40    MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL WORLD

Perhaps in an attempt to revive an ailing patient, some commentators have added a

fourth component: shared. However, as this refers predominantly to content that is
shared on social media platforms, this is seen by most as an extension of either owned (a
post by the organization is shared by users of the platform) or earned (a complimentary
post by a customer is shared with other users).

3.7  CONTENT MARKETING

Although the tactic of creating content to attract potential customers is not new, the
concept of content marketing has become increasingly popular in recent years – so much
so that it is now recognized as a discipline in its own right. Defined by the Content
Marketing Institute (contentmarketinginstitute.com) as ‘a marketing technique of

RESEARCH SNAPSHOT
B2B content marketing objectives
When Pulizzi and Handley (2015) of the Content Marketing Institute asked B2B
marketers how important each of the various content marketing goals were to
their organization, they got the following results.

Upsell/cross-sell 52

Customer
57
evangelism

Customer loyalty 69

Lead nurturing 74

Sales 75

Engagement 81

Lead generation 83

Brand awareness 84

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Percentage

Figure 3.3  The importance of content marketing goals to organizations

Perhaps a little confusing is engagement. Presumably, the content would be indus-

try or product specific that would provoke a response – engagement – from new
or existing customers.
 MARKETING GOES DIGITAL    41

creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire, and
engage  a clearly defined and understood target audience – with the objective of
driving  profitable customer action’, the practice has seen increased relevance due
mainly to changes in search engine algorithms and the growth in social media, which
have placed an emphasis on the quality of online content. This focus on the import-
ance of quality content is, in itself, a result of consumers blanking out traditional mar-
keting messages – and focusing on information they find useful. The objectives of
content marketing can include: sales, increased web traffic, direct sales, customer
retention, brand awareness, brand loyalty, customer acquisition, customer retention,
lead generation or thought leadership, and it is equally valid in both B2B and B2C
markets.
Whilst content can simply be the non-­sales content of a website (e.g. describing how
products can be used – which many would consider to be good practice anyway), stra-
tegic content marketing would include the specific development of content to be pub-
lished in such formats as: social media (e.g. tweets, Facebook entries), blogs, articles,
white papers, case studies, research reports, guides, webinars, shared documents, pod-
casts, Q+A pages, videos, forums, infographics and PR. It is because all of this content
– which is not necessarily hosted on the organization’s website – can bring visitors and
links into the site that it is sometimes referred to as inbound marketing. For the same
reason, those new to the concept have promoted content marketing as demand or
demand-­generation marketing – presumably to move an established traditional form of
marketing into their digital age. As is covered in Chapter 5 with regard to website
content, content for marketing purposes also includes non-­textual items, such as
webinars, videos and podcasts. Throughout this book, I have emphasized the import-
ance of having the right talent and management in place for effective digital marketing,
and this is no more valid than if the organization is considering strategic content
marketing.

MINI  CASE
Smile, please
An example of educational content marketing comes from sellers of dental health-
care products Colgate. Their website is designated as an Oral Care Center, which
provides information on all things teeth – from basic cleaning through to cosmetic
dentistry and oral health during pregnancy.
There are also links to authoritative journal articles on a variety of subjects, one of
which gives an effective example of how content and SEO combine. The paper is
on metallic tastes in the mouth, and so has the header: What Causes Metallic Taste
in Mouth? Is that not exactly what someone would type into a search box if they
had the problem?
See: www.colgate.co.uk/en/uk/oc/oral-­health (regional versions are also available).
42    MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL WORLD

Practitioner and author Rebecca Lieb (2017) suggests that any content marketing
strategy should have four key elements determined before any content can be developed.
They are:

1. Brand. What does a prospective customer think of when they consider the organiza-
tion or its products? What is the promise the brand or organization is making?
2. Messaging. What does the organization want to say and convey? What does it not
want to address? How will the organization deliver its messages?
3. Positioning. Where does the organization stand in its competitive landscape? What
sets it apart from other organizations, brands and products? What are its unique
strengths and key shortcomings?
4. Values. What are the organization’s core values? What aspect of the organization
does it want to promote, e.g. innovative, corporate responsibility, its staff?
Whilst these are eminently sensible, experienced marketers would include these things
in a situational analysis prior to developing any aspect of strategic marketing.

3.8  INFLUENCERS

Marketers have always been aware of influencers; the concept goes back as long as
mankind has traded. However, like all marketing practices, the concept was only formal-
ized much later – in this case, by Katz and Lazarsfeld in 1955 – though the latter had pro-
posed the concept some ten years earlier. Traditional influencers were personalities
chosen to promote particular products or brands – but they were, by necessity, famous
people who commanded attention from the public and high fees from marketers. Fur-
thermore, being personalities in TV, radio or print made these offline influencers a kind
of elite. Digital influencers however, as Chris Anderson points out in his seminal book,
The Long Tail (2006), ‘… aren’t a super-­elite of people cooler than us; they are us’.

