in Geoffrey Moore’s back garden, more and more marketers are on the lookout for a B2B content marketing agency that can make them famous. … That’s a good thing. But almost every B2B agency out there is hurriedly carving a new ‘Content Marketing’ sign for their front door. [...]

Infografik: The anatomy of content marketing – the heart of online success – Infographics

Tue, 06 Mar 2012 08:27:28 EST

The anatomy of content marketing – the heart of online success.Via www.contentplus.co.uk

The Rules of Engagement: 9 Principles of Smart Content Marketing | Original9 Media

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 16:10:05 EST

You’ve heard the same terms we have in recent years: Content marketing, branded content, custom publishing, or – the least favorite one I heard recently – corporate content creation. Ugh. OK, so the semantics are less than inspired – no big surprise there. But the opportunity all those terms point at is indeed a big [...]

The Rules of Engagement: 9 Principles of Smart Content Marketing | Original9 Media

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 16:07:40 EST

How To Lose Friends And Alienate Twitter Followers: 5 Stupid Social Media Mistakes | Fast Company

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 15:24:23 EST

Written by Amber Mac, Fast Company. When I interviewed entrepreneur and author Guy Kawasaki recently, I chatted with him at great lengths about his Twitter publishing habits. Take a look at his feed, and every few minutes you’ll see a new post, from why videos go viral to Playboy’s plans for a strip club.With so [...]

Skyword Study: Early Morning Publishing Yields the Most Article Views

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 04:49:44 EST

Articles published during breakfast and lunch yield more views on average. Last month, Skyword’s clients, including The Wall Street Journal, IBM, Everyday Health, and Education.com, used our content production platform to produce more than 13,000 pieces of original content for their Web and social properties. As a growing list of media companies, brands, and [...]

Branding: Where Marketing and Writing Become Friends by Matthew Turner — The Book Designer

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 04:27:52 EST

By Matthew Turner (@Turndog_million) Growing up I was under the impression writers were artists… usually alcoholics, people teeming with personal issues, and eccentric as hell. These people wrote, sent out their work, got published, and sat back watching the royalties pour in. Now, this was probably naïve of me, but for all I know this [...]

Why People Share: The Most Overlooked Part of Social Media Marketing

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 04:30:00 EST

A lot of great marketers make lousy social media marketers. Most of the time they don’t even know how bad they are at it, probably because they’ve been so successful in some other kind of marketing (advertising, PR, CRM… something). I’ve seen this in various forms since we opened Ignite Social Media in 2007.

Before You Name Your Company, Consider How Google Will Rank It

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 14:47:17 EST

Naming a company or a product used to involve a number of factors—none of which related to SEO considerations. But no longer. “It doesn’t matter whether your brand is online or not, “[I]t will be googled, ” says Ann Smarty in an article at MarketingProfs. “So, before you choose your brand name, you should understand … [...]

SEO is Just Marketing. Deal With It. via TopRankBlog

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 10:46:31 EST

Written by Lee Odden I’ve had people learn that I’ve recently written a book called Optimize and they ask what it’s about. I say it’s about optimizing customer discovery and engagement with content. The response I usually get is something like, “Oh, cool. I thought it was about SEO.” Well, in a way optimizing content [...]

How Our ‘Newsjacking’ Oscars Article Got Readership, Reaction, and Results

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 18:53:01 EST

We Got Coverage and Kudos from David Meerman Scott, Chris Brogan, and All Top Yesterday, we discussed how Sasha Baron: successfully newsjacked the Oscars with his successful Red Carpet stunt. Posing as the Dictator, he spilled the alleged ashes of the late North Korean dictator Kim ill Jung on Ryan Seacrest. Although we loved [...]

How One Comic Genius NewsJacked the Entire 2012 Oscars

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 09:14:46 EST

Sasha Baron Cohen Grabs the Spotlight with Only a Beard, a Uniform, 2 Pretty ‘Security Guards’, and the ‘Ashes’ of Kim Il Jung. Every year the American Academy Awards attracts tens of millions of viewers, no matter how boring the 3+ hour television event might be. In 2012, the ceremony itself may have been even [...]

Pinterest: Will Guys Be Left Behind with the Burgeoning Social Media Tool?

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 11:46:58 EST

What is it that women seem to love and understand and guys don’t? (about Pinterest, of course) Perhaps, it’s their self-description which doesn’t make it sound like a guy thing: Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, [...]