If you're an inbound marketer, you're probably already on board with the idea that business blogging is an effective way to generate leads . And you probably also know that you can increase your blog's ability to generate leads if you also promote it in social media -- the more exposure the better, right?
But we did a little analysis here to see if there's something else we can all do to make our business blogs and social media networks even more effective at lead generation . Turns out, there is. And it's auto-publishing your blog content to social media. Who would've thunk it?
A recent analysis of leads generated by HubSpot's customers indicates that companies that automatically publish their blog posts to social media get 50% more leads than companies that don't.
Additionally,
companies that used a social media publishing tool to schedule their social media posts had 3 times as many leads as those that didn't.
1) Optimize your blog titles and content. Focus on the keywords that matter to your business. Social media content is indexed in search engines, too, so if you're concerned with optimizing your organic presence, inclusion of keywords in your blog post titles and content will help support that effort.
2) Provide tweetable "nuggets" in your blog posts. This will help you expand your blog's reach on social media in two ways. First, short tweetable statements help your readers find new copy to pull into their updates when they share your content via social media other than just your title. But you can also use tools like Click to Tweet that let you find tweetable content within your blog post that, with just one click, lets a reader share content to their social networks with a pre-filled tweet of your choice. What a great way to expand your reach and drive new traffic to your blog!
3) Provide easy social sharing options. Social sharing buttons are one of the easiest ways for visitors to get your blog posts out to the rest of the social media universe. The easier you make it for readers to share your content, the more your blog content will spread.
4) Consider a platform that automatically schedules and publishes blog posts on social media. Think this data applies to your business? Put it to the test. Use a social media publishing tool that integrates with your business blog so you can see this kind of epic lead increase for yourself.
5) Establish the best times to publish in social media. We've done our own research on the best times to publish social media updates, but it certainly varies from business to business. We also offer suggested times in the HubSpot social media publishing tool to help businesses spread their content out throughout the day. Figure out what times you receive the most engagement from publishing your blog content on social media to get the most bang for your buck!
Do you auto-publish your blog content to social media? Will this data encourage you to experiment with it if you weren't doing so already?
Image credit: Alan Cleaver
Inbound Marketing Blog Feed
Anne Thornley-Brown @executiveoasis 9:07 AM on July 16, 2012
This is interesting as I have noticed negative tweets and blogs about auto-posts using tools such as Triberr and Paper.li. Some of the put downs were so strong that I blogged about it last week and conducted an #eventprofs Twitter chat.
'What's Up with Triberr & Paper.li Bashing?' on #cvent http://bit.ly/NiPFbD
10 Tips for using Triberr & Other Auto Posting Tools Effectively http://bit.ly/N9Hl0b
I have a follow up scheduled this Thursday with tips for using Paper.li and other content aggregators and customized new feeds.
Thank you for sharing some hard data. I will definitely share it with my readers and Twitter followers.
Prashant Kaw 9:38 AM on July 16, 2012
Good post, Anand. My one comment is that co-relation does not indicate causation.
Could it be that companies using auto-publish are just better at lead-gen, period? Or, the ability to use auto-publish means they are always ready with their article ahead of schedule and have thus done a better job optimizing on all fronts - best title, etc.
What about the average reach of all the companies doing better with leads?
I think something is missing, otherwise this would be a GREAT post! Thanks for sharing.
Toni Anicic 9:44 AM on July 16, 2012
Yea, but please note that this only works if you really know what you're doing. I've seen auto-publishing gone bad a lot of times.
Posting 10 tweets in a row in a short time interval is one such example. Another is tweets not really made for twitter, meaning title getting cut off without any valuable info because it was too long etc.
Nate Goodman 10:07 AM on July 16, 2012
It's not that I doubt your research, but you aren't mentioning the obvious question which is how do auto-posters compare to those that manually post to the same social networks at the same optimal times of day? My guess would be that there would be no difference. Albeit, it's much less laborious if you have a tool to auto-post, but if the small business can't afford a tool, then manual posting should be just as effective.
kevin gallagher 10:09 AM on July 16, 2012
Hi,
Very interesting data. thanks for sharing. However we al the customers all sending out the same amount of tweets. I do see how automating it leads to more leads. Would doing it manually just be as effective from a conversion point of view?
