Your Digital Marketing Coach with Neal Schaffer

Customer experience marketing. It's a buzzword that a lot of people throw out, but what exactly does it mean, how important is it to you business today, and what are the first steps you can take to implementing customer experience marketing the right way?I could not think of a better person than friend and customer experience marketing expert Dan Gingiss to have on my podcast to answer these questions and more for my listeners.As Dan explains, customer experience marketing is a vital aspect to both your online and offline business. It also could be the one defining thing that can differentiate your brand from your competitors. Dan takes us through the correct way to implement customer experience marketing. Listen in and read the show notes below to learn more.Key Highlights[00:44] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Dan Gingiss[04:09] What Dan Realized About Social Marketing[08:03] Defining Customer Experience[08:44] 2 Keys of Customer Support[10:57] Why Customer Experience Is Getting A Buzz Just Now?[13:00] Customer Experience As The True Differentiator For Brands[13:21] You Need To Compete With Experience[13:39] Example Of A Company That Provides Great Customer Experience[16:33] Creating Emotional Attachment With Your Customers[17:16] Customer Experience Audit[22:21] Dan's Advice To Companies[25:01] Connect With DanNotable QuotesBy spending time focusing on providing remarkable experiences, you can get more people talking positively about your brand and start drowning out some of that negativity.The way that I define customer experience is that it is how people feel about every single interaction they have with a brand.One of the things that I love to say is that I believe today, there's no such thing as an offline customer experience. Because even things that we used to consider being offline, like say, being on an airplane, well, the guy that was dragged off the airplane, showed us that not everything on an airplane is offline anymore, right? Because it can come online in an instant.I believe that customer experience is going to become the last true differentiator for brands.When companies treat their customers well, customers don't mind as much, they don't pay as much attention to a sale down the road that you know, is going to get them a 10% discount to what you're charging them, because they know that you're going to take better care of them.Creating that emotional attachment is, is probably going to be a great way to generate a positive customer experience.I'm talking about actually becoming a customer and actually going through the process of whatever it is that your company offers to customers.The harder thing is creating unique, remarkable new experiences. Differentiation, that isLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Getting to the front page in the search rankings is a battlefield - you're fighting a war! The struggle to stay relevant and compete with an ever growing number of competitors requires the right tools and the right approach to revitalizing existing blog content and strategically creating new content.If you are approaching content from a social media marketing perspective, or from a blogging perspective, today's podcast is going to really resonate with you because I want to give you a hopefully new and really holistic way of thinking about search engine optimization and therefore the content that either you already have  on your site or new content that you are going to blog in the future as part of your content marketing and social media marketing effortsKey Highlights[03:39] What drives traffic?[03:47] Why Search Engines Are Relevant And Powerful[04:46] The Concept Of Freshness[05:36] Data-driven Approach[06:19] Why Some Content Outperform And Some Underperform?[06:57] Minimum Number Of Words for Blog PostsNotable QuotesAt the end of the day search engines is what drives traffic.I still think at the end of the day, you know, people read emails, people read blogs, but people do a heck of a lot of searches.Search engines are still there and are still as powerful and as relevant as ever. And therefore, when we think about content, we should be thinking about search engines.Why does some content outperform and some underperform? Well, what I've found some of the underperforming content is actually competing with good performing content on your websites.If you blogged about the same thing over and over again, Google is just going to try to find the best one if you're trying to target the same keyword.