Well, it’s early June and it’s getting hot. The pavement is sizzling and the afternoon thunderstorms are rolling in. What better way to beat the heat than hang out in the A/C and read articles about copywriting, content marketing, SEO and more?

Besides my general day-to-day reading, I’ve also been busy trying to finish the Online Marketing Superstars book. I’m hoping to complete the book here in the next week – only 60 pages to go!!

I’m also busy preparing my article series on posture and how digital marketers can protect their muscular health from long hours of sitting, hunching and so on. I’m hoping to have the first article on posture completed in the next week or two.

In the meantime, feast your eyes on the following pieces I’ve found to be especially insightful.

#1 – 8 Incredibly Simple Ways to Get More People to Read your Content

After spending hours slaving away at your masterpiece, you’re delighted to finally post it online. When you come back in a few days to check on it though, you’re dismayed to find that hardly anyone has read it. The fact is that 79% of web users scan rather than read according to Jakob Nielsen’s usability research from way back in 1997. One of the core challenges of writing for the web is ditching many of the lessons you learned in school. One sentence paragraphs are okay, while sub-headings and bullets make your piece more conducive to scanning. Read more…

 

#2 – How Should You Get Started in Content Marketing?

The Internet has evolved well beyond the whole “shop 24/7” proclamations of years past according to Daniel Burstein of MECLABS. These days, marketers have to strive to cut through all the noise that’s online. They simply can’t slap up a blog and offer a free e-book. Although there may be no financial cost, there is a cost in terms of the visitor’s time. Rather than just providing basic information and assuming readers will trust it, marketers need to address key questions or pain points. Before you even write your first blog post, you first need to identify your value proposition. Read/listen more…

#3 – The broadcast medium formerly known as social media

In its infancy, the Internet was essentially “social” in nature, but by the late 90s, it had become more “commercial.” Once networks like Facebook and Twitter came onto the scene, things shifted back to social. In recent years though, companies have increasingly been using social networks to promote their products and services rather than using these tools to have true conversations. This represents a great opportunity for copywriters to help companies switch from the “broadcast” model to the “conversational” model. Author Nick Usborne thinks companies will be receptive to this switch since most are not seeing great results from social media. Read more…

#4 – A Field Guide to the Four Types of Content Marketing Metrics

One of the key advantages of content or inbound marketing is the immense amount of data you can obtain to help guide your efforts and achieve business objectives. But what exactly are these various metrics? Jay Baer of Convince & Convert provides a helpful SlideShare presentation that dives into four types of content marketing metrics – Consumption Metrics (i.e. page views), Sharing Metrics (i.e. Likes, Shares, +1s), Lead Generation Metrics (i.e. email/blog subscriptions) and finally, Sales Metrics. Read more…

 

#5 – What are the best day-to-day time saving hacks?

If you’re like me at all, you struggle to finish your to-do list each day. Emails come in, the phone rings, the dogs start barking at a squirrel – you get the idea. Any sort of advice on how to maximize productivity during the workday is certainly welcome. This helpful piece featured over at Quora provides a few rules you can implement to save time and get more done. For example, if it’s a task that will take you two minutes or less, go ahead and do it. Trying to remember or plan for it later will turn a 2 minute task into a 10 minute one. Read more…

Well, as they say in show business, that’s a wrap!

Again, I’m nearing completion of the Online Marketing Superstars book, which is a great compilation of advice from some the web’s top marketing, SEO and social media professionals. Once I finish the book, I plan to compile a top 50 list of quotes in near-term and then a full summary of the book in the long-term.

In the meantime, stay cool and don’t let any barking dogs or ringing phones take your focus away.