In the Court of the

Content King
Why is great content key to online marketing?

Introduction

Hi! My name is Mike Darnell. I was born in 1974

My 1st job was modeling underwear & Roman toys

My partner is Virode Imtarnasan Thai, 38 years old, married, studied law Career: EA, Sega, IRM Web: Cnngo, Vertu,
Playboy

Is your website targeting and engaging prospects?

Where we do business

The Fun Bit

Foreword

According to the

MARKETING
is

the activity, institutions, and processes for creating,

COMMUNICATING,
delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers...

Marketers have always known the key to success is providing succinct and useful information regarding their products

both in person and otherwise.

Hold that thought

in 1996 Bill Gates wrote a visionary article titled

Content is King:

Content is where I expect the real money will be made on the Internet, just as it was in broadcasting

The TV revolution spawned a number of industries, including the manufacturing of TVs, but THE LONGTERM WINNERS WERE THOSE WHO USED IT TO DELIVER INFORMATION & ENTERTAINMENT
[Bill penned the article in March. In August Microsoft and NBC launched MSNBC]

the broad opportunities for most companies involve supplying INFORMATION or entertainment. NO COMPANY IS TOO SMALL TO PARTICIPATE

One of the exciting things about the Internet is that anyone can publish whatever content they can create. THE INTERNET ALLOWS INFORMATION TO BE DISTRIBUTED WORLDWIDE AT ZERO MARGINAL COST

The essay is a masterpiece because it predicts not only the webs ascent as an easily accessible means of publication, but also how this will impact human society as a whole

Strangely Microsoft has never been able to capitalize on Bills insights regarding the web

Some perspective

In 1996 Microsoft and Netscape were fighting to control HOW we accessed the web

Content is King
predicted that wouldnt matter half as much as

WHAT WE DID ONCE WE GOT THERE

but as the web grew in size the problem became FINDING WHERE WERE GOING

That was about to change because these guys shared a room in Stanford

Sergey Brin
PHD project:
Data Mining Development

Larry Page
PHD project:
Inferring the importance of a research paper from its citations in other papers

Theyre better known as...

Why is Larrys Ph.D project the key to Google search, and how does this matter to YOU?

Inferring the importance of a research paper from its citations in other papers

What does that mean?

paper

paper

paper

A bunch of research papers

paper
paper

paper

paper

Paper

paper

paper

all citing the same source

paper

paper

paper

IMPORTANT paper serve as an indication the source is Important

paper

paper

paper

Lets swap one word

Site 1

Site 2

Your site

Site 3

Site 4 Etc.

Larrys big idea, and the foundation for Googles search algorithms, is simply the concept that:

A web pages importance can be inferred from the number of pages linking to it

What does this mean to you?

Simply put: The more OTHER SITES link back to yours, the better your Google search ranking

Are all links equal?

Sector Trade magazine

Your site

Opinion Leaders blog

Wikipedia definition related to your business

Good inbound links are from pages that relate to your offerings and industry

The importance of the linking webpage determines the quality of the link

This is known as

PAGERANK
after the guy who invented it Larry Page

The cute version

How does Google know?

Google calculates Pagerank relationships by MAINTAINING A COPY OF ALL INDEXED PAGES

This is INCREDIBLY resource intensive

Googles hardware infrastructure is a cornerstone of its success and a closely guarded secret
[in 2010 Googles data centers were using the equivalent of the output of your average nuclear power plant]

Now that we understand the importance of links to search ranking the next question is

Why would anyone want to link to you?

Take a minute and list the links youve created and shared recently

Now list what motivated you to create each link

The CONTENT

was compelling enough to create a response

We link to content that: A. Moves us B. Engages us C. Is USEFUL

REMEMBER THIS?
Marketers have always known the key to success is providing succinct and useful information regarding their products

Theres Nothing New Under the Sun

Conclusion

1. CONTENT HAS ALWAYS BEEN KING: Marketing has always been about communicating useful and engaging information related to products and offerings

2. THE WEB LEVELS THE FIELD

The low cost of publishing and syndicating Online Content serves as an equalizer giving SMEs an opportunity to compete with MNCs on even ground

3. A LINK ECONOMY The ultimate measure for success of any type of online content is the number of inbound links and user engagement it generates Good content is rewarded with better search rankings, which in turn, further boosts its popularity, etc

Workshop time!

1. Pair up and introduce your businesses 2. Come up with 5 ideas for content relating to your partners business that you would be likely to link to
3. List the topic, media, attraction and estimated cost (time, effort, $$$,) 4. Determine criteria for measuring success 5. Present your work to the group This is a brainstorming exercise: Don't shoot down ideas, don't criticize, keep it open

Don't say "you can" Say "I would link to..."

Content by Topic
Products/Services Company information News Events TIPS/HOW-TOS* FAQS Lists CASE STUDIES TESTIMONIALS/CLIENTS Articles etc

Content by Medium
Texts (HTML/PDF) Images Presentations Audio Podcasts VIDEO Forms/Quizzes Etc.

* Extra Credit: Why are some of the above in ALLCAPS?

Afterword

The inherent challenge in generating marketing content online is finding a sweet spot between content that is "link bait", and content that has commercial marketing value for your company SUCCESSFUL online campaigns are campaigns that resolve this in an optimal fashion

Questions?

Easter Egg

About this Image

in 1969 Barry Godber, a computer programmer in his 20s, provided the cover art for one of rocks most revolutionary albums:

In the Court of the Crimson King

The album is considered a revolutionary masterpiece because it substituted rocks blues foundations with jazz and classic elements

The outer cover is probably more famous than the inner

Sadly Barry didnt live to see his artistic endeavor become a cultural icon.

He died of a heart attack shortly after the albums release at the age of 24

Thanks!
Im at mi@vimi.co Mike