In his excellent post describing the seven habits of the most successful content marketers, Neil Patel (@neilpatel) explores how planning, organisation, idea capture, keeping an industry pulse, networking, an eye for quality and analytics, sets them apart.
But, interestingly, hidden in plain sight, is an eight habit which is fast becoming a regular feature in posts from savvy content marketers.
The habit to which I am eluding is the in-line textual call-to-action (CTA), or, in the case of Neil's post below, a CTA right at the top of the post.
As research continues to show the declining efficacy of the CTA banner at the end of posts and the increasing 'invisibility' of the blog 'sidebar', it is worth giving consideration to this approach.
Certainly, in the case of many of the leading content marketers, you will see evidence of this as well as in-content links to related articles (called out for what they are).
In the case of Neil's post below there is a textual CTA at the top, three Related links and a CTA banner at the bottom.
And, after all, Neil Patel is a very successful content marketer.
Content marketing is a strategy that’s practiced by many, but perfected by few. In fact, a 2014 study found that only 9 percent of B2B marketers surveyed said that they were very effective at content marketing, while the majority of respondents (41 percent) said that they were only marginally effective. Yikes. What is it that sets the elite few apart from the rest of the pack? What produces content marketing in some and hesitation in others? Is it creativity, imagination, work ethic? Often, the reason boils down to, simply, habits. Those legitimately crushing it at content marketing have cultivated efficient habits that allow them to run their campaign at a consistently high level. This allows them to accomplish more in less time and with minimal friction. Here are seven specific habits of the most successful content marketers.
