Crank up the volume:Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

In 2013, the Weather Channel was named a finalist for the Shorty Awards, an awards program recognizing the best of social media.

The specialty channel known more for thunderstorm warnings than social influence was nominated after its #TornadoWeek campaign generated a disproportionate amount of buzz.

And while the campaign didn’t win the company an award, #TornadoWeek is a great example of the power of content amplification in action.In partnership with the digital marketing agency Vert, the Weather Channel’s week-long social media campaign challenged Twitter users to “create a tornado” in The Weather Channel’s office. A high speed fan was linked to Twitter, with every tweet containing #TornadoWeek increasing the fan’s speed.

After five days the #TornadoWeek hashtag had been used almost 50,000 times, and the website had received 140,000 visits (we assume it also got quite windy in the office). Media sources such as The Huffington Post and Mashable also reported on the campaign, further driving its reach numbers.

Followers were also able to follow the progress of the office tornado via the Weather Channel’s website.

The marketing effort was a huge boost for the Weather Channel, and increased more than just its social following: it also attracted 59 per cent more younger viewers than the previous year’s Storm Week.

With a substantial increase in viewers, the Weather Channel proved that the right amplification campaign can help a company’s content soar to new heights.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

1. What is content amplification?Content amplification refers to a set of tactics used by content producers to increase the reach of their content, in order to get it on as many different platforms and seen by as many interested consumers as possible.

The different tools marketers use for content amplification can be grouped into one of three types:

1. Owned media: This involves platforms that belong to your company, including such things as your company’s website or blog.

2. Paid media: These are amplification platforms that your organization would have to pay for, such as pay-per click advertisements.

3. Earned media: By engaging with influencers and followers, companies can extend their reach by “earning” shares and promotions.

The most successful amplification strategies will use a combination of these platforms.

N A T I V E A D V E R T I S I N G Content amplification is commonly mistaken for native advertising, but

they’re not one and the same.

Native advertising can help amplify content, but generally refers to paid

placements whose appearance matches the form and function of its location.

An advertisement that appears as if it’s simply another article or piece of content

on a web page is just one example.

Need more details? Check out Agility PR Solutions’ whitepaper, “Behind the Mask:

A Guide to Native Advertising”.

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1 // what is content amplification?

Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

Why bother? It probably goes without saying that you want your content to reach to the ends of the universe (and maybe even further). Conventional wisdom says the best way to do this is to simply produce the best content, but this is misleading: in the current media landscape, the best content can easily go unnoticed if not kickstarted via content amplification techniques.

And the ubiquitous use of ad blockers doesn’t help matters. While we all understand the desire to block pesky pop-ups, as marketers these blockers can stymie efforts to reach our audience. Traditional advertising campaigns online may now go largely unseen due to the proliferation of ad blockers.

Instead of throwing money away on paid advertisements that could go unseen, marketers are dedicating more resources to producing content that interests their targeted audience and finding ways to reach this audience through amplification techniques.

Avoiding ‘content shock’ and ‘follower fatigue’But if all you do is post content and move on to the next project, it won’t take long for it to get lost in the vast sea of information out there. “Content supply is exponentially exploding while content demand is flat,” explains Mark Schaefer, author of The Content Code.

He calls this “content shock”. While the same number of people are searching for content today, infinitely more people are producing more content all the time. That means your content has to compete with an ever-growing pool of other great (and yes, sometimes not-so-great) content, all vying for the attention of the same audience.

Schaefer argues that to avoid content shock companies need to be “spending at least as much time on amplification as on content creation.” What’s happening now, he says, is that “we are moving to a situation where amplification arguably matters more than the quality of content.”

Once companies have gained an audience, a good content amplification strategy can also help avoid follower fatigue. Follower fatigue occurs when audiences are continuously bombarded by similar-sounding content, resulting in lost interest.

1 // what is content amplification?

“We are moving to a situation where

amplification arguably matters more than the

quality of content.”

- Mark Schaefer, author of The Content Code

Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

2. Creating content that moves The first part of any successful content amplification strategy is creating easily-amplified material. This may sound elementary, but it’s not exactly easy, either. Throwing dry spaghetti at the wall hoping that it sticks just won’t work; the content has to first be worthy of amplification.

Despite Schaefer’s assertion on the previous page, quality still matters. But making quality content, and then varying the format and platform in which and on which it is consumed, is key to pushing your content even further. If done properly, one piece of content can take on a life of its own and — hopefully — reach audiences on countless different platforms.

