In a survey of business-to-business marketing decision makers in March 2008 about their custom content preferences, there was a clear preference for newsletters, white papers and case studies. The report is being released today by Joe Pulizzi over at Junta42, who ran the survey in partnership with BtoB Magazine.
This survey was conducted among larger businesses, and has implications for the small business or independent service professional, if you want to follow best practices.
When companies invest almost 30% of their marketing budget in content, you know it’s important.
And the good news here is that even as a solo professional, with a small budget, and no staff, you can compete with larger businesses since it costs almost nothing to publish your own blog. Your customized content can be as professional and worthy as any large company’s.
Authenticity and connection being key for engaging readers, you have
an advantage because you write your own content from your own
experience and stories.
Most solo professionals I work with struggle to find the time to put
all the pieces of their online marketing into place while servicing
clients at the same time. But with efficient blogging software and
KickStartCart to manage subscribers, digital downloads, and
autoresponders, much of this can be automated.
The key is to write regularly, write from the heart and always keep the readers’ interests in mind.