How do you view your newsletter—whether e-mail or print? Do you see it as separate from your website? If so, you’re potentially overlooking a huge opportunity to maximize your content marketing impact, says Newt Barrett on Web2journal.com.
In his post, Barrett shares seven ways to get more for your newsletter buck. Depending on your business, all seven of his ideas might not apply, but on his list are a few must-dos to make your newsletter work harder for you:

• Link each newsletter story to a page on your website. “You want your readers to find their way easily to your online home so they can discover lots more about your company, its products and its people,” he says.
• Be sure to make RSS feeds available for your newsletter and for all of your web content. “This is an easy and free way of syndicating your news stories that will extend your newsletter subscriber base dramatically,” Newt says.
• Be sure each article integrates social media sharing capabilities. “If you’re lucky, a great article may go viral and be spread across the web by enthusiasts who value and want to share your content,” he says.”

Back in the late 1990s, Hammock “Publishing” (our original name) helped to organize a small group of custom publishers into a fledgling trade and professional organization called the Custom Publishing Council. Back then, the member companies primarily published magazines for corporate clients. (Although, at Hammock, we had managed online communities since the Compuserve days.)
But as I’ve noted on this blog recently, the scope of our work, and that of our fellow custom publishers, has broadened to include a wide variety of media beyond magazines — video, audio, all forms of online, digital, interactive and social media.

Valentine’s Day is over, but if you’re looking for a good content marketing strategy, you could probably take a few lessons from the best Valentine’s cards and gifts you’ve received through the years. According to the Idea Launch blog, effective content marketing is like a valentine. It is:
•Funny
•Intelligent
•Keeps things fresh and exciting
•Trustworthy
•Dependable
•Thoughtful and considerate
•Understanding
Your blog, e-mail newsletter or Web site can be well-written and come with the best “packaging” in the world, but remember: If it doesn’t have heart and connect with the audience, you won’t make an impact.

Your customers are busy. Preoccupied and stressed. They feel the strain of the economy. Despite the many distractions they face, you have to find a way to successfully connect with them. The key to that connection is content–but not just any content. By creating relevant, engaging and informational content you will find that not only will your prospects become customers, but also that you will build loyalty with your existing customers.

If you are looking for the best places online to keep up with the latest on content marketing, look no further. The savvy folks of Junta42 have done the work for you—reviewing hundreds of blogs to come up with the best of the best when it comes to content marketing blogs for your reading pleasure. While we might be a bit biased (as our own Rex Hammock’s rexblog.com comes in at number 11), we think this is a great list full of cutting edge thinking about content marketing.
Here are the top 5 blogs from the list:

I’ve been in several meetings with marketers recently in which one person at the table will say something like “our digital strategy” and then, in a few moments, someone else at the table will start talking about “our internet strategy.” Now you may think “digital” and “internet” mean the same thing, but consider this: If two people are having a conversation and there is a word that could be interpreted two ways, then the chances are one-in-four that they will understand what each other means.*

Many businesses have realized the importance of maintaining a blog, but how many see their blog as a product? New media marketing master Chris Brogan discusses the importance of viewing your blog as a part of a “content ecosystem,” noting that as soon as you recognize your blog as “only ‘a’ channel, that’s when you start thinking of other outreach opportunities.”
According to Brogan, being able to view your content — and all of your products — as an ecosystem instead of completely separate entities increases its value and opens the door for development.

(A similar post appeared on RexBlog this morning, but I wanted to share it here, as well.)
This morning, I ran across one that is not only interesting — it’s inspiring. It’s inspiring because it underscores the dramatic opportunities that exist when a content company doesn’t let its legacy get in the way of its opportunity.

If you’re not getting all you want out of your content marketing efforts, this content marketing essentials article on copyblogger.com provides a few essential ideas on how to keep readers coming back for more.

1. Offer a reward. Give your readers something that will benefit them in some way. The content must entertain or help, and hopefully do both.
2. Show that you know your stuff, but don’t get a big head. Be a trustworthy source of information. Your readers want someone they can relate to, not an over-their-head college lecturer or smarter-than-everyone-else guru.
3. Create a relationship first: You won’t create relationships—or sell anything—without building trust. Think about creating a “content net” in which you can sell what you have over time and not rely on one hard sell.

Focusing on these content marketing basics and making them part of your overall content marketing strategy should help lead you to the results you are looking for.

The word content today means many things: Writing, photography, video, illustrations, design, interactive games, apps and data. Content can refer to a wide variety of media, also, from beautiful coffee-table magazines to how-to videos appearing on the web.
Because marketers are discovering that the difference between success and failure is often the quality, strategy and measurement of an organization’s content, we’ve decided to more clearly define our services by using the term “content marketing” to stress the solutions and support we can provide our clients.