30Oct 2019 by Bob Cargill
What’s Your Mud?

What’s Your Mud?

Branding, Marketing
What's your mud? What's your secret sauce? What's the one thing you can offer to your audience members that they can't get anywhere else? I read an article in Sports Illustrated recently about this guy who provides Major League Baseball with the mud that's rubbed on baseballs before they're used in games. Apparently this mud makes it possible for a pitcher to get a dependable grip on the ball. This mud is unique. This mud is valuable. This mud, according to this article, has been the only mud used by MLB for decades. Every brand and business should have the equivalent of this mud as their own product or service. Something exclusive. Something rare. Something no one else can offer. After all, there is a lot of competition in the…
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05Oct 2019 by Bob Cargill

Advertising is Everywhere

Advertising, Branding, Marketing, Public Relations, Social Media
Advertising, marketing, PR and social media …all this is changing at breakneck speed. What strategies and tactics worked for us a few years ago, or as recently as last year, could easily backfire on us today. We can’t afford to have whatever messages we’re sharing with our own respective audiences be anything but relevant, timely, engaging and even amusing. Never mind the glut of content people are trying to sort through and digest, many consumers, customers and clients won’t tolerate anything that even resembles a sales pitch anymore. Stop begging for business and start earning that business. Stop trying to fool those on the receiving end of your messages and start trying to help them. Stop hitting listeners, viewers and readers over the head time and again and start listening…
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16Sep 2019 by Bob Cargill
Bob Cargill’s Marketing Road Show on November 22, 2019 (3-8 PM)

Bob Cargill’s Marketing Road Show on November 22, 2019 (3-8 PM)

Marketing, Social Media
On Friday, November 22, 2019, Bob Cargill's Marketing Road Show will take place from 3-8 p.m. at Out of Office in Hudson, Massachusetts. Sponsored by Avidia Bank, 3 Media Web, Aveli By WSI and Ideal Video Strategies, the Marketing Road Show will be an educational and entertaining event on the importance of authenticity in marketing today. Along with an action-packed agenda of speakers and panel discussions, there will be plenty of time for networking, socializing and just plain fun, too. Scheduled speakers to date include social media and marketing consultant Bob Cargill, business coach Michelle Holmes Mercier, Avidia Bank’s communication manager Katelin Cwieka, Vision Advertising's Julia Becker Collins, InVision's Richard Banfield, 3 Media Web's Lysa Miller, Rapport International's Wendy Pease and Avid's Jeff Copetas. Tickets for this event are only…
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10Sep 2019 by Bob Cargill
Podcast: A Few Words with Dave Matson

Podcast: A Few Words with Dave Matson

Marketing, Social Media, Sudbury
In this episode of my podcast, Bob Cargill's Marketing Show, I have a ridiculously awesome conversation with David Matson on the patio in front of the restaurant, 29 Rustic Mediterranean, in Sudbury. Dave is a digital marketer who specializes in SEO, lead generation, content strategy and social media. We talk about content marketing, SEO, community management on Facebook, even some of our favorite rock bands. About David Matson (in Dave's Words, from his LinkedIn Profile) Digital marketer focused on SEO, lead generation, content strategy, and social media. I built a business that generated thousands of leads per month for criminal defense lawyers from organic search. I am the founder and organizer of one of the largest and oldest SEO Meetup groups in the country. http://www.meetup.com/BostonSEO/
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25Aug 2019 by Bob Cargill

Anybody Can Write About Anything

Marketing, Social Media
Anybody can write about anything almost anywhere online. That’s what the proliferation and prevalence of social media has made possible. Anybody can position themselves as an authority if they are knowledgeable, talented and prolific. With that authority, though, comes a great deal of responsibility. If you have a blog, you need to know what you’re talking about or you risk being exposed as an amateur. If you have a YouTube channel, you need to be able to enlighten, educate and entertain viewers. Whatever social media channel you are active on – from LinkedIn to Twitter, Facebook to Instagram – if you try to fake it till you make it, chances are you’ll be ignored or worse yet, called out eventually for mediocrity. And you’ll give social media a bad rap.…
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12Aug 2019 by Bob Cargill

Ephemeral Content

Content, Marketing, Social Media
Do you have a fear of missing out? Lots of people do. Otherwise known as FOMO, a fear of missing out is when you are afraid that something is not going to be available when the time comes for you to experience it. Ephemeral content preys on that fear. Ephemeral content – the focus of attention on Facebook Stories, Instagram Stories and Snapchat – is content that disappears after being available for consumption for only a short period of time. Like the limited-time offer used by traditional direct marketers for years, ephemeral content creates a sense of urgency among its audience which leads to greater interest, desire and engagement. Because it comes and goes so quickly, people tend to react more quickly to it when they see it, not wanting…
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09Jul 2019 by Bob Cargill

Personalities as Publishers

Branding, Marketing, Social Media
Thanks to social media, every brand and business today is a publisher. The people within those organizations are usually the ones who are responsible for those publishing efforts, though. They are the rock stars, the lead magnets, the only way – in many cases – their employers would have any worthwhile content to share with their constituents in the first place. I listened to a ridiculously awesome podcast recently, the Digiday Podcast hosted by Brian Morrissey, in which the host spoke to Barstool Sports’ CEO, Erika Nardini. You can listen to this episode here. Among other things, Nardini talked about the success of her company’s many podcasts, monetizing content and building a subscription business that isn’t necessarily dependent on advertising. “Personalities are the new publishers,” she said at one point…
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21Jun 2019 by Bob Cargill

Social Media Can Change the World

Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Marketing, Social Media, Twitter
Far too many brands and businesses are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole on social media. They’re using LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and the like as broadcast channels, places to promote themselves instead of to share and engage with others. They're not posting nearly enough, either. They're still not getting it. Marketing, advertising, sales, PR, heck, whatever line of business you're in…it’s all changing rapidly before our very eyes. Consumers don’t believe anything anymore. So, transparency wins. You want to have your audience’s attention? You want to earn their trust and loyalty? Stop manipulating them and start listening to them. Put yourself out there on a frequent basis and let them get to know you as a human being, not a corporate logo or a company…
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