Have you ever heard someone say "I don't have time to blog" or "I just don't know what to blog about"?
It's understandable. A well researched and thought-out blog can take hours, and most just don't have extra hours laying around. However, business owners and marketing professionals alike fall in to the mistake of thinking that blogging is the end-all-be-all of content marketing. There are hundreds of ways to create content on the Internet to increase engagement and authority for your brand. While a blog gives an opportunity to outline many points and ask questions, you can also engage in seconds with a Facebook post or a blog comment.
I decided to create seven pieces of content for DigitalSherpa this morning and share them as examples.
- Comment On Another Blog
- My Google Reader informed me of a new post today on Social Media Explorer that I found interesting and had something to say about, so I left a comment that might drive more discussion.
- Re-Tweet That Content
- While I'm on the blog I just commented on (and was obviously engaged by), why not give others the chance to chime in? I thought the blog was of value, and think others might to.
- Tweet About A Trend
- While we're looking at Twitter, let's try to reach a new audience here. Yesterday I posted about services who use duplicate content for their clients and how it can hurt businesses. Today I made a tweet about that post and added #contentmarketing and #smallbiz, two pretty active Twitter trends, to get that content in to those circles.
- Post On Facebook
- DigitalSherpa helps put on a major event for the design industry every year called Design Bloggers Conference and a Facebook post works perfectly to help spread the word about that.
- 'Like' A Page On Facebook
- This is the easiest of them all. How is this content though? Well, it creates notifications for both that page owner and on my activity feed for those in my network to see. I chose to 'like' a fan page for a community of apartment professionals. We have a lot of clients in that vertical and I'd like to stay up to date on news in that community. My 'like' might be noticed by the owners of the page and lead to them liking and engaging on my page as well.
- Add Flickr Photo
- Remember the Design Bloggers Conference? Well I don't want to stop at Facebook trying to get the word out about that. There is a popular group on Flickr for interior designers and I added this photo of the venue for the conference in to their pool.
- Join A Forum/Discussion Group
- No matter your industry, there are people on the Internet talking about it. Forums and discussion groups are a great place to meet other industry professionals, prospects and competitors. I chose to join this forum, which is the same group from the Facebook fan page I 'liked' earlier, as there's a steady stream of discussion about the apartment industry and a lot of engaged users.
These are just a few of the ways you can quickly create content on the Web while you browse with a cup of coffee in the morning.
What are some other quick and effective ways to create content?