Features

Repurposing content can be an enormous time and sanity-saver for marketers struggling to scale content production. It takes a lot of pressure off non-marketers within your organization who aren’t natural writers, and ensures content relevancy when previously successful content is repurposed.

There are, however, a few common pitfalls that can get you into trouble.  Follow these guidelines to save time and avoid headaches when repurposing content:

1. Am I really repurposing?
It’s important not to confuse repurposing with reusing or redistributing content. 

A common trap marketers fall into...

Using video is nothing new. YouTube reports that they have 72 hours of content uploaded every minute, demonstrating just how crowded and noisy the video content area is. 

When you start creating videos, you’ve got to understand that once your video is out there, you don’t have full control over it any more. Sometimes a spoof of a video can take off and can really positively aid brand awareness. Then there are the other occasions where it can do enormous damage – is all publicity really good publicity? (Let’s leave that for another day!)

If your content is good, then it’s more than likely someone...

1. Foursquare's Awesome Virtual Map / Time Machine 

Kind of creepy, just not really creepy.

The animation flies you around all those haunts you've visited in times past, served up in a lovely 3D effect that you can autoplay to your heart's content. You can zoom in or out of its map showing all the places you've been, checking out each of your check-ins. The interface helpfully provides places Foursquare has recommended for you as well. (via Mashable) 

2. Apple is Back, Jack

- WDDC (Apple's Wordwide Developers Conference) was this week and it looks like the technology power brand has some kick...

At ExactTarget, client feedback plays a vital role in how we make decisions every day. So far in 2013, via our Client Success Surveys, we've listened to what clients have said about everything from our brand to our products to our teams. We make it a priority to share this valuable information across our organization, so we can take action and address suggestions.

• Are easy to do business with
• Care about our customers and partners
• Are...

There’s no question about it: email is the foundation of successful B2B marketing strategies.

In 2012, BtoB Magazine reported that 59% of B2B marketers rank email as the #1 tactic for generating revenue and predicted that in 2013 spending on email by B2B marketers would increase 65%. A big reason more B2B marketing budget is flowing to permission-based email is that 57% of marketers say email newsletters are their most effective tool for lead nurturing. (Source: MarketingSherpa 2013 Email Marketing Benchmark Report)

B2B Email Marketing at its Best
One brand that, in my opinion, is a best-in-class...

In recent years, the explosion of social media has left savvy Internet-goers with choices far beyond Facebook. If you're just about tweeted out, one strong option to consider for promoting your small business is Instagram. With roughly 100 million users, it's a viable method for getting the word out about your organization. Unlike other social media giants, Instagram doesn't focus on a full website; it's mainly available via smartphone app - and if your target audience is smartphone savvy, then you should be too. Follow these tips to help get your Instagramming efforts kickstarted today:

1....

First off, I forgot to renew my Call Recorder software and didn't realize it until after the video was recorded. My apologies to all. 

June 5 marked the 32nd anniversary of AIDS being discovered, and Project (RED) / Mashable decided to mark it with a campaign centered around breaking the WORLD RECORD for Most Vine videos created in a day. 

From the Project Red website: 

We’ll even be featuring some of our favorite Vine videos on the NASDAQ marquee screen and tower in Times Square and on Mashable’s homepage. How do you join us in setting the#REDWorldRecord? It’s easy – shoot your 6-second Vine...

Our last post focused on managing customer conversations and preferences. Next up are #5 and #6 on our Deliverabilty Top 10 List:

Tip #5 - Offer Engaging Content, Not Just Marketing
Marketers who succedd are the ones who recognize that users remain in control when it comes to email. Mail streams that consist of nothing but marketing material are likely to fail, as they will experience high spam complaints and low user engagement. On the other hand, mail containing content that the recipient finds useful or desirable should do well as ISPs move to engagement models when making filtering...

Social media has been around for more than a decade, and most businesses have come to realize that social can (and should) be an important part of their marketing program. At the same time, marketers continue to struggle with with how to fully leverage—or even understand—the ever-changing world of social media marketing.

