ZyraTalk

Look, we know you're here for the digital marketing tips. And we know you don't want to wade through paragraphs of preamble to get to them. We respect that, so we won't waste your time. We've rounded up some of our favorite tips on marketing from industry experts, including content strategists, marketing managers, best-selling authors, and more. Let's dive in.

Kris Hughes, Content Strategy Consultant

1. Don't (always) chase keywords with a high global search volume even if they have low competition.

One of the best ways to solve for your readers and customers, rather than your business or search engines, is to target long-tail keywords relevant to your topic.

This will “reveal more opportunities to chase, and you'll organically rank in time for higher GSV keywords in your niche," says Hughes.

2. Use Google Predictive Search to find new content ideas.

Hughes suggests typing your target keywords into Google. The Predictive Search feature will return a variety of topics that you can add to your running list of topic ideas.

Another way to leverage Google for content ideas is by “going down the rabbit hole” in Google's answer boxes, located around the mid-point of the search results page.

“If people are asking questions about your topic they'll show up here,” says Hughes. He adds, “If people are asking questions, it's a great signal you should create content to answer them.”

Ryan Redding, Owner of DP Marketing.Services

3. Take care of people.

Redding's “unusual” tip for digital marketers is also a simple one: take care of people.

“There are thousands of marketers in the market, each claiming to have a better widget or technique than the next person," says Redding. “Instead of talking SEO or SEM, Ahrefs or SEMRush…find a way to take care of people first.”

Jay Desai, Head of Growth at Trend

4. Not everything you do needs a direct attributable ROI.

Desai acknowledges that some of the best digital marketing channels are the hardest to track. Think YouTube, LinkedIn, podcasts, etc.

The key to amplifying your presence on these platforms is to keep experimenting. Not only will your copywriting skills improve, but you'll find a sweet spot that helps you create branded content faster.

5. Don't feel like you have to track everything.

Trying to track every metric on every channel consumes precious time you should be spending doing the work. Instead, Desai suggests pinpointing 2 or 3 key metrics that “tell the story of success for your business.” Then, get to work!

Jim Knapp, Founder of JK Strategies LLC

6. Use the “three R” planning framework.

The “three R's", according to Knapp, stand for recall, response, and retention.

Start with retention: what are you doing (and what should you be doing) to keep the customers you have?

Then move to response: what are you doing to generate sales from new customers?

Finally, consider recall: what are you doing to build top-of-mind awareness? This, according to Knapp, is “marketing's greatest force multiplier”.

Once Knapp has mapped out this framework, he applies it to the phase his clients are in — survival, profitable survival, share growth, etc. — to “determine their level of ambition".

Brandon Doyle, Marketing Manager at Blue Corona

7. Focus on the metrics that really matter.

“Oftentimes business owners get caught up in rankings, top impression share, etc. While important metrics to look at, each digital marketing channel a compnay invests in should have a set of KPIs to monitor, measure, and pivot against if needed.”

When you're first starting out, it's hard to know which metrics are most valuable. Getting to this point will take some trial-and-error.

8. Diversify your digital marketing strategies.

It's safe to say every business wants to rank on the first page for their target keywords. Which means the competition is fierce on search engine results pages.

That's why, according to Doyle, every company should invest in as many channels as possible to maximize their search visibility. Local services ads, pay-per-click, organic, reviews, reputation management — this is just a small sample. Cast a wide net for the best results.

Olivia Duke, PPC Team Lead at Blue Corona

9. Time spent toward analysis is never time wasted but can be inefficient if you're not intentional about it.

It can be easy to fall down the analytics rabbit hole, which is why it's important to choose the right metrics to track.

Create templates and automate everything you can, says Duke. You should spend the majority of your time interpreting the data, not formatting it.

10. When working with small data sets, look for ways to aggregate.

This is a great way to spot actionable trends and cut noise across similar campaigns, markets, and time frames.

Philip Kuehnen, Growth Evangelist at ZyraTalk

11. Kiss your ego goodbye.

“Marketing is about helping people,” says our very own Philip Kuehnen. “Whether that revolves around helping them recognize a problem they didn't know they had, or about giving them useful advice. The best marketing demonstrates that you can help people by actually helping them.”

12. Reduce friction in everything.

Make your content available in text, visual, and audio forms. More importantly, don't gate content. This makes it easier for prospects to engage with your brand.

Bernadette Jiwa, bestselling author and storytelling advisor

13. Create a brand that your customers want to belong to.

“A great brand is not a mark burned into a product—it’s something we want to belong to," writes Jiwa in Marketing: A Love Story: How to Matter to Your Customers.

The Rapha Cycle Club (RCC) is an example — admittedly borrowed from a Fast Company article — of a brand that fosters belonging. With clubhouses around the world and even a code of conduct, RCC isn't just another apparel company. It's a community with shared values and mutual respect.

14. Make people happy.

“The job of every single business on the planet is to do just one thing — to make people happy. When you find ways to do that, you win.” — Meaningful: The Story of Ideas that Fly

The modern digital marketing landscape is inundated with pushy tactics. How many times have you landed on a website, only to fend off a pop-up ad 0.3 seconds later urging you to sign up for a newsletter?

To be more specific, how many of those pop-ups included tacky opt-out messages like, “No thanks, I don't like good content"?

That's the polar opposite of making people happy. Sure, your product solves problems for those prospects. But harassing them or making them feel guilty for not opting in before they've had time to learn about your product and your brand isn't the way to earn and retain new customers.

Jiwa's advice is a back-to-basics breath of fresh air. Make people happy. It really is that simple — and that hard.

Jackie Quiring, Conversion Copywriter and Marketing Strategist

15. Use power words.

“Power words elicit a strong emotional or psychological response in the reader and compel them to act," writes Quiring in a LinkedIn post.

Here are a few examples of power words:

Bargain
Insider
Easy
Elite
Toxic
Obsession

Read the LinkedIn post for more industry secrets. (See what we did there?) And don't forget to follow Jackie for fresh ideas on conversion copywriting.

Marketing tips from the experts: wrapping up

There you have it: 15 marketing tips from industry experts.

Key takeaways:

Sharpen your copywriting skills with “power words”.
Figure out the metrics that matter and don't waste precious time overanalyzing.
Leverage Google's Predictive Search and “People also ask” features to find new content ideas.
Templates, automation, and pre-defined frameworks will work wonders for your marketing efforts.
Build a brand that takes care of people, makes them happy, and invites them to a community where they belong.

Got some marketing tips of your own you'd like to share with us? Start a chat with us and fire away. We're always looking for new ideas to feature and blogs to follow. Or, check out our post on A Brief History of Digital Marketing.

15 Tips About Digital Marketing from Industry Experts