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Social media keeps changing. It seems that every few weeks you hear that Facebook has some new algorithm that messes up all the energy you’ve been putting into it. Then a new feature appears and everyone tells you how amazing it is for branding and marketing. And then it turns out that it’s not as amazing as everyone says (remember Periscope?). How do we keep track of the social media marketing trends? How do we adapt? How do make sure to stay atop of the ever-flowing changes but at the same time never waste too much energy on them either? Today I interview an expert to help you answer all those questions about social media marketing trends. During my recent trip around the world, I was able to go to the Falcon.io "Spark" conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, where I finally had a chance to meet up with someone I've known and respected in social media for quite some time: Matt Navarra, a social media consultant and former social media director for the The Next Web as well as consultant to organizations such as the United Nations and BBC. In this interview I talk with Matt about what has happened to social media in the past 12 months and what’s next for the future with regards to social media marketing trends. Should businesses continue experimenting with Facebook? How can brands make use of both Instagram and Facebook Stories? What is the next big thing? Listen to find out!Key Highlights [01:09] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Matt Navarra[02:47] Areas Where Matt Is Shifting Focus On[03:48] Is Facebook Underutilized By Brands?[05:08] How Matt Helps Brands Create Visual Content Strategy Around Stories[06:39] Tools That Matt Recommends[08:27] The Instagram Swipe Up Feature and Facebook Stories[11:33] Matt's Take on Pinterest[13:35] Trends That Brands Should Be Focusing Now[18:57] Matt's Advice on Creating Strategy[20:35] Final Thoughts[22:00] Connect With MattNotable QuotesSo the big thing that most people are talking about at the moment is really moving away more than ever, from focusing on Facebook pages, and also post pages and profiles in general. And it's that trend of people wanting to understand the value and how to leverage the value from stories as a format, which is not new, per see.Well, the first thing is that, you know, there's you don't always have to do all yourself and sometimes I think brands and both small and large organizations try and do everything themselves.I think that some of the best stuff that's created is often the simplest, and the little things that look more most authentic. It's not a medium that needs to be polished, I think the more polished it is, the less authentic it becomes. And that's when it kind of loses its value.It all comes down ultimately to how creative you've been in kind of steering people towards swipe up, also giving them a reason or inner motivation, Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

16 days. 6 countries. 2 continents. After a business trip around the world, I pondered what role businesses should play in social media. And then it dawned on me: Social media marketing has been going on for ten years, but brands on average still suck at it. Should businesses keep trying to do the same thing? Or is it time for a next generation, new approach to social media marketing that takes into account the fact that we are now entering our second decade of implementing organic social? Listen on for the conclusion that I have and the advice for you to completely blow up and reconstruct your social media marketing efforts to be more effective in 2019 and beyond.Key Highlights [00:49] It's Time For Second Generation Strategies[03:41] Why Influencer Marketing Is Ahead In Southeast Asia And China[04:42] How Influential Influencers Are In China And Southeast Asia[06:03] Brands Moving More Into Paid Social[06:40] Do Consumers Want To Talk To Brands On Social Media?[08:28] Influencers Are The Best Content Creators[10:44] How Most Businesses Started Out[11:53] Inciting Word Of Mouth[12:47] Marketers Are Miseducated On Influencer Marketing[13:38] Redefining Influencer Marketing[17:07] Invest In Relationship With PeopleNotable QuotesI think that businesses really understand the influence that these people have in that part of the world.We've been doing social media marketing for a decade now. And I think we need to come to the realization, and I keep saying it, but it bears reminding that social media was made for people, not for businesses, right? Businesses really shouldn't be in social media. But I don't think that people want to have conversations with brands in social media, unless they're gonna complain, perhaps if they have a question.That's what social media is about, is about building relationships with people.Many businesses started out word of mouth, happy customers, successful customers, they told their friends, and so on. But what's important here is that I applaud falcon.io Because one of the keywords in Spark, that digital marketing conference I spoke at was how going forward? Do we incite conversations that connect? And I think that's what it's about, right? It's about leveraging our customers who 10 years ago, we're not on social media, but they're on social media. Now, it's about spreading word of mouth through social media.So if business is about word of mouth marketing, and social media should have been about word of mouth marketing, the only way to incite word of mouth marketing is not from the declining reach of your organic posts, nor is it about your advertisements. It's about leveraging people.What's important is that we need to redefine and the business of influence is going to be all about redefining it. And I think that employee advocacy is a great way toLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

