Treat your blog like a Porsche – How to make the most of evergreen blog content
Porsche makes evolutionary changes to its 911 (2012 version shown). A blog can benefit from a similar approach.
Many people have heard of Porsche, but only the die-hard enthusiasts reflect on the history of its most famous product, the 911. The nameplate has been redesigned 5 times in its storied history – a new one is being introduced for 2012. But each time a redesign was announced, car enthusiasts understood what kind of vehicle to anticipate – a sports car with a rear-mounted 6 cylinder engine in a rounded rear body, 2+2 seating, and headlamps pronounced above the hood and fenders.
Now what does an automobile have to do with blogs? Well, a 911 is an example of an evolutionary updates that retain favorite aspects and gain enhancement with new ones. You can take the same approach with evergreen content, articles that consistently attract traffic for your site.
First, what is the benefit, besides drawing traffic?
Evergreen posts can give an indicator for new content, by implying what topics can be repeated. Using the Porsche example, you may have a popular evergreen post on driving a Porsche 911; A potential follow-up post could be on a driving comparison of the 911 against other Porsche models, like a Boxster, or an older model, like a 924 (We’ll skip the 914 to avoid hurt feelings of the Porsche sport car club arguments in the 1970s). The choice can give an opportunity to build content that can keep you audience browsing on your site a bit longer.
An evergreen post can also provide an ease in brainstorming new post ideas, refreshing the mind by allowing a focus on topics that require few thinking steps to extend. If your post is a year old, for example, find an aspect of the topic that has been updated. I did a post on Microsoft’s first store, then did a follow up when Microsoft announced its plans a year later. These kinds of updates can save you time behind the laptop because some of the structure is already there.
Even posts from bloggers or sharing from readers can also give new branches from an evergreen topic. This is particularly useful for topics such as sports, politics, entertainment, and neighborhood events.
Here are a few ideas for creating and managing evergreen content:
Use analytics tools to first identity evergreen content
To determine an evergreen content, look at the content report in your web analytics solution and examine the average time on site and visits. You should have an idea of when posts were made. Many blog URLs can be set to include the date.
When you look at the content report, you can then see a post and its date, then sort by time on site or exit rate. An ordered comparison can be done, but for examining a sort based on multiple dimensions you would have to export into a spreadsheet.
Use site search to determine topics that visitors may be looking for
Sometimes search results from the site search reports can give ideas on what people are generally looking for and not finding (If you are not sure, this is an activated feature on many analytics tools such as Google Analytics – A quick refresher will be posted soon). Those ideas can influence your evergreen topic due to their degree of relativity to the topic. For example, let’s say you find results that indicate that visitors are looking for Porsche repairs. Your blog may be on Porsche history, so post on repair history may be a good topic to build upon past historical views and develop an intro into repair topics that may be closer to what people are looking for. The best approach is to use your experience on the topic when reviewing site search
To date or not to date?
Consider what naming the date in the title can do — Dates can, er, “date” the material, but I have seen blogs receive traffic for a post written more than a few years ago. Try to keep dates naturally in the post, rather than in the title.
Retweet evergreen posts with updates
In addition to making a new post, you can update the evergreen post with additional material or a few comments regarding what is new. Consider also sharing evergreen posts in a your email distribution as well
Consider a video version of your evergreen topics
A video version of your evergreen content can give a different spin on the topic and can be another augment.
Consider giveaways of related plans and how-tos
Giveaways become great evergreen topics that continue to attract traffic. White paper downloads can be giveaways, as are how-to charts or informative graphs.
Consider contrarian views
A friend of mine sent me a post about a filter bubble online – how the scope of internet information can become narrow due to a dependency of an algorithm matching search usage, and was sent as help to a post I was writing on the spread of information. Most evergreen posts are usually about a utilitarian topics, but some reasonable debate can infuse life into even the most pedestrian of topics. An article on planning holiday marketing can be a debate about whether holiday catalogs are really useful, for example.
Managing A Facebook Fan Page Crisis – Lessons from a Pfizer Hacking
Pfizer had a hack to its Facebook page, but it managed the problem (like any business should)
Pfizer recently addressed a hacking attempt to their Facebook Fanpage. The hacker took control of the page and made a few illegal posts before Pfizer regained control once more. No business likes having its page hijacked, but it is particularly troubling for small businesses. Small businesses can not always recover as quickly. Still, if a loss of control happens, a few steps can be used to manage followers and minimize problems.
