Category: Marketing Automation

It’s easy to picture the customer journey as a well-traveled, east-to-west road trip, following a single highway from awareness to consideration to purchase.
In reality, people take a lot of detours.

If you want a complete picture of the customer journey, it’s essential to connect your marketing efforts with the tool at the center of it all: your company’s trusty CRM.
While you may be familiar with a CRM, you probably aren’t using it to its full potential. Here, we’ll cover its role in marketing and how it powers great customer experiences.
CRMs are traditionally considered a tool for sales teams to track leads, prospects, and customers. With them, reps can see every interaction a contact has had with a brand — everything from calls with a sales rep to website visits.
But on the marketing side, marketers rarely use a CRM for anything other than creating email lists, if at all. This is a huge missed opportunity.
Think of your CRM as a single source of truth — tracking every customer interaction and painting a clear picture of their journey. Here are the benefits of this:

One central hub for data. Any business, regardless of size, needs a central location for storing data. This makes it possible to identify patterns and see what’s working (and what’s not).
More audience segmentation. You’d never send the same message to every customer — which is why segmentation is so crucial. A CRM can group your audience into segments — such as where they live or when they’re most active — so that you can talk to your audience in a more targeted way.
Optimized campaigns. A CRM tool can connect to your marketing channels, enabling you to see how your channels perform and how your audience is interacting with you.

By putting it at the center of your marketing strategy, you can truly personalize your messaging, create more targeted and meaningful content, and expedite the sales process — helping your entire company grow.
Let’s dive more into this below.
What is the Role of CRM in Marketing?
As I mentioned above, marketing is about more than single, solitary interactions – it’s about building a complete customer experience.
Here’s how CRM can power different areas of your marketing:
1. CRM for Email Marketing
With email and your CRM, you can segment your contacts into different lists based on any CRM data point like location, page interactions, and more. And it doesn’t stop there.
You can add an extra layer of personalization to your emails by sending different CTAs to customers based on your CRM data. By sending relevant, personal emails, you can build trust and provide value to customers and prospects.
A CRM can also help you and your team save time. By connecting email to your CRM, you can avoid exporting and importing lists of contacts into your email service provider (ESP). This keeps all of your contact information up to date while helping your team stay compliant with CAN-SPAM laws.
2. CRM for Social Media Marketing
You probably already know this, but it bears repeating: social media is a two-way street. Producing great content for social — like clever tweets, trendy Instagram photos, and engaging videos — is important, but it’s not enough.
By pairing your CRM with social, you can see how customers engage with your platforms and the conversations they’re having — making you more prepared to interact with them.
A social CRM can also give you an overview of topics, hashtags, and influencers within your audience segments. Then, you can leverage this data to provide timely, relevant content.
3. CRM for Digital Ads
While third-party data helps you reach a broad persona, the first-party data you get from your CRM lets you target a hyper-specific group of people. It allows you to create relevant ads for any audience, no matter what stage they’re at in the buyer’s journey.
For example, you can create a custom audience of all the contacts in your CRM who viewed a certain product. Based on this audience, you can then create an extremely specific ad that provides information about that product to propel them along their buyer’s journey.
This makes a big impact on your customers. Think about how many ads they see in a day. How many of those do you think are actually relevant? By promoting highly targeted ads, your customers won’t be surprised or frustrated when they see one.
CRM Marketing Automation
CRM software is designed to help sales and customer service professionals — but it can also help you perform some marketing tasks.
For instance, in a CRM you can set up email sequences to engage with leads without manually re-creating content. It can also alleviate your workload by taking tedious tasks off your hands, like manual data entry or logging customer interactions on social media.
However, while CRM software can perform some marketing automation tasks, your CRM alone may not be the right solution for all of your marketing. Check out this helpful article that compares CRM versus marketing automation.
Final Thoughts
When marketers leverage their customers’ data for good, they can craft remarkable customer experiences. By combining your efforts with a powerful CRM, you can connect the dots to improve the customer journey.

Big Idea or Enduring Question: How can you automatically add topic(s) to a record? Objectives: After reading this blog, you’ll be able to:  Use record-triggered flow to automatically add topics to a record  Use Get element to find topic id instead of avoid hard coding of Id Use create records
The post Auto Assign a Topic to a Record appeared first on Automation Champion.