I recently keynoted social media enterprise platform company Falcon.io's Spark conference in Copenhagen, Denmark on the topic of influencer marketing. I had a chance to meet with their founder and CEO, Ulrik Bo Larsen, at the event and get his perspective on all things social media marketing. Listen in for his advice.Key Highlights [00:48] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Ulrik Bo Larsen[02:27] Successful Things Jay See That Brands Do In Social and Digital These Days[05:03] Falcon.io's Core Message of Marketing[05:46] The Areas Where Marketers Need To Improve On[09:01] Big Things That Marketers Miss Out Of[11:13] Bringing The Content Team Together[16:26] The Focal Points Marketers Should Focus On[17:28] Three Centers Of GravityNotable QuotesA lot of these great things that people want to achieve on these channels, which is often starts with a marketing message, you want to want to get a specific message out, you want to set on specific product, you want to create a rareness around a brand, a lot of those things are now especially in I would say in the mid market and some of the more innovative enterprise companies, people are starting to realize that a lot of those things are very intertwined.I think that a lot of things are moving towards you know, visual content. And it obviously you know, sometimes changes the need for kind of the you know, the expertise you need internally to produce that is different than just writing copy but but it's all those things are coming together.So I think you need to engage with perhaps a new set of agencies to help you out produce some of that content and you need to staff your own your own teams in ways so that you can maneuver what is you know, the changing landscape of what constant formats are working and it's video it's visual video now it's portrait instead of landscape and all those things are constantly happening right and you write us need to be Ready for for that and embrace it as you know, an exciting line of work rather than oh my god, I thought I had it down, because that's never gonna happen.You may have some, some some difference of, of, you know, personality, and there are differences throughout the states of America for sure. But it is, you know, it's my new compared to the differences in culture over here. So I think that that's important. So you often get into a more more refined set up with, with regional and local markers, local activation, where you take some of those some of the content pieces and really want, you need to localize them to these to these markets over here.What you want to do, you want to bootstrap them with some tooling, and some platforms, and something to kind of hold on to creLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Influencer Marketing is about way more than just Instagram influencers with millions of followers. This episode is a preview of Neal's new book on influencer marketing, The Business of Influence, and aims to change your mindset to understand that influence is literally everywhere, on every social network and content medium, and those who influence include your followers, customers, partners, and even employees.Key Highlights[01:49] Why Influencer Marketing Is Today's Hot Topic[02:16] Compelling Reasons To Be Utilizing Influencer Marketing[03:29] Books About Influence[05:27] The Definition and Concept of Influencer Marketing[07:55] Influence Is Everywhere[09:15] Early Form of Influencer Marketing[10:11] Longes Life Span Of Social Posts[11:02] What Is Affiliate Marketing[11:07] How To Become An Affiliate[11:55] Other Types Of Influencer Marketing[12:03] Brand Advocacy[13:15] More Types of Influences[14:51] People Always Outperform Businesses[16:16] Expanding Mindset About Influencer Marketing[17:34] Using Events To Expand InfluencesNotable QuotesI believe that influencer marketing should be a fundamental part of a company's marketing. And this is not just for consumer brands that are targeting Millennials or tweens for any brand, including b2b brands, including nonprofits and government organizations.When you begin to think about all this holistically, you begin to see that influence does not depend on social network influence really is everywhere.So we can't forget when we talk about influencer marketing, the power of working with bloggers because, you know, the lifetime of a tweet is very short.Here's the thing, an influencer doesn't have to be that 10 million follower, Instagram celebrity. And influencer might only have 5000 followers, but they have a very, very highly engaged community in something that is relevant to the products and services that you offer. Now you begin to see how broad of a definition influencer marketing should be. There's plenty of stats out there that show that by investing in relationships with your customers, you will end up getting more business than investing in advertising outside of your customers.  In other words, not only through loyalty, will your customers purchase more from you, but they will also refer you to others that will end up being your customers as well.And I think the whole idea about working with influencers is ideally at the end of the day, you want to try to convert them into becoming brand advocates, right?The whole idea is that social media was made for people, not for businesses, right.But if you use the creation of around a blog post, as a way to hopefully get them to share your posts, or at a minimum, it helps you establish a relationship with the influencer for theLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

