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  •  
    In a post at Email Marketing Reports, Mark Brownlow presents a screenshot that looks like a page from a 19th-century novel: lengthy paragraphs filled with sentences of uniform length. That, he notes emphatically, is not how your email messages should look. "In fact, you wouldn't read the words if that was ... more
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    At least once a day, writes Joe Pulizzi at the Junta 42 blog, he receives an email asking how much content marketing (print and online) should cost. The short answer: It depends. "Look at it this way," he says. "I can pay $12 dollars to play eighteen holes of golf ... more
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    According to Brian Clark, founder of Copyblogger, using the right words in the right way in your website copy will consistently help convert visitors to buyers while also determining "how well you rank in search engines and how much traffic you get." In a popular post at the blog, Clark offers ... more
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    According to Lee Odden, the SEO concept of "fresh content" has been distorted by a convoluted game of telephone—one person giving information to the next, each with his or her own interpretation, until the final person receives a definition quite unlike the original. "I'm sure the genesis was something like: Someone ... more
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    During the hot summer months, email marketers often despair of subscribers whose minds are somewhere else. "So how can you make your email marketing messages matter to office workers counting the minutes before happy hour on sidewalk patios?" asks Ajay Goel at the Webbiquity blog. "Or busy moms and dads ... more
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    When it comes to SEO, writes Ian Lurie at Conversation Marketing, "Publishers have it easy: Make some changes, site- or server-wide, and you're a hero." This isn't quite the case, though, for writers and editors. "Editorial staff," he continues, "have to apply sound SEO and online writing practices to every ... more
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    American businesses spent $5 billion reaching the Hispanic market in 2008, and for good reason. By 2013, Latinos will control 10 percent—or a staggering $1.4 trillion—of the country's buying power. So reports Chanin Ballance in an article at MarketingProfs. "That puts Hispanics ahead of all other minority groups, including African ... more
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    Want to increase traffic to your site? A recent article at the SEO Traffic Spider recommends using social-media optimization (SMO) as a highly effective method for search-engine optimization of any website. As the name implies, you optimize your site by advertising it through social-media sites and online communities. According to the ... more
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    It's been a long time coming, writes Dylan Boyd at Email Wars, but with "new systems of marketing automation we are finally gaining ground to creating trigger-based campaigns on actions, behavior and timing." Boyd provides a thorough rundown on various trigger-based campaigns you might employ. Here are a few highlights to ... more
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    In a post at the Online Marketing blog, Lee Odden notes that one of the biggest fears for website owners is a sudden drop in search-engine rankings. Case in point: Google's recent 'Mayday' algorithmic change affecting long-tail searches (see Google Webmaster Matt Cutts' video explanation). It left many webmasters up-in-arms ... more
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    If a subject line gets truncated on its way to your subscriber's inbox, cautions Mark Brownlow at Email Marketing Reports, it can do more than cause a "wry smile" or a "little embarrassment." It can cause outright confusion, or it can tell your customers something you didn't even mean to ... more
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    "Facebook has more than 400 million active users who collectively spend more time on the platform than on any other website in the world, sharing detailed information about their likes, dislikes, and preferences," writes Matt Lawson at MarketingProfs. In other words, the social networking powerhouse is a potential bonanza for search ... more
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    It's the social weapon you just don't hear enough about: SlideShare. At first glance, it comes across as a mere archive for uploading presentations, but oh—it's so much more than that! When used correctly, SlideShare can help you cleverly boost your messaging, your brand, your very corporate presence online. Consider these four ways ... more
