(MANCHESTER, NH | BOSTON, MA) – Millennium Integrated Marketing (Millennium) is pleased to announce that it will be presenting at the University of New Hampshire (UNH) Digital Marketing Conference on Friday, May 12 , 2017 from 11:15am to 12:00pm at The Sheraton Harborside Hotel in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Millennium president and strategist, Linda Fanaras, will lead a conference session on Inbound Marketing.
About the UNH Digital Marketing Conference
The UNH Digital Marketing Conference is a new addition this year to the university’s Professional Development & Training Program, an annual program which provides individuals, businesses, schools, and organizations with opportunities to gain or further their knowledge on a variety of fields/subjects. Millennium will be joining other industry leading companies such as Ben & Jerry’s, HubSpot, and Timberland to provide attendees with the latest tricks, tools, and trends in digital marketing – from social media, inbound marketing, display advertising, and more.
Millennium’s presentation, “5 Ways to Really Succeed with Inbound Marketing,” will provide participants with an overview of inbound marketing as well as key strategies for lead nurturing, content creation, customer retention, and etc.
“We are very excited to be attending as well as speaking at UNH’s Digital Marketing Conference,” states Linda A. Fanaras, President of Millennium Integrated Marketing and conference presenter. “It is always a pleasure to share our expertise with other businesses and professionals in order to help them optimize their marketing campaigns and realize quantifiable results.”
About Millennium Integrated Marketing
Millennium is an award-winning boutique digital marketing agency helping clients build powerful web, brand and public relations strategies that capture market share and accelerate growth. Nationally recognized as a women-owned business (WBE and WOSB certified) and certified Google AdWords, Bing, SharpSpring, and HubSpot Agency Partner, the firm works with consumer, technology, healthcare, higher education and non-profits. With offices in Manchester, NH and Boston, visit the firm on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. For more information, call Linda Fanaras at 877-873-7445 or visit www.mill-im.com.
The PR pitch or article pitch, while sometimes overlooked for more “sexy” marketing tactics, is a powerful mode of communicating brand value and establishing credibility in the marketplace. As shifts from traditional to digital marketing occur, the role of media outreach has become more critical than ever. In fact, surveys have shown that 80% of B2B decision makers prefer to get information on a business through an article (Content Marketing Institute).
Brands today are built by the consumer experience. The way in which those experiences are communicated and shared ultimately tells the value of any brand. To have value, brands must command attention, have authority and inspire a conversation.
Media outlets and editors are barraged on a daily basis by writers, freelance journalists, and PR reps seeking to have their stories told and their articles published. So, how do you write an effective article pitch that won’t be ignored, but compel a response? Start by following these four simple tips and tricks, and before you know it, you’ll be well on your way to becoming an article pitching pro.
Be Strategic
As with any marketing approach, it’s always best to be strategic and have plan for executing your PR pitch. The foundation of any good pitch is a strong story. Assess your company’s strengths, and select a topic that aligns with your capabilities and business objectives. The aim of article pitching is to position your business as an authority/thought-leader in the field and increase brand visibility. To achieve this, develop content that speaks to your areas of expertise, and offer real value to the media outlet and its readers.
Successful pitches are a result of careful planning. Whether it’s your first pitch or your one-thousandth, it is never a good practice to send a pitch to just anyone. Depending on the nature of your story, your target audience and your objectives, certain media outlets may be appropriate for your pitch while others may not. It is important to remember that not all publications are necessarily right for your story. A recent survey of industry professionals, including publishers, editors and journalists, showed that nearly 70% of them will reject or ignore a pitch if it appears irrelevant to their publication. So, make the effort to tailor your media list to each specific pitch. A pitch that aligns with the publication’s audience, coverage area, and subject matter is much more likely to result in a media pickup.
Make it Personal
If you want someone to take the time to read your pitch, take the time to develop and write it. Once you’ve established a content strategy and a list of media outlets, tailor your pitch to each reporter/editor and publication. Submission guidelines are provided for a reason, so use them to your advantage. They will often list the person you should get in contact with as well as provide some general tips on what they’re looking for and how-to pitch to them. Using a generic pitch may save you time upfront, but in the end, you’re not doing yourself any favors.
