Developing a content strategy is a complex process that involves several stages and the creation of solid content strategy deliverables that will propel the business further.
It has to start with an in-depth audience and market research. Marketers need to set specific, actionable, and attainable goals. A strategy should provide content creators with effective tactics for brand positioning. Finally, a good content strategy has to include actionable guidelines for creating, distributing, and managing content.
Undoubtedly, doing these things is a complex task. And doing it right necessitates a data-driven, tactical approach. Ideally, that approach allows businesses to achieve their content goals.
When building a content marketing strategy, marketers have to supplement it with key content strategy deliverables. These documents help guide creators and collaborators through the content production process. And they allow them to enforce a plan that is fully outcome-oriented.
This article will help you understand content strategy deliverables. It will cover different types of documents and their function in your marketing plan. Lastly, it will provide tips on incorporating these outputs into your system.
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What Are Content Strategy Deliverables? Definition and Importance
What’s the worst thing you can do when planning your content marketing approach? It’s allowing yourself to take shots in the dark.
Yes, intuition can be powerful. However, a successful content plan requires a highly focused approach. Ideally, one that allows you to track and measure outcomes on multiple plains.
That’s where deliverables come in.
The concept of deliverables refers to any tangible or intangible output produced during a project. In the context of content marketing, these documents:
Guide teams through the production and distribution process.
Set KPIs for measuring success.
Ensure that each content marketing activity aligns with your brand’s business goals.
Types of Content Strategy Deliverables
Like any other strategic guideline, a content strategy deliverable must be:
Specific.
Measurable.
Relevant.
So, if it is to serve your business, it needs to tie in with the different elements of your marketing plan.
With this in mind, you need to produce several types of content strategy deliverables to ensure a seamless marketing process.
Existing Content Audit Report
The number one priority for brands developing content strategies — especially those that have already produced and distributed resources as parts of their marketing tactics — is to conduct and compose an in-depth content audit report.
Study your existing content and its performance in key areas. This can help identify what your business has been doing right (or wrong) in its content strategy. More importantly, it can uncover valuable opportunities to allow your content to go from average to exceptional with just a few tweaks.
Here’s what to include in your content audit report:
Inventory
Creating a comprehensive list of all existing content on your website is an excellent way to gauge quantity, quality, and performance. Moreover, it’s an effective way to determine whether your resources need updates or your website’s content section needs restructuring to better align with the buyer’s journey.
Furthermore, conducting a content inventory is a great way to identify outdated, duplicate, or irrelevant pieces on your website. It should be a crucial document during the later stages of your content strategy, particularly when determining what pieces to include in your content calendar.
Traffic Data and SEO Performance
Knowing how many people are interacting with your resources (as well as where they’re coming from and how they’re discovering your pieces) is essential info for developing a highly successful content strategy. It’s also a great place to start if you want to invest in content marketing to boost brand and product awareness.
If you decide to hire a B2B SEO agency to grow your startup, expect to receive this deliverable as part of their service.
User Intent Alignment
Developing a content strategy that drives results requires that you invest in resources for each stage of the buyer’s journey. By studying how your existing content aligns with user intent, you can check how blog posts and content pages relate to your audience’s intended outcomes.
For example, the FAQ section of the Invest page on CapitalPad is perfectly optimized to align with the needs of prospects populating the lowest stages of the sales funnel.
On the other hand, something similar to Jetboil’sHow to Make Camping Coffeewill be more suited for building product awareness. That’s because it aligns with the informational search intent of people populating the topmost stages of the marketing funnel.
Audience Personas
Any content marketing strategy — especially a successful one — necessitates an in-depth audience understanding. After all, the only way to ensure your content aligns with your target audience’s needs and aspirations is to comprehend those needs and aspirations in the first place.
For this reason, use deliverables to identify and describe your brand’s audience personas. Then, invest in high-quality content that aligns with each target group’s priorities to ensure maximum engagement and conversion rates.
Generally, there are a few key customer persona characteristics to include in your documentation:
Demographic Data
Define each audience personas’ age, gender, income level, occupation, and geographic location. This will allow you to tailor marketing messages in a way that will be relevant to these potential customers and prevent you from spending your budget on campaigns with poor performance.