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    Your B2B email marketing program might have a good reason for sending a steady stream of one-size-fits-all messages to prospects. "The idea being that by keeping these folks exposed to your company's name and logo, you'd stay 'top of mind,'" notes Ardath Albee at Marketing Interactions. "That process is now ... more
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    Whether you've run out of inspiration or simply want to refine a good idea, a freewriting session might be the best way to get your best thoughts on the page. "I've seen people use it to create a strategic direction for their company, brainstorm ideas for a personal branding campaign, ... more
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    "The true test of pursuing either an SEO campaign or pay-per-click (PPC) advertising (or both)," writes Scott Buresh in a recent Pro article at MarketingProfs, "is knowing that it all boils down to your company philosophy, return on investment (ROI) objectives, budget, and numerous other monetary and marketing factors." To help ... more
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    "It doesn't matter how great your video is," writes Larry Kim in a Pro article at MarketingProfs. "[I]f people don't know it exists, it doesn't have much business value." That means you have to optimize your YouTube video for maximum visibility. So, how do you get the crowd to turn ... more
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    As email becomes ever more prominent in the typical marketing mix, we can expect a few slip-ups and oversights. According to Max Kalehoff—writing at the AttentionMax blog—telltale symptoms of lax email practices include an ignorance of basic etiquette and less-than-rigorous spam compliance. "I'm not going to out anyone (including a prominent technology ... more
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    If you're not in the market for luxury real estate, there's a good chance you haven't seen the glossy brochures that Christie's Great Estates and Sotheby's International Realty produce for their multimillion-dollar listings. "It is a shame that few of us do get to experience this world," writes Rohit Bhargava ... more
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    "Adding social-media icons to your email campaigns … takes just a few seconds," writes Jim Hitch at the Emma blog, "but it can increase your reach and help you identify your most avid followers. Who knew all of that could be as simple as pushing a couple of buttons?" According ... more
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    In a post at Copyblogger, Sonia Simone put an interesting twist on the perennial question "Ginger or Mary Ann?" by asking whether your blog is the sexy-starlet or the wholesome girl-next-door type. Ginger, for example, wasn't going to let something like a shipwreck interfere with her glamorous persona. "It takes some ... more
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    "Trust is one the hardest things to build into the 'blink' factor on a website," says Patsi Krakoff in a recent post at the Writing on the Web blog. "It's one thing to grab readers' attention with great headlines and clever tag lines. It's another level of challenge when the ... more
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    If we were to suggest plain text for your next email campaign, you'd probably laugh in our faces. "The superiority of HTML email to plain-text email for driving response has become an accepted truth in email marketing," says Mark Brownlow in a post at the Email Marketing Reports blog. "Alchemy ... more
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    Does your marketing content tell buyers what they want to hear—or only what you want to say? Writing at the Marketing Interactions blog, Ardath Albee reports on a study that found content is relevant to a customer's needs only 42 percent of the time—and a lack of compelling content reduces ... more
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    By now, it's pretty clear to most people what works in the blogosphere—and what doesn't. Not everyone, however, has caught on. Accordingly, Frank Days used a post at Tangyslice to discuss the functions a blog simply won't serve. To help these extremely late adopters, Days provided a list of what ... more

Writing: See all 393 items

Writing articles by the best and brightest in the field

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  • Five Lessons From the Social Media Frontlines by Debra Ellis
    The rules of social media are just now being written, so they are more like guidelines than well-defined best-practices. In other words, it doesn't make sense to blindly follow rules someone else has set. There's only one sure way to know what works for you in social media: Test it. ... more
  • Six Reasons Print Belongs in Your Media Mix (or Why Digital Popularity Brings Print Opportunity) by Gordon Plutsky
