Paid Content Discovery: 5 Steps for Success
Whether you have published content for inbound marketing and are ready to leverage it further, or you’re just starting to look into content as a media asset, your initial campaign setup will be key to your success.
Unlike display ads, where tons of help, templates and self-serve tools are available to test a display campaign on Google, paid content distribution is much more fragmented and manual.
In this post, we’ll cover the basic steps you need to check off to set up your organization for success. In subsequent posts, we’ll dive into each one in more detail.
1. Select your content.
Do you publish a blog? If so, this is likely your best place to start. A variety of content discovery networks support promoted blog posts in the “you might also like” section of publisher web pages. They usually charge per click, making it easier for you to measure performance. (More on that below).
Which blog posts to pick? Start with four: two that have already performed well on social media/inbound, and two that haven’t. This way you’re testing the new channel as both an incremental and a complementary additional to your current mix. The headlines of all should be brief, under 55 characters, and each post must have an image. Both the image and the headline should relate directly to your content.
Avoid sales-rich posts that entice users to buy. Focus instead on educational, thought leadership pieces. Lists work well.
If you don’t have a blog, this a great impetus to start. For this test, you can set up a free account with WordPress, SquareSpace, or Weebly, and write one post that you think will teach your customers something new. If you published case studies or whitepapers, a summary of one is a good place to begin.
2. Make a call to action
Your content shouldn’t do outright sales, but it’s ok to ask readers for additional engagement if they like it. Have an email signup, a link to your homepage, or another actionable step that users can perform once they’re finished reading. Track signups using the analytics strategy below.
3. Select and set up your channels.
Most content distribution and in-stream native channels use one of two pricing structures: CPC or CPM. If this is your first test, your focus and ROI, and your budget is less than $25,000, start with CPC. You’ll be able to get more response data, and test more channels.
Examples of networks and exchanges that you can use here are Outbrain, nRelate, Taboola, Content.Ad, AdBlade, and others.
Each one will require you to register – some have a self-service dashboard, and some require you to email an account manager to set up a campaign. Self-service ones don’t have minimums. Managed services networks, tend to have minimum spends of around $100/day.
Since you’re just starting out, pick 3 channels to start with. That’ll give you ample data about the breadth of available pricing and performance of your content.
Each network will conduct an editorial review of your content before your links go live, so make sure you’re registered on all the ones you’ll be using before starting your campaign. That way your start dates will line up on time.
4. Set up Analytics
If you don’t use many marketing channels, referring URL might be the simplest way to go. Every content discovery network sends their traffic through a set of 2-3 unique URLs, usually described on their website. You can use those to track where traffic is coming from.
However, these might change without notice, and you have to manually correlate the traffic with the post that attracted it to your site.
UTM links are a richer way to track performance, especially if the test is part of a broader set of marketing channels.
Most analytics tools, including Google, HubSpot, KissMetrics, MixPanel, and Omniture support UTM parameters. If you don’t know how UTM parameters work, here’s a primer: http://support.kissmetrics.com/integrations/utm-variables.html
We suggest the following UTM structure, modified *for every link for every network you test on.*
This is a bit of work initially, but it will pay off in crystal-clean analytics.
http://blog.yoursite.com?utm_campaign=CAMPAIGN_NAME&utm_source=NETWORK_1&utm_content=POST_1
http://blog.yoursite.com?utm_campaign=CAMPAIGN_NAME&utm_source=NETWORK_1&utm_content=POST_2
http://blog.yoursite.com?utm_campaign=CAMPAIGN_NAME&utm_source=NETWORK_2&utm_content=POST_1
etc….
5. Allocate a budget and set a time frame.
Your first campaign should run 4-5 weeks to allow for adjustments, and significant data. Adjust weekly – every network will give you a different amount of impressions, clicks, and leads on different days, so it’s important to monitor closely, and run small experiments with maximum CPC settings.
For the budget, we suggest spending no less than the greater of:
$1000 per network, or 15% of your monthly display media budget
That will allow you to get at least a few thousand clicks and ample time to measure against your other channels.
You’re good to go! Hit the big red button, watch traffic roll in, and crunch those metrics!
(If you’d like help, your needs are more complex or you rocked your test and are ready to dive in further, we’re always here to help at Reactor Media - drop us a note and say hi!)