Online Behavior
Most consumer groups have varying tendencies in online behavior. For example, different age groups populate different social networks. They prefer different content formats. And some generations even have specific preferences regarding how they want to interact with branded content.
Gen Z, for instance, prefers community-driven marketing content. That’s why many businesses vying for their attention heavily invest in sourcing user-generated content that is effective at building brand-consumer relationships.
Psychographic Information
Today’s consumers base their shopping behavior on their interests, beliefs, and values. For example, more than 80% of people are willing to pay more for sustainable products.
Identifying and understanding these sets of beliefs can be hugely beneficial in allowing you to develop a successful content marketing strategy. Plus, it can benefit your product development process — especially when trying to break into new or competitive markets.
This tactic makes it possible to produce tailored content. This is essential, as 71% of consumers expect personalization, and 76% become frustrated when brands fail to deliver it.
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If there’s one irreplaceable document you need in your content strategy, it has got to be a content calendar.
As an organizational method that ensures you’re publishing resources consistently and in a logical order, an editorial calendar can hugely contribute to positive content marketing outcomes.
Even more, when combined with audience insights, a content calendar can reveal ideal distribution channels, posting times, and content formats, helping you get the biggest bang for your buck from your marketing efforts.
Another benefit of having a content calendar to consult during the production and distribution process is that it can help you predict and keep up with seasonal trends.
For instance, when publishing blog posts that get seasonal upticks in consumer interest — like the Best Gifts for Dads from Men’s Health — it’s not just important that they’re online when that uptick in interest happens. Even more importantly, it’s essential that they target the right search terms and even show publication and update dates so that readers know they’re relevant at the time of reading.
A content calendar can help you predict these periods of intensified consumer interest and give you enough time (along with some guidelines) to prepare in the best way possible.
Visual Style, Brand Voice, and Tone Guides
Consistency is key in content marketing. If you want to invest in content that can boost brand awareness, elevate trust, and build relationships with your prospects, you need to ensure your content adheres to a predetermined set of guidelines.
On the one hand, these guidelines need to align with your branding strategy. However, it’s also important that they resonate with your target audience’s preferences and reflect your brand’s unique value proposition.
Style guides are a content strategy deliverable that can make it easy for your team to remain true to your brand’s visual identity, voice, and tone.
Furthermore, if your business outsources any aspect of its digital marketing activity — from content creation to video editing to social media management — this document will be one of the keys to staying true to your brand messaging.
It’s also worth noting that this document will be irreplaceable during the editorial process. It will provide your marketing team with a set of rules on how to format for accessibility and readability.
Moreover, you can include any necessary distribution channel protocols in this deliverable — especially if your brand does something similar to Wendy’s. This brand clearly uses different approaches on Instagram vs. X, with the former being more commonly used to publish commercial messaging, while the latter serves the purpose of community building and sparking conversations.
Key Performance Indicators
Lastly, a well-developed content marketing strategy requires a well-thought-out system that makes it possible to measure and analyze performance.
By defining and including relevant metrics (like engagement rates, traffic, and conversion rates) in your deliverables, as well as specifying what tools you use to study content performance, you can collect data on your digital marketing activity’s effectiveness and make informed decisions for optimizing performance.
Final Thoughts: Utilizing Content Strategy Deliverables to Achieve Your Business Goals
Although you might be confident in your content marketing plan and don’t feel like you need to produce any deliverables, the time may come when these make or break your attempts to boost brand awareness or engage your target audience.
Even more importantly, these documents are crucial for teams that involve multiple content creators or editors. And they’re an irreplaceable part of a cohesive content strategy for brands that publish guest posts on their blogs.
Finally, if your business goals include expansion or a sale exit, you will need these deliverables to guarantee a smooth transition.
Producing (and regularly updating) these documents may not be your top priority — especially if you’re performing multiple jobs within your small business.
Nonetheless, having them on hand is the best way to guarantee a cohesive marketing plan. It’s also a great way to elevate your content’s quality and to make it easier to bring on collaborators once the moment is right.
A direct comparison of content strategy vs. content plan is necessary to clearly understand what is the scope of each of them and how to obtain maximum benefits from using them correctly.
What Is a Content Strategy?
Content strategy refers to the strategic approach and framework employed by businesses in developing and managing their content assets. It involves the careful planning, creation, distribution, and analysis of content to meet specific business goals.