Here are just a few amplification techniques that the best content marketers employ to spread their message.

1. SKYSCRAPER TECHNIQUE The first stage of the skyscraper technique is to find existing content that’s similar to what you wish to produce.

After you’ve found a strong sample of similar stuff, filter it to identify which items have performed the best. Then, once you’ve determined the best examples, it’s your job to try to add value by creating even better content. Similar to standing on the shoulders of giants, the skyscraper technique involves building on others’ work to reach even loftier heights.

Improving already-excellent content may seem like a tall task, but Brian Dean, founder of SEO training blog Backlinko.com, suggests some easy ways to do it:

1. Bring it up-to-date: Bring statistics or facts up to date, or include more timely examples or anecdotes.

2. Make it appealing: If you can make content look better and more visually appealing, it’s more likely to get your audience’s attention.

3. Increase the length: Expand the existing content. For instance, make a list longer or add more written explanation.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

2. GUIDES AND WHITEPAPERS Do you need a lengthy piece of content to get your desired audience’s attention? Guides or whitepapers are larger pieces of content that can be used to gain credibility, respect, and readership. These longer pieces are valuable to people interested in your topic, and also present your company or organization as thought leaders on a given subject.

Another benefit of creating guides and whitepapers is that you can often leverage your existing knowledge or content. Expanding existing blog posts or other, smaller pieces into a longer format is always easier than writing a guide from scratch. By reformatting your content into longer pieces, you’re likely to reach an audience more deeply interested in your topic than those who check out shorter blog posts or tweets.

3. TWEETABLE SNIPPETSThough we’ve just finished extolling the virtues of lengthening your (or others’) content, the fact is that sometimes the opposite is true: sometimes less is more. Lengthy pieces may be valuable to your audience, but can sometimes scare off readers. When it comes to initially grabbing a reader’s attention, you may have to break these pieces down to get readers primed for your longer, deeper content. The bottom line is that creating tweetable snippets which link to your longer content can help improve readership.

Tweetable snippets are small extracts from your longer content. Take the most exciting, intriguing, or otherwise attention-grabbing element of your content and share it, along with a link to the larger piece.

Remember, you only have 140 characters to tell people about your piece on Twitter, so make every letter count.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

best practicesOnce you’ve reached the point of disseminating your content, there are some more general considerations to keep in mind.

4. INDUSTRY AND EMOTIONAL APPEAL Dave Landry, an online business journalist who specializes in social media amplification trends, says two crucial ways to gain audience attention are industry appeal and emotional appeal.

Using the former ensures that your content is à propos, and that the industry or vertical you’ve trained your sights on will care about it. Use words and phrases those in your target vertical will understand. And while sticking to the tone and lexicon of your target industry, also make sure to distinguish your own brand identity: Create content that fits with what others in your industry are creating, but give yours a unique voice that fits your specific company.

Emotional appeal is a bit more basic, but can also go a long way in eliciting audience interest. Cute, shocking, or funny content, for example, can all stir emotions in readers, and producing content or snippets that draw on these emotions can and will help drive views.

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1. LIMIT YOUR RESHARESThis may seem counterintuitive when trying to amplify your content, but sharing the same post over and over can cause follower fatigue. Individuals who already follow you online, or even those who happen across your work, don’t want to see the same content again and again. You also don’t want to bombard loyal followers with content they’ve already seen. Engaging in such behaviour risks pushing your hard-earned followers away.

2. PICK YOUR POSTS You’re likely going to be tempted to create shareable links and tweetable snippets for all of your content. After all, you’ve worked hard to create the best content out there, so it’s understandable that you want to share it in as many ways as possible. But resist that temptation. Choose your best content and make sure to highlight these pieces above others. This will give your company or brand more credibility, and your followers will thank you for not clogging up their streams.

3. VARY YOUR MESSAGES If you really can’t stop yourself from pushing that one great piece more than you maybe should, make sure to vary its dissemination in some way. Change the snippet that goes along with your link, update an example so your reshared content is more up to date, or make sure that when repromoting content you offer your audience something of value. The idea is to give those who have already seen the piece additional value they may have missed the first time around.

Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

3. Utilizing influencers to move your content Influencers are experts within a particular industry or on a particular topic. More than just experts, though, an influencer is an expert with a large and engaged following.

