Content offers, like ebooks, can convert your existing traffic and even attract recent traffic. Nevertheless, in case your ebook is not getting too many downloads or leads, your marketing is likely to be the issue.
With the intention to achieve success, your offer have to be compelling enough that it practically begs users to opt-in. Read on to find the very best techniques for marketing your ebook, whitepaper, guide, or other lead-generating resource.
How To Write An Email
- Use an expert email address.
- Have a compelling subject line.
- Start with an appropriate greeting.
- Have a robust attention grabber.
- Keep your message concise.
- Be consistent together with your font.
- Check the tone of your message.
- Write an easy closing.
- Use an expert signature.
- Practice email etiquette for every work situation.
- Use CC and BCC fields correctly.
- Schedule your emails.
- Do a final spelling and grammar check.
- Schedule a follow-up reminder.
1. Consider a co-marketing campaign.
Before you create your helpful content offer, consider if there’s any partnerships that you could leverage. Co-marketing provides a possibility for cross-collaboration on content in order that two parties “own” that content and profit from it.
Listed below are some explanation why co-marketing is a great idea:
- Sharing resources for the offer’s creation doubles the worth of the content and diminishes the fee/effort of its production
- Promoting to 2 networks increases the reach of the campaign exponentially
- Each partners have vested interest in the outcomes of the promotion because each reap the advantages (the leads generated from it)
Pro Tip: Search for partners which have similar audiences, values, and goals. In the event you usually are not aligned, neither party will receive the expected results of the collaboration.
2. Utilize industry influencers for his or her thought leadership and reach.
Whether you choose to do co-marketing or not, you possibly can’t deny the facility of influencer marketing. Think through your existing partnerships in addition to other major players within the industries or social circles you desire to reach.
Consider these thought leaders’ goals: finding relevant articles to share with their fan base, increase their reach, and further establish themselves as an authority.
You possibly can appeal to those goals by featuring them in your content offer. For instance, ask them for a quote that you could incorporate into your content offer or link to a different article they wrote. If you finish the piece, send them a complimentary copy. I’d suggest telling them how much you’ve got appreciated their expertise and that you just were delighted to incorporate them.
The important thing to this tactic is to make your personalized outreach unique and value their while. In spite of everything, they likely get bombarded with messages asking them to share content.
Pro Tip: Remember to say that you will be promoting the offer to your network. Because they’re featured within the content, this acts as an incentive for them to share your offer to their audience as well.
The important thing to this tactic is to make your personalized outreach unique and value their while. In spite of everything, they likely get bombarded with messages asking them to share content.
3. Use email marketing to advertise the ebook together with your existing audience.
Admittedly, outreach is arduous. Remember in regards to the network you have already got. Your email subscribers have already expressed interest in similar content offers, and if this recent ebook continues to supply value for problems they need assistance with, that is one other opportunity to proceed engaging them.
As you proceed to supply value, you are establishing more credibility and authority of their eyes. As you stay top of mind in this manner, you may be first on their list after they are able to make a purchasing decision.
To realize maximum success with this tactic, it helps to have a segmented audience so that you just’re all the time providing relevant, timely, and personalized content.
You do not need to email a particular ebook to your entire contact database since it probably doesn’t relate to all of your contact lists. If you don’t segment emails, your engagement shall be lower and your success shall be diminished.
Here’s what I mean:
On considered one of your opt-in forms, you may have visitors discover what they need assistance with. For an inbound marketing agency, it would say, “What Does Your Business Wish to Improve?” with options to pick out:
- Grow our web presence
- Rank higher on Google
- Generate more leads
That way, if an ebook was created around website positioning, it could possibly be sent to all of the subscribers who’ve already shown interest in rating higher on Google.
Pro Tip: Use HubSpot’s free email marketing tools to create and optimize compelling email campaigns.
4. Create a compelling call-to-action.
Your website visitors will likely discover about your ebook through call-to-actions (CTAs), which is the a part of a webpage that encourages users to take motion.
On this case, meaning clicking on a button, banner, or link that may take them to the landing page where they can learn more and download the content.
A poorly designed or placed CTA could possibly be the thing that is stopping your ebook from generating leads, so it is vital to speculate the time in optimizing them.