Devani 10:55 AM on July 16, 2012
Very interesting. I don’t get why auto posting would be more effective, because the same content goes out whether you auto post it or not. I would like to learn more on why it’s more effective, and how it creates more interaction and leads...?
Devani 10:56 AM on July 16, 2012
Very interesting. I don’t get why auto posting would be more effective, because the same content goes out whether you auto post it or not. I would like to learn more on why it’s more effective, and how it creates more interaction and leads...?
Dominic 12:40 PM on July 16, 2012
What a timely post here. We just began to expand our social reach first by integrating social plugins, second step posting to social sites like Twitter and Facebook.
We are still in the initial phase and have to waite for the results to measure success.
I believe it makes perfect sense ´cos your potential clients are at differente venues at different times.
Lastly, finding the auto-tools that comply with our content strategy and Google as well as effecieny in general is probably, next to the core results, the main challenge here. Dominic
Allison M Reilly 12:40 PM on July 16, 2012
Isn't this data a bit contradictory to the data you found on auto-posting social media updates in general? I thought that auto-posting statistics and status updates to Facebook and Twitter got a lot less engagement then those manually posted. I'm confused that the opposite would be true for blog posts.
Carol 1:21 PM on July 16, 2012
Thanks for the story. I've also read various articles about the downside of automated social posting. Too much too often is spam. I like the optimized scheduling features of Buffer and the cross network sharing features on in1.com.. In1 will also offer a timely scheduling feature shortly.
Tim 1:59 PM on July 16, 2012
This is an interesting statistic, but I have to ask why is there a difference between being sent manually at a specified time or auto-scheduling at the same time?
Anand Rajaram 2:26 PM on July 16, 2012
Thanks everyone for the great feedback. I wanted to post follow-ups to some of the questions mentioned in the comments:
1. Yes, Correlation doesn't imply causation. Businesses that automatically publish blog posts could very well be doing other things correct, that this in and of itself may not result in new leads. What we found is correlation, and there are some logical explanations to why it could be. You are promoting your content more (and hopefully better), so you are getting more leads.
2. Automation by itself is not what is causing more leads. Automation helps in efficiency, and is not an end in and of itself. One could arguably publish them manually, every single time at the appropriate timeframe and still see the same results. But that wouldn't be very efficient and it is wise to use tools for this purpose.
3. The data talks about a correlation between auto-publishing BLOG posts and effective use of social media scheduling tools. As noted by several other commenters, it is critical to keep the conversation personal, especially in social media. The kind of automation also makes a difference. It is one thing to automatically re-tweet or automatically DM every follower, but it is another thing to automate the publishing process and make sure that you broadcast the great content that you created.
Karen Clark 7:20 PM on July 16, 2012
I would like to see this broken down by which platform - I imagine this WOULD be true for Twitter only. Not for Facebook or LinkedIn.
Bernie Borges 8:11 AM on July 17, 2012
I'm okay with social media scheduling of blog content. But, I am sooooooooo not a fan of auto publishing. It is very robotic. I believe it is more negative than positive. The lead stats shared here shock and disappoint me in this regard....Oh well. I'll get over it...
Anthony D. Nelson 5:24 PM on July 17, 2012
Without knowing more details about the study, I'm not going to trust this report one bit. So many things can skew this data.
Companies that auto-publish to social media also probably produce a lot of content. Companies that produce a lot of content get a lot of leads.
Companies that don't produce much content, don't auto-publish. These companies don't produce as many leads.
Is it the content production or the auto-publishing that led to the leads?
Dan Goldstein 9:20 AM on July 19, 2012
I agree with the overall sentiment so far in the comments, it is more likely that the companies who auto-publish are more sophisticated in other areas as well.
Would be cool to see if their additional leads actually came from their social media efforts.
I am sure we all look forward to an update on the findings.
Marc Nashaat 9:33 AM on July 19, 2012
Ha! I was just having this conversation the other day with my team. I think the important thing to remember though is that the auto-publishing is dealing specifically with created content and not engagement.
Social media needs to be personable and one on one so there most certainly still needs to be a human behind the page interacting with its fans.
I think it follows logic however that auto-publishing blog/content posts will increase a companies lead gen. It's a matter of reach amplification.