In psych research, low self esteem was originally considered a bad thing. There were all sorts of concerted efforts in American society to raise the self-esteem of children. I Googled around for a fun …
Some content standards to consider
Clarity is key. Confusion is the enemy. In a world that's slowly moving towards web accessibility (defined in Wikipedia as "the accessibility of a computer system to all people, regardless of …
The case for ethical framing (for profit)
It's inevitable. You must provide a frame in marketing. Take away framing, and maybe also scarcity and the ability to interrupt (ads), and we'd have a lot of trouble getting people to buy …
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Is Jetpack bad?
Jetpack comes stock with a Wordpress org install. It's actually the most used plugin on Wordpress with 100,000 installs on a bad day. Wordpress is the most used CMS on the internet, so it's a big …
Actually, CDNs are probably bad for image SEO
In doing some work for a client, all their Jetpack stuff was configured for images to load via i2.wp.com or some variation (Jetpack seems to be a go-to for offshore Wordpress dev resources of which …
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On confirm-shaming
Seeing my last email in my own inbox, entitled "don't be basic with your content," felt a little... mean? weird? annoying? I don't know. It just didn't feel like the kind of subject lines I want to be …
Steps toward being more strategic with your content
When you go from writing content on instinct to planning content with a strategy, a bunch of questions will pop up to create resistance to the new approach. Inevitably you'll want to know: what …
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How much hygiene do you need?
I've resisted publishing about my struggles with becoming a regular flosser and will continue to resist talking about that type of hygiene for now. As discussed in a recent email, in the …
Solving problems
I think any problem (that can actually be solved) just requires these things: having an understanding of the problemgiving it undivided attentionat the right scope of focus for enough timeat a …
things that matter and things that last
I am "attention deficient." Left to my own devices, I could easily look up from my computer, be surprised it's dark outside and realize I've gotten nothing done that matters. When I think about …
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What determines the rate your content improves?
I'm (still) reading Ultralearning by Scott Young. In it, he uses Benjamin Franklin's approach to improving the quality of his writing (identify a weak area, isolate it, drill it with rapid feedback, …
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“What should I write about?”
But first! I mentioned in a previous email I'd write more about the decision to move to contentaudience.com. If you're at all curious about the process that led up to that (and the daily emails and …
Review of Philip Morgan’s The Expertise Incubator
This is a (long) unsolicited, thinly veiled testimonial for Philip Morgan's The Expertise Incubator, that, because it's so long I am calling a review. If you aren't familiar, this is the landing page …
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“Here lies a guy who…
spent all their time doing things for clients they were pretty okay at. If job funerals were a thing, at this moment that would be on my headstone. "Guy" because I couldn't decide if "freelancer" …
Visualizing a website with a graph database
I spent the better part of the weekend getting to a point where I could load crawl data about pages on my site and links between those pages into a graph database. It started as more of a tut/way …
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A content strategy précis
For high school history class weekly assignments, we'd have to summarize beefy articles into one sentence summaries our teacher called precis (pré·cis). The neat part was the reprieve we'd get from …
Do people even use share buttons anymore?
I was bummed I didn't get an email out today, and then I remembered I had this draft just sitting there. What's interesting here isn't actually the question, but how we can answer questions like it …
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An update on the research project
As mentioned, I'm doing some research on what digital marketing efforts are working for audience-first businesses (built on expert content), what's not, and how is that changing? You can read the …
Super power or curse. You choose.
Habits aren't everything. The ability to cultivate, refine and revise them is, though. The fifth lever is a good content amplification habit. I think about this in my own work and it feels like …
The Five Content Challenges
This is my current analysis of the most significant changes in the landscape affecting audience-first businesses. The list is a work in progress and as I learn more through research and …
The 4th content lever
The fourth lever is extendability. I'm cheating on this one a bit. It's the ability for content to be repurposed or re-used for benefit or it can be how far that content goes on it's own merits …
The third lever
The third lever is rapid feedback. Have you ever been pulled into a Facebook Ad funnel because it did such a nice job of describing a problem you had? I have. Of course there is a ton of …
Watch content organization double organic traffic, twice
Today I was doing some research for the third content lever and got sidetracked by something pretty neat I wanted to share. 5min Screenshare video [Youtube] Still working on the third content …
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The affinity loop
The second content lever is affinity. I'm still working on this one and it could more aptly be called loyalty, but to me that's a bit of a dirty word. I think of all the loyalty programs intended …
De-mazing your content
What's the path of least resistance for getting your existing body of content to work for you? I've been working on this question for a few months now. It's a tough one but I think I have it. It's …
20 insights for your audience-first business (part 2)
This is part 2 of a quick exercise I did. As I mentioned on the first part, I'm publishing it for posterity because I wasn’t particularly happy with the results and hope to come back, do the exercise …
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20 insights for your audience-first business (part 1)
I just finished David Baker's book, The Business of Expertise... I wish I had read it 5 years ago. In it he discusses an exercise to do a gut check on whether or not you're an expert in some thing …
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What makes users deeply loyal?
One of the things I love the most about the idea of working with personal brands is that they're... people. We follow, get inspired by, and learn from people, not companies. People have …
Ethics in info product marketing
This one's a bit long - so if you only have 90 seconds, skip to the heading, "the web makes dehumanizing people easy!" I've been obsessed with internet marketing info products for almost a decade …
Are you a content hoarder?
The more I write about the blog problem, how organizing a blog is hard, the effects of not organizing it, related common issues that can arise, the more I'm reminded of hoarding behavior. When you …
Are you doing content just one way?
Doing content one way for a long time works really well, until it doesn't. It's like investing in lots of different things and then picking the one that did the best and staying bearish on it …
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Comparing opportunities during keyword research
In keyword research with the synonymous intent method, we learned how to better measure the traffic potential for a given content opportunity. We looked at how posts can account for multiple keyword …
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One neat trick for better keyword research
Originally I was going to call this, "better keyword research with the synonymous intent method," but alas, I opted for the mystery headline. The two most common mistakes in keyword research I see …
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More thoughts on health and wellness subject matter
The problem with the new SEO when it comes to anything remotely bordering on medical subject matter is that efficacy is situational. It's a what-treatment-for-what-ailment with a comparison to …
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Your subject matter should determine whether and how you handle SEO
This is a continuation of the Understanding the New SEO series. SEO was always a no-brainer. It's where a majority of new user traffic comes from. But now you must consider what, if any, effort …
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Understanding the new Google results (and new SEO)
If you run an online business, an understanding of organic traffic, how it works and the context it lives is integral to your ability to survive and thrive online. To get SEO tips, the vast …
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How discounts affect your relationships
At some point we'll have to define discounting. Does "early bird" pricing count? Does bundling products together for a lower total price count? If you're coming from a place of gratitude, does that …
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What JC Penny learned the hard way about discounts
I've always thought of discounting as something personal brands shouldn't do. Discounting is for life. Personal brands are for life. Changes to either are irreversible. It's a chemical …
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Personal brands are delicate when you’re incongruent
I recently watched Aziz Ansari's new special, "Right Now." It was... unsettling. This super eloquent and clear Rollingstone review by Maria Fontoura did a much better job than I ever could of …
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Don’t over-optimize your site
A few days ago I wrote about a Google search patent. Short version of that post: the patent describes a method to "shuffle" your rankings between the time you make changes to a site and Google …