When you only have seconds to earn an editor’s attention, showing that you cared enough to learn about, and understand, their publication will help your pitch command attention. Consider leveraging a publication’s editorial calendar to enhance the strength of your pitch and media outreach efforts. This allows you connect your expertise to the focus of a future issue – demonstrating that your story is relevant to the specific publication.
Get to the Point
It is important to be respectful of people’s time. Recognize that they are also very busy and get right to the point. A MuckRack survey found that 58% of journalists consider two to three paragraphs as an ideal length for pitches. Make your case quickly, but provide enough details so they don’t need to look for further information to determine if the story is worth their time.
Read, Reread & Proof
This one may seem obvious, but in the rush to meet deadlines or get things done, the edit/review process can often be forgotten. You are trying to present yourself as an industry expert, so making a careless mistake like skipping spellcheck is one surefire way to get your pitch moved to the trash. Take the time to check, and double-check your work to ensure everything is spelled correctly, especially the name of the person you are contacting and the information you have provided is accurate.
Article placements are a powerful way to generate exposure for your business and establish yourself as a thought leader and credible authority in the marketplace.
About Millennium Agency
Millennium Agency is a nationally recognized, top woman led B2B branding, positioning, and digital marketing firm who knows how to create value that emotionally influences your customer’s buying decision, giving you the competitive advantage. As your trusted partner in B2B software technology and manufacturing, we provide the branding and positioning framework that make an impact – so you can focus on what you do best – run your business successfully. With offices in Boston and New Hampshire, and a worldwide presence, the professionals at Millennium Agency would like to learn more about your business. Visit www.mill.agency or book time here.
(MANCHESTER, NH | BOSTON, MA) – Millennium Integrated Marketing (Millennium) is proud to share that it has been selected as one of Manchester, New Hampshire’s Top 3 Advertising Agencies by Three Best Rated®, an independent, third-party business review site.
About Three Best Rated®
Launched in 2014, ThreeBestRated.com reviews local businesses across the United States, and picks three businesses they deem the best in a specific business category. Millennium was named a top 3 advertising agency in Manchester, NH in the specific category of Professional Services – Advertising Agencies. Based on Three Best Rated’s evaluation of the firm’s reviews, company history, complaints, customer satisfaction, trust, and cost, in comparison to other Manchester based advertising agencies, Millennium was selected as one of the top 3 advertising agencies in the area for its overall quality and excellent service. The list also included advertising firms Clearly Creative and EVR Advertising.
“Our primary focus at Millennium has always been to accelerate growth for our clients and their businesses,” states Linda Fanaras, President and Strategist of Millennium Integrated Marketing. “It’s an honor to know that our hard work and dedication has paid off.”
Reach out to us today to discuss your advertising goals!
About Millennium Integrated Marketing
Millennium Integrated Marketing is a data-driven, digital, content/PR, and branding agency that focuses on optimizing the customer experience. Millennium is a nationally recognized women-owned business (WBE and WOSB certified) and certified Google AdWords and Bing Partner with offices in Manchester, New Hampshire and Boston. The firm works with companies across industries, including higher education, technology, healthcare, non-profit, and professional services and can be found on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. For more information, call Linda Fanaras at 877-873-7445 or visit www.mill-im.com.
In marketing, it’s always best not to get too comfortable with doing something one way, because before you know it, everything will change. Advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have irreversibly rewritten the rules of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Forget word count totals, exact-match keywords, and getting away with any black hat SEO techniques; today, your content must serve the user’s intent to stand a chance at ranking.
Google and Bing have invested huge amounts of money in AI and other machine learning technologies to make their search engines stronger, smarter, and more capable of delivering relevant, more useful results. With the help of AI, search engines are able to recognize and form connections between words to rank webpages by credibility and the usefulness of their content.
While the algorithms themselves that drive our search engines may be complex, below are 3 simple SEO do’s and don’ts you can follow to help ensure you’re found.
DO provide value-focused, user-driven content
Every business – big or small, start-up or household name – should develop and utilize a content strategy on their website. Search engines exist to provide people solutions or at the very least answers to their queries. The integration of AI in search algorithms means that pages aren’t only being judged for the quantity of their matching keywords, but also the quality of their information. Various factors, like time-spent on page, interactions/shares, and the number of natural links to your page, help search engines discern the value of your content. It makes sense that pages with high-value, informative content that serve the user’s intent would have longer visits, more shares, and be referenced on other sites.