- First, to prevent consider using HTTPS for Facebook page access, particularly if the page is accessed while mobile. This is done by a simple setting adjustment. You can learn security tips at these pages at Lifehacker and Tek3D.
- Use Twitter for updating your followers on what has happened. Focus on rectifying the problem, but give updates along the way to let folks know your business is on top of it.
- Once you have taken administration control back, summarize what happened on your Facebook page or blog post. This also helps those who do not follower Twitter understand the problem as well as bringing closure to the situation.
- Note the dates of the problem. Facebook Insights does not filter out the data, so you may have to adjust your assessment of fanpage performance to exclude the compromised period. Also use annotation in your web analytics solutions as well if traffic is arriving from Facebook to your site.
Groupon gives lessons for effective digital coupons (sort of)
Groupon experiments with a new car promotion at LaFontaine Cadillac-Buick-GMC
Groupon created an interesting experiment by combining its coupon service with an auto purchase. Working with Lafontaine Cadillac-Buick-GMC, Groupon offered members the chance to purchase a $500 discount towards a Cadillac, GMC, or Buick vehicle between July and December 31st. You can read about the campaign at Autoblog. The jury is out if the deal has been a successful experiment.
The Autoblog post and associated comments raised some great observations, but I have some other ideas that small businesses could learn and apply:
- Consider price sensitivity of a coupon – A coupon should be easy with a price discount clear as a bell. The price sensitivity of a $500 is a token discount, made worse with a $200 buy-in dependent on 100 other people buying a vehicle within 5 months. While the odds favor gathering 100 people by then, it’s still risky given the economy, which leads to….
- Consider the product and brand. The vehicles in the offer are premium vehicles in GM’s brand portfolio. A $301 discount may be helpful to GMC, maybe Buick, but not Cadillac (The Autoblog post comments raise a good point about how much value the discount really brings)
- Consider customer alternatives available – is the deal appealing in the given economy? The dealer is located in Southeast Michigan, a region in which car dealers selling brands from the Big Three typically have a captive audience – Big 3 employees enjoy a company discount on the price of a new vehicle purchase. This also means the dealer competition for after-sales service is higher, since an employee can do business at any dealership. A Groupon program would indeed create a captive audience of 100 customers in a highly competitive market, but given Michigan’s economic condition and the specific nature of the auto employees in southeast Michigan, a coupon could have limited impact.
- If you are planning a coupon, consider using an URL builder in a link of a coupon offer — make sure your business is able to track the reach of a coupon for your intended audience.
Google Plus for Business coming with analytics capability – Is Google Analytics integration included?
The stats for Google Plus + has been very impressive, kicking off a number of Facebook vs. Google + posts on the web. As of end of July 2011 comScore reports 20 million unique visits to the network and averaging nearly 2 million visits a week according to Experian (source: Mashable). Plus users have so far been mostly impressed with the social network which allows groups – called circles – to contain separate newsfeeds, keeping messages organized.
Google Plus
Google has cautioned business owners to not create a Google Plus profile. Venture Beat reports that Google is accelerating its effort to release a Google Plus profile system specifically for business with analytic features. No details have been released if there’s an integration to Google Analytics but the potential incorporation of analytic capability link would be an important development for Google. Google has revamped its Google Analytics solution to include a social media plug in. Furthermore Google +1 buttons can be tracked in Google Analytics, so a refined integration with Google Plus would make further sense – imagine being able to see what traffic from shared networks is effectively coming to your site.
An analytics integration would provide more segmentation opportunities for participating businesses and lead to better identification of how traffic is being lead to a sign up, a purchase, or another designated conversion. Conversion measurement is sorely lacking in Facebook – a marketer can measure likes, comments and sharing a site, but no funnel analysis capability exists in Facebook Insights to guide a business to select a media based on conversion goals.
Linking Google Plus to Google Analytics would continue Google’s refresh effort for the analytics solution. It will also offer new ideas for small businesses beyond the current assumptions of how analytics can be used. (Update as of Sept 22nd, 2011: Google has opened Plus access for anyone, but no word on the business profiles)