Should You Pay Up to Succeed in Social, or Refresh Your Content Strategy? [Inbound Industry Report]

Inbound Marketing Industry Report, highlighting top articles and news stories from the third week of November, 2012.

How Strong is Your Facebook Reach, Really?

If you manage a Facebook brand page, I'm sure you've taken notice of how many people actually see each post you publish. And, I'm also pretty sure you've thought, "What's the deal?" when comparing that number to your brand's actual number of Facebook fans—there's a huge discrepancy.

Is it a coincidence that Facebook rolled out the paid "Promote" feature after acknowledging that posts only reach about fifteen percent of your followers? Dangerous Minds (@DangerMindsBlog) doesn't think so. After doing the math, they figured they'd need to spend $2,000 to $3,200 per day promoting posts to reach 100% of their 50,000+ following. Is it worth paying up to get your followers (or friends) back?

(And it's not just brand pages. Individual user reach also may be dwindling too, again with Facebook offering a solution for sponsored posts. Check out what some of the PR 20/20 team think about potential marketing and social implications of promoting posts on personal profiles).

Here's Mark Schaefer's (@markwschaefer) take: "To succeed on the social web today you better bring your A Game and a bucket of money." It's not a level playing field anymore. We're dealing with an all-out content arms race; a writer and a blog just won't cut it.

Fresh Perspectives on Content Strategy

But, there's another side to argue: you don't have to shell out the big bucks to have your content be seen. Matthew Grant (@mattgrant) talks with author Andrew Davis (@TPLDrew) about brandscaping, and why it's important to think like a producer, not a publisher, to try to find the resources to create the right kind of content for your audience. His two main tips?

1. Don't do content yourself; invest in its creation instead. Unless your company sells content (e.g. is a media company), there's probably someone better than you to create it for the audience you're trying to reach.
2. Don't hire a celebrity spokesperson; make one. Find someone who loves your product, uses it every day and is already creating content.

Whether you're publishing or producing branded content, it's important to remember that the end goal shouldn't end at the sale. Ardath Albee (@ardath421) shares how you can use content to connect the dots after purchase to foster customer or client loyalty, resulting in prolonged relationships, repeat purchases, referrals and more.

What's New?

• New York Times CEO Mark Thompson started his job last Monday, after leaving the BBC. NYT's decision was made due to Thompson's success leading the BBC: "Mark will lead us as we continue our digital transformation, bolster our international growth, drive our productivity and introduce new technologies that will help us become better storytellers..." said publisher Arthur Sulzberger (source).
• Apple users—did last weekend’s iMessage and FaceTime interruption leave you feeling socially stranded? It’s not surprising if you didn’t even notice—the outage was a mere five hours, but had some iPhone and iPad users taking to their social networks to complain about the lack of service.
• Looking to make your brand a bit more (p)interesting? Last week, Pinterest formally unveiled new "business accounts," along with Terms of Service specifically for companies. (Technically, until last Wednesday, commercial use of the site was prohibited.)
• In the past few months, Twitter has made a number of improvements affecting the user experience. Most recently, you'll get greater results when clicking Discover or search on the iPhone or Android app to find out what's happening.
• Facebook is trying to put out its fire for recent Page reach issues with the introduction of Pages Feed. Similar to your regular feed, the most relevant / popular posts will be displayed, without any overpowering personal chatter.
• Google+ Hangouts just got even larger. Now, you'll be able to invite up to 15 people to a Hangout, upping the previous limit of ten. And, access is open to any school using Google Apps for Education. Do you utilize Hangouts? The PR 20/20 team frequently hangs (and clowns around) in G+.

Bookmark of the Week

LinkedIn offers a 5-step guide to getting started with Company Pages and engaging followers for social media success. The strategy breaks down how to create, grow and connect with potential customers on LinkedIn into digestible, action-oriented steps

What articles made your top list last week? We'd like to hear your opinions.

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