Engaged followers are those on social media platforms who do more than simply follow industry leaders and subject experts. They’re often the ones retweeting content, writing reviews, and engaging in conversations with influencers, with their own followers, and with people in their day-to-day lives. It is important to tap into this follower base, because these are the people who are more likely to engage with and share your own content.

Instead, use media monitoring and analysis to look for important figures in your industry who get a lot of retweets, favorites, or replies. This information can be located using a manual search, but tools have also been developed that do the work for you. Companies like Impactana, Klout, and yes, Agility PR Solutions can help identify and provide statistics on influencers.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

Who needs influencers? You need to engage with influencers if you want to successfully amplify your content outside your own platforms. Engaging influencers is a major part of an earned media strategy, and your goal should be to piggyback off of influencers within your target industry to add value and promote your content.

Of course you think your content is great, but when a recommendation comes from someone outside your organization, someone who’s trusted and respected, it carries even more weight.

Marketing guru Jay Baer created a list of eight types of influencers, and here are just a few of the roles they can play:

1. IMPROVE THE REACH OF YOUR CONTENT Influencers have a large base of engaged followers that you likely also want engaging with your content. Having these engaged followers see your content — which is already known to be of interest to them — is likely to elicit yet further engagement, such as retweets. It’s a beautiful cycle.

2. GIVE CREDIBILITY TO YOUR WORKThe best influencers are considered experts on your industry or subject matter. If these influencers engage with your piece (either by sharing or commenting) it gives your work more credibility. By linking to or contributing to your content, the influencer is suggesting to their followers that your content is reputable.

This can be especially useful later on in your relationship with the influencer if your brand or company is facing a crisis. In the face of bad PR, your influencer can defend you and your brand, and this can be invaluable.

3. ADVISE YOU ON CREATING BETTER CONTENT Consider asking influencers for quotes or having them contribute a piece to your company blog. Getting an influencer’s name involved in your content, whether on the byline or in the body, will boost its value. Being featured in your content does more than just improve your content, it also helps your influencer gain more recognition. It’s a win-win.

Influencers may also be willing to provide advice on your work. Reach out for this advice and take the feedback seriously — they are experts, after all.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

4. Keep a toolbox Beyond influencers, there are a number of tools and organizations that can help amplify your content. And while free services are great, you may also wish to invest in paid services like Outbrain, Promoted Tweets, and Facebook Ads.

Promoted Tweets push content to viewers most likely to be interested in that content. Through Promoted Tweets, companies can also monitor campaigns, and are given an overview of how their tweets are performing. Businesses can get stats on how many clicks, retweets, and likes each of their tweets receive.

And it can be very effective: A Promoted Tweet campaign run for TripCase, a free travel application, saw a 25 per cent increase in engagement from Twitter users.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

Similarly, Facebook Ads can target advertisements toward a specific audience, using demographic data such as location and age to tap into a certain market segment. These ads can also target people based on interests, behaviours, and connections with others.

Similar to Promoted Tweets, these campaigns can also be very effective: After Me Undies invested in Facebook Ads, it reportedly saw a sixfold increase in its ad spend ROI. Similarly, Celebrity Cruises saw a 3x increase in online bookings after launching its Facebook Ads campaign.

Outbrain specializes in content amplification, by recommending content to visitors of a given website that are likely to find the content interesting.

Other tools that provide free services you can leverage to amplify content also include LinkedIn, Hootsuite, and MailChimp.

Your decision to use these services and the value you get from them will depend largely on your resources. Most of these services only provide a limited range of possible actions if you go with their free plans, but if you have the funds, these services can help you narrow in on your audience while saving you a lot of time and effort.

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Crank up the volume: Harnessing content amplification to drive leads

In summary A good content amplification strategy will use a combination of earned, owned, and paid media to

promote your organization’s content

Content amplification can help your company avoid the common marketing problems of ad blockers, content shock, and follower fatigue

Create content that moves: use the skyscraper technique to stand on the shoulders of giants, while also linking to your larger pieces through compelling, tweetable snippets to gain social media attention

Be sure to follow best practices such as limiting your reshares and utilizing both industry and emotional appeal

Develop relationships with influencers who boast large, engaged audiences

Consider investing in tools like Facebook Ads or a service like Outbrain that can help boost your content amplification strategy

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Looking for the right tool to manage your influencer strategy?

Contact Agility PR Solutions for a free consultation.