Each content strategy takes into account factors such as target audience, brand positioning, and market research to ensure that the content resonates with the buyer persona and achieves desired outcomes.
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A content plan is a tactical roadmap that outlines the specific actions and steps required to execute a content strategy effectively. It provides a detailed schedule and action plan for content creation, distribution, and promotion. The content plan is the core part of a content strategy.
Typically it includes elements such as a content calendar, content types and formats, distribution channels, and strategies for amplifying content reach. It serves as a blueprint for businesses to implement their content strategy in a structured and organized manner.
Importance of Content Strategy vs Content Plan in Digital Marketing
Content strategy:
Provides clear direction, goals, and guidelines
Identifies target audience and tailors content accordingly
Increases brand awareness, engagement, and conversions
Content plan:
Translates strategy into actionable steps
Streamlines content creation and maintains consistency
Content strategy: Considers overall brand messaging and integration across various channels
Content plan: Focuses on channel-specific details and content distribution tactics
Complementary nature of content strategy and content plan
The content strategy and content plan work hand in hand to achieve overall content objectives.
Content strategy sets the foundation and strategic direction, while the content plan translates strategy into actionable steps.
The content strategy is the foundation on which the content plan is built, guiding decisions on the target audience, content themes, and messaging.
Effective execution of the content strategy is the main task of the content plan, providing structure and organization.
Content strategy and content plan are interdependent and mutually reinforcing, with the strategy driving the plan and the plan implementing the strategy.
The Content Strategy Process
Overview of the content strategy process
Research and analysis
Conduct market research, competitor analysis, and audience insights
Identify content gaps, trends, and opportunities
Goal setting and objective definition
Define specific (SMART) goals aligned with overall business objectives
Identify target audience demographics, behaviors, and preferences
Segment the audience based on relevant criteria
Content ideation and creation
Generate creative ideas for content that resonate with the target audience
Develop high-quality, engaging, and valuable content pieces
Content distribution and promotion
Determine the appropriate channels and platforms for content distribution
Plan and execute content promotion strategies to maximize reach and engagement
Measurement and analysis
Track key metrics and performance indicators to assess the effectiveness of the content strategy
Analyze data to gain insights, identify areas for improvement, and make data-driven decisions
Case Study/Example of a Successful Content Strategy Implementation:
Company X, a fashion retailer, executed a content strategy with clear actions and measurable outcomes:
Research and analysis:
Action: Conducted market research and analyzed three direct competitors.
Result: Identified content gaps and emerging trends in the fashion industry.
Goal setting and objective definition:
Goals: Increase brand visibility by 30%, increase organic traffic by 20%, and boost conversion rates by 15% in the next year.
Action: Defined these objectives aligned with overall business goals.
Audience identification and segmentation:
Segments: Fashion enthusiasts and trend-conscious individuals.
Action: Identified and segmented the target audience based on demographics and behaviors.
Content ideation and creation:
Action: Developed a mix of content types, including 50 blog articles, 20 style guides, and 100 social media visuals.
Result: Created engaging and relevant content tailored to the target audience’s preferences.
Content distribution and promotion:
Action: Leveraged social media platforms (Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok), collaborated with influencers, and implemented targeted email marketing campaigns.
Result: Reached the target audience effectively through multiple channels.
Measurement and analysis:
Metrics tracked: Website traffic, social media engagement, and sales data.
Action: Monitored the impact of the content strategy and made adjustments based on insights gathered.
Result: Achieved significant growth in brand visibility, increased organic traffic by 35%, and improved sales conversions by 15%.
The comprehensive content strategy process played a pivotal role in guiding the planning, execution, and measurement of Company X’s content initiatives. Through their strategic approach, they achieved measurable success, including substantial brand visibility growth, increased organic traffic, and improved sales conversions.
The Content Plan Development Process
A step-by-step guide to creating a content plan:
Aligning with content strategy objectives
Ensure that the content plan is in line with the goals and objectives defined in the content strategy.
Reflect the strategic direction and messaging of the overall content strategy.
Defining content themes and topics
Identify key themes and topics that align with the target audience’s interests and needs.
Research industry trends and audience preferences to inform content selection.
Mapping content to target audience personas
Understand the different segments within the target audience.
