My Blog My Blog

How Hunter Got 100+ Mentions in 3 Months With Cold Outreach

Link Building
December 8, 2021/by
How Hunter Got 100+ Mentions in 3 Months With Cold Outreach Google ranking factors are constantly changing, but links remain one of the most critical factors used by search engines. If you want your website's pages to rank in search and attract tons of organic traffic, you will undoubtedly need links. Good links are like "votes", which help search engines identify the best content to show for specific search queries. There're tons of link building strategies you can try depending on your goals and needs. With some strategies, you can get those important "votes" and increase referral traffic and gain more visibility for your company. At Hunter, we're constantly improving our link profile and getting more visibility for our brand. We've tested tons of link-building strategies, and there's one that showed us the best results — link building via "best" listicles. In less than three months, we got 96 new links from 54 domains, were mentioned in 33 new product listings, and upgraded our positions in 17 listings. How did we do it? Read this guide, and I'll show you how we implemented this strategy step-by-step. First things first: What are "listicles"? A "listicle" is an article made of a list — typically with some kind of extra detail below each item. This is a popular format to review products or services as it's easy to skim to find important information. Titles tell you what to expect (e.g., each title could be the name of the product or service), and each...
Read Full Story

The Ultimate Guide to Successfully Rebranding in 2020

Branding
December 8, 2021/by
The Ultimate Guide to Successfully Rebranding in 2020 When you're first starting a business, branding is likely the last thing on your mind. After all, it's hard to sit down and flip through fonts when you're still trying to figure out who your customers are (and where to find them). Plus, even if you made creating a brand identity a priority, in the beginning, a change in business plans might have made your initial branding strategy obsolete. Whether your branding design efforts started (and ended) with a logo jotted down on a napkin, or you whiteboarded your way through the complete branding process -- from brand values to logo variations -- somewhere along the way things stopped working. However you got here, you're not happy. Fortunately, rebranding is not uncommon -- many major brands, ranging from Dunkin' Donuts to Uber, have successfully rebranded in the past. If you're considering a rebrand, keep reading to learn how to rebrand a company, plus examples of other brands who've successfully rebranded their website, name, logo, or entire company mission, and purpose. Okay, now that we know what rebranding is, let's make sure you have the right reasons to rebrand. The Right (and Wrong) Reasons to Rebrand Rebrands are complicated and carry big risks. Even big brands aren't immune -- just look at Uber. After redesigning its logo, 44% of people were unsure of what Uber's logo represented.  Ultimately, knowing the risks of rebranding can help you determine whether or not you're...
Read Full Story

How to Create Marketing Offers That Don’t Fall Flat

Content Types
December 8, 2021/by
How to Create Marketing Offers That Don't Fall Flat In marketing, offers are the gateways to lead generation. Without them, site visitors have no way of getting converted into leads. They are also a critical tool for nurturing existing leads into a position that makes them more sales-ready. But gosh, isn't the word 'offer' so utterly vague and abstract? What the heck is a marketing offer, and what are the qualities of a good one? Because we see so many marketers get tripped up on this concept, let's discuss exactly what a marketing offer can be, highlight the characteristics of an effective offer, and explain how you can start using them the right way. What an Offer Isn't Sometimes the best way to explain what something is, is to first identify what it isn't. Unfortunately, many of the things marketers sometimes consider to be marketing offers aren't actually offers at all. First, let's clarify. What marketers should classify as an offer is something of value that a website visitor must complete a form to get access to. And yeah, sure you can put just about anything behind a form. But there are certain things that, when put behind a form, just won't contribute much of anything for your lead gen or lead nurturing initiatives. We're not saying you shouldn't bother with these types of content. What we're saying is that you shouldn't put them behind forms or rely on them to effectively generate and nurture leads. Here...
Read Full Story

How Consumers Responded to Black Friday Ads in 2021 [+Trends to Watch]

Advertising
December 6, 2021/by
How Consumers Responded to Black Friday Ads in 2021 After 2020, there were big expectations for what 2021 could bring. Some predicted lower Black Friday sales as supply chains struggle to meet demand. Others said 2021 would bring record numbers. As an advertiser, you might want to learn more about growing online purchasing behaviors – and how you can leverage them in 2022. Below, we'll highlight what we learned from polling 300+ consumers after this Black Friday. Then, we'll present a few consumer behavior predictions you'll need to know about when determining your 2022 Black Friday ad strategy. What We Learned About Black Friday Shoppers in 2021 To help marketers discover more about the consumer behaviors behind Black Friday's 2021 results, I surveyed a pool of more than 300 people using Lucid Software. The goal was to learn what led them to engage with or purchase products in Black Friday ads. Here's what we learned from our results. 1. Social media was the leading driver for ad engagement. With Black Friday deals comes an inundation of Black Friday ads throughout all forms of media. It's no surprise that millions of people shopped on Black Friday – but which ad strategies actually led to purchases? When I asked participants, "Did you engage with any online ads or promotions for Black Friday?" 56% said they engaged with one or more ads in some way, while only 26% said they ignored them. We also found that social media was the...
Read Full Story

What Is Servant Leadership?

