Marketing

Last week we shared ways brands can create compelling stories that engage and inspire customers. Now, we take a step back to understand why a brand might want to create a story. Why is storytelling so important? Since the beginning of time, storytelling has been an important part of the way humans interact and evolve. And that’s…

The golden age of the multi-billion dollar businesses may well be behind us. Startups and small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are armed with more resources and investment opportunities than ever before. The freelancers and agencies who work for them are also learning that they can have a place at the business table without being crowded out…

Content marketing comes in for a good dealing of bashing, often deservedly. The Content Marketing Institute defines the concept as a “strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.” But in practice, as J. R.…

Content audit. Those two words can strike fear into the hearts of marketers and copywriters everywhere. And yet in today’s content marketing-centric world, content audits are more important than ever. The more content you put out there as various bits of information dispersed across multiple mediums — from landing pages, blogposts and downloadable content to…

Customers are an integral part of your brand story. In fact, they’re the star attraction. Wordsmithie helps businesses tell their brand stories through their customers’ voices and experiences. These can take the form of short testimonials, longer case studies or feature articles. Customers who’ve benefited from your products or services are often happy to share…

Whether you want a parcel of cyberspace to plant your thoughts in, or need to share your business model with the world, blogs are the du jour communication channel. But the sheer number of platforms available makes the decision to blog harder than it needs to be. Here are some thoughts to help you weigh…

One little comma can create a whole lot of havoc. Whether to use the serial comma—a.k.a. the Oxford comma—before “and” to separate three or more items in text is a hotly debated copyediting topic. Do you prefer apples, oranges, and pears? Or apples, oranges and pears? Proponents say the series comma makes things clearer, while…

With the old year rapidly winding down, it’s a good time to think about your editorial calendar for the new year. Maybe you write your organization’s blog all by yourself. Or maybe you enlist help from other knowledgeable people in your office. However you work, a calendar will help get you off to a good…

Successful businesses and organizations don’t create content that just talks about them. Sure, it’s important to let customers know about your products and services, company mission and history, news and events, etc. But it’s not all about you. It’s about them. A savvy content-marketing plan covers what customers need and want to know from your…

We’ve followed the controversy about native advertising with a lot of interest. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has been scrutinizing—and may even attempt to regulate—the way that media and brands use native advertising. But what exactly is native advertising? Amazingly, there’s not a clear answer. Even the Interactive Advertising Bureau, which really ought to know,…