Copyblogger Collection – Interent Marketing Voices

3 Resources to Help You Publish the Content Your Audience Wants

“Oh no. We have to toss them out,” the bartender said with a sour look on her face as she removed a thin, black straw from her mouth. Four intricate cocktails she just made were lined up in a row in front of her.
“All of them?!” her coworker asked.
“Yep. When I taste-tested them, I realized I added too much Fernet-Branca.”
And down the drain the cocktails went.
A couple months ago, I sat a few feet away from this interaction and observed the bartender acknowledge her mistake, even though it was costly. She then produced the proper cocktails before presenting them to her customers.
Although it was arguably not fun to admit she had mixed the drinks incorrectly, she realized it was more important to maintain her audience’s trust and deliver the cocktails they ordered.
Her goal was to serve them what they wanted — and that is the essence of effective content marketing.
Are you willing to change course, if necessary, to deliver the right type of content to your audience? This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to absolutely, positively know if your content will rock
How to avoid 11 common blogging mistakes that waste your audience’s time
How to follow the one, irrefutable law of podcasting success

As you work your way through the material below, think of the following lessons as publishing guides for meticulous content creators.

What to Do When You Absolutely, Positively Must Know If Your Content Will Rock

Any

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3 Resources to Help Beginners Become Professional Content Marketers

“Da” was the first pronoun I used to refer to myself as a small child. I think I was trying to say “I,” but I overcomplicated the word.
At any rate, whenever I encountered a new or challenging task — like growing human beings do — I would say out loud:
“Now how Da do dis?” (Translation: How do I do this?)
It became a running joke in my family, and it’s a phrase I still use today. When I sat down to write this article, I said to myself, “Now how Da do dis?” I say it to myself every time I write.
Ideally, content marketers of all levels are impassioned and driven, but beginners tend to be an especially enthusiastic bunch. There are so many possibilities and you want to explore them all. You know you can master content marketing; you just need to figure out how.
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to take advantage of exactly where you are right now
How to transform your business with a well-built brand statement
How to use specificity to build a profitable audience

As you work your way through the material below, think of the following lessons as a mini content marketing course for beginners.

5 Things to Take Advantage of When You’re Starting Something New

Your vision of success may look like having a large audience that helps sustain your business. That’s a smart goal, and there’s nothing wrong with it.
However,

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3 Sources of Fuel for Sophisticated Content Marketers

“Don’t worry; she’s nice” is a phrase a friend might comfort you with before you contact someone you don’t know.
Once you hear those words, relief sets in.
If we know “nice” is the preferable way to behave toward others, why is it that we all encounter many people who are not “nice?”
It’s a complicated question. Perhaps everyone has his or her own idea of what “nice” is. Regardless, you have the power to choose your behavior in any given situation. You can be a considerate, respectful person to other people.
“Considerate” and “respectful” are more concrete and less subjective than “nice.”
And while “nice” is a reasonable starting place, effective content marketing has precisely defined characteristics. It’s sophisticated and goes way beyond “nice.”
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to seduce blog readers and win clients
How to make winning infographics without risk
How to delegate content marketing tasks

As you work your way through the material below, think of the following lessons as a mini content marketing course for sophisticated content marketers.

No Blog Traffic? Here’s a Simple Strategy to Seduce Readers and Win Clients

Writing is hard work, so it can be quite disappointing if you’ve been writing content for your site for a while but it’s not attracting the right clients and customers to your business.
As Pamela Wilson said yesterday, “Content marketing results happen slowly, and they happen over time.” No one can speed up the process, but Henneke has

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3 Resources to Help Your Content-Driven Website Flourish

Although it’s only January, I refer to this time of the year as “pre-pre-spring” (in the Northern Hemisphere). Call me optimistic.
The gingerbread, cinnamon, and pine aromas of the holidays have certainly faded, but the sweet smell of flowers blooming and warm breezes haven’t quite arrived yet.
Still, it feels like the seasons are shifting and we’re moving toward a new beginning.
And we don’t have to impatiently wait for this change to occur — a powerful, content-driven website works for your business any time of the year. You can start building or expanding yours today.
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to discover your strengths and supercharge your business
How to become an unstoppable digital content creator
How to gain an unfair business advantage

As you work your way through the material below, the following lessons will help you set business goals for your content.

Discover Your Strengths and Supercharge Your Business

Whether you’re just getting started or you’ve been building your business for a while, you may feel confused about what you should focus on next. What’s the best step to take so you make the right type of progress?
In Discover Your Strengths and Supercharge Your Business, Sonia Simone shows you a way to narrow down all of the ideas running through your mind.
She outlines a simple plan that helps you slow down, take a deep breath, and produce the content that matters to you and your audience.

The Unstoppable Rise of the

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3 Resources to Help You Choose the Right Words for Your Content

Taste the tomato.
The first week of the year can stir up a lot of energy, excitement — and anxiety.
The other day, while hurriedly shoving forkfuls of a salad into my mouth (I needed to get back to work), my taste buds suddenly lit up due to a bite-size piece of tomato. It was fresh and delicious.
I decided to slow down and enjoy my food. Eating was the only task I needed to focus on at that moment.
When you approach your content marketing duties, your only job is to focus on executing your current task as best as you can.
Sometimes that task is choosing the right words.
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to craft and deliver captivating presentations
How to make more sales during your webinars
How to optimize every element of your online copy

As you work your way through the material below, use the following lessons as a mini content enhancement course.