To create a robust CTA, you will need to utilize the next:
- Skilled, yet daring design that stands out on the page
- Energetic language
- Short, yet specific messaging
- A/B testing to find out what copy and design best resonates together with your audience
Pro Tip: Use HubSpot’s call-to-action tool to create, test, and optimize engaging CTAs in your website.
5. Craft an enticing landing page.
Well designed landing pages are the important thing to getting conversions.
When users click on CTAs in your ebook, they shall be directed to a landing page that may include additional details in regards to the offer. It would also include a form that requires users to insert their contact information in exchange for the ebook.
Even when users make it to your landing page, it doesn’t guarantee a conversion. Your landing page have to be engaging and communicate your offer’s value or else users will bounce. To avoid this, let’s go over some best practices:
- Write a headline that focuses on the advantages of your offer
- Include images that illustrate what to anticipate
- Write energetic and compelling copy
- Make the lead form visible and above the fold
- Only ask for the data you would like, like a reputation and email
Pro Tip: HubSpot’s free landing page builder has every little thing it is advisable to quickly create and test a landing page in your ebook.
6. Promote your ebook in your highest trafficked (but still relevant) blog posts.
Along with your other methods of promotion, you desire to be sure that you just’re converting organic traffic as well. But here’s the issue: A user cannot convert on a landing page they never land on. They will never be involved in a content offer they do not learn about.
Content offers aren’t an “In the event you construct it, they may come” scenario. As a substitute, see how you possibly can capitalize on the traffic you are already getting for its promotion.
By putting the CTA (call to motion) on recent blog posts, all you are doing is making a chance. Mainly because you do not know if that blog post will ever generate traffic. In spite of everything, it’s brand recent.
Nevertheless, you possibly can put a CTA on an existing blog post that has proven success, pushing that ebook to a known source of demand.
Promote your offer on relevant blog posts that already get traffic to place your ebook in front of the audience you have got.
Pro Tip: Routinely analyze blog post performance and update content to make sure your most visited posts don’t lose out on traffic.
7. Follow website positioning best practices.
With the intention to increase your possibilities of organic traffic, all your web content must be optimized for engines like google — including ebooks and their landing pages.
Conduct keyword research with tools like Ahrefs to seek out the very best keywords to incorporate in your ebook’s title, meta-title, meta description, URL, and image alt texts.
Ensure that you simply use keywords which are relevant to the content of your ebook. Targeting irrelevant keywords may lead to a penalty from Google. For instance, if I used to be writing an ebook about “beekeeping for beginners”, I would not optimize for a keyword like “pollinator garden.” Although users looking for beekeeping content could also be involved in gardening, the 2 search terms have very different user intents.
Pro Tip: Learn more about website positioning through HubSpot’s SEO certification course.
8. Create a PPC campaign to advertise your content offer.
In the event you know your content offer has a transparent path to revenue, organic plays alone usually are not all the time the very best route for promotion, especially if there is evident demand as people seek for resources identical to yours.
PPC is a quicker tactic than website positioning. Plus, it’s a terrific strategy to promote not only your organization and its services, but in addition campaigns and offers you create. A successful PPC campaign boosts visibility and downloads to your offer by driving high-intent users to the landing page.
Pro Tip: A/B test your PPC campaigns to extend CTR and conversions. Only a small adjustment to your ad’s title, description, or goal keywords could make a huge effect in your results.
9. Announce your content offer on social media.
Email is a terrific tactic for promoting to an existing audience, and so is social media. A further profit is that social media promotion can reach beyond that existing audience rather more easily.
You’ll want to post in your social channels once your offer is live, conveying the worth it accommodates for the reader and including a picture to draw their attention. Mix these posts in together with your other content in order that your readers aren’t delay by an excessive amount of promotional content.
Pro Tip: Use HubSpot’s free social media content calendar template to coordinate your promotional campaigns with ease.
10. Consider putting promoting budget behind it.
On some social channels (I’m you, Facebook), organic reach is not what it was. Boosting posts helps to extend reach to each your followers and beyond. Alternatively, you too can create an ad that promotes your ebook and do paid promotion to a targeted audience.