    Just because marketers are jumping on the interactive-marketing bandwagon doesn't mean things on the interactive side are all rosy. The decreasing numbers for print don't necessarily mean a particularly high ROI for all digital initiatives. Still, there is opportunity—but you need embrace a multichannel approach. Catalogs are a great example. more
  • How to Identify and Avoid This Survey-Questionnaire Design Problem: Mixed-Mode Scales by Carey V. Azzara
    Data from mixed-mode questions are hard, if not impossible, to interpret accurately. But such flawed survey questions abound, perhaps because at first blush they seem entirely workable. Here's why they're not—and how to avoid them in your survey instruments. more
  • Formulate Your Content Strategy in 10 Simple Steps by Steve Sponder
    Content is moving from being among the final considerations of a Web-development project to being front and center in a digital-marketing strategy. And, more and more, brands are recognizing that a strategic approach to content is becoming important. To help, here's a simple 10-step systematic process for formulating a content ... more
  • URGENT: Bussiness moneys for you Dear, sir!! A Reformed Spam Writer Helps You Stay Out of the Junk Folder by Anna Goldsmith
    About 10%-20% of all emails you send—even to people who requested them—will get accidentally routed to the junk/spam folder. What about that other 80%-90%? Those emails may not be spam, but they will have definitely broken some of these six rules for avoiding a one-way trip to email oblivion. more
  • How to Use Direct Mail to Drive Targeted Website Traffic by Dean Rieck
    If you want to drive traffic to your website, which media should you use? Too many people suffer from an "oil and water" mentality when it comes to mixing online and offline media. But they work well together. And when you need to drive online traffic, an integrated approach can ... more
  • Five Reasons Why Deep Links Help—Not Hurt—Your Site by Larry Kim
    Historically, companies that monitor links to their websites haven't looked kindly upon inbound "deep links"—links to site pages other than the homepage or other top-level pages. But the truth is that deep links can actually be really good for a website. Here are five benefits they provide. more
  • Five Ways to Get Unique, Keyword-Relevant Content on Your E-Commerce Site by Adam J. Thompson
    E-commerce sites can be particularly challenging for search-engine optimization (SEO) because they tend to lack unique, relevant content. The challenge can be easily (though not necessarily quickly) overcome with these five content techniques that can help you search-optimize e-commerce websites. more
  • Two Survey Questionnaire Flaws to Avoid: Scary Matrix Questions and Unbalanced Scales by Carey V. Azzara
    Poorly designed questions and scaling problems can derail your research efforts faster than you can say "the cat in the hat"! To help you avoid a few of the more common and onerous problems, this article explores two separate but related questionnaire-design issues: matrix questions and unbalanced scales. more
  • Gone Phishing: Why eBay Emails Can Be Hard to Trust by DJ Waldow
    People tend to open an email based on the two things they can see in their inbox: the From name and the Subject line. If recipients receive an email from a sender they do not recognize or trust, they are less likely to open it. If an email with a ... more
  • Content Curation: Engage Your Customers in Three Simple Steps by Pawan Deshpande
    Most marketers are eager to achieve a level of engagement with current and prospective customers, but the majority stop dead in their tracks when they consider this question: Where am I going to find the time to develop all the content necessary to do it? But here's a little secret: ... more
  • Why Do People Write Like That? (And How You Can Avoid Doing the Same) by Ernest Nicastro
    Those who write in corporatese love a paradigm, whether it's new, shifting, or otherwise. And they would never think of simply using something when they can leverage it. But there's a better way. more
  • How to Create a Content Strategy for B2B Nurturing Campaigns Pro Contentby Paul McKeon
    If you are like many B2B marketers, you have great content-delivery tools—in the form of marketing-automation or campaign-management software—but a short supply of effective content to push to the market. Here's how to create content for the four stages of the buying cycle. more
  • Five Things to Think About Before You Launch Your Next Website by Jonathan Kranz
    Most companies do a fairly good job keeping pace with technologies. But the harder, yet more rewarding, work involves keeping up with how people use the Internet to learn, communicate, shop, and entertain themselves. By matching your Web presence to your customers' Web habits, you stand the best chance of ... more
  • Email Marketing for 'Dads and Grads' Season by Wendy Lowe
    To some, June means the official start of those lazy days of summer. To many retailers, though, June is a busy month, because it's when they pick up extra revenue from those shopping for "Dads and Grads"—Father's Day and graduation season. How do you get your share of that revenue? more
  • What I Did Right: How I Averaged 80 Comments and 135 Tweets in My First Week of Blogging by Lisa Petrilli
    My first-ever two blog posts have received 159 comments and have been tweeted 272 times. I'm simply stunned. But my foray into blogging has shown me that it can be a Herculean task to keep up with responding to comments and tweets while balancing clients and life. The reality is ... more
  • The Secret to Reaching the Latino Market by Chanin Ballance
    To successfully reach the Hispanic audience, marketers should understand that what works with the general market can't simply be transferred to the Latino market. Instead, messages must be culturally adapted to capture the thought, meaning, and feeling, not just the words. more
  • Establish Credibility and Persuade Customers via Contributed Articles by Ford Kanzler, Bob Peterson
    This is the strategy: Get company executives or yourself published in an editorial context for significantly greater marketing credibility than self-publishing another whitepaper that just sits on your website. more
  • The Promises and Pitfalls of Translating Marketing Content  by Swamy Viswanathan
    When you're marketing to global audiences, your messages must be accurate, concise, and targeted to establish consumer trust and brand loyalty. Satisfied customers often result in repeat purchases and increased return on investment (ROI). That is where translating marketing content comes into play, ensuring that messages are properly conveyed to ... more
  • Seven Score and Seven Years Ago: Writing Lessons We Can Learn From Lincoln's Masterpiece by Ernest Nicastro
    As marketing professionals, business owners, and salespeople, our livelihood depends in large part on our ability to communicate. And as we prepare for our next marcom project, marketing campaign, sales presentation, or public-speaking opportunity, we would do well to call to mind the lessons to be learned from Lincoln's masterpiece. more
  • Brand Language: A 2020 Vision by Mark Thomson, Alton Wright
    One has only to scan news reports from the beginning and the end of the past decade to see how much our language has changed in the interim. The usual suspects—technology, consumer culture, politics—were joined by new agents of lexical change: think terrorism, economic instability, and social networking. Here are ... more
  • When Best-Practices Aren't: Five Ways to Break the Rules of Email Marketing and Still Win the Game by DJ Waldow
    A best-practice is the generally preferred practice, one that will make your company more money, thus making your boss happy, which in turn will make you happy. If it were only that easy. more
  • The End of the Long-Copy vs. Short-Copy Debate by Barry Densa
    Which converts better and drives more sales: long-form copy or short-form copy? "The more you tell, the more you sell," claim the adherents of long copy. "No one has time to read below the fold," counter short-copy partisans. Of course, both sides are right... more
  • A Five-Step Guide to Take Your Campaign Global by Dina Paglia
    How can you ensure that your translated campaign carries the impact of the original? More important, how do you avoid the enormous cost (new creative, photography, design) of having to launch a new marketing campaign for each local market? more
  • A 10-Question Lead-Generation Checkup Checklist for Your Website Pro Contentby Bob DeStefano
    Is your website a lead-generation machine? Your website can be your most powerful marketing tool, delivering a steady stream of new business leads and filling your sales pipeline. Find out your website's lead-generation potential by giving it a lead-generation checkup. more

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  • Lead Generation How-To Guide
    Great product, great sales team, great marketing collateral - now what? People to sell to, of course. Put your lead generation tactics under the microscope with this enlightening how-to guide. Get more and better qualified leads, faster today.
  • Paid Search Advertising Template
    If you're a little intimidated by the prospect of Paid Search Advertising, seriously, join the crowd. Here it is though -- a guiding light through the complex waters of Paid Search Advertising. We assembled a 30-page template to make learning and implementing a successful paid search advertising campaign for your firm as easy as possible.
  • Benchmark Survey: Communication Skills
    Link directly to the raw (aggregate) data in this 2005 survey about the skill level survey respondents have in various ways of communicating. With access to the raw data, you can view the results, and even filter them to see how a subset of companies in your country or industry answered. In this way, you can interpret the data in the most meaningful way for you.

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