Finding and installing a social media management product isn't enough. You need a thorough understanding of how to launch, grow, and innovate your social media programs.

Look no further! ExactTarget Social Media Services can provide you with proactive support, a pragmatic...

For many marketers, keeping subscriber data as up-to-date as possible is a constant struggle. For some, it’s like keeping a teenager’s room clean—an endless endeavor. Every time an email is sent, the reply inbox gets flooded with out-of-office notifications, unsubscribe requests, and (sometimes!) valid customer responses.

But you’re a marketer, not a machine. Wading through all those responses can be time-consuming, frustrating, and, often things can get overlooked. Plus, those customers with actual responses are expecting to have their thoughts read and replied to. It could be a complaint, a...

I'm excited to start a new series on the ExactTarget blog centered around the hottest digital marketing stories and trends of the past week. We will publish a new list at the beginning of every week. Just to be clear, this is a blatant rip-off of the BBC series. 

1. The Power Behind Waze and Mapping: Waze was on the tip of many tongues last week with rumored bids from Apple and Google. Why is there so much buzz about Waze? The company, which initially launched in Israel, provides crowd-sourced information. Users can wave their hands over their mobile device while driving to vocally report...

Like many social media marketers, you're probably focused on strengthening your content marketing strategy--which means you need a solid policy for outbound publishing and approval of social media messages. And you know that can get complex in a hurry!

Effective content marketing means not only defining who can publish what and where, but also managing the communication stream of creating, editing and approving final content. As your team starts to grow, this whole process can often become a massive tangle of roundabout email exchanges and lengthy Excel spreadsheets.

SocialEngage approvals...

Recently, Twitter announced a new security feature to better protect accounts: login verification. This optional two-factor authentication method will run a second check upon sign-in to Twitter.com to ensure it's really you. You must enroll your account in two-factor authentication at Twitter.com in order to activate this feature.

If you have activated this feature, or are thinking about it, you might be wondering how this will affect SocialEngage. Here are a few key things to keep in mind:

• Activating two-factor authentication on a Twitter account will not de-authorize third-party apps...

Summer is heating up here at our Indianapolis headquarters, and our May product release delivered a few new features with plenty of sizzle over the weekend. Whether aimed to save you time, optimize your marketing efforts, or just make our interface easier to navigate, we think you’ll really like these new enhancements.

And don’t forget—we have free training on product release features via 3sixty. It’s interactive, and takes less than 30 minutes.

1. It’s Here! Send to Multiple Data Extensions
This long-requested new feature gives you the ability to save time by sending to a large data set in one...

I'm proud to announce the release of the newest predictions guide from Australia. The guide features predictions for emerging trends across email, mobile, social, cross-channel and marketing automation from industry leaders, including Jeff Bullas, Chris Baumann and Iggy Pintado as well as thought leaders from Adobe, Direct Marketing Association, ExactTarget and Microsoft.

“The new year provides new opportunities for marketers to create innovative, customer experiences that build loyalty and deliver business results across email, mobile, social media and the Web,” said Lee Hawksley,...

At ExactTarget, we pride ourselves on empowering our clients to connect with their customers to drive engagement that builds loyalty and brand advocates. One of the highlights of my day is getting to spend time talking with our great clients and diving into their innovative campaigns across email, mobile and social.

One of Celebrity Cruises’ recent campaigns focused on transforming on-hold bookings into reservations with an automated email campaign. The campaign saw a double digit percent boost by triggering custom emails to potential travelers featuring their preferred destinations, cruise...

The ExactTarget Nexus team invites you to participate in our #NexusCafe Twitter chat tomorrow and every Thursday from 11am-12pm ET, where we discuss emerging topics and trends from across the digital marketing world. The virtual coffee chat is held directly on Twitter, hosted by @ETNexus. Follow the #NexusCafe hashtag in CoTweet or other Twitter application and add the hashtag to your tweet in order to participate.

On August 25 at 11am EST, we're hosting a Twitter chat using the #NexusCafe hashtag. Our featured guest will be Ken Moorehead from Compendium.

Here is a preview of the questions that...