Content for Leads: How to Create Content That Spreads and Fills the Funnel

Do you create content?

Are you looking to generate more leads?

To learn how to get the most from your content, I interview Jason Miller.
More About This Show
The Social Media Marketing podcast is an on-demand talk radio show from Social Media Examiner. It's designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

In this episode I interview Jason Miller, the senior manager of content and social at LinkedIn Marketing Solutions. He's the author of Welcome to the Funnel: Proven Tactics to Turn Your Social and Content Marketing Up to 11. Jason is also an excellent photographer specializing in rock bands.

Jason focuses on creating sharable content that also generates leads.

You'll discover how content ties into influencer relationships and how to leverage it.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below.
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Here are some of the things you'll discover in this show:
Content for Leads
How Jason got started in content and social

Jason worked in the music industry before he decided to reinvent himself in the social space.

He tried to bring social to his music label, but they weren't interested. So Jason quit, went back to school for training in SEO and digital marketing. He worked at a little startup called Market Tools, then Marketo and he's now at LinkedIn.

Jason talks about his time at Marketo. He led global and content marketing and did the blog and the social channels himself when he first started. It was chaos, he recalls. Jason learned very quickly how to solve other marketers' problems and write about them, which is how he grew his blogging skills.

"It was B2B marketing, which could be quite boring," Jason recalls. "I took what I call the George Costanza approach, where I do the exact opposite of what everybody else is doing."

For example, if someone said to Jason that social media doesn't work in B2B, he would do the exact opposite and prove them wrong. After a tremendous amount of trial and error to find out what worked and scaling his content efforts, Jason was successful.

Listen to the show to hear the backstory for Welcome to the Funnel.

Build relationships that tie into content

Jason believes it's essential to include influencers in your marketing strategy, especially in your content.

When you first start building your presence, seek out thought leaders in the space. Figure out how to take their wisdom and feature it in your content. You'll add third-party validation and keep from talking too much about yourself.

At the same time, you also get on their radar. They know you're helping them spread the word and eventually you can find mutual benefit.

Listen to the show to learn how going to conferences helped Jason get into guest blogging.

How to create sharable content that generates leads

Jason believes we don't need more content, we need more relevant content.

He has a concept he started at Marketo and brought over to LinkedIn called, "The Big Rock." Basically you need to ask yourself what conversation you want to own, and then write the book on it.

Jason suggests going from thinking like a publisher to actually publishing like a publisher.

When Jason first got to LinkedIn, the question was, "How do I market on LinkedIn successfully?" Since the conversation was being owned by others, Jason decided to take it back. He wrote a 65-page book called The Sophisticated Marketer's Guide to LinkedIn. It was everything you wanted to know about marketing on LinkedIn, written very strategically.

It was broad-reaching content gated for the purpose of collecting email addresses. It was great for lead generation, bringing people into the funnel, helping out fellow marketers and getting the word out.

According to Jason,