I don’t want to build e-mail list now, but I have interesting offer to my audience on TikTok. Which tool is free and allow me to build a simple website when my fan can write his email, confirm it and then get an free e-book. I want to save this emails to my future mailing list. What tool will be best for it? I want to do it for free. I can code some frontend to website, but I need to host it and gather emails for free submitted by /u/jazzymoneymaker [link] [comments]

The interview question, “What makes you unique?” is not an opportunity to confess weird habits or odd quirks. It’s a chance to provide the interviewer with insight into how you’d be the best candidate for a role, while proving you’re someone who can think on her feet.
Essentially, “What makes you unique” really means, “What makes you an exceptionally good candidate?”
To avoid an awkward conversation, you’ll want to be prepared to answer “What makes you unique?” in an interview. Here are seven sample answers to ensure you’re proving yourself an incredibly valuable company asset.

How to answer “What makes you unique?”

Mention skills listed in the job description.
Provide examples from your background. Reference prior accomplishments or results from past roles.
Avoid generic phrases like “I’m a hard worker”. Make your answer compelling.
Include key personality traits that will allow you to deliver similar results in the future.
Tell the interviewer how your unique skills will help the company succeed.

7 Sample Answers to “What Makes You Unique?” and Why They Work
1. “I am a very good communicator and find it’s easy for me to relate to other people.”
Consider mentioning a personality trait you feel would be a good fit for the business. After reading the job description, make a list of attributes that could make you an exceptional candidate.
Additionally, including a personality trait in your answer allows you to display how you’re a good fit for a role in which you have little prior experience.
For instance, if you’re applying for a position as a team leader, it’s critical that you demonstrate strong communication skills and an ability to connect with a diverse group of people. If you tell the interviewer, “I am a very good communicator and find it’s easy for me to relate to other people”, you’re able to match your personality to components of a successful leader.
Effective communication is a critical trait to emphasize in interviews — if you consider how 86% of employees cite lack of collaboration as a main component of workplace failures, you can begin to appreciate why effective communication is so important. 
2. “I really enjoy learning new things and am constantly seeking out new learning opportunities.”
By mentioning your passion for learning new things, you’re demonstrating you’re growth-focused and unafraid of challenges.
Additionally, answering the question in this way allows you to remind the interviewer why you’re uniquely qualified for the role — while other candidates might have more prior experience in the industry, you’re proving your desire to exceed expectations of the job quickly.

3. “My prior experience in customer service has provided me with unique technical skills that I can apply to this role.”
If you have prior experience in a role vastly different from the one for which you’re applying, you might use this as an opportunity to explain how your background uniquely qualifies you. With an answer like this one, you’re able to alleviate concerns the interviewer might have with your lack of experience in the field.
It’s critical, however, that you provide specific examples of how your prior experience has provided you with certain transferrable skills.
For instance, you might say, “My prior experience in customer service provided me with technical skills and an extensive knowledge base for how our product works. As a marketer, I will be able to use this knowledge to ensure we’re meeting our customers needs with every campaign we launch.”
It’s also important to highlight: Previous job experience has declined in importance when it comes to recruiters evaluating candidates. In fact, between 2017 and 2021, that number has dropped from 92% to 62%. So it’s okay if you feel your prior work experience doesn’t perfectly align with the role for which you’re applying, as long as you can explain how your skills will help you succeed. 

4. “Working at a startup gave me an opportunity to understand the ins-and-outs of the industry, and to take on tasks I might not have at a larger company. I think this experience gives me a slight edge over other applicants.”
Similar to the answer above, this answer is a good one if you’re attempting to switch industries. If you think your prior experience could deter interviewers from seeing you as exceptionally qualified, this is an optimal chance to prove them wrong. Consider how your background has allowed you to gain unique skills that others, who followed a more linear career trajectory, might not have. 
For instance, if you previously worked at a small startup and now you want to transfer to a large corporation, it’s important you mention how those skills will make you successful in this new role.
5. “I’m not afraid of failure. In fact, I think it is an essential part of the experimental process that gets you to success. For example … ”
This answer shows your interviewer that you’re not afraid to take risks. Of course, you’ll only want to say this if you have a positive example to reinforce the importance of failure in the workplace.
You don’t want to sound like you make mistakes all the time, but you’ll stand out if you mention how you turned a failure into a success.
For instance, you might say, “I’m not afraid of failure. In my last role, we tried to streamline our SEO process and, along the way, found we’d accidentally decreased traffic to our site. However, this initial failure allowed me to see the errors in our previous procedure. My team and I came up with a more successful strategy to avoid these mistakes in the future, and ended up increasing traffic by 20%.”
With this answer, you’re showing you’re capable of remaining flexible and open-minded when something doesn’t work right away, and you know how to take failures and use them as learning opportunities — a critical skill for any work environment.

