The fundamentals of result-oriented content strategy
Andy Lambert, the Co-founder and Growth director at ContentCal always wanted to be in marketing but landed in a sales role. 2008 was when B2B businesses considered marketing as a support function and relied heavily on sales. Over time, he slowly moved away from sales and had the opportunity to explore marketing.
He brings some crisp takeaways. Stay tuned for:
- Using webinar for lead generation
- Top 2 channels that marketers should invest in the long-term
- Tools that matter at the top of the funnel
Principles of Marketing
Andy: I rely on some very fundamental principles for my marketing journey.
- Being human and accessible
- Adding value - invested a lot in educational content.
Sources of information for a marketer
Andy: For social media news, my favorite is the Social media today and for marketing practices, I use The Marketing meetup which is marketing-led webinars, and for case studies, I go over to marketingexamples.com
Most successful and failed marketing campaign
Andy: The most successful has been the webinar at ContentCal. We have done increasingly well, rising to 2500 leads every month. Working with guests is such a critical angle. The more popular the guest, the bigger is the reach.
The failed strategy which we are still trying to learn is ‘Refer a friend program’. We have not been able to engineer it well, and so now it is back to the drawing board.
How do you find awesome guests for your webinar?
Andy: Marketing meetup or marketing examples are two sources. When I see something useful I invite those speakers to our webinar. When we bring good content then it starts getting spoken about and starts getting referred.
Tools for managing the webinar
Andy: We use Demio as the webinar management tool which is integrated with Hubspot used as our CRM. When someone watches Demio, we add them to Hubspot. We nurture them and take them through the journey for conversion. This has helped us measure and now we know that we spend 50 pounds for conversions from webinar signups. This helps us calculate our conversion rate.
Top 2 channels to increase marketing presence
Andy: A content strategy that transcends these two channels is what you should invest over the long turn
- SEO or search engine optimization
- Social media
Marketing tools recommended
Andy: Amplitude and Segment are the two tools that help us analyze our user behavior that helps with conversion optimization. Chart Mogul provides heatmaps and ready-made charts that takes us away from spreadsheets and tells us more about the traffic and its location and how the churn rate is, and many important metrics that help us make decisions fast.
Using email marketing for lead generation
Andy: Email marketing is not at the top of the funnel. It is great for nurturing. How we have acquired the email address is the most important. Email cadences and their automation is what helps in using email marketing for better conversion and taking your leads through the funnel.
Conversion optimization with website traffic
Andy: Conversion optimization is not important in the early days. With CRO, marketers worry too much about the micro metrics, but it is dependent on the stage of the business where we are. You need to look at the volume and scale that lets you do demand generation as the primary concern.
Building a marketing career
Advice for early stage marketers
Andy: We learn something all the time and you need to be a continuous student. Marketing is a skill that you need to practice with something as simple as a blog.
Your Mentors?
Andy: Mr.Smith who is our chairman and I call him ‘workdad’ who is there to listen and help me with advice to get over the hurdles. It is always important to have a mentor outside your family. Also, there are mentorship platforms where there are many people who are willing to offer advice.
Any experience or takeaway that you want to give our audience.
Andy: Always be curious. If you don’t love it and feel proud of it, then don’t put it out there. There is too much content out there. Try and add value.