Roundup posts are a powerful form of influencer marketing when strategically planned and implemented correctly, especially but not limited to B2B businesses. Learn how to create your own roundup posts with this interview with Codrut Turcanu, one of the global leaders in producing expert roundup blog posts.Key Highlights[00:32] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Codrut Turcanu[02:38] How To Define A Roundup Blog Post?[04:40] How Did Codrut Started The Concept Of Having Experts Chime In Your Blog[07:05] Pain Points Businesses Will Face The First Time They Do Influencer Outreach[09:55] Why And How Roundup Blog Posts Benefits Businesses[11:58] Success Stories[15:48] Case Study Example[19:05] Ballpark Number For Roundup Posts[21:47] Codrut's Final AdviceNotable QuotesThe quick, the quick, or the fast solution would be to think about what is the end result? Once you know the goal, or the main achievement, then you can start and create or compile your experts list or your influence in classes list.What I recommend my clients do, first of all, before they set on the goal, before they decide what they really want to achieve with their first test Roundup, then I suggest that they create a list with people whom they already connected with, these might go back to previous clients, doing Venture Partners, and so forth.Definitely worth about because you connect with people who are already influential in their marketplace in the industry, actually, when you associate with people who already have an audience, already have access to people who work or want to access, like, for example, leads clients, social media ordinances, and so forth.It also puts you on the radar of these influencers, because now you're starting to build a relationship with them through this engagement through this tactic of inviting them to have their opinion voice. And with the right promotion with the right strategy, you may be able to collaborate with them so that they can promote your blog post, then you can also use your newsletter and social media accounts, to drive traffic to your back to your blog post as well to your expert.This is why I recommend my parameters to my clients, because they open the door to a long term relationship and the links the social shares, the visitors leads and clients will follow quickly afterwards, it will come as a natural effect.Now, one remark I want to make this, this concept of excellent that can be just and implemented in any niche, no matter how large or small in any industry. That's why I suggest to my clients to go to connect with those on the middle levels, who have a sizable and significant audience, but they are so respond to emails or to their social media accounts personally.Always focus on quality content, and quality experts. And this goes back to listening to your audLearn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

On this podcast I first compare the concept of an Instagram follower policy with that of other social networks and then focus on detailing my experience on Instagram to help you create a policy that will help you grow both Instagram followers and engagement.Key Highlights[03:36] Why I Spend A Lot of Time On Instagram[04:37] Following Policy[06:42] Understanding Limitations[09:22] Why You Should Prune Your Connection[18:32] Instagram Limitation[19:54] What Fuels The Influencer Marketing Industry[22:43] Another Reason Why You Should Reduce Irrelevant Followers[23:58] The Golden Sign of Fake Influence[29:00] The 1,500 RuleNotable QuotesI like to say no one has a monopoly on ideas. No one has a monopoly on storytelling.At the end of the day. You need to have your own policies. as to how you want to use I mean, it obviously you need to have your own strategy as to how you want to use Instagram, is it going to be for personal for business for both? But you need to have a policy as to who you're going to follow.If no one engages with that content, boom, no one else is going to be able to see that content. And that's why having, you know, quantity is important. But the quality is even more important, because the quality of the relevance in your connections is not there, right? Your content is not going to be seen by anybody, it's going to be seen, first of all, by irrelevant people. I think it's important to also show people that follow you that if they're real and relevant, you're going to follow them back, because it's social media. One way of building out a community is through social signals is tapping people on the shoulder. And one of the tactics that you use for that, in addition to commenting and liking and you know, the different ways you can engage with people is definitely following them.I, for someone that's investing on a daily basis, investing time in a platform, I want to engage with other people on Instagram that are equally invested in the platform as I am right. I want to know that they're publishing on a regular basis, they're engaging on a regular basis. So this is one way in which we begin to look at the importance of not only the follower following ratio, but also this average engagement rate. Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