6. “When solving problems, I apply both logic and emotional aspects in equal proportion. For instance, I’m trained in SEO and understand how to use analytics to ensure a marketing campaign is successful, but I also majored in design and know how to apply creativity to a project as well.”
If you’re stuck on deciding how to demonstrate your unique qualifications, start by thinking about how other people approach problems at your company, and how you differ.
For instance, most people are either logical and use analytics to solve problems, or emotional and use creativity. It’s rare to find someone who is both. If you truly believe you combine these two aspects, it’s an impressive ability you should highlight.
7. “I’m exceptionally organized, and at my last company, I was able to apply this skill to improve our process and increase ROI by 33%.”
Remember, when your interviewee asks “what makes you unique”, she’s really wondering “how will you help our company?” At the end of the day, it’s critical you tie your answer back to how you will solve problems for the company. 
48% of recruiters say improving quality of hire is their top priority in 2022 — so you’ll want to ensure your answer highlights how you will excel in the role for the long haul.
To avoid sounding like you’re bragging, consider a personality trait or skill set that helped your last company achieve results. If the results are quantitative, make sure you have the specific numbers to support your claim. However, it’s also appropriate to share qualitative results, such as, “my organizational skills led my manager to trusting me with a major project within the first two months in my role.” Ultimately, providing examples shows the interviewer you’re results-driven, and aren’t just saying generic phrases to answer her question.

Imagine this: as a content marketer, things are going pretty well for you — you’re confident about your upcoming campaign, the ROI from your last couple were stellar, and projections for the new one looked just as good, if not better, than ever before.
And then something happened, and you need to pivot your content.
Maybe it’s a sudden trend or global event that diverts your audience’s attention. Or, perhaps a competitor’s campaign launch has everyone talking, and you’re unsure if your current content strategy is good enough to outshine theirs.
Regardless, this shift has impacted your company directly, which means, your entire campaign is impacted directly.
With that being said, now you have to decide if you need to pivot your content plan — and quickly. But how do you respond to an event like this?

