Content Is King In Marketing

Coca Cola’s marketing agency (evidently) has a magnificent video on their content strategy for the next 7 or so years:

It’s an in-depth look at what Coca-Cola wants to do to grow its content marketing strategies over the next couple of years and leverage the idea of storytelling via social media. Rather than try and dominate by doing everything themselves, CC also wants to use consumer stories to drive their brand success. The video also has some great examples of other companies that have done this successfully. Go watch the whole thing.

SixRevisions also has a great post about creating and maintaining good content now and in the future:

Content is All That Matters on the Web (SixRevisions.com): “Instead of aiming for a spectacular one-time-big-time viral success, it’s necessary to build a solid foundation and plan for the long haul. It can take months, even years, to develop an effective content strategy.”

Rather than try and create something yourself that will go “viral”, tap into existent spaces, memes, trends, etc for your own needs. Take advantage of what’s already on the web and build on it for the long haul rather than trying to aim to create something that will be relevant for x amount of time and then fade out. It’s not worth it and your business is more valuable than that.

IFTTT Comes To iOS

This is huge:

MacStories: IFTTT for iPhone: A Different Kind of iOS Automation: “IFTTT brings a different kind of automation to iOS that doesn’t need URL schemes or bookmarklets, but that instead looks into native pieces of data to connect services together. It’s an innovative approach to monitoring photos, contacts, and reminders that are added or modified on an iPhone, but it should be familiar to users who already rely on IFTTT for their daily web automation tasks.”

After I hooked the service up to various services (WordPress blog, Pinboard, Instagram, et al) last week, I’ve once again fell in love with the idea of automating a few things that I do on the web. It’s a little nerdy and has a learning curve until you get things just the way you want them, but this service is hugely useful for both affiliates and publishers. I like it because it’s an easy way to bring things onto my self-hosted WordPress site (which I’m trying to make my home base for everything) without having much fuss about it because IFTTT works quietly in the background as long as everything is set up right and working.

Now that IFTTT is on iOS as well, there’s so even more potential with iOS7’s new background tracking for apps. The native features that you can use in the iOS app with Photos, Contacts, and Reminders aren’t much to shout about (yet), but the web recipes you can use are immensely powerful. I rely on IFTTT to do a lot of heavy lifting for me in the background and have it plugged in with various channels such as Pinboard, Instagram, foursquare, WordPress, a few RSS feeds, and even SMS. I’m kicking myself for not using the service more earlier because it’s added so many new channels and features in the past year.

Whether you’re an affiliate, a publisher, or just want a web service that does things in the background for you (e.g. back up your Instagram photos to Dropbox, text you the weather every morning, or really just about anything else), go try IFTTT. You’re missing out if you’re not using this service.

Here’s my recipes, btw:

IFTTT / devintonhaeuser’s Shared Recipes

Google’s Matt Cutts on Link Building and Memorable Websites

Matt is right… create an experience and work towards the big picture rather than just make something for the moment…

Link Building Is Not Illegal (or Inherently Bad) with Matt Cutts: “Their goal should really be to make a fantastic website that people love and tell their friends about and link to and want to experience. As a result, your website starts to become stronger and stronger in the rankings.”

Go read the whole interview and pull your own conclusions from it. It’s not a short read, but it’s worth it.

Be unique and do your best work in all that you do.

Dropbox Adds Cloud Syncing For Apps

This is huge:

Dropbox moves beyond files, looks to offer seamless cloud syncing for third party apps | The Verge: “Dropbox wants to provide the cloud backbone for all types of mobile apps and websites. At its first ever developer conference today, the company revealed a new service that takes Dropbox away from just files and folders. With a new API called Datastores, the company is offering developers of mobile apps a platform that can sync real data — like contacts, to-dos, game saves, and more — with the cloud and across devices.”

I love Dropbox and use it religiously. It’s a dead-simple way to keep things in sync even if you only have 2 devices. Whenever I’m looking at a new app, I try and avoid apps that use Apple’s good-in-theory-but-shaky iCloud service and go for those that use old-fashioned Dropbox sync. I guess you could say I’m superstitious but if you’ve ever lost a big document because of iCloud, you understand me.

The great thing about this change is that Dropbox’s app data syncing will be universal. Sure, devs have been hacking together syncing solutions for years using Dropbox, but this opens the service’s API up to more than just text editors and things like 1Password.

A good example is OmniFocus. I love OmniFocus on Mac and iOS and use it as a sort of catch-all for my GTD system. However, I also like the Android platform and have been wanting to experiment with it for some time. One of the main reasons I haven’t given into the urge to give up my beloved 4S for an Android device is the fact that I’d be losing a lot of apps (like OF) that I’ve come to love and rely on.

In 2013, having a decent cloud service to keep things up-to-date and backed up is a must.

That’s why I love Dropbox 🙂

Dropbox – News: “Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring all your photos, docs, and videos anywhere, and share them easily. Any file you save to your Dropbox will automatically save to all your computers, your phone or iPad, and the Dropbox website. Dropbox also makes it easy to share with others. And if your computer melts down, you can restore all your files from the Dropbox website with a couple clicks.”