Results driven blogging for B2B brands

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Results-oriented blogging Alison Bolen (@alisonbolen) SAS

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Transcript of Results driven blogging for B2B brands

Page 1: Results driven blogging for B2B brands

Results-oriented blogging

Alison Bolen (@alisonbolen)SAS

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Presentation overview

• SAS Background • Growing a corporate blogging

program with a content strategy in mind

• Content planning for multiple blogs• Balancing content strategies across

a large number of blogs• Coaching bloggers about content

strategy• Measurement and results

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Background: SAS social history

• 1976: First SAS Global Forum

• 1996: SAS-L launches• 2004: Internal blog

program started• 2006: SAS communities

launch• 2007: First external blog

launched• 2011: Transitioned to

WordPress platform

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Background: Marketing Editorial Team

• Part of the larger External Communications team, which includes PR

• 8 full-time “brand journalists” edit & manage: Blog network with 28 blogs Two quarterly magazines 3 Knowledge Exchange microsites ~ 200 customer success stories (annually) 2 monthly e-newsletters 12 quarterly e-newsletters Social media program management

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Strategy: Map goals to corporate goals

• Become primary source for SAS news & info

• Establish SAS employees as trusted advisors

• Facilitate an ongoing dialogue with customers

Translated: PR, Marketing & customer support

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Strategy: Understand content ecosystem

support.sas.comwww.sascommunity.org

Customer support blogs

Soc

ial M

edia

Research solutions

Evaluatevendor offerings

Knowledge Exchanges and blogs

Implement and assess

www.sas.com

Primary goalsProperty

Non-SAS domains

Identify the problem/opportunity(Priority SAS topics)

Negotiate and purchase

* Increase awareness & credibility of SAS thru thought leadership* Limited lead gen

* Surface relevant solutions to CBOs* Exploration, “stickiness”* Lead nurturing

* SAS awareness* Engage prospects* Establish credibility

* Lead capture

* Customer support resources* Provide content to support cross/up sell

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Strategy: Align with broader content strategy

For content to be relevant and valuable, it must be:

• Persona-based: developers vs. business end users• Aligned with the steps in the buying process:

remember your funnel• Business problem-focused: align with marketing

business objectives Metadata is the enabler:

Target audience Topic Industry Offering Stage of the buying cycle

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Strategy: Find the right content

• Where do stories live? Word documents Power points Videos Live events In the minds of employees

• Where does knowledge live? Sharepoint White papers Wikis Internal blogs In the minds of employees

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Strategy: Find the right people

Gary Cokins, Closing the Intelligence Gap

Chris Hemedinger, The SAS Dummy

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Planning: Monthly assignment

• All posts due on 15th of month

• Publish most timely posts first

• Publish breaking news items and fillers throughout

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Planning: Quarterly focus on one topic

• Quarter 1: risk in insurance

• Quarter 2: customer intelligence for insurance

• Quarter 3: combat fraud in insurance

• Quarter 4: business intelligence for insurance

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Planning: Three themes every week

Mondays: Getting started articles. “Topics that I know that I know.” Exploit this knowledge to publish a quick post that requires minimal effort.

Wednesdays: Topics that I am trying to learn, such as sampling and simulation and efficient SAS programming. Share what you learn motivates you to get it right.

Fridays: Posts about data analysis. Often inspired by reading other blogs or by having a robust curiosity.

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Planning: Divide by areas of specialization

16 Think Tank team members for healthcare

Authors specialize in specific areas

Assignment to blog on your topic area at least once every other month.

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Balancing: Display commitment

• SAS Voices blog acts as a testing ground for new bloggers

• Internal blog network of 700+ bloggers also act as testing ground

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Balancing: Group blogs REQUIRE editors

No assignments and nobody in charge = NO CONTENT

Rethink your idea of editor. Does not have to have “communicator” in job title

Job responsibilities: content chaser, people wrangler, idea generator, post polisher, etc

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Balancing: Plan across blogs as needed World Statistics Day:

12 posts SAS 9.3 Launch:

10+ posts Conference editorial

calendars: plan ahead to avoid overlap

Consider event assignments by theme

Blog home page shows posts from all bloggers

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Balancing: Combine or retire as needed Combine when unable to

blog often: Executive blogs

Combine when topics too similar: Social media and Customer intelligence

Retire when not being updated consistently

Retire or transition when employee leaves role

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Coaching: Workshops & training

• Monthly blogger meetings to teach SEO, WordPress tips, writer workshops, etc

• Quarterly blogger engagement training• Social value workshops to introduce benefits of

blogging and other social content strategies to new users

• Storytelling workshops being developed• Resources on intranet include blog FAQ site, blog

discussion group, video tutorials, a blog about blogging, social media guidelines

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Coaching: Advise; don’t micromanage

• Be patient with different learning styles• Don’t pre-judge• Don’t expect too much: Not all 200 bloggers will

follow every piece of advice• Don’t take it personally when others ask, “Why

don’t the bloggers do _____?” Photo guidelines SEO Individual tips about titles, paragraph lengths, etc

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Results: Customer support

• “Sorry for the confusion, and thanks for the details, I could not have done it without you.”

• “Great post. I might have to steal this line of thinking next time I walk into such a project.”

• “Before you ever code a function or statistical procedure, look and see if SAS already has a pre-written one. It is almost certain they do.”

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Results: Marketing success examples

• Bloggers invited to speak at customer and industry conferences.

• Blog posts picked up by industry journalists and magazines.

• Blog posts lead to a sales engagements.

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Results: The new PRSocial media monitoring finds an MIT Tech Review article that mentions the use of SAS for social media analytics.

I arrange for an interview & blog post

IT World Canada – and others – interview same customer after reading SAS blog post.

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Results: Top news source on sas.com

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Results: Next steps for measurement

• Use of SAS Social Media Analytics to better understand sentiment and influence to increase by end of 2011.

• New CMS system will be integrated with WordPress blog system in 2012

• SAS Customer Experience Analytics will analyze traffic run on CMS and WP sites by 2013

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Questions?

Alison Bolen • @alisonbolen• blogs.sas.com • [email protected]• 919-531-9057

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