We asked HubSpot managers to give their insights about how to navigate major changes that alter your content planning. The HubSpot Blog also surveyed 1,000 marketers to learn more about their content planning practices.
In this post, we’ll learn what they have to say. We’ll go over how to identify when you need to pivot quickly, and strategies you can take in order to make that transition as smooth as possible.
How to Pivot Your Content Plan
When something major happens to alter your content strategy, think about how it will affect your business goals. After all, the content you’re creating reflects the goals of your business.
“The content HubSpot creates is intended to help businesses around the world grow better by addressing their current needs. When we have to pivot our content plans quickly, it is because those needs have changed quickly,” says HubSpot’s Vice President of Acquisition, Emmy Jonassen.
Let’s take a look at advice from Jonassen, as well as tips from managers across the marketing field — including Senior Social Media Manager Kelly Hendrickson, Global Brand Marketing Manager Alicia Collins, and Content Growth Strategy Manager Karla Hesterberg.
Let’s get started!
1. Know when to pivot.
Knowing when to switch up your content strategy is never an easy decision to make. There are a couple of aspects you should consider when you find yourself needing to re-work your content strategy, but first is knowing when the right time is to do that.
“The toughest part about pivoting your strategy is knowing when,” Hendrickson says. “As a social media manager, I would ask myself, ‘Right now, can we provide value to our audience?’ ‘Can we provide content that will be helpful and welcome in the social space?’”
46% of marketers surveyed by the HubSpot Blog said they knew it was time to pivot because their previous content strategy was experiencing poor engagement.
If you’ve realized that altering your strategy will help you deliver more valuable, helpful, and timely content to your audience, then it’s a good time to pivot.
Ultimately, content plans should serve your business goals, but also deliver worthwhile content to your customer that’s timely. If your content isn’t providing a timely lens to customers, it might be time for you to pivot your strategy.
A content audit could be a good way to determine if you need a shift. Per the HubSpot Blog survey, 36% of marketers conduct content audits to identify gaps in their content strategy.
Take a look at your content plans. If your information aligns with your business’s goals, that’s great, but does it align with the times?
Instead of devoting all of your content planning to a new product launch, for instance, change up the frequency of your posts to include more content that can serve your customer’s needs depending on what’s going on in the industry, or in the world.
2. Put your audience first.
So, you’ve decided it’s a good time to pivot. How do you cater to the new shift in your audience’s lives, though?
Check your audience’s web behavior — you’ll find information that relates to what your audience is thinking about. For instance, if keyword search reports have indicated that keywords are changing from “local marketing tips” to “online marketing tips,” think of it as a clue that needs are shifting.
However, this shift isn’t exactly what you planned for — in fact, the content you’ve planned for is already scheduled, ready to go, and ultimately different from the results you’ve found from researching web behavior.
Hendrickson’s team was in the same boat. “In our case, we found we could provide our audience with helpful information,” she says. “But that information was not our previously produced and scheduled content.”
So, what do you do?
“We paused all publishing and pivoted immediately based on audience needs,” says Hendrickson. She and her team saw that they needed to rework how they catered to the needs of their audience with different content, so after some web behavior analysis, they found their answer. “At that time, an immediate need for our audience was tips about remote work and leading with empathy.”
She continues by saying, “We made that decision by looking at our audience, as we always do, and figuring out what challenges they were facing and prioritizing our changes there.”
According to a survey conducted by the HubSpot Blog, 46% of marketers have adapted content to reflect the issues going on in their customers’ lives.
When in doubt, start with your audience and put yourself in their shoes. What would you want to see from your favorite brands during certain times of year or periods of change?
If you have a large audience, it’s important to make sure your content addresses the needs of different groups you’re looking to serve. 38% of marketers surveyed by the HubSpot Blog said their biggest mistake when pivoting their content plan is focusing too much on one segment of their target audience.
As you look to pivot, take a holistic approach to addressing the needs of your broader audience.
3. Change your content lens.
We’ve talked a lot about how thinking about the customer will help guide your pivot decision and content planning. When you’ve got an idea of the type of content you need to deliver to your audience, the next step is the delivery itself.
“We need content and campaigns that are helpful and understanding,” Collins says. So while your content is framed around helping the audience, does the caption convey an understanding, empathetic point of view?
When you deliver content, you’re reflecting your brand and your brand’s goals. If one of your brand’s goals is to connect with your customer, you must change your message delivery to reflect comprehension of the situation.
Per the HubSpot Blog survey, 43% of marketers have changed the tone of their content to be more empathic and authentic in recent years.
“Companies and customers are operating in different ways — we can’t always assume that the same types of marketing will resonate,” Collins notes.
For instance, let’s say a major cybersecurity issue upends your industry and is seen everywhere, from LinkedIn posts to newspaper headlines. Rather than shying away from the issue, consider how you might provide content that focuses on IT safety and security, or more generally, tips and tricks for successful online marketing and sales strategies.
4. Connect with other colleagues.
“During major industry or global changes, it becomes especially important that we understand our audiences’ needs so we can create relevant and helpful content fast,” Jonassen remarks.
Recall that Hendrickson’s team had to recognize the new needs of their target audiences, and discovered that remote work and how to lead during hard times was increasingly popular. From there, they were able to conduct research and figure out a plan.
However, if you’ve found that your team is struggling to collect insights, or you don’t know how, reach out to other colleagues to come up with a game plan that will be helpful to you. While your customers need actionable, timely, empathetic content, you need to understand how to figure out their other needs, as well.
“We start by analyzing user behavior, talking to our Sales and Customer Service teams, and interviewing prospects and customers,” Jonassen says.
Similar to social media and branding, it’s important for team members working on customer acquisition to analyze how their customer will be thinking about their lives differently, so you can create offers that will be relevant to their new lifestyle.
If you find yourself struggling to deduce how your customer thinks because you don’t interact with them directly, think about the colleagues you have who do have a customer-facing role.
Sales and Customer Service colleagues are a great place to start — they’re in constant contact with customers, and because of that, will have a good grip on recognizing common problem areas among customers.
The best part about this strategy? It fits any business size. Even if your company is a small but mighty one, there’s at least one person constantly communicating with customers, and leading hiring efforts. They’re your front lines (and usually, talking to them is free, and less time-consuming than conducting multiple research quests).
5. Don’t overestimate your pivot.
When you recognize you need to shift, you don’t have to launch an entirely new product or completely re-identify your brand. In fact, that’s something you shouldn’t do.
Hesterberg states, “Don’t change everything at once. The worst thing you can do in a situation like this is pivot too hard and too fast in your rush to meet short-term needs.”
It can be startling to customers if a company overhauls their entire strategy overnight (Do you remember the “IHOb” fiasco?), and leave them confused.
My grandmother always used to say, “If it’s not broken, don’t fix it,” a mantra that should apply to your pivot process planning. Changing what your brand stands for can be messy, time-consuming, and confusing for customers.
“Remember that content strategy is always a long game — your short-term strategy can’t compromise your ability to solve for the ongoing, long-term needs of your content property. Find key areas where you can be flexible to meet immediate needs, but know what you can’t budge on,” Hesterberg suggests.
Your pivot should be a balanced addition to the strategy you already have in place. Half of marketers surveyed by the HubSpot Blog said when they last pivoted their content, their content plan changed a moderate amount.
In every campaign you make, one of your goals is most likely to serve the needs of the customer. Keep these tips in mind, and stay calm throughout the storm.
6. Get ready to experiment.
Digital marketing is ever-evolving, and new platforms and features can often be a driving force behind a content pivot. According to the HubSpot Blog survey, 68% of marketers have pivoted their content plan to leverage a new social media platform. We’ve seen this play out in real-time with more brands looking to capitalize on the rise in popularity of TikTok in recent years.
In addition to emerging platforms, jumping on new features of existing platforms can be a key part of a content pivot. Per the HubSpot Blog survey, 77% of marketers have pivoted their content plan to try leveraging a new feature on an existing social media platform, such as Instagram Reels. 
Experimentation and flexibility are important for content pivots. When exploring new platforms and features, it can take some time for brands to navigate what their audience wants to see on a new medium.