Just take into accout that individuals don’t browse social media with buying intent, so you will have to be certain that the offers you promote and the way in which you promote them piques interest and conveys value. Otherwise, they’ll just see it as an ad and scroll on past.
Pro Tip: You possibly can manage all of your Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Google ad campaigns in a single place by utilizing HubSpot’s ads software.
11. Promote your ebook before launching.
Pre-launch marketing campaigns may also help construct excitement in your ebook while it’s in the ultimate stages of production. Plus, they will provide you with an idea of how interested your existing audience is within the content.
Listed below are some ways you possibly can promote your ebook before it launches:
- Reveal the quilt and title of the ebook
- Publish a brief snippet to get readers hooked
- Write a fast summary of the ebook and what users will gain from it
With each pre-launch campaign, you will need to incorporate a link to a landing page that communicates all the main points of your ebook and allows users to pre-order it.
Pro Tip: Include a special offer, like a reduction code or exclusive content, to users who enroll in your ebook prematurely.
12. Repurpose your content into different formats.
The primary time they see your post, they might not click and convert instantly. Like with anything, it may take multiple “impressions” to draw attention and pique interest. At the identical time, should you proceed posting the identical thing time and again, your content gets stale.
Enter repurposing.
Your ebook can easily be was a slideshare, infographic, quiz, or other format. By having multiple “versions” of your content for promotion, your ebook can go farther while getting more eyeballs on it.
Pro Tip: HubSpot Academy repurposing content course is a terrific resource on how recycling content can profit your ebook marketing strategy.
13. Create related video content.
Along with repurposing your ebook into written content, consider creating companion videos as well. Not only do most individuals prefer watching videos over reading, chances are you’ll reach recent audiences on video apps like TikTok and YouTube that you just would not have otherwise gotten to on other channels.
Although video marketing could appear intimidating or time consuming, it’s well worth the investment. In actual fact, 92% of video marketers in 2023 said that video gives them a positive ROI. As video becomes more widespread, it would be essential to incorporate it in your marketing strategy.
Consider carefully about how your ebook will translate into video format. Write an overview of the important thing points from each chapter you desire to discuss, then develop your script. Due to visual component of the video, your script doesn’t must be too in-depth. As a substitute, go for writing a script that is evident, concise, and conversational.
Pro Tip: Short form videos (under three minutes) have higher ROI, lead generation, and engagement in comparison with long form videos, videographics, webinars, and livestreams. Consider making a multi-part video series, moderately than cramming your entire ebook right into a single video.
14. Connect with area of interest readers on social media.
Look on Twitter and LinkedIn for users which have been sharing similar content to what you have got created. Just by searching on Twitter for #inboundmarketing, I can see who’s sharing inbound marketing blogs, guides, and resources. Plus, I can see who’s getting the largest reach by way of likes and retweets.
Reach out to those individuals with an easy message that encapsulates “Hey! I saw you shared [this article] and I believed you may like [this related content offer]”. This fashion you already know that the person might be involved in what you are writing because they have been involved in similar content before.
This tactic won’t work in addition to the influencer tactic in tip #3 since you are not providing mutual value, but lots of these individuals spend a whole lot of time curating content for his or her audience, and you may just be helping them out.
Pro Tip: When connecting with area of interest readers, personalize each message so you do not come across as spammy.
15. Undergo a content community or online group.
Likelihood is, engines like google and their social feeds usually are not the one places your audience hangs out. In case your ebook accommodates specialized or area of interest information, you may have the ability to focus on these niches through content communities and online groups. For instance:
- Area of interest Facebook groups
- Area of interest LinkedIn groups
- Quora
- Slack groups
- NextDoor neighborhoods
- Industry forums
For instance, should you’re a roofer in St. Louis, join your community group on NextDoor.com and offer your content there. When your neighborhood gets hit by a hailstorm, your infographic on “Assessing Storm Damage as a Homeowner” can come in useful to the community’s residents.
Pro Tip: Content communities are also a terrific resource for getting feedback, starting discussion, and sharing your passion in your services with others.
