There are some amazing tools for sale on the internet that can make every area of your life easier and more productive. Here are some tools that will make your content marketing and publishing journey easier and more effective as well:-
Website:
Not all websites are created equal when it comes to adding and indexing content and getting found in search engines. You don’t need to spend a fortune on custom website design these days, some of the premium themes for WordPress and other platforms have attractive designs, clean code, wonderful features, an easy-to-use back end, and are mobile responsive as well. These four features are very important, and if your website doesn’t have them then maybe it’s time to think about a redesign if you want your content marketing to be effective and really propel your business forward.
N.B. There are still web-designers around who won’t design mobile responsive websites. If you are considering using someone who says they don’t think it’s important to build a mobile responsive website then I suggest you avoid them like the plague. Google wants to offer users the best experience possible, and with an increasing number of users accessing the web on mobile devices they simply won’t offer your website as an alternative if it’s not mobile.
You can find great premium website themes from StudioPress, WooThemes, and iThemes and others for less than $100 – I really don’t recommend that you build your website around a free theme. It will cost you more in hassle, lost traffic, and negative visitor experience than it’s worth.
Autoresponder:
You may not need a full-fledged service like InfusionSoft, or Ontraport, but you definitely need an autoresponder service to help you capture names and addresses and mail to them appropriately. The web is changing rapidly and there is no guarantee that all the services that currently serve your content free of charge will remain that way. The only way to ensure that you can keep in touch with your customers is to have their contact details in your possession. At a minimum, you need to connect an autoresponder to your sign-up box and lead magnet so that you provide a reason for people to give you their email address, and a way to keep in touch with them.
Without an autoresponder and way to capture addresses you are seriously affecting the long-term security of your business no matter what industry you are in.
InfusionSoft and Ontraport are far more than simple autoresponders. They allow you to manage contacts, create marketing campaigns, and track interactions beyond emails and webforms, as well as creating invoices and managing sales. They are priced accordingly. At the lower end of the scale are your stripped down autoresponders like Aweber and Mailchimp (both of which have a $20 introductory product). Mail Chimp also has a free account which will allow you to link to the form on your website and capture email addresses.
Lead Magnet:
You need to give people a reason for providing you with their name and email, and that is where your Lead Magnet comes in. This can be anything from a checklist, to a report, to a free book. The most effective type of lead magnet varies from industry to industry and also over time, but it should be something that is useful and valuable to your target audience. It is also good to have a variety of lead magnets targeting different segments of your audience.
Typical Lead magnets include:- checklists, ebooks, reports, white papers, training videos, physical books and DVDs. The idea is to show prospects your knowledge and the value you offer.
Social Media Automator:
Like autoresponders social media automators come with a range of prices and features from the basic to the highly sophisticated. Unless you are planning to make social media interactions a huge part of your strategy you probably only need a basic automator that can take care of scheduling and sending your social media posts to build your audience and keep people aware of what is going on.
I often recommend BufferApp or Hootsuite because they cover the essentials at an affordable price, but there are many other options. The key is an app which will allow you to schedule your posts ahead of time. You may or may not want something that lets you read all your social media posts in one screen.
SEO Optimiser Plug-in:
If you are adding content regularly because it is a critical part of your business growth you’ll want an SEO Optimiser to help you tag, plan, and link your posts effectively. This is especially important if more than one person is writing and uploading content because you won’t be as familiar with it. The businesses I consult with who use SEO Optimisers have gained greater traction through their content marketing than those which only use human tagging and linking. This is not the same as an SEO service or content spinning, it is more a question of assessing the topic, reading level and tagging that goes behind your posts. These optimisers evaluate your content and make suggestions, they also help you get the best results out of your adwords or SEO subscriptions. I always work on the basis that if you have great foundations the superstructure of your building will be cheaper and have more impact!
My all-time favourite SEO Optimiser is Scribe (and not just because I’m an affiliate!). If you are serious about creating a high quality, content rich site that attracts organic traffic and converts visitors into buyers then Scribe is well worth the investment. If you aren’t sure how serious you are about your content creation then SEO by Yoast is free and will help you with the essentials.
Funnel(s):
The more targeted your marketing is, the more effective it will be. A funnel is simply the route for visitors into your community via an advertisement, landing page, training, email campaign, and even direct mail. You can have a simple, single-layered marketing strategy that converts 5-20% of visitors, or you can have a more complex multi-layered marketing strategy that could convert closer to the 50-80% mark by being carefully tailored to the demographic and psychographics or each particular segment. Your funnel directs readers immediately to the type of content they are most likely to find interesting and valuable, and therefore that content which is most likely to move them from a visitor to a buyer. These days there are some fantastic tools that help you create funnels quickly and easily.
Some autoresponders also help you build funnels, there are several landing page developers out there that help you build effective drag-and-drop pages and add funnels, Lead Pages is excellent, but my current favourite is ClickFunnels (for which I am an affiliate) because of its versatility, power, and affordability. I can build an entire funnel in 10 minutes which is absolutely amazing. ClickFunnels can also send your emails out for you and they are adding more and more features.
Video Creation:
Are videos essential? Well, no, … but … the truth is they are a powerful marketing tool, and they do get great response and engagement from viewers. I’m not talking about professional videos, although there’s certainly a place for them if you have the budget. I’m talking about simpler, cheaper iPhone videos, whiteboard videos and cartoon videos. These days you can create engaging videos affordably and without too much hassle using video creation tools.
If you need help creating your videos then iPhone Video Hero teaches you how to do it easily using just your phone or iPad and some apps for special effects. Powtoons is great for cartoon-style videos (so you don’t need to feature personally), and Easy Video Sales letter helps you create great sales videos quickly.
New Rainmaker:
I hate to sound boring, but New Rainmaker by Copyblogger combines several of these tools in one comprehensive package which makes it easy to manage and saves you time and hassle while also providing you with secure WordPress Hosting into the bargain. I love the seamless integration of many useful features and they are adding new capabilities every week.
Your time is precious – it’s the one resource you can’t multiply (unless you hire more people to work for you), so have a look at these content marketing tools which can set you free for focus on the things you do best.