Over the past few years, TikTok has seen explosive growth, and it shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, by the end of 2022, TikTok is predicted to reach 1.5 billion monthly active users.
But there’s another big player in the game of short-form video — Instagram Reels, which Instagram launched in 2020 to provide a space for Instagram users to post short, ‘snackable’ content that mirrors what you’d see on TikTok.
We’ve already covered the debate of TikTok versus Instagram Reels, so I won’t go into that here.
Instead, I spoke with an Instagram influencer and consultant, Kar Brulhart, who has grown her own Instagram account from 0 to 45,000+ viewers and obtained over six figures in less than 10 months using Reels — all organically.
Here, we’ll cover Brulhart’s tips for how brands can leverage Instagram Reels to reach new audiences and acquire new customers.
But first — why Instagram Reels over TikTok?

The Benefits of Instagram Reels
“A lot of brands think they need to be on multiple platforms in order to have a voice and a presence, but it’s more important to get very good at one or two platforms, and have a voice and message and community there,” Kar Brulhart told me.

She adds, “We forget these platforms are about community, and we have to nurture our audiences in order to get results.”

Brulhart told me she’s decided to put all her eggs in the Instagram basket because she ultimately finds the platform more user-friendly, and there are more features and benefits for a business owner compared to TikTok.
This makes sense: Instagram is owned by Meta (formerly Facebook), which provides users with extensive advertising tools and opportunities. While TikTok is attempting to provide similarly robust advertising capabilities, it’s ultimately still in early stages and has a long way to go.
Brulhart does acknowledge TikTok has its advantages: It can serve as a great way to generate brand awareness and funnel audiences to your website or Instagram, land brand partnerships, and it can help entrepreneurs and brands keep up with trends. Her strategy is to use TikTok to post to TikTok for more brand awareness, identify buzzy trends and sounds, and then leverage that information to reach new audiences on Instagram.
Ultimately, Brulhart told me brands could be leaving money on the table if they aren’t using Reels. As she puts it, “I went from less than 2,000 followers in February 2020 to over 15,000 the next month through Reels, because Instagram is pushing Reels to new audiences. And 75% of the people who find my account are coming from Reels — compared to Stories and posts.”
If you’ve determined Reels is a viable option for your business, you might be wondering how to get started with it. Let’s dive into that, next.
(Note: These tips are from Brulhart — if you’re looking for a more high-level overview or curious how brands are already using Reels, take a look at Everything Marketers Need to Know About Instagram Reels, first.)