Content that is developed for the sole purpose of search rank will actually be counterproductive to your efforts. Instead, provide value-focused, user-driven content that will answer your customers’ questions and be shared by others. Ultimately, Google rewards websites that others deem worthy of reading.
DON’T use automated, duplicate, or meaningless content
In turn, irrelevant or useless content can irreparably damage your search standings. Search engines are seeking pages that offer clear and relevant solutions that benefit the end-user. Pages that don’t accurately represent your business, your products and/or services, or fail to meet users’ objectives are going to have high bounce rates, less interactions, and few shares – demoting its value to search engines. Take for instance, content automation, can’t we all tell when a post or comment has been generated by a computer bot for the sole purpose of just publishing something? Doesn’t it feel ingenuous and often not worth your time reading?
Great SEO starts with winning content.
DO have an intuitive, mobile-friendly website design
Rankings aren’t only about content, but also the user experience. The presentation of your content can play nearly as an important role in your rankings as the content itself. In fact, a recent study by Adobe found that 38% of consumers state that content being unattractive in its layout or imagery is a key reason they stop engaging with a site.
In a sea of content, the user experience has emerged as a crucial element in earning consumer attention. This includes making sure your website has been optimized for viewing across all devices, has an intuitive content structure, and is easy to navigate.
DON’T be deceptive or try to play tricks for higher rankings
Behaviors viewed as deceptive or intended to manipulate search results are increasingly being penalized by search engines, like Google. Google’s driving motivation is to deliver the most relevant, practical results to a user in the smallest number of clicks possible. SEO strategies, such as keyword stuffing, content automation, cloaking, and doorway pages are seen as ways of misleading the consumer and can result in severe penalties or even a site being banned from Google.
DO review your website for hacking, broken links and/or malicious content
The authority of your website is often relative to the quality of your network, or rather the credibility of your inbound and outbound links. Being strategic about your linking structure on your website includes remembering to monitor them. Linking out to credible sources, signals to Google that you are providing quality content to your users – giving you a boost in rankings. In addition, internal links to similar and/or relevant content on your website helps Google learn more about you, so it knows when a query may match an answer on one of your pages. If these links get broken or link to a penalized or malicious site, your search rank can suffer.
DON’T forget to optimize your page load speed
When content is so readily available, it is important to deliver your content to searchers as quickly as possible or risk losing their attention before you’ve even had a chance to say a word. Consumers want answers now, so make sure your site loads quickly. In fact, the same Adobe study found that content that takes too long to load results in 39% of consumers stopping further engagement with your site.
For now, SEO and content marketing are inexplicably intertwined and it would be nearly impossible to try to do one without the other. However; at the end of the day, it all seems to boil down to one thing – creating value for your customers. I hope you find these SEO do’s and don’ts helpful.
This article was originally published on Prime Women.
Want to learn more about SEO do’s and don’ts? Need to enhance your content to be search engine optimized?
Contact Millennium President and Strategist Linda Fanaras at 877-873-7445 ext. 201 or connect via email at [email protected].
About Millennium Agency
Millennium Agency is a nationally recognized, top woman led B2B branding, positioning, and digital marketing firm who knows how to create value that emotionally influences your customer’s buying decision, giving you the competitive advantage. As your trusted partner in B2B software technology and manufacturing, we provide the branding and positioning framework that make an impact – so you can focus on what you do best – run your business successfully. With offices in Boston and New Hampshire, and a worldwide presence, the professionals at Millennium Agency would like to learn more about your business. Visit www.mill.agency or book time here.
Content should be viewed as a tool that provides value for your audience. It needs to be clean and provide value. Don’t overthink it. Learn how simplifying your content and establish a unifying voice that connects it all together will increase the time prospects spend on your website. Enjoy the first video of our 10 Talks series!
Is it time for a content refresh? Contact Millennium President and Strategist Linda Fanaras at 877-873-7445 ext. 201 or connect via email at [email protected].