What are the biggest issues facing the influencer marketing industry today? And how can marketers best navigate the influencer landscape? Join me for an exclusive insider's look at the influencer marketing industry in this interview with Eric Dahan, CEO of the leading influencer marketing technology company OpenInfluence.Key Highlights[00:24] Introduction of Podcast Guest, Eric Dahan[01:31] How Powerful Is Influencer Marketing?[05:16] The Types Of Influencers Brands Should Be Working With[10:00] Things That Brands Need To Improve Upon Working With Influencers[10:32] The Common Mistakes Brands Do In Influencer Marketing[15:03] Influencer Marketplace Model[15:41] The Issues With Influencer Marketplace[21:22] Friction Of Supply And Demand[25:01] Influencer Pricing[27:23] Connect With Eric And Open InfluenceNotable QuotesI think, you know, the reasons why influencer marketing is so successful, is pretty straightforward. You know, there's so much information out there, there's so many ads out there. And so it makes sense that when you have an influencer, that you're already following, you're already consuming the content they create, when they integrate a piece of branded content with their normal content stream. It just resonates a lot better, right?At the end of the day, you know, there's no one size fits all strategy, right? For a very simple level,, you have three components, right? You have the message, the messenger, and the audience, and all those three things have to be aligned, to have something really resonate and be effective. And so you know, believe me when I say, we love nothing more than dynamic marketplaces, and being able to extract deficiencies with transparency.I think the right approach is identifying the right influencers, and then shopping from those influencers, having them compete against one another, for opportunities. And that's a really good forcing function for driving, you know, cost down in value up. But in today's world, with the emergence of social media, with the emergence of mobile, native social platforms, you opened the door to, you know, from a handful of celebrities, to now hundreds of 1000s and millions of people becoming, you know, influencers.And so there are all these different variables that really affect and influences price, because influencers are people and for them, they don't really have a high cost structure, right, they've recovered, essentially their living expenses, but they don't have any cost of goods sold associated with what they're selling.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com

How fresh is your content? Content is the currency of social and digital media, yet what type of content in what content medium do you publish in what outlet or social media website? Join Neal for an insightful look into why content has an expiration date and what you can do to get the best ROI from your content.Key Highlights[03:47] Content As Currency of Social Media[05:40] Content Marketing Bridges Gap[08:11] It's About Engaging[10:18] Engagement Content[11:54] Written Content[13:04] How I Began My Blog[16:47] Figuring Out Your Best Brand[17:30] Moving To NealSchaffer.com[19:22] What I Do With My Old Blog Posts[20:17] Ways Of Devaluing Your Site[21:56] Ideal Content Types[23:49] News Value On Twitter And LinkedIn[24:11] SEO Audit ToolsNotable QuotesContent is the currency of digital media. Without content, you really have no presence on the Internet.And the idea about content marketing is you're trying to bridge that gap between the content that you want to publish to promote your own products and services, and the content that your prospective clients want access to.So those engagement type of content are really specific to social media. A lot of it is visual and they really help both humanize your Brand and help you deepen relationships with those that might have a similar interest. And that's always going to come to your favor.And the whole reason why and really, at the end of the day, especially when you think about the way that algorithms work, and the way that people associate or have greater affinity with other people than with brands, that my best brand is my name, Neal schaffer.com.Whatever industry, you're in technology changes over time.If engagement content is fleeting, as it should be because the life of a post in social media is very short. I will say though, with hashtags on Instagram, and Pinterest, these are areas where the content lives a little bit longer.  But no matter how much you try to make it evergreen, like those LinkedIn posts, like the cloud posts, or the Foursquare posts, it changes. So something can never be evergreen.But guess what, you're never going to be able to compete with the big boys. Because they just have they already have greater domain authority and search engines, they already have a larger following than you do. There really is little value in trying to publish news that everybody is going to read somewhere else anyways.  And that's why even a blog post, no matter what type of blog post, no matter what type of company, it has an expiration date, nothing in this world, unfortunately, it's going to last forever.Learn More:Buy Digital Threads: https://nealschaffer.com/digitalthreadsamazonBuy Maximizing LinkedIn for Business Growth: https://nealschaffer.com/maximizinglinkedinamazonJoin My Digital First Mastermind: https://nealschaffer.com/membership/ Learn about My Fractional CMO Consulting Services: https://nealschaffer.com/cmoDownload My Free Ebooks Here: https://nealschaffer.com/books/Subscribe to my YouTube Channel: https://youtube.com/nealschafferAll My Podcast Show Notes: https://podcast.nealschaffer.com