 

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by Latina IG Educator & Coach (@karbrulhart)

5 Tips for Succeeding on Instagram Reels, According to a Reels Influencer
1. Find your niche, and post consistently.
Kar Brulhart’s niche is Instagram coaching and growth, so she told me she’s focused her entire content strategy around these two key themes.

“I repeat myself often,” Brulhart says. “People get nervous about sounding repetitive, but you need to repeat yourself often, and constantly remind people of your offers.”

It can be tempting to create content on popular or trending topics even if they’re not a direct match for your product or services, but that isn’t a good idea. Social media marketing isn’t just about attracting an audience — it’s about attracting the right audience.
Additionally, posting often and on a pre-determined schedule can help you see growth on the platform, since social algorithms reward consistency. Brulhart began seeing success when she continued to post often about similar themes that mattered most to her intended audience.
2. Add context in your captions.
“Short video works really well on TikTok — like audio trends, and lip-sync trends — and what you should take away from that is you don’t have to put your entire message into a 15 or 30-second Reel,” Brulhart recommends.
She adds, “Instead, it can be something relatable and inspirational, and then in your caption, you can add that context.”
Consider, for instance, the following Reel, in which Brulhart posts a few quick text phrases in the Reel itself (like “I was bullied by a man in my first job in NYC”), but then elaborates extensively in the caption:

 

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by Latina IG Educator & Coach (@karbrulhart)

3. Be obsessive about your data.
As marketers, we’re already data-obsessed. Data can help you identify what’s working well, what needs improvement, and what should be ditched entirely. And your Reels strategy should be no different.
As Brulhart puts it, “I would suggest looking at your data every seven to 30 days, analyzing it, and figuring out which Reels perform well — then, take that same topic and create a carousel post, and add more context in the caption of that post.”
She says, “Half of your audience isn’t seeing your content at any given time, so be repetitive because chances are, people didn’t see it the first time.”
A brand’s success with Reels, Brulhart believes, lies in the marketing team’s ability to experiment and use data to figure out the strategy that works best for that particular brand. For instance, perhaps your audience is more into trends and relatable content over educational Reels, which is information you can only uncover through analytics.
Brulhart says, “Where I’ve seen the most success with my clients is when they aren’t afraid to pivot and change their strategies because the platform is constantly evolving, and there are always new features so it’s important to consistently test out those new features — especially because Instagram rewards those accounts that jump on the new features early.”
4. Create behind-the-scenes content.
When I spoke with Brulhart about this ‘newfound rise’ in short-form video, she reminded me it’s been a long time coming. For instance, Snapchat first came on the market with short-form video content back in 2012.
“These platforms have democratized video,” Brulhart told me, “and made it cheap and easy and fun to create videos. And it’s who we are as people — we like to overshare, and we like to create videos to share our lives.”
Post-pandemic, social media users are craving more authentic, relatable, behind-the-scenes content from influencers and brands alike.
For instance, in 2020, roughly half (42%) of Gen Zers said they wanted content described as fun— which surpassed Gen Zers’ interest in romantic content (29%) and exciting content (27%).
And, post-pandemic, 34% of HubSpot Blog Survey respondents said they still seek out more positive and uplifting content than they did pre-pandemic.
As Brulhart puts it, “It’s not about perfection or aesthetics anymore — the stories that work the best are those vulnerable, personal, behind-the-scenes content. So don’t be afraid to switch from professional aesthetic to something more approachable and fun.”
One brand that Brulhart admires for their short-form video strategy is Duolingo. The language-learning app goes viral often because they’ve begun using their owl mascot in funny, relatable TikToks (like seen below).

