Category: Marketing Automation

The Friendly Way to Adapt Your Content Like a Flexible Yoga Instructor

Restorative yoga is a gentle, passive practice that promotes relaxation in the body.
The other day at the start of my weekly restorative yoga class, our instructor asked us which areas of the body we’d like to focus on that day.
A few other regular students shouted out, “Shoulders! … Lower back! … Psoas!”
However, I stayed quiet because I started writing this article in my head. Class that day wasn’t going to be restorative for me because I viewed my yoga instructor as a content marketer and her students as her audience members.
While she likely already had a series of poses in mind to teach that day, she asked her audience for feedback that would shape her lesson plan. Tailoring the asanas to her students’ needs would help ensure that they were satisfied and happy that they came to her class.
But did the requests from her students stifle her own vision of what she wanted to teach? Did the suggestions block her own creativity and passion for yoga?
On the contrary, I argue that her students’ input actually enhanced her creativity and passion for yoga.
The same thing can happen when you find out what your prospects hope to achieve by consuming your content.
Inhale and focus on how you can help
When you serve an audience, you focus on how you can use your natural abilities, strengths, and knowledge to help people.
Listening to your audience’s problems gives you direction. You don’t aimlessly create content. You recognize what

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Marketing Automation Defined in 60 Seconds [Animated Video]

Ever find yourself in a conversation with your boss or a client and she mentions implementing marketing automation?
Did you understand her request, or did the conversation grind to a halt because you’re not familiar with the term?
If you fall into the second category, you’re not alone.
Marketing automation is a hot topic these days, and its popularity has grown rapidly since 2013, but it can be tricky to define.
What exactly is marketing automation?
Watch our 60-second video about marketing automation
With help from our friends at The Draw Shop, we whipped up 12 definitions from our new Content Marketing Glossary into short, fun whiteboard animated videos.
Here’s our video for the definition of marketing automation:
Animation by The Draw Shop
And for those of you who would prefer to read, here’s the transcript:
Marketing automation refers to software used by people and companies to streamline, automate, and measure marketing workflows by automating repetitive marketing tasks.
In other words, it performs certain manual marketing tasks for you. Night and day. Rain or shine.
Here’s an example of how it works:
Imagine someone downloads one of your ebooks. Marketing automation software will capture the contact information from the form, segment that lead based upon the information it gathered, and then send them an appropriate series of emails over a prescribed time.
Share this video
Click here to check out this definition on YouTube and share it with your audience. You’ll also find 11 additional Content Marketing Glossary videos.
Learn more from the Content Marketing Glossary
We’ll feature the rest of

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LAST DAY: Claim Your Rainmaker Platform Pro Upgrade Option Before It Expires

On Monday, Brian and I hosted a webinar that focused on the fundamentals of smarter online marketing and how the new Rainmaker Platform Pro features help you execute them.
Specifically, we went through a live demo of the Learning Management System and Marketing Automation features, which I used myself to develop The Showrunner Podcasting Course.
We got overwhelmingly positive feedback on the webinar, so we are reposting it here for anyone who missed it.
But first, an important reminder about the Rainmaker Platform Pro upgrade option that expires later today.

Act now … before our best-ever offer to upgrade to Rainmaker Platform Pro expires
Rainmaker Platform Pro — which includes the online course builder and marketing automation features — is not available for general purchase yet. Once it is, it will cost the equivalent of $145 per month (billed at $435 per quarter or $1,495 annually).


But if you start your free, 14-day trial of the Rainmaker Platform by today at 5:00 p.m. Pacific Time, you will be eligible to upgrade to Pro for a one-time fee of $495.
So you will have all of the Pro features, and you’ll receive every Pro feature enhancement going forward at no additional charge for the life of your account, but you will still be locked in at the Standard recurring rate of $95 per month (billed at $285 per quarter or $950 annually, depending on your plan) instead of the $145 per month you’d otherwise pay.
Basically: you’ll save money in the

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Unleash the Power of Rainmaker Platform Pro

The Rainmaker Platform is only one year old, but it’s ready to turn pro. If you’re not familiar with Rainmaker, it’s the complete solution for building your online marketing and sales platform.
With the Rainmaker Platform, you can:

Create powerful, content-driven websites on your own domains.
Build membership sites and online training courses.
Sell digital products like software, ebooks, and more.
Perform sophisticated online lead generation.
Optimize your content for search engines and social networks.
Master cutting-edge tactics and strategy with included training.
Avoid a patchwork of plugins, themes, and complicated code.
Forget about upgrades, maintenance, security, and hosting headaches.
Take your content to WordPress at any time you choose.

Our current customers who qualified already have access to the great new Pro features I’ll explain below. The early feedback has been positive, and we’ve already begun enhancements.
The Rainmaker Pro Plan is not yet available for general purchase on the site, but it will be soon. Before that happens though, we’re going to give every Standard Plan customer the chance to upgrade to Pro for a low, one-time fee (more on that in a bit).
First, let’s take a look at what’s new.
New Standard Features
These features are available now in the Standard Rainmaker Platform Plan:

Social media post scheduling: You can now create and set social media posts — on Twitter, Facebook (including Facebook pages), and LinkedIn — to be delivered at a specific time in the future. You’ll find this new feature in the Traffic section.
Add redirect links: We’ve always had the option to create redirects

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