16. Find other linking opportunities.
Using tools like Ahrefs, you possibly can see other web sites who’ve linked to content like yours. Reach out to them together with your content offer link and see in the event that they want to incorporate a link to your resource. I find that that is most helpful when you’ll find a broken link that your recent link can replace. Webmasters generally appreciate when someone lets them know of an issue with their website links, and should you can provide a link to switch the broken one, it would get placed.
Alternatively, use a tool like BuzzSumo or Mention.net to seek out mentions of your organization online. You may have the ability to see who has mentioned you or your content offer and determine whether or not they have linked back to you or not. In the event that they have not included your link, reach out to that website and explain it would provide their readers a greater experience in the event that they could find the article that’s being mentioned.
Pro Tip: In the event you’re in search of more backlink opportunities, I highly recommend Backlinko’s resource on backlinks to seek out other places you may get a link from!
17. Guest blog on popular web sites together with your ebook as CTA.
It’s possible you’ll even have a possibility to capitalize on a 3rd party website’s organic traffic and promotions through guest blogging. In case your buyer persona goes to a preferred website that gives solutions to the issues they’re experiencing, your content offer must be there too (so long as it’s similarly relevant and helpful, in fact).
When you nail down which web sites your buyer persona is reading to get information, see if these web sites offer the chance for industry leaders to guest blog. Some web sites would require an application or an article proposal, but when you get accepted blogging for one website, it becomes much easier to get accepted on other web sites.
On the conclusion of the article, use your ebook as a next step CTA so if a reader finishes the article and desires more information, your content offer is there.
Pro Tip: If you write your articles, keep them educational and do not self-promote. Remember, you are attempting to help the reader solve an issue together with your expertise and industry knowledge.
18. Arrange podcast interviews.
Getting interviewed on a preferred podcast might be a terrific strategy to gain exposure in your ebook. Try reaching out to podcasts with large audiences, and offer to be a guest on their show and speak about your expertise.
Like guest posting, you will need to narrow your give attention to contacting podcasts which are each relevant to your ebook’s subject material and buyer persona. For instance, a financial advisor who wrote an ebook on how you can save for a down payment on a house would want to achieve out to a podcast that focuses on financial advice.
When preparing in your interview, take inspiration from the data listed in your landing page to create talking points and give attention to the things your buyer persona will profit from by reading your ebook.
Pro Tip: Ensure that you provide the podcast producer with a link to your landing page to place within the show’s description so listeners are in a position to easily access your ebook.
19. Speak at industry conferences.
Do you attend any annual conferences which are unique to your industry? Consider applying to be a speaker at it.
Take into consideration your knowledge and unique perspectives in your subject area and the way sharing your expertise can be beneficial to your buyer persona. Then, use those big picture ideas to create a speech to present on the conference.
While your presentation should not be focused on promoting your ebook, you will likely have the ability to plug it at the top.
Pro Tip: Speakers are often in a position to attend the remainder of the conference totally free. Use that access to your advantage and network with others in your industry.
20. Publish a printed version.
Consider it or not, there are still people on the market preferring print media over digital media. So, why not meet them where they’re and publish a printed version of your ebook?
A small batch of physical copies might be all you would like, since most individuals will opt to download the ebook as a substitute. Still, the printed versions are great to have for while you go to networking events and need to construct higher relationships with other professionals.
Pro Tip: In the event you extra printed copies of your book, consider doing a giveaway in your social media accounts.
21. Give your ebook away totally free.
As we have already discussed, ebooks are a incredible strategy to generate leads — especially should you offer them totally free.
People might want to submit their contact information to be able to receive their copy of the ebook, whether or not they need to pay for it. When collecting their information, you too can include a field that enables them to subscribe to your email list.
Then, once you have got their details on file, your sales reps can nurture and convert them into paying customers down the road.
Pro Tip: Preview your ebook’s first couple chapters in your landing page to be able to entice them to download the entire thing.
Content that just sits in your website cannot properly do its job and produce in leads. But worry not, by utilizing these promotion suggestions you will see somewhat bit of additional effort can really take a content offer from zero to hero.
In the event you’re involved in creating attractive ebooks that capture attention and produce more results in what you are promoting, try the FREE resource below (see what we did there?).
Editor’s note: This post was originally published in September 2016 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.