@duolingo apparently can’t hire Dua so here we are
#duolingo
#brandtok
#marketingtok
#DuaLipa
#DulaPeep
#dualingo
♬ original sound – kooze

Humanizing your brand is a vital component of any good social media strategy. The more your audience can relate to your brand, the more they can trust your brand.
However, it’s important to note, you don’t want to copy something just because it’s a trend — it should also make sense for your brand, and feel authentic and real. As Brulhart says, “My biggest failures is when I’m just doing a trend. It doesn’t work — people smell it.”
5. Hire someone to create Reels-specific content.
If you’re interested in taking your Reels strategy to the next level, you’ll want to consider hiring someone with expertise creating engaging short-form videos for social.
Brulhart told me, “If you have the budget, hire someone who has a resume to show you they can create content specifically for Instagram or TikTok (i.e. a Reels video editor).”
If possible, you’ll want to hire someone with a proven track record on Reels who can ensure your content is appropriate for the platform and will perform well.
If you don’t have the budget to hire someone full-time, however, that’s okay, too — in that case, Brulhart told me, “Make sure your brand is tying its Reels back to your business’ content pillars. Don’t make the mistake of just jumping on a trend because it’s funny or cute … What ends up happening is you’ll get an influx of followers, but not the right followers. It’s key to make sure everything ties back to your business objectives.”
Additionally, if you don’t have the budget to hire someone full-time, consider enrolling in Brulhart’s Social Department membership, in which she sends trending audio as well as niche-specific ideas to people every week to save them time on Reels.
You’ll also want to consider how you can leverage other content creators to help tell your story in ways you can’t think of — brand or influencer partnerships can help you with this.
Ultimately, Reels can be an incredibly powerful tool for reaching new audiences and increasing brand awareness and loyalty — but it’s not for everyone. If you’re unsure whether Reels is right for you, test it out for a few weeks and then analyze performance to figure out whether it’s worth your marketing resources.
Who knows? Maybe Reels is the missing piece in your social strategy. 
Feature Image Credit: Kar Brulhart (used with permission)

Today, you’ll learn step-by-step how to do a content audit that works – and we know it works because we’ve grown our traffic 10x over the past few years using content. And in-depth audits have helped us get there. In this guide, you’ll learn: Where to find your site’s content strengths Steps to repair content…
The post Your A-Z Content Audit Guide appeared first on Benchmark Email.

