“I don’t know where to get started with content marketing.”

Yes, Content Marketing is the latest rage in the world of business and marketing, as well it should be. Great teaching and communication gets results—always has, always will. But as with any trend, the issue of “getting started” has been a huge stumbling block for many companies—from the biggest brands to the smallest mom and pops.

Generally speaking, when a company or brand wants to initiate a content marketing campaign, there are many questions that need to be answered, a few of which are:

• Who in our company can produce content?
• How often should we post new blog articles, videos, etc.?
• What is the best type of content for our business and industry? (text, video, audio, etc.)
• What will the “voice” of our content and brand sound like?
• Who will be the person in charge of planning, organizing, editing, and managing our content going forward?
• Will we need to hire a new employee(s) to do this well or can we leverage the in-house talent we already have?
• What platform should we build our blog on (like WordPress) ?
• How much will social media play a role in our content marketing efforts?
• What will enable us to consistently produce content going forward so it has a lasting impact?

As you might imagine, there are many other questions to consider in this process, which is exactly what we do with The Sales Lion. Companies come to us when they know they want to get started with content marketing but need guidance so as to eliminate the learning curve that stunts the initial success of so many content marketing ventures. Furthermore, they come to us when their content marketing efforts are stagnant and not getting the desired results. And if you want to get a really good feel as to the principles we teach, view this slideshare deck:

http://www.thesaleslion.com/

How to Create a Movement and Explode Your Brand with Content Marketing: A Case Study

by Marcus Sheridan

There is a reality to this thing called content marketing that is inescapable:

Content Marketing is NOT a “tip your toes in the water” approach to business.

Nope, not at all.

The fact is, those companies that manage to turn content marketing from a “program” (a forced set of actions) to a true “culture” (intrinsically motivated actions) are the ones doing exceptional things in their space.

And when this culture is established, the possibilities for impact are literally limitless.

A photo of the Health Catalyst website, a company that is truly creating a movement with the help of great content marketing.

How Content Marketing is Helping to Revolutionize the Healthcare Industry

Case in point, I want to take a look at a company today that is not only one of the greatest examples of building a brand and driving revenue through content marketing I’ve ever seen and been a part of, but has managed to spawn a literal movement within their industry.

This company I’m referring to is Health Catalyst.

In just over 18 months since starting Content Marketing, Health Catalyst not only signed massive clients like Kaiser Permanente and Partners Healthcare, but they’ve also become the “it” brand within their industry—the company everyone is talking about in their space and a respected thought-leader of their field.

But the question is, how did they do it? How did this small, Utah-based B2B company manage to become an industry-wide leader despite the incredibly deep pockets of competition from the likes of Oracle and IBM?

The steps of Health Catalyst’s success are a literal blueprint for any company looking to achieve amazing results with content marketing. And although *your* company may not do exactly what you read below, I would first ask you if the following would be possible…

8 Examples of Content Marketing Excellence by Health Catalyst

1. They have Amazing Leadership Buy-In

I knew the first time I ever spoke to Health Catalyst they were going to do some special things in their space. My reason for knowing this was simple—their Senior Vice President, Paul Horstmeier, told me the following statement:

“We want to be the premier thought-leaders in our industry. If hospitals and health organizations have questions, we want them to think of Health Catalyst.”

Simple, bold, and quite telling was this statement because since that time Paul has literally been the most impressive senior officer I’ve ever worked with when it comes to demonstrating leadership and vision with what content marketing is really all about.

2. They took the time to get Buy-In from staff

I’m sure you’ve heard someone in your company at one time or another say, “We don’t have time for blogging.” And if anyone should have that excuse, it would be Health Catalyst. Their company’s subject matter experts are doctors and health professionals, the last people you’d expect to “have the time” to produce content. Notwithstanding, theyfind the time to make things happen. Since our kickoff workshop to explain to the staff the what, how, and why of content marketing—multiple people throughout the organization have worked tirelessly to establish themselves as the true “teachers” of the healthcare analytics space.

3. They invested heavily in a content marketing team

Often times, companies think the duties of a content manager are no more than a few hours a week and certainly not the job of more than one person. With Health Catalyst, the opposite is true. The company has multiple team members working in their content marketing division and because of this, they have managed to consistently produce 2-4 new pieces of content (most of which is very technical and research-oriented) every week for over a year.