How to Craft and Deliver Captivating Presentations

You could think of each piece of content you create as a presentation. It’s the enjoyable information you publish in exchange for your audience’s attention.
In How to Craft and Deliver Captivating Presentations, Michael Port dissects the features of a mesmerizing speech or presentation, beginning with the words you write.
Next, he walks you through a detailed tutorial about effective content development.
If public speaking makes you nervous — or if you’re apprehensive about publishing your content online — Michael gives you

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Indispensable Writing Lessons from 3 Historic Creative Thinkers

Do you ever catch yourself romanticizing earlier time periods?
Thoughts like, “It was so much easier to establish authority with ebooks when they weren’t as common” or “I wish people still had longer attention spans.”
Before you get too bummed out, remember that digital content creators are currently well-positioned and previous generations had their challenges as well.
Even way back when long-form, romantic love letters were all the rage, a hastily scribbled note was the equivalent of today’s cursory, ambiguous text message.
But let’s see what we can learn from our creative forefathers — the ones who have made a powerful impact on contemporary writing and content marketing.
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to kill writer’s block and become a master copywriter
How to demand attention
How to energize your content with made-up words

As you work your way through the material below, think of the following lessons as a mini content writing course.

How to Kill Writer’s Block and Become a Master Copywriter in Only 3 Hours a Day

Check out How to Kill Writer’s Block and Become a Master Copywriter in Only 3 Hours a Day for a profound tale about Eugene Schwartz’s dedication to excellence — and keep reading to learn a simple writing practice that can help you focus on producing your best work.
Robert Bruce breaks down the system that enabled Schwartz to be a powerful and lucrative copywriter.
No fancy tools or gimmicks needed. This technique appeals to those

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3 Adaptive Content Resources for Advanced Marketers

Let’s say you own a yoga studio in a town of yoga enthusiasts. It’s called Om Depot.
You currently offer an equal number of Level 1, 2, and 3 classes every day.
Monday through Thursday, your Level 2 and 3 classes sell out and you have to turn people away, but your Level 1 classes only have a few students.
On Fridays, however, a yoga group for beginners visits your studio. Your Level 1 classes sell out and you have to turn people away, but there is plenty of space in your Level 2 and 3 classes because advanced students take private classes at a different yoga studio on Fridays.
Once you notice this pattern, if you don’t make adjustments to your class offerings based on your customers’ behaviors, you’re missing an opportunity to serve them better.
The same is true about the experiences you offer your website visitors. Wouldn’t your content, products, and services stand out if you could adapt each visitor’s experience to meet his or her needs?
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles about the first steps you need to take when you want your site to have adaptive content. They’ll show you:

How to fix your old, neglected, and broken content
How to identify site visitors (and why it matters)
How to personalize your content to boost conversions

Keep reading for a bonus that will provide additional adaptive content education.

A Brief Guide to Fixing Your Old, Neglected, and Broken Content

Before you can create customized

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3 Editing and Proofreading Lessons to Help You Elevate the Quality of Your Content

Let’s compare bland content to plain bread.
Plain content bread isn’t going to build an authority sandwich for your business; it’s fairly easy to produce and many other places offer it.
Editing and proofreading are the peppercorn-crusted turkey and applewood-smoked bacon you need to layer on top of your plain content bread.
With peppercorn-crusted turkey and applewood-smoked bacon (and maybe even some Dijon mustard or horseradish mayonnaise), you’re able to craft an engaging experience for readers — something savory, a little spicy, and more robust than all the other plain content bread out there.
Building an audience is hard work because you have to offer people an experience they don’t get anywhere else. The winning details that make your content a go-to resource can emerge during the time you take to edit and proofread.
This week’s Copyblogger Collection is a series of three handpicked articles that will show you:

How to objectively review your own writing
How to transform your content into persuasive and shareable works of art
How to catch more writing mistakes with an underutilized proofreading trick

As you work your way through the material below, think of the following lessons as a mini editing and proofreading course.

The Traffic Light Revision Technique for Meticulously Editing Your Own Writing

I can give you an example of how editing played an important role when I wrote the introductory paragraphs above.
I originally compared editing and proofreading to “peanut butter and jelly.”
A draft of the opening section was complete with this analogy, but when

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3 Content Marketing Infographics to Help You Present Your Ideas with Style

Style is the answer to everything.
A fresh way to approach a dull or dangerous thing.
To do a dull thing with style is preferable to doing a dangerous thing without it.
To do a dangerous thing with style is what I call art.
– Charles Bukowski, Style
The concept of style has multiple layers of meanings, and this week’s Copyblogger Collection contains multiple layers of insights.
At first glance, the following is a series of three handpicked content marketing lessons that will show you:

How to tell a meaningful marketing story
How to optimize every blog post you write
How to avoid landing page pitfalls that make you lose business

Within these lessons, however, you’ll also discover three different types of infographics.
Infographics visually depict your unique perspective and immediately communicate style.
As you work your way through the material below, consider how you can attract new readers with intriguing illustrations that complement your written content.

The Amazingly Simple Anatomy of a Meaningful Marketing Story [Infographic]

If you think silent films are outdated in our current talkative world, think again.
Demian Farnworth never misses an opportunity to pay tribute to outstanding storytelling practices.
The Amazingly Simple Anatomy of a Meaningful Marketing Story [Infographic] breaks down the elements of stories that get under our skin and stick with us.
When you understand these elements, you can use them to craft powerful messages for your audience.

11 Essential Ingredients Every Blog Post Needs [Infographic]

The content you produce to tell your marketing story needs to be unparalleled in quality and value.
In 11

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