PRACTICAL INSIGHT
More or less like us
Chris Anderson’s assertion that digital influencers are us is perhaps behind findings
in a study by Markerly Inc (2016), which suggests that – on Instagram, at least – as
an influencer’s follower numbers rise, the rate of engagement (likes and com-
ments) with followers decreases, with 1K to 10K followers seeming to be the
optimum. As follow counts increase, it seems the super-­influencers are considered
to be less like us.

Every society – be it national or related to a niche hobby or pastime – has always had
(and always will have) a very small number of people who will carry an influence over
other people. In a marketing context, this refers to the influence an individual has
over  the segment of society which has potential customers of any product, brand or
 MARKETING GOES DIGITAL    43

organization. These individuals wield a significant impact on the buying decisions of

people who seek advice, guidance or recommendation on particular products, brands or
organizations – particularly if they act as advocates, or even evangelists. Many such
people tend to act in an altruistic manner, offering their opinion for no financial gain –
gaining notoriety within their chosen society is generally sufficient reward for them.
However, the development of the Internet – social media, in particular – gave these influ-
encers the opportunity to reach thousands of listeners instead of dozens, and millions
instead of hundreds. Furthermore, digital media gave those influencers who were more
mercenary a platform to make money by selling advertising space around their com-
ments and proclamations. Digital marketers soon realized that these online influencers
were not famous personalities, and so could be hired for much lower fees – often simply
the products they were being asked to endorse. Furthermore, where identifying those
who held influence over others offline was very difficult – online, the opposite was true,
with marketers being able to use digital technology to assess influencers’ power by mon-
itoring the blogs, reviews, social media content and websites created by these online
brand advocates.
The use of influencers in marketing is not, however, free. Nor is it infallible. Influencers
are professionals and as such have demands. However, in the great scheme of things that
is strategic marketing, the sums paid to influencers (negotiated by agents with fees being
dependent on the number of readers, followers or friends the influencer has) who can
reach a specific targeted audience in a voice they will respond to are negligible compared
to other marketing activities. However, the fees are seen by many people as little more
than bribery for publicity. Figure 3.4 shows the results of research by Roy (2014), which
suggests what influencers expect in return for endorsing an organization, brand or
product.

4%
4%

12%
31%

Material used to produce content

Exclusive and worthwhile information
Monetary rewards
Free invitations to events
Products being lent to them
16% Other

28%

Figure 3.4  Influencer expectations

44    MARKETING IN THE DIGITAL WORLD

As well as the cost, there are other issues the digital marketer must take into account.
One is that, from a marketing standpoint, many endorsements are – effectively – adverts.
The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) takes the view that paying influencers is advert-
ising, and so all endorsements must be identified as such. However, having a blogger
start an endorsement of a product with the words ‘I have been paid to say this’ rather
defeats the objective of the exercise. As the social media marketer has little control over
the influencer’s output, the brand might find itself being cited by the FTC because the
influencer has broken the rules.
Furthermore, as is the case with all social media marketing, calculating ROI can be diffi-
cult – engagement does not necessarily translate into purchases. There is also the issue of
the quality of the influencer’s followers; are they real or the product of an astute – or
dubious – recruitment strategy? Finally, influencers can go from hero to zero overnight
and even if the brand can extract itself from the misdemeanours of an influencer, the
time and resources put into the relationship are all wasted.

3.9  AFFILIATE MARKETING

As is the case with several subjects in this book, affiliate programmes are a business
model in their own right. However, as the book is about using the Internet as a medium
for marketing, in this section we will consider using affiliates as a means of marketing a
product – not how to make money by setting yourself up as an affiliate.
Affiliate programmes are a form of performance-­based marketing where a commission is
paid only if a sale is completed. Because multiple affiliate programmes can function on
multiple websites, the notion of selling things through the practice has been dubbed
affiliate marketing. Based on the offline practice of referrals – a tourist excursion company
rewarding a hotel for any recommendations made by its staff, for example – affiliate mar-
keting is where the website publisher is paid a fee for each user that clicks on an affiliate
ad and ultimately makes a purchase (or whatever the affiliate conversion objective is).
Because many affiliated sites simply use display or text ads to promote affiliated prod-
ucts, it is common for affiliate marketing to be associated with online advertising. As far
as the user is concerned, an affiliate link is an advert and it is difficult for the uninitiated
to tell the difference. However, just as the hotel owner will do more than simply display
a leaflet for excursions, effective affiliates go further than simply posting ads. Although
the description might be a little unkind to the former, affiliates can be divided into two
camps: (1) the amateur, or part-­timer and (2) the professional, or network affiliate.
The amateur sees being an affiliate as a way of generating a little money from their
website, which – although a money-­making venture – is not a full-­time job or sole source
of income and any income often barely covers the costs of the site. It is this kind of
member that originally made up many of Amazon’s affiliates. This is not to undermine
the online retailer – it is said that much of their early success and brand development
was through their affiliates and, if nothing else, was instrumental in developing the
brand. However, having a significant number of affiliates is no use if they are not actively