Category: Content Marketing

Session @ Google – Digital Insider

Five years back, I remember applying to Google for a job. Today it felt like full circle, being invited to take a session at Google for their Digital Insider program. An hour long session with rapid fire questions and the famous Google blend coffee :)

Session: Content That Works

Agenda : Content powers communication but creating content that works is a challenge. Join Aashish Chopra and Guneet Singh as they share what they’ve learnt about creating impact with content.

210 Sign-ups in 24 hours – Webinar On Viral Video Marketing

Hope is not a strategy and viral is not a ‘happy accident’.

Join in April 26, 2018 for the story behind 300 million views :)

Featured in Forbes – Driving Sales & Leads With Content Marketing

Forbes published an article about Content Marketing tips from world’s top marketers, about proven ways to drive sales & leads. Grateful to be mentioned among BS free, action oriented individuals and how they are making a dent in Content Marketing around the world :) Here’s the excerpt from the article.

Strive to be relevant. Make your content share-worthy.

Aashish Chopra, head of content marketing at ixigo.com, creates viral videos. He has produced branded posts on Facebook garnering 40M views in a week and has won various marketing awards in Asia.

Chopra shares that

“content must be made for low attention spans, responsive to tiny mobile screens, drive conversations, and prioritize storytelling over production value”.

He makes a good point in adding that “when your content is share-worthy, you beat the platforms at their own game, saving on distribution, making the message so powerful that everyone becomes a messenger spreading your content like wildfire”. The longer we stay relevant in their lives, the higher the sales numbers. And with cheaper phone and data, videos are exploding everywhere.

Chopra recommends asking yourself: “Why would anyone share it?”

Over last three years, Chopra has done tireless experiments and created five buckets of share-worthy content, every option backed by millions of organic views:

  1. Inspirational: Inspirational content is a tall order, but one that has got us the biggest success.
  2. Useful: Making an obsessive list about users’ pain points and finding ways to creatively solve those in a video. Audience with similar pain points, tend to share with their peers.
  3. Celebrate their life: All the pain points we can’t solve, we celebrate, creating relatable content.
  4. Topical: Creating content which news-jacks global breaking news and gives the users a vehicle to share their sentiments.
  5. Change the world: When we create content which creates an authentic impact in the world, be it an act of kindness or making a difference with tiny actions, everyone becomes a messenger of that idea and brand becomes a conduit in celebrating that.

“Remember, views can be bought, but shares are earned, and when shares start snowballing, that’s when magic happens,” says Chopra.

— end of excerpt —

If you’d like to read more about my experiments in viral marketing or be the first to know when the books comes out.. signup for the Mailing list, connect on LinkedIn or Tweet me up :)

3 Content Marketing Trends That Will Dominate 2018

An amazing year comes to an end, complete with videos going viral, news-feeds getting chaotic and organic reach nosediving. If content marketing is your game, 2018 would be the year videos take centerstage. It’s going to be exciting and super competitive. These are the trends and focus areas for 2018, something I’m pasting on my wall. Happy New Year :)

 1. Videos will continue to dominate

If you’ve been procrastinating about getting on the video bandwagon, it’s time to get started. With low cost smartphones and cheaper data, video is exploding on tiny screens everywhere. You got to experiment with different video formats. Live video is turning out to be huge, we got 65,000 comments on an experiment just last week.

Regional content is fast becoming a big deal in India, an experiment this year hit 20 million views. Even LinkedIn is going gaga on videos, with incredible engagement. It’s time to deep dive and find the format which works for you: short form, long form, web-series, 360 video, live video, interactive video or the enchanting AR/VR.

2. Organic reach will nosedive

With so much competition and chaotic news-feeds, Facebook has made it harder to reach your audience, unless you pay. Your content needs to work harder. If you want to reach millions on low budgets, either have kick-ass share-worthy content or cough up the moolah!

Remember.. views can be bought.. engagement is earned.

Focus on creating content for low attention spans, tiny mobile screens, think conversations not campaigns, obsess about storytelling not high production value and most important: Distribution! We’ll beat platforms at their game, when we make our message so powerful that every messenger becomes an evangelist, spreading our content like wildfire.

3. Brands will be built on content, not advertising

Our generation is trained to ignore Ads. The radars in our heads are so evolved, we can spot BS miles away. Ad blockers are on the rise, TV numbers are down and when was the last time you shared an Ad? Ads will need to evolve, be more authentic and BS free. Engagement is more important than views.

We need to reach their hearts, not bombard their eye-balls.

We’re living in a time where staying relevant is more important than recall. To create kick-ass content, we need multi-skilled storytellers in our teams. Filmmakers who double up as designers, designers who know copywriting and writers who know communication and branding. We need to groom multi-talented rockstars!

Happy Content Marketing in 2018 :)

One more thing..

If you’d like to read more about my experiments in viral marketing or be the first to know when the books comes out.. signup for the Mailing list, connect on LinkedIn or Tweet me up. Oh and here’s the latest viral video :)