Leadership
December 3, 2021/by
What Is Servant Leadership? Leadership looks different for everyone. Some choose to use a democratic style, where they make final decisions after getting input from team members. Some are individualists, focused on personal development and improvement, while others act as a coach that works to help employees develop their skills and build strong teams. Although different in practice, most leadership styles have in common that the leader is a force of authority at their business — entirely different from servant leadership, where authority is purposely left by the wayside. In this post, learn about servant leadership, its main characteristics, and how it can benefit your organization. What is servant leadership? Servant leadership is the idea that a leader’s primary goal is to serve their employees and give them the support they need to develop their skills and succeed at their jobs. This differs from traditional leadership in that a leader doesn’t enforce their authority or treat others as subordinates. Robert K. Greenleaf first coined the term servant leader in his 1970 essay The Servant as Leader. In the essay, he says that the servant leader “Focuses primarily on the growth and well-being of people and the communities to which they belong” and that they “Put the needs of others first and help people develop and perform as highly as possible.” Essentially, the leader (a boss, CEO, or any type of executive at a business) exists to serve the people that work for the company. In turn, employees supported by a leader with...
Read Full Story

What Is Content Seeding & How Does It Work? [Examples]

Content Planning
December 2, 2021/by
What Is Content Seeding & How Does It Work? Every summer, I start a vegetable garden. I purchase seeds, plant them in various places in my backyard, tend to them, and with the help of the right weather conditions, help them grow. Why am I talking about gardening on a marketing blog? Content seeding. But instead of planting zucchini seeds, marketers plant content to grow brand awareness and leads. Let's get into the specifics of what content seeding is and how it works. Content seeding allows brands to highlight their content in places target audiences will see and engage with it. Influencers are a prime choice for content seeding because they usually have large audiences. These audiences have been proven to trust influencers more than their friends. For instance, lifestyle subscription box FabFitFun has a target audience of women "ages 18-34, who love a good deal want to hear about the latest and greatest trends in beauty, fitness, nutrition, and style." When they work with influencers on content seeding, they choose platforms their target audience is interested in, like my favorite podcast, True Crime Obsessed (TCO). When I heard ads for FabFitFun on TCO, I was immediately interested in the brand and what it offers, so I followed the link in the podcast subscription. The added bonus of hearing high praises from hosts I've come to connect with and trust solidified my interest and ultimately drove me to subscribe. That's content seeding in motion. When...
Read Full Story

5 Steps to Create an Outstanding Marketing Plan [Free Templates]

Marketing Strategy, Popular
December 2, 2021/by
5 Steps to Create an Outstanding Marketing Plan Do you take a good, hard look at your team's marketing strategy every year? You should. An annual marketing plan helps you set your marketing on the right course to make your company's business goals a reality. Think of it as a high-level plan that guides the direction of your team's campaigns, goals, and growth. Without one, things can get messy -- and it's nearly impossible to put a number on the budget you'll need to secure for the projects, hiring, and outsourcing you'll encounter over the course of a year if you don't have a plan. Keep in mind there are variations to the marketing plan you need, depending on your industry and the goals of your marketing team. To make your plan's creation easier, we've put together a list of what to include in your plan and a few different planning templates where you can easily fill in the blanks. To start, let's dive into how to create a marketing plan and then take a look at what a high-level marketing plan has inside. In this article, we're going to discuss: What a High-Level Marketing Plan Includes How to Create a Marketing Plan Marketing Plan Templates You Can Use Simplified Marketing Plan Template Plus — Social Media Plan Templates Marketing Plan Outline Marketing plans can get quite granular to reflect the industry you're in, whether you're selling to consumers (B2C)...
Read Full Story

What Will Influencer Marketing Look Like in 2020?

Influencer Marketing
December 1, 2021/by
What Will Influencer Marketing Look Like in 2020? Have you ever purchased something because a well-known person you admire used the product or service? I’m guilty of this — in fact, I recently bought myself a new waterski because a professional water skier and micro-influencer, Whitney McClintock, shared a video on Instagram of herself using the ski. I was in the market for a new ski and followed Whitney for quite some time. I figured since she used this particular ski, I should too — if Whitney promotes it, why wouldn’t I love it? You might be thinking, "Slightly questionable logic, Kristen." Maybe. But, did Whitney’s post get me to buy the ski? Oh, yeah. (And I do love my new ski for those of you wondering.) This is just one example of a tactic used by businesses across virtually every industry called influencer marketing. Examples of these channels include social media, blogs, columns, digital and print ads, and television. Influencer marketing is increasingly more popular among businesses these days because traditional advertising has become less effective in attracting leads and customers. Influencer marketing works because it uses tactics like word-of-mouth marketing and social proof, which are now critical aspects of any successful marketing strategy. Customers trust their peers, friends, and people they admire more than the companies selling the products and services they buy and use. Before we dive into the different types of influencers, let’s review the difference between a brand influencer and a...
Read Full Story