Every sixty seconds 38,194 Facebook statuses are updated, 347,222 Tweets are sent, and 300 brand new websites are launched. According to Google CEO Eric Schmidt, in two days’ time, we now create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization up until 2003. So, as a business person, what should you do? Write. It’s sink or swim time and the only way to stay on top is to ride write that wave.
Content Marketing is the New SEO
Once it was enough to add optimized titles and links, sprinkle content with the right balance of keywords and phrases, throw in a little business jargon, and maybe trade inbound links with other websites. Now making sure that you’re found online means writing content that is useful and informative to your audience, and writing often. Google rewards fresh content that is read and shared.
Fortunately, it’s not as difficult to generate good content as it used to be (we can even help). Sure, you still have to know your topic, but there are plenty of tools available today to help you discover just what’s on your customer’s mind, and others that will help you whip it into grammatically correct shape.
Here’s a list of some of our favorite tools:
Post Topics
Twitter »
Drop a hashtag in front of your idea, product, or service, (e.g. #webdesign), and see what is being discussed.
Meetup »
Like Twitter, a quick search of phrases related to your business will quickly tell you what people are scheduling meetups to talk about.
Quora »
Search your services and find out what people are asking. It’s a great way to find where customers need help.
Buzzsumo »
This is a great tool for discovering what other organizations are writing about, right now. Even better, Buzzsumo tells you the number of times someone’s post has been shared, and where.
Headline Generators
Hubspot’s Topic Generator »
Simply enter three words relevant to your post and Hubspot provides you with headline options designed to get clicks.
Portent’s Content Idea Generator »
This one is just plain fun. Enter your topic ideas and Portent will spit out quirky headlines with a personality!
Spelling and Grammar
Grammarly »
Grammarly provides a free browser extension that quickly identifies spelling errors and suspect grammar along with an explanation and possible solutions.
After the Deadline »
From Automattic, the makers of WordPress, After the Deadline is an open source grammar, style, and spell checker available for download or as a WordPress plugin.
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