A curated list of Content & Marketing news and artifacts, bits and pieces that made it in the fourth week of February 2016. Don’t be shy: leave your opinion in the Comments section!
No Panic in Virtual Detroit — Why isn’t there a panic button on the American Uber app? Here’s to save you a click: because users should dial 911. Duh! \fastcompany
Heed the Signals — Among the 200+ ranking signals that Google uses to rate your web properties, you’ll find these 14. Because all Google wants is for you to build useful content and package it correctly. \semrush
Your business is SEO, period — “75% of people judge the credibility of a company based its website […] You should develop an SEO frame-of-mind.” Enough said. \ducttapemarketing
Sign Here — Don’t sign anything (in an email) unless you can wrap it with a carefully crafted ad. Here’s 5 ways to do this without annoying your readers. \convinceandconvert
Content Downgrades — A popular post in the online marketing community that argues for an alternative to content upgrades. \inbound
Double Trouble — 9 tips, 3 constraints, twice the number of customer acquisition in record time. Believe! \kissmetrics
The Grammar of Branding — “The vocabulary, grammar and tone of the language [you use] will be incredibly important” to your branding efforts. Easier said than done. Here’s how you should approach it. \justcreative
The Future Called — Get ready for truly, madly, deeply disruptive changes in the next two years: Experiences over products, on-demand economy, digital detox and 23 other equally disturbing trends growing beneath the surface. \briansolis
A/B Planning — Product launches are critical in establishing customer loyalty and ensuring longer term retention. Why, then, is so little efforts devoted to those product launches? Here’s a list of things to do and say to guarantee a perfect product launch in 2016. \marketo
The Greats — Here’s a bunch of advice from a bunch of social media/content marketing stars. Many of them are rather plain (“Photos are a proxy for people.“) but some are worth pondering. \contentmarketinginstitute
Customer Service extended — Content marketing, when planned and executed right, is a great way to enhance the customer service side of the business. Study shows that customers would rather find the answer themselves than wait on someone to regurgitate it for them. \convinceandconvert
A Passage to India — Over a billion people, 300+ million Internet users and a yearly Internet growth rate that currently sits above 50%. To reach out to this people, you need to get to know them. You also need a plan. And, last but not least, you’ll need a bigger boat. \SEMrush
Facts Figured — Why bother with Instagram? Maybe because it’s an arm of the Facebook empire? Because it has 300 million active users? This post explains how to deal with Instagram in details, with facts to back it up. \brafton
WhereAds — What should you bet your online advertising budget on in 2016? Search Engines or Display? Here are the answers you’re looking for. \verticalmeasures
Four dot Five — The first Beta of WordPress 4.5 is out this week. Hurrah! \wordpress
The Impact — How does BuzzFeed manage to feed a world hungry for viral, harmless news bits and also make an impact? This article won’t answer this tricky question directly, but it will at least give you some idea of where it’s all going. \fastcompany
Gather ’round — Storytelling, an art as ancient as humanity itself, is key to modern management. “It was a dark and stormy night… ” \fastcompany
Size Matters — Once you figured out what you’re going to say, you need to determine what size will fit your audience best. Here’s a guide that should help you. \woothemes
Competitor — Here’s another weekly roundup, from a different angle.\marketingprofs
French Branded — “If you’re not an Experience, you’re not a Brand.” Said two guys sitting on a couch talking about branding. \briansolis
Basket Case — Here’s how to build a business case for Content Marketing. The long term game needs a budget too. \newscred
That’s all for this week, folks! Until then, make sure to follow Backbay on Twitter.
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