Pull Marketing Blog

How To Use Your Weekends and Down Time For Inbound Marketing Content Creation

  

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When I'm talking to people about Inbound Marketing, one of the ideas I always try to get across is that you must keep one acronym in your head - ATC or Always Think Content. This means that you're not just thinking about content creation when you're sitting at your desk and say to yourself "I need to do some marketing!" Instead, following ATC means you look at every event that happens in your day as a potential source of content ready to make it on your blog or on your social media sites.

Yes, this means weekends too.

I want to invite you to experience the ATC challenge this weekend. Fortunately, to make the challenge easier, I have created a content creation strategy guide to help you make the most of your weekend.

1. Bring Your Digital Camera Along

One of the biggest myths about blog posts is that they always have to be in the written form. Taking your digital camera along with you on the weekend and documenting any interesting or relevant experiences you have is just as valid a form of content creation as sitting down and writing an article.

When taking pictures for your blog, try to develop a common thread among the shots so that they have some editorial quality to them. Once the weekend is over, you can curate these photos with some captions and you have a new blog post ready to go.

2. Try Out A New Product

On Twitter yesterday, I challenged Mike Volpe (@mvolpe), the VP of Marketing at HubSpot, to conduct a review of the iPad as soon as he has had time to use it over the weekend. While there will be thousands of iPad reviews online by the time it launches in stores, I value Mike's point of view because of his position as a thought leader in the Inbound Marketing community. I know that he's going to look at the device from a marketing perspective and be able to give insights that general tech or consumer reviewers won't be able to provide.

If your weekends are a time to go shopping, look at the products you buy as something that can be reviewed with your own unique angle. Don't try to satisfy the general consumer population when you do this. Focus on what your ideal clients might want to know. Put together a few bullet points, grab your easy to use video camera, and speak as if you're talking to just one person. In a few short minutes, you'll have valuable content to post on your blog.

3. Do Impromptu Interviews

If you're serious about marketing your business with Inbound Marketing, you always need to be carrying a video camera like the Flip. When you start a blog, you have started your own media channel. This means you need to be on the lookout for news, interesting people or events, and find ways to engage with your audience. Don't be afraid to ask the people you're talking to if you could interview them about something related to your site. They don't have to be experts - they just need to have an opinion.

To help with this, carry around a list of questions that you can ask to anyone you come across. You can then put up these individual interviews or edit them into themed montages. Just by stepping outside of your comfort zone slightly, you have the chance to make use of other peoples' opinions and knowledge to grow your blog.

Have you made the jump to entering the Always Thinking Content mode? What other quick and easy content creation tips do you have for using the weekends as a source of blog material? Leave your comments below!