Last Updated on April 4, 2022 by Rakesh GuptaBig Idea or Enduring Question: How do you @mentioned related users in a Post to Chatter Salesforce Flow action?  Objectives: After reading this blog, you’ll be able to:  Use the post to chatter action in the record-triggered flow Use Get element to
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Last Updated on April 4, 2022 by Rakesh GuptaBig Idea or Enduring Question: How do you automatically Post a message to Chatter Group message when a user creates an event? In Salesforce, Chatter Group represents the group of people. It’s a great way to boost collaboration in your organization. You
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People always tell you that building a business isn’t a quick and easy journey and that the “overnight success” stories you see tend to downplay the years of work that go into creating that success. So, when I started my innovative undergarments company, Perkies, I expected it to be about the journey, not the destination.What I didn’t expect was for it to be a three-year journey of figuring out how to develop my signature product (a sticky bra with replaceable adhesives) before selling a single unit.I’m not saying it wasn’t worth it. Seeing the glowing reviews from women who feel more confident while wearing our product makes up for every long day spent cold calling manufacturers, every prototype I had to assemble with my own hands, and every rash I developed while trying to find body-safe adhesives that actually worked (true story).I also don’t think my multi-year timeline was out of the ordinary for creating a product that hasn’t existed before. But, there are things I wish I had known to set expectations for myself (and maybe help the process go a little smoother).So, to help other inventive entrepreneurs who are embarking on the journey of developing a product, here are four things I wish I had known from the get-go.1. It Was More Complicated Than I ThoughtWhen I first had the idea to create a product for women who were tired of throwing away an entire sticky bra just because the adhesives had worn down, it seemed so obvious. “How has nobody thought of this before?” I wondered.I quickly realized, though, that while others had probably had the same idea, no one had gone to the trouble of turning the idea into a final product—likely because there are so many steps involved in doing so.Here’s just a brief overview: I had to determine where to source the materials for each component of the product, and then find separate manufacturers to put all those elements together. We ended up working with a manufacturer in China for the bras, manufacturers in the U.S. for the three different adhesives we use, and an adhesive converter who laminates the adhesive layers together into the finalized stack up. I also had to work with many different experts to develop specialized materials and processes—and quickly realized I wouldn’t even be able to automate everything immediately. Until recently, I was cutting the specific shape of our adhesives by hand, and I still add in the layered pull tabs myself.And this is all on top of shipping and fulfillment, plus the supply chain issues that have been plaguing us since, well, the plague started.There were a lot of steps between my original idea and my early prototypes (on the left) to the functioning sticky bra with replaceable adhesives we have today (on the right)!Oh, and Murphy’s Law applied at just about every step along the way. I can’t count the number of times I had to extend deadlines because I was waiting on a manufacturer, I’ve been close to tears because a supplier sent me something that didn’t work, or I accidentally sent a faulty sample to a customer.Ultimately, what separates an idea from an actual product is entrepreneurs who have the grit to get through all of this. Based on my experience, I’d recommend giving yourself enough time and mental fortitude to deal with the complications. I also found it incredibly valuable to make friends with other product-based founders to commiserate with when I was in the weeds.2. I Either Needed a Lot of Time or a Lot of MoneyI knew that I’d be able to streamline the development process if I could raise a little funding: I could pay materials experts to source the perfect adhesives, I could pay manufacturers to rush my orders, and the like. Unfortunately, I quickly found that no investors were interested in signing a check until I had a working prototype. I couldn’t create my product without money, and I couldn’t raise money without a product.Instead, I sacrificed my own time to do the R&D. And it was not glamorous. I would spend weeks finding manufacturers who could answer tiny questions like whether the adhesive could be a few millimeters thicker to improve adhesion. For months, every time I went to a workout class, I wore different adhesives to see what held up to sweat. I’d invite friends over with different bra sizes to test molds for me. It was a lot of time and effort for tiny gains toward my goal.You can’t be afraid to ask for help—friends were often thrilled to help me test product samples.I also opted to move in with my family to give myself more financial runway (not that I had much of a choice). If you don’t have the luxury of moving home to start a business, I’d recommend making a plan for how you will fund your idea or how you’ll give yourself enough time to put in the work. Can you find friends and family or angel investors who believe in you despite not having a prototype? (I’ve since found that former founders are much more understanding of the product development process than VC firms or angel investors who have never started a company.) Can you do product development on nights and weekends while you continue working your full-time job?3. I Needed to Build Interest Long Before My Product Was ReadyEspecially since I didn’t know how long this whole process would take, it was tempting to not tell anyone except my closest friends and family what I was working on until the product was ready.Instead, I pushed myself out of my comfort zone and started creating traction on our social channels. We didn’t have product images yet, so instead I designed fun graphics hinting at our final product. I also found that followers loved getting a peek into the behind-the-scenes of product development. In the end, it was helpful to already have a following of excited potential customers once the bras were ready to sell.Early Perkies marketing images gave a sense of our product shape and purpose.Another valuable way I found to start building brand trust (and making a little money) was developing an ancillary product that I could get to market faster. While doing early customer research, I realized sticky nipple covers were a popular undergarment in this category and that they would be much easier to develop—so we launched “Perkies Petals” six months before the sticky bra came out. This had the bonus benefit of helping me iron out kinks in sales and shipping before the sticky bras were ready.Finally, I learned a lot about the common strategy of soliciting pre-orders. We did a friends and family pre-order for the bras, and while the influx of cash was nice, it also added extra pressure, especially when we had to keep pushing back the timeline (see point #1).My advice: If you’re considering a pre-order, only do it with people who you know will be forgiving! And whatever approach you choose, do everything you can to build buzz along the way. The last thing you want is to finally have a product—and then spend months and months finding customers to buy it.4. Product Development Never StopsAfter pushing back the launch timeline again and again (leaving my friends and family who had pre-ordered hanging), I finally set myself a hard deadline to launch in May 2021. Even though the product still didn’t feel 100% there, I knew I needed to get it to market at some point (plus, I wanted to get people their backless bras before summer!).This was hard for a perfectionist like me, but it ended up being incredibly helpful. I’ve learned so much from hearing about the experiences of real customers using the product. It was a good reminder that, while you obviously don’t want a product that disappoints customers, you can and will continue improving things even after you launch. (Remember: the iPhone didn’t launch with all the features it has today!)Most of the feedback I have received has been excellent, but based on some constructive notes from customers, I’ve changed the location of the pull tab on the replaceable adhesive, improved the instructions that come with the bra, and more. We’re also in the process of developing new products to keep the business growing.In other words, even after almost four years, I’m far from done. Product development truly never stops, and if that sounds exhausting, this may not be the right path for you. But if you, like me, think the constant journey to build something new will energize you every day, then stick with it. If you can put your pride aside and put in the time and effort, you’ll create something customers love—and that’s an amazing feeling.