actionable marketing guide

Dear ,

Boo and other Halloween salutations! 

In the US, especially my neighborhood, Halloween translates to candy and costume shopping. To help get you in the mood, here are some of AMG’s past Halloween posts.

• 13 Treats to Make Your Customers Love You. 
  This article plays off of the idea that children dress up and go house to house shouting “Trick or Treat!”

• 31 Blog Tricks Every Blogger Can Use.
  This article uses the Halloween hook differently.

Also salutations for the Day of the Dead celebrated in Mexico on November 1^st.

Change is in the New York air. Fall weather is blowing into town.

While I love the unseasonal warmth, the uncharacteristic autumn weather is confusing nature. Instead of fall colors, the deep fuchsia roses around the Limelight Church are peeking their heads into the sun.

Last week, I ventured over to Brooklyn for the Incite Summit at the Marriott Metrotech. The summit brought together senior brand marketers.

Having worked for global corporate brands including Citibank, Bertelsmann and The Economist, as well as at the forefront of content marketing, I was interested to hear how brand marketers framed their challenges.

The big message was: Use your brand storytelling to invite people into your community.

As humans, we’ve been taught to listen to, remember and tell stories. Storytelling is in our DNA; data analysis isn’t! (BTW, Chip and Dan Heath describe this well in their book, Made To Stick (affiliate link)).

Maximize the power of brand story telling by integrating your stories and those of your customers into your content and brand messaging.  (Here are 30 ways to find the stories associated with your brand.)

Weight Watchers does a great job of brand story telling to create something bigger because community is at the heart of their offering. It supports you to achieve difficult personal goals. Weight Watchers’ customers appear in their content and advertising.

The best reason to attend live events: Meet people in-person. After communicating with Glen Gilmore (@GlenGilmore) for years on Twitter, we actually got to meet face-to-face. I loved that Incite’s Summit was an intimate event allowing attendees time to engage with each other.

As a marketer who has created and received lots of conference swag over the years, I loved two items I got at the Incite Summit.

• Ceros’s canvas bag (below). A knitting project jumped into it as soon as I got home.

• Arrow Promotional’s rechargeable UBS battery in the shape of an orange that can double as a coaster. It’s already in use on my desk! While it’s too heavy and big for my pocketbook, it brightens my desk.

Happy Marketing
Heidi.

Heidi Cohen
Actionable Marketing Guide

P.S: If Social Media or Content Creation is part of your 2018 plans, join me at Social Media Marketing World 2018. There are both full conference admission and content creator ticks. I’m speaking about Content Creation.

2017 Blogging Research That Will Make You A Better Blogger

2018 B2B Content Marketing Distribution: What The Data Doesn’t Tell You [Research]

Brand Storytelling: 30 Ideas That Will Make Your Business Memorable

How To Improve Your Winning B2B Content Marketing Distribution [Case Study]

​​​​​​​Social Media Marketing World 2018 is just around the corner (February 28 - March 2, 2018, at the San Diego Convention Center.)

Brought to you by Social Media Examiner, this is the conference for anyone wanting to learn how to make the most of social media and meet the companies and experts in the field.

Join me at this exciting event. Don't delay – the current promotion ends Friday!

• Take a deep dive into Andy Crestodina’s Orbit Media’s Blog Survey. It’s well worth your time since every business (B2B, B2C, NFP or solopreneur) needs a home base.

  Heidi Cohen was quoted regarding where and when people blog.

  

  Hint: It’s no longer work you do in your PJs!

  Also check out how Crestodina connects to new content from existing content. It shows Google and readers which is the updated information.

  

• Heidi was interviewed by Mary Ellen Slayter for Velocitize regarding Interactive Content.

  If you’re interested in getting up to speed on Interactive Content here are 3 great primers:

  • Interactive Content Defined
  • 5 Types of Interactive Content
  • Interactive Content Metrics
    
    

• Dennis Shaio interviewed BuzzSumo’s Susan Moeller on Medium about content creation. Moeller mentioned HeidiCohen.com as a go-to-site! W00t!

  Important take-aways:

  • Moeller spent about 12 hours crafting a blog post over a period of 2 weeks! This is on the high end based on Orbit Media’s Blogging Survey.
  • Shaio created interview content on Medium. Are you using Medium yet?