4. They focused not only on great content, but put major attention to things like SEO and Social Media.

I wish we had room in this article to show what the editorial draft of a Health Catalyst blog article looks like, as it would blow most companies away in terms of its detailed nature. But to give you a quick feel, whenever a new piece of content for the company blog is produced, it also includes the following for review:

• Page Title
• Alternative Page Title
• Unique SEO Title
• Target Keywords for the post
• Current site rankings for targeted keywords
• Corresponding articles for end of post
• Meta Description
• Customized URL
• Customized description for each social media platform (twitter, facebook, LinkedIn, etc.)
• And others components

Pretty detailed, isn’t it? To further paint the picture, their Senior VP I mentioned earlier, Paul Horstmeier, passionately reviews each posts as well as the SEO goals therein. In fact, there have been many times when I’ve personally traded multiple emails with Paul and his team debating over ONE single word in the title of the post, simply because they understand how much one word can matter in the grand scheme of SEO.

5. They developed a world-class website and knowledge center

I’ve spoken about the Health Catalyst knowledge center before, but I truly believe it’s the model for what great content marketing companies should look like. With all of their articles, videos, webinars, case studies, etc. housed in an easy-to-find area of the site, current customers and prospects alike can become immersed and thoroughly educated in the world of healthcare analytics.

A glimpse of Health Catalyst’s incredible knowledge center, full of videos, webinars, case studies, etc.

6. They produced the entire gamut of content—from articles to eBooks to Webinars

As mentioned above, Health Catalyst understands that in order to be true thought leaders, they need to teach the industry using a variety of methods, allowing their prospects to learn in *their* preferred style—be it video, audio, or text.

7. They organized an incredible conference with hundreds in attendance from around the world

In what may be their boldest display of passionate teaching for their subject matter, Health Catalyst put on an extremely successful conference called HAS14 (Healthcare Analytics Summit) where hundreds of health professionals from around North America flew in to Utah and received two days of premium education from the likes of Billy Beane (Moneyball) and other analytics and health professionals. With over 80% of the attendees not even a client of Health Catalyst, and with no reference to themselves (pitching) from the stage, the event was an overwhelming success for attendees and the company alike.

8. They produced a heartfelt and profoundly moving documentary

If global healthcare is going to improve and people around the global are going to get the care they deserve, changes MUST be made in the fundamental way healthcare facilities currently operate. In order to show what is truly possible to others in their industry, Health Catalyst produced an INCREDIBLE documentary called “From the Heart”—a work that has since been shared hundreds and hundreds of times on social media and throughout the industry. Shown below, the documentary is powerful, moving, and extremely well-produced. In fact, I’d personally recommend you watch the following 2 minute video, as it will give you a profound glimpse into the issues currently facing global healthcare as well as the possibility of a When it comes down to it, they’re just great teachers who care.

As you can see, what Health Catalyst has done in such a short period of time with content marketing (about 18 months) is rather astounding. But the fact is, they “get it.”They are obsessed with improving their industry through world class communication and teaching. They don’t shy away from the way consumers use technology, but instead they embrace it and even push the limits of what others might think is possible.

Folks, this is how you make change with content. This is how you become a thought leader in your space. This is how you create a movement.

Well done Health Catalyst, well done.

http://www.thesaleslion.com/

Apple, Microsoft And Google Are World's Most Valuable Brands

A strong brand name is an incredibly valuable asset. Consumer companies in particular devote huge chunks of time and resources to solidify and expand their brands. “A valuable brand delivers a return for the company on two dimensions,” says David Reibstein, professor of marketing at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School. “Either it allows the company to charge a premium price or it adds more volume or market share.”

When it comes to charging a premium price and moving product, no one does it better than Apple AAPL +1.41%. There are other phones and tablets that are functionally comparable or arguably better than the iPhone and iPad, but the Apple brand carries tremendous weight and credibility, and customers are willing to pay up for that. The company sold 39.3 million iPhones in its latest quarter and could sell as many as 60 million during the last three months of 2014 with the holiday selling season. Apple also moved 12.3 million iPads and 5.5 million Macs last quarter.

