how to create engaging data-driven stories

“Data-driven storytelling is poised to be the next big trend in content marketing.” October 2015.

“Data-enhanced storytelling is rapidly reshaping both content and advertising.” January, 2016.

Data Driven Stories• Engaging• Impactful visuals

• Evergreen resource• Attract higher links

SME Most Shared Content Last 6 Months

Content Marketing Institute

5 Core Data Driven Narratives

1. Trends.

2. Rank order or league tables.

3. Comparisons.

4. Relationships. Correlations and causation.

5. Surprising or counterintuitive data.

1. Trends

1. Trends

Twitter Fails To Grow Active Users

2. Comparisons

2. Comparisons

US Presidential Election

2. Comparisons

3. Rank Order Tables

3. Rank Order Tables

Content Marketing Example

3. Rank Order TablesTop Trigrams on Twitter & Facebook

4. Relationships

OPS -the percentage of time a player gets on base and the average number of bases a player reaches when they come to the plate

4. Relationships

4. Relationships

We found No Correlation between Total Shares and Referring Domain Links. Correlation was just:

0.021

5. Surprising Data

“America Imprisons More People Than Any Other Country”

5. Surprising Data

5 Core Data Driven Narratives

1. Trends.

2. Rank order or league tables.

3. Comparisons.

4. Relationships. Correlations and causation.

5. Surprising or counterintuitive data.

Thank You

Steve RaysonDirector, BuzzSumosteve@buzzsumo.com@steverayson

How to create engaging data-driven stories

Steve RaysonBuzzSumo

Alexandra Tachalova Digital Olympus

Even top digital marketing blogs rarely write data-driven stories.

#datastories

HubSpot Top content

List

List

Guide

Guide

List

How-to

How-to

List

Guide

Problogger.com Top content

How-to

Tips

How-to

Tips

How-to

How-to

How-to

How-to

List

Convienceandconvert.com Top content

List

Predictions

How-toResults of research

How-to

Trends

Trends

Lists

Lists

Because it takes more efforts

Why don’t they do that?

#datastories

Why should you do that?

You stand out, especially when you don’t have the name and recognition

Publicity: build your name for yourself, improve your image

#datastories

Search Ranking Factors 2015 by Moz.com

149 referring domains 85 – an AVR number of ref. domains per a post on Moz blog

Moz.com blog Top Authors

What works?

#datastories

A powerful hypothesis is based on:

Hot news

Well-known trends

about industry trends?

Where can I learn

#datastories

Quora

Reddit

Industry Communities

BuzzSumo

#datastories

The magic of where to search, or how to uncover

hot news in a few min.

#datastories

Google Trends

#datastories

Industry news portal - SimilarWeb

#datastories

Without backlinks you can’t rank in Google.

You have a thesis:

#datastories

Collecting stats:

Primary data

Secondary data

Primary Data

Surveys

Interviews

#datastories

Tools to useto speed up the process

TypeForm

#datastories

PollFish

#datastories

Information that already exists in the web.

Secondary data:

#datastories

Statista.com

#datastories

The last developer has

broken my heart site…

#datastories

Go to Upwork.com and find a developer for low-cost rate.

#datastories

Analyzing datasets

#datastories

Analyzing datasets

Analyzing datasets

Hacks that will Increase Publicity

#datastories

Increasing publicity through involving:

Experts

Partners

#datastories

Partnerships: streamlined data collection

Connect with a company that has the dataShow value of publicity

Exchange publicity for data

Sounds too good to be true…

Downsides:

You don’t control the process

You will likely invest more than your parner They have other priorities

#datastories

99% of websites on the first pages of Google have more than 1k backlinks.

Data-supported thesis:

#datastories

You know where to publish it – now save time.

Structuring your content

#datastories

Short QuizSelect one of

statements (A or B) on each slide and share your answer

in the chat box

#datastories

50% of companies that use social media don’t know how to measure the effectiveness.

50% of companies increased their budgets on

Social Media in 2016.

A

B

70% of marketers lack a consistent or integrated approach to their work.

70% of marketers have a content strategy.

A

B

45% of marketers will increase their content

marketing budgets in 2016.

45% of marketers don’t have a documented

content marketing strategy.

A

B

Why do negative stories work better than others?

#datastories

Eye-tracking research

#datastories

Marc Trussler Eric Soroka

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140728-why-is-all-the-news-bad

The results of this study prove that people tend to select negative news.

#datastories

Check your style:

Academic or informal?

Entertaining or dry?

Short or long?

#datastories

Structure:

Title and sub-titlesIntro?Lists?Pictures (design)

To the first 5 people who email me.

Free 1-hour of consulting

#datastories

alextachalova@gmail.com

bit.ly/alex-linkedin

@AlexTachalova

Facebook.com/alexandra.tachalova

alextachalova@gmail.com

Alextachalova.com / DigitalOlympus.net

Thank you!

#datastories