Create content tailored to each persona, addressing their specific pain points and motivations.
Creating a content calendar
Develop a schedule outlining when content will be created, published, and promoted.
Consider factors such as seasonality, events, and campaign launches.
Selecting appropriate content formats
Determine the most effective formats for delivering the content.
Consider the preferences and behaviors of the target audience.
Choosing relevant distribution channels
Identify the channels where the target audience is most active.
Select platforms that align with the content strategy and optimize content reach.
Planning content promotion and amplification strategies
Define strategies for promoting and amplifying the content through various channels.
Explore partnerships, influencer collaborations, and paid advertising opportunities.
Case Study – Example of a Well-Executed Content Plan:
Company Y, an e-commerce platform, successfully implemented a content plan that resulted in significant improvements in engagement and conversions. Here are the clear actions and numbers involved:
Aligned with content strategy objectives:
Objective: Increase user engagement by 25% and drive sales with a 20% conversion rate boost.
Action: Aligned the content plan with these objectives.
Defined content themes and topics:
Identified themes: Product reviews, buying guides, and user-generated content.
Action: Selected these themes to provide value and encourage interaction.
Mapped content to target audience personas:
Segments: Beginners and experienced users.
Action: Developed tailored content addressing their unique needs.
Created a content calendar:
Action: Established a consistent publishing schedule with three blog posts, two videos, and ten social media posts per week.
Result: Maintained audience engagement and met marketing objectives.
Selected appropriate content formats:
Formats used: Blog posts, videos, and social media visuals.
Action: Utilized this mix to cater to diverse audience preferences.
Chose relevant distribution channels:
Platforms targeted: Social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest) and relevant online communities.
Action: Focused on these platforms to reach the active target audience.
Planned content promotion and amplification strategies:
Strategies implemented: Targeted social media advertising with a budget of $18,000 per month, influencer collaborations, and encouraged user-generated content.
Action: Executed these strategies to amplify reach and engagement.
Through this well-executed content plan, Company Y achieved good results:
Increased engagement by 30% with higher interaction rates on social media platforms.
Boosted sales with a conversion rate increase of 15%.
Maintained a consistent publishing schedule resulting in improved brand visibility.
Utilized diverse content formats to cater to audience preferences effectively.
Targeted active distribution channels for maximum reach.
Amplified reach and engagement through strategic promotion tactics.
Integration and Optimization
Importance of integrating content strategy vs. content plan
Aligns efforts towards a unified vision and objectives.
Ensures consistency in messaging and brand positioning.
Maximizes the effectiveness of content initiatives.
Continuous optimization of content strategy and content plan
Monitoring and analyzing content performance
Regularly track key metrics such as engagement, conversions, and audience feedback.
Evaluate the success of content initiatives based on predefined goals.
Making data-driven adjustments
Identify areas for improvement based on performance data and analytics.
Optimize content elements, such as headlines, visuals, and calls-to-action, to enhance effectiveness.
Staying up-to-date with industry trends and changes
Keep abreast of evolving industry trends, consumer behavior, and platform algorithms.
Adapt content strategy and content plan accordingly to remain relevant and competitive.
The role of content strategy and content plan in achieving business goals
Content strategy sets the overarching direction and goals, providing a roadmap for success.
Content plan outlines the specific actions and tactics required to execute the strategy effectively.
Together, they enable businesses to attract and engage their target audience, build brand authority, drive conversions, and ultimately achieve their desired business outcomes.
The integration of content strategy and content plan ensures synergy and coherence in content efforts, while continuous optimization allows for data-driven improvements and staying ahead of industry trends. Ultimately, the combined role of content strategy and content plan is crucial in aligning content initiatives with business goals, driving growth, and fostering long-term success.
Ranking the highest possible in search engine results is a fierce battle. An interminable ever-changing list of on-page SEO steps and off-page SEO factors impact these results.
The main purpose of on-page SEO techniques is to naturally optimize a piece of content for search engines, in such a manner that it is easily found and listed in front of targeted visitors.
Here is a list of on-page SEO techniques that everyone should use to boost rankings:
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Most experts consider that the title of the post is the most important on-page SEO factor. Their argument is that if the title is not attractive and engaging enough to click through, or not optimized, the content will never appear in front of the user.
Others, like MOZ, consider the title tag as the second most important