Add it all up and the Apple brand is worth $124.2 billion and almost twice as much as any other brand in Forbes’ annual study of the world’s most valuable brands. The value of the Apple brand is up 19% over last year. Apple’s strong brand and innovative products allowed it to redefine four industry categories over the past 13 years with the launches of the iPhone, iPad, iPod and iTunes. The next industries on Apple’s hit list are smarthwatches with the Watch and financial payments with Apple Pay. Premium pricing pushes up Apple’s operating profit margins to 33%, and the company generated $50 billion in free cash flow for the fiscal year ended in September.

Microsoft MSFT -0.18% ranks second with a value of $63 billion, up 11% after being flat the previous three years, as the brand works to make the transition to a mobile world. Microsoft has recently had more success with its move away from the PC and software licensing model towards cloud offerings.

Microsoft inked a five-year, $400 million sponsorship deal with the NFL last year. The pact requires the NFL to use Surface tablet computers on the sideline that download high-def photographs of plays as they occur. Unfortunately for Microsoft the arrangement has provided more evidence of the power of the Apple brand, as announcers and players repeatedly refer to the Surface tablets as iPads and one player called them “knockoff iPads.”  Microsoft is still a bit player in tablets and phones. “There is a lot of catching up to do,” says Reibstein. “They are going to have to work to overcome the brand disadvantage they have in those areas.”

Google GOOGL -0.53% shoots up two spots to No. 3 among the top brands with a value of $56.6 billion, up 19%. Google is the generic term for the search category, but what separates Google from brands like Kleenex and Xerox is the amount of money it generates from its ad-driven business. The Google brand generated $16 billion in earnings before interest and taxes over the last 12 months, and it is one of the biggest ad spenders in tech at $2.8 billion in 2013. “With a well known brand, people trust it a lot more, and part of what is happening with Google is a matter of trust,” says Reibstein.

To determine the best brands, we started with a universe of more than 200 global brands. We required brands to have some presence in the U.S., which eliminated big brands like multinational telecom firm Vodafone and state-owned China Mobile, which has almost twice as many mobile subscribers as any other brand (Vodafone is second in mobile). The final list includes product brands like Anheuser-Busch InBev -owned Budweiser  and brands that are marketed under their corporate name like IBM IBM -0.85%, which ranks fifth overall.

Forbes valued the brands on three years of earnings and allocated a percentage of those earnings based on the role brands play in each industry (e.g., high for luxury goods and beverages, low for airlines and oil companies). We applied the average price-to-earnings multiple over the past three years to these earnings to arrive at the final brand value (click here for the full methodology).

The 100 most valuable brands span 15 countries across 20 broad industry categories. Brands from U.S.-based companies make up just over half the list with the next biggest representation from Germany (9 brands), France (7) and Japan (5). Tech brands are the most prevalent with 16, including 11 of the top 25. Automotive companies landed 16 brands in the top 100 led by Toyota at No.9, worth $31.3 billion.

Sandwiched around IBM are a couple of brands facing the challenges of people’s changing eating and drinking habits, particularly in the U.S. Coca-Cola ‘s value rose 2% to $56.1 billion, placing it fourth. ”When you are selling sugar and water, your brand better be very important,” says Reibstein. The Coca-Cola brand is still extremely valuable, but it operates in an industry with few growth prospects. Coca-Cola sold 13.5 billion cases globally of its signature brand in 2013, up just 0.6% from the prior year. The McDonald’s brand is sixth overall, worth $39.9 billion, but up just 1%. McDonald’s has been working to make its menu appear more health conscious, but many consumers aren’t buying it. Global same-store sales slid 3.3% in the third quarter.

The biggest gainer in the top 100 was Facebook, up 74% for a value of $23.7 billion and No. 18 overall. Various surveys report that fewer teens are using the social sharing site, but the Facebook brand still carries tremendous weight with 864 million daily active users in September. Revenue for the latest quarter jumped 59% with advertising representing 92.5% of total revenue. Other big gainers in the top 100 include Amazon.com (+45%), Starbucks (+25%), Toyota (+22%) and Nike (+22%).

http://www.forbes.com/