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Great overview on what a Content Strategy is and all it entails

What is Content Strategy? Content strategy plans for the creation, publication, and governance of useful, usable content. Necessarily, the content strategist must work to define not only which content will be published, but why we're publishing it in the first place. Otherwise, content strategy isn't strategy at all: it's just a glorified production line for content nobody really needs or wants. (See: your company's CMS.) Content strategy is also-surprise-a key deliverable for which the content strategist is responsible. Its development is necessarily preceded by a detailed audit and analysis of existing content-a critically important process that's often glossed over or even skipped by project teams.

Last year this time we posted about setting up a budget for your web strategy.. So, we decided to do the same this year. When we plan a web strategy for our clients it always includes a cost budget and time budget . Here's a generic version of our web strategy budget, including what 48Web budgets for our web strategy. This post turned out extremely long so we'll be releasing it in chunks - for easier reading. In this post we'll cover the hosting aspect of your web strategy.

Interesting details on a Web Strategy Survey.. Some interesting details include: - More than 60% had a web strategy that looked at least 6 months out - Only 57% of respondents can say they are confident their existing strategy is effective - Most effective strategies were planned six months in advance

More than 130 internet stakeholders were surveyed in December of 2008 on how they are approaching their web strategy in the upcoming year. Survey respondents represented internet professionals at corporations of all sizes, non-profit organizations and agencies.

Great social media strategies for resaurants

The financial crisis is likely to hit the fine dining industry very hard. Already there have been reports of exclusive London restaurants slashing their prices in order to maintain a steady flow of clientele and therefore subsequent cashflow. Competing on price, however, is never a wise, or usually profitable, strategy, so dining establishments need to look for alternate ways to bring in the customers. One easy way is to develop a social media strategy to connect with your customers and create a community of regular diners.

An intro to Diigo Groups and a call to join Diigo if you haven't yet. Oh.... and join the Web Strategy Group...

If you are a Diigo user (you *have* to be if you do Social Bookmarking) - check out the group I made today - Web Strategy. If you are interested in Web Strategy, Social Media, Internet Marketnig, etc… you are advised to join the group to share great articles and get in on the Web Strategy discussions.

You're responsible for the direction of your online strategies for your company or organization, specifically using social media and computing tools to reach, connect, and build communities around your brand. Most folks at your company know this space is important, but don't know how to do it, they are relying on your expertise to think holistically, integrated, and strategically.

Jeb makes a great case for developing a web strategy for your business - and provides a seven step strategic plan that should work for you. I'm glad he mentioned something we are always preaching - "Analytics or Tweak and Repeat". Once you implement your strategy you should always be tracking it and honing it.

Is your business struggling to survive in the current economic environment? Are you seeing your cash reserves dwindle as new business drys up? Even if you are doing well I have the same advice- Use the web to save and grow your business.

As I mentioned last year - as well as on many posts since - analytics is a critical facet of your web strategy not only because it provides measurement, but it is one of the most valuable research tools you have at your disposal. Most people install analytics on their website and never look at the data again. There are many reasons for this. Some people don't have time and most just don't know what the data means.

Situation: You run a social media program at a corporation, and you need to measure to improve your program, but more importantly to show to your bosses that this 'new media' program is worth it's weight. Challenges: You see the immediate value of a community program but your management is unconvinced. Furthermore, the brand police and the traditional hard-liners don't like your 'open-thinking' type of revolt. There may be other challenges too: lots of activity but few people, or you simply don't know where to start. Goals Deliver a report that demonstrates the value of a social media program as well as helps you improve the program over time.

Great overview on how to measure the social media aspect of your business's web strategy...

Hyperlocal search strategy is an often underlooked market for many local businesses - especially the local service industry. If you are a plumber in Des Moines, IA and you aren't in the "local listings" when you search "des moines, ia plumber" - than the people companies listed are stealing business from you... Even if you are the #1 organic search result

The top web search results are buried by three local search results. If you're a local business, and you want to get traffic, you'd better get placement in that 'three box' (or in some cases, 'ten box') that shows local results. On the bright side, this version of universal search gives you yet another way to hop, skip and jump right past all the other web search results. All you need to know is how to best position your site for a local search listing.

This is an AMAZING digest of internet marketing posts from 2008 covering SEO, Social Media tools and strategy, twitter, facebook, friendfeed, blogging etc. This is a must read for any internet marketer from beginner to advanced.

Here's how this works: In the Internet Marketing Best Posts "series," I take posts that are typically timeless - they're not confined to a specific event or news occurrence - they're valuable for the long haul in terms of Internet Marketing and creative strategy. Hopefully, you'll see that these posts are still relevant in a few years down the road. These posts range from beginner to advanced with a greater emphasis on the more intermediate posts. I'd argue that if you're starting your Internet Marketing business with not much know-how, you should check out the 2007 posts; in fact, most may still find them relevant regardless of the skill level.

Search Marketing investment is a staple of an effective web strategy and the "build it and they will come" strategy does not work. No matter how good your product, content, or website is - they will not come unless you invest in your SEM web strategy.

It appears a large proportion of small business owners are still stuck in the "build it and they will come" mentality. The study highlights that most small businesses have developed websites, but have done little more to enhance their online business presence. According to the report, over 59% of small business owners who own websites don't use paid search marketing, and of those, a whopping 90% have never tried it.

It's fantastic that interest in social media is so high, but I'm alarmed at the number of brands and agencies that are ready to jump into social media to take "advantage" of audience concentration in Facebook, Twitter, and other fast-growth outposts. What's lacking in most social media programs is an actual strategy. If you don't know precisely why you're in social media, with whom you want to engage, and how you're going to measure success, you're not ready to start.

Some quick hit items that may help you have a better web strategy in 2009.

Kind of a light hearted step by step for Internet Marketers. Usually I fly past any list of more than 10 items...but this one caught my eye thanks to Lisa Solomon at www.freemoneyhour.com.

Twitter is a great resource for doing research...

Twitter search for Web Strategy

Quit treating your website like a brochure! You can communicate to your visitors with video, audio, written word, and even in a conversational manner through blogs and discussion forums. If you have the option of communicating so clearly to your visitors … why aren't you?

Innovation around Web 2.0 technologies continues to pick up steam as companies look for ways to cut spending and get more from the solutions they choose. Polly Traylor outlines some of the Web-oriented tools and strategies.

In combination with the first article comment it gives an insight into two different viewpoints on certain aspects in this article.

Chris Andersons book "Free" - some inspirational thoughts on business strategies.

Anderson's book gives you some inspirational thoughts on successful business strategies. In my case I preferred to listen to the audio book. Here it is available for free as ebook and audio book versions.

At the 2010 Inbound Marketing Summit in Boston, Bernie Borges was a panelist on the topic of "Driving More Qualified Leads into your Funnel." One of the questions from the audience was from a marketer who shifted his 2010 online marketing budget from paid to organic inbound marketing. He said that his lead performance had declined and asked for input on how to address it. He didn't give any other details, so Bernie gave his input from both a B2B and B2C perspective. Read more...

Luckily, you don't have to keep up with every detail. But there are some important SEO trends you should know about as we go further into 2009. I'll break the list down into two sections - Strategy and Tactics and Industry/Big Picture Trends - and then turn it over to you at the end.