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heyitsnoah: I know, I know, you’ve seen this photo already. But...

cajuninthecity — Thu, 08 Nov 2012 21:33:03 -0500

I know, I know, you’ve seen this photo already. But you gotta admit it’s still pretty damn amazing. (On the off chance you haven’t seen it, it’s yesterday’s storm in NYC taken from a plane.)
(via Photo by d0057 • Instagram)

Content marketing continues to be one of the rising stars of the...

kellyreeves — Wed, 07 Mar 2012 15:59:48 -0500

Content marketing continues to be one of the rising stars of the online marketing world as brands from American Express and Proctor & Gamble to GE and General Mills use it alongside more traditional strategies to reach their target audiences. Why? Unlike traditional marketing, branded content is engaging, provides value and adds to the online experience instead of interrupting it.

At Outbrain, we’re all about great content, which is why we wanted to get the scoop from some of the folks in the trenches. Earlier this year, we surveyed senior-level brand marketers and agency executives as they gathered to judge entries for the 2012 Effie Awards — a program that recognizes the most effective and impactful marketing and advertising communications. What follows is an insider’s look at the state of content marketing.

KEY FINDINGS

100% of brand and agency marketers surveyed utilize content marketing in their overall marketing strategies. At 87% of respondents, video is the most common form of content created.
Social media is the most popular channel marketers use for driving traffic to content with 96% of respondents currently utilizing. Usage is up from 88% in 2011.
Marketers employ content marketing efforts to drive brand awareness and target top of purchase funnel consumers rather than for generating direct leads or sales. Social media engagement is the most popular indicator marketers consider when measuring the success of content marketing efforts (89%), followed by views or content downloads (76%).
Social media, video advertising and content marketing are viewed as the most effective tactics used for brand awareness, consideration and affinity.
82% of brand and agency marketers expect to increase content marketing efforts in 2012.

Read and download the full insights from our State of Content Marketing, 2012 report now.

Clickthrough for full infographic (via Marketers Who Share...

kellyreeves — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 10:31:00 -0500

Clickthrough for full infographic

(via Marketers Who Share Content Drive Traffic, Gain Customers [INFOGRAPHIC])

The 3 Biggest Content Marketing Mistakes CMOs Make Recently, I...

kellyreeves — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 11:28:00 -0400

The 3 Biggest Content Marketing Mistakes CMOs Make

Recently, I had the privilege of joining Jeffrey Hayzlett’s panel on digital media innovation at the CMO Summit in Dallas. One of the questions Jeff asked was, “What are the three biggest mistakes that CMOs make in relation to digital media in general and content marketing in particular?” This post covers some of the topics we discussed and to which I think marketers should devote more thought: believing that true branding can only be achieved offline, failing to think about content holistically and only considering bottom-line results.

The newsonomics of what to read next » Nieman Journalism Lab » Pushing to the Future of Journalism

kellyreeves — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 12:27:28 -0400

The newsonomics of what to read next » Nieman Journalism Lab » Pushing to the Future of Journalism

Now Hiring: Director, Customer Acquisition

kellyreeves — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 15:51:00 -0400

Outbrain, the leading content discovery platform, is seeking a motivated Director, Customer Acquisition. The position will lead all customer acquisition and marketing efforts of a new product launch while playing a key role in Outbrain’s fast growth. This newly created role reports to the Vice President, Marketing.

If you are interested in joining a group of accomplished, passionate people pushing the evolution of online publishing with some of the web’s top sites, then we want to talk with you. As with any Outbrain employee, we’re looking for someone who is resourceful, bright, proactive, a go-getter, works well independently and as part of a team, and who will be passionate about what she or he does. For this role, we are looking for a highly experienced direct marketer who has hands on knowledge of key direct response tactics and a strong analytical background.

Responsibilities

Oversee all customer acquisition efforts for key product launch
Develop strategies and tactics to deliver customer targets including but not limited to, search marketing, email marketing, display advertising, affiliate marketing and partnerships
Drive search marketing management and campaign optimization to meet company goals, maximize budget and drive efficiency.
Manage the development of strong and effective advertising creative
A/B testing analysis of product landing pages and advertising campaigns
Analyze campaign performance to ensure they are bringing in positive ROI
Create and maintain a targeted CRM program
Develop promotional plans to incentivize new and repeat customers
Leverage data and analytics to develop new acquisition strategies to generate quality leads based on customer engagement and lifetime value. (out-of-the-box thinking is preferred)

Qualifications

Highly quantitative and analytical marketer
Strong track record of developing and driving ROI based acquisition programs online
Strong search marketing background
Highly proficient in Google Analytics
Self-starter / self-motivated, capable of staying on track and pursuing solutions without supervision
Ability to work under pressure, meet deadlines and handle multiple projects simultaneously
Detail oriented
Fun to work with

Please email resumes to jobs[at]Outbrain.com

How To Monetize Your Content Online, Part I: Supply « The Outbrain Blog

kellyreeves — Fri, 22 Jul 2011 16:58:00 -0400

How To Monetize Your Content Online, Part I: Supply « The Outbrain Blog:

It’s tough being an online content publisher these days.

While the flow of advertising dollars into digital continues to increase—online advertising spending is expected to grow 20% to $31.3 billion in 2011 in the U.S. alone, according to eMarketer—it has not resulted in higher CPMs for publishers.

Rather, the increase in spending is spread thin across a crowded field of technology middlemen (i.e. ad networks, exchanges, data providers, DSPs, etc.).

