Now long form content is the latest thing in marketing

Suddenly a number of marketing sites are talking about long-form content. So what is this and why is it a good thing?

As with many emerging ideas, there is yet to be any formally agreed definition, but basically it is longer than normal content that engages the site visitor.

Take a step back. At one time it was widely claimed that if you didn't engage the visitor within seconds, then they would lose interest and head off to the next web site. Perhaps when generic search was common, there were usually a lot of sites turned up on search to check out. But is this still the case? Taking a straw poll of b-2-b people, by now they know the web sites of the companies they deal with and use the site rather like a product catalogue. Search Engine Optimisation, where one technique used is to load the copy with keywords tended to call for longer text into which all the potential search words could be included. One report suggests that although SEO boosted site traffic, engagement was not so good. Visitors didn't stay too long.

So how long is a piece of string? Or in this case how many words qualifies as long content? For comparison how about press releases? Again, it is probably not defined and varies according to the publication, but 100 words is not that unusual and they will probably edited get down. A press release in a paid for journal will include a short headline, image, maybe a logo too and contact details. Yes it is a short ad. Press releases are more usually in the 100 to 250 word range before the editor begins to think of the piece as an article. Articles are not submitted without being requested by the editorial side and can range from 400 words to 2,000 and may also include an image or two. The thing is, even at the upper end of this word scale many subjects can still not be covered in depth and so we produce White Papers and Guides to provide more detailed content.

Now here is an interesting thing. When content (and of course this has to be relevant and of value to the reader) is in the 1,000 to 1,600 range and taking 7 or 8 minute to read, then time spent on site increases considerably too. Long content might be used on a landing page from a campaign  to provide valuable content the visitor wants to know. It may more commonly now be placed on a blog and also on social networks - Facetime and LinkedIn have both having developed platforms for long content. And of course, producing long form content marks you out as knowledgeable which helps enhance the brands value.

Is email the right vehicle for building sales relationships?

Is email correspondence an adequate alternative to telephone contact  or  a sales visits?

There are some interesting pointers to economic and sales activity which some suggest give indicators of how good, or bad things are. Let me give some examples. The number of cranes on the  skyline might serve as a simple indicator of construction activity which in turn is a measure that the economy is on the up. Walk into a businesses premises and there are plenty of indicators of how successful is the business. In a typical manufacturing business, say, a walk through the warehouse can often give the game away by looking at the carton labels (and dust) to get the idea of how quickly, or not, the stock is moving. Have a look at the company's leading products - are there any on the shelves, are there too many? What about the sales office, are the phones busy? Or is everyone typing emails?

A few years, well decades ago, the electrical manufacturing business I worked for had a large team of salesmen 'on the road' and a culture of sales that pervaded all areas of the business including R&D and production. Both the research labs and production lines were used as sales assets with customers invited to see have clever we were. But the front line sales people were the people who really closed business and importantly got inside the customer company and opened up other sales opportunities. In some internal sales offices the telesales teams were recruited for their persuasive sales skills where the value did not justify a face to face sales call.

So the question is can selling by exchange of emails be as effective with no real sales relationship to build trust and confidence? There is restricted scope for really understanding what the customer actually needs and introducing alternate or additional products. In fact it doesn't really do much more than a basic web site and leaving it entirely to the customer to conclude the sales journey themselves.

Update on data

Databases can be powerful marketing tools, but are yours up to date?

Most companies I  have dealt with over the years have acquired a form of mission creep when it comes to databases in so far as they don't have one database, they have several. In fact if you count in those held by individuals there could be dozens. And it all happens innocently enough. Lets look at some of the reasons why.

There is the salesman's personal customer list that in pre-computer days would be held on a card index and it has to be said jealously guarded, considered a private set of records not to be shared with anyone. At the other end of the sales process were the records held by the Accounts team of Invoicing contacts. Although working for the same organisation the accounts people generally had little say in the specification  and choice of goods to buy - that was more a relationship between the sales engineer and the specifying engineer for example. However into this equation has come the buyer and this role can be a problem for companies providing technical support to the end user at product prototype stage to fine tune their product, all secure in the hope that low orders for prototypes would transfer into high volume orders year on year as production ramped up. This cosy situation was under pressure once the professional buyer started looking to suppliers in China. So customer contacts could be different according to where in the sales process they were and databases proliferated.

Then there are the social events databases of people considered important enough to invite to events whether it is the launch of a new product or a hospitality suite at a sporting event. And of course there is the Christmas card list, the newsletter list, the technical bulletin list ... need I  go on?

Another frequently encountered problem was dealing with the database technology. There were one or two brand names in the world of sales databases that cropped up again and again. The usual problem was that someone, often at a senior level in the company had been impressed by the sales presentation and signed up for the system. The job of looking after it was frequently given to a junior member of the team and not only did they struggle to use it, but nobody else wanted to take on some of the work and the database soon became a mess. Nobody knew what data was good and what was outdated or just plain wrong.

The thing is sending marketing communications to the wrong people - left, deceased, moved away, new job etc - is not only a waste of money, but can be counter productive if people think you don't know what you are doing.