Welcome to Day 2 of 12 Days of Experts! This month, we’ll be featuring 12 hand-picked articles by industry experts and thought leaders, offering a wider perspective on marketing, business, and leadership. We hope you enjoy these voices from outside the WordStream world. I’m tremendously excited that an author, speaker, and writer of Ann’s renown would allow us to share her insights with our readers. – Larry
Content Marketing in 15 Minutes a Day by Ann Handley, Head of Content, MarketingProfs
Part of me is allergic to the headline I just wrote—or, at least, the “15 minutes a day” part. Because starting out with a stingy marketing mindset runs counter to the spirit of the rich content marketing opportunity.
It reminds of me of punching a clock at a job you hate: How little do I have to work? How much responsibility can I shirk?
But, still, businesses—especially very small ones—have certain constraints and often-ungenerous realities. What if you really have only mere minutes a day to focus specifically on marketing? What if you run, say, a restaurant or a pizza shop—and you’re squeezing out a Facebook post in between the lunch and dinner rush?
Can it be done?
Yes. But only with a solid plan and strategy in place.
At least, that’s the message Shelly Kramer and I gave in March at the International Pizza Expo in Las Vegas.
(Yes, a pizza expo is a thing. And, yes, there was a lot of pizza there. And wood-burning ovens. And industrial dough mixers. And did you know you can buy crushed tomatoes in containers the size of trash barrels…?)
At a session I co-presented with Shelly (of V3 Integrated Marketing), titled Content Marketing in 15 Minutes a Day, we focused on helping the mostly small restaurant owners in our audience think about dumping boring corporate messaging and embracing social media and content as a cornerstone of their marketing. In other words: Quit marketing, start engaging.
(Side note: I talk to a lot of marketers, and talking to a group of mostly owner-operators is always a good bubble-bursting reality check.)
In addition to the why of social and content, we talked about the how, advising them on two primary things:
Content Marketing in 15 Minutes a Day: 3 Content Hacks #12experts