And it is largely following increased audience usage of digital media as opposed to resulting in larger payouts per page view for content creators. Meanwhile, the cost of producing content remains stubbornly high. Recent developments like Google’s Panda update, which rewards original and high quality content in search results, as well as the increasing amount of traffic directed by the social Web via “word-of-mouth” will likely sustain the expensive cost of developing quality content.

When the balance sheet reflects a disparity between the price of producing content and the revenue it can realize, a shift is necessary. In order to increase monetization, online publishers must recognize the two halves of the problem and tackle them in different ways:

1. Drive higher audience engagement to increase valuable supply

2. Add new revenue streams, without subverting goal No. 1, to increase demand

Read more on the Outbrain blog

(via A Direct Response to Content Marketing Shift « The...

kellyreeves — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 13:12:29 -0400

(via A Direct Response to Content Marketing Shift « The Outbrain Blog)

Content Sharing Fuels Social Media Activity « The Outbrain...

kellyreeves — Tue, 17 May 2011 13:18:24 -0400

Content Sharing Fuels Social Media Activity « The Outbrain Blog

(via Content-Marketing-Infographic-by-Marketo)

kellyreeves — Mon, 16 May 2011 11:40:04 -0400

(via Content-Marketing-Infographic-by-Marketo)

We've Seen the Future of Ads and It Looks Integrated

kellyreeves — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 16:40:44 -0400

Mark Suster has a great guest post up on TechCrunch today that discusses the future of advertising online and the movement towards more integrated ads since consumers are “blind” to traditional online advertising methods such as banners. One point he makes is that “our attention is all in the [content] stream. As evidenced by the eye-tracking studies – they will remain [there].” He claims that integrated advertising means are more effective in reaching consumers, and we wholeheartedly agree. Content is key for brands online and presents a better opportunity for engaging and entertaining your audience — actually catching their attention — in a more genuine manner.

While there is an ongoing debate about whether or not people actually want to read branded content, our data shows that consumers respond to paid content no differently than editorial content — as long as it’s quality and interesting to them.

Read Suster’s full post at TechCrunch

(Our post on the blog)

The Content Lab: Content marketing and the stressed-out CMO

kellyreeves — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 13:00:36 -0400

The Content Lab: Content marketing and the stressed-out CMO:

thecontentlab:

It’s official: content marketing is a CMO-worthy issue. But getting the attention of the CMO with content marketing is probably harder than ever.

According to a recently released Roper study, nine out of 10 chief marketing officers see value in content marketing, and 35 percent of CMOs…

When Asking For Social Media, Do Companies Mean Content Marketing?

kellyreeves — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 15:27:09 -0400

When Asking For Social Media, Do Companies Mean Content Marketing?:

whycontentmatters:

When companies say they want to use social media as a marketing tool, do they really mean content marketing? Will Davis, managing partner at Right Source Marketing, thinks so.

“When companies learn more about what content marketing is—and that you can leverage your own content in the social media space—they almost always realize that’s what they really wanted to do, and social media is just one piece of their content marketing puzzle,” he writes.

Check out his complete post here.

A nice sneak peek on how we do what we do. (Sidenote: It’s...

kellyreeves — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 14:44:00 -0400

A nice sneak peek on how we do what we do.

(Sidenote: It’s a good thing we have a data analyst because that looks like another language to some of us :)

futurejournalismproject: via blog.involver.com Social media...

kellyreeves — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 14:15:48 -0400

futurejournalismproject:

via blog.involver.com

Social media has turned us all into content creators. But for journalists, the people traditionally empowered with this task, social media has been a major disruption, characterized by newspapers in every part of the country shutting their doors, and significant job loss. Yet amidst these changes, many newspaper brands have found ways to maintain and even expand their readership. A recent article in Mashable makes a strong case for the idea that social media has reinvigorated the market for quality journalism.

Content discovery heralds new engagement era - iMediaConnection.com

kellyreeves — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 14:08:26 -0400

Content discovery heralds new engagement era - iMediaConnection.com:

Discovering something you like online can be wonderful, but the sheer volume of content out there means for publishers the challenge is no longer creating content, but helping the right people to discover it.

Tweet This: Agencies Get 28% of Revenue From Digital | Agency...

kellyreeves — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 16:05:06 -0400

Tweet This: Agencies Get 28% of Revenue From Digital | Agency News - Advertising Age

“Digital’s share of agency revenue rose from 25.8% in 2009. In dollar terms, agencies’ digital revenue jumped 16.9% in 2010.

One point is clear: Digital has become a standard tool across every agency discipline.”

Media Agencies Make Mark as Content Creators | MediaWorks - Advertising Age

kellyreeves — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 11:28:28 -0400

Media Agencies Make Mark as Content Creators | MediaWorks - Advertising Age

Referrals from social sites fall overwhelmingly into a few...

kellyreeves — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 11:21:35 -0400

Referrals from social sites fall overwhelmingly into a few content categories. Social media users are eager to share—and click on—news and entertainment stories, which account for nearly three-quarters of all social media referrals. Industry watchers have posited that one reason for social sharing getting so much attention from the media is their outsize impact on media websites. (via How Engaged Is Traffic from Social Sites? - eMarketer)

Also see our original report & data here.

Vote for Outbrain's panel submissions for Internet Week!

kellyreeves — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 16:49:17 -0400

Vote for Outbrain's panel submissions for Internet Week!:

SEO? SMO? What Everyone Needs to Know About the Future of Online Content Consumption
Sending the News Feed to the Tailor: Personalization & Why Online Content is Not One-Size-Fits-All
Going Beyond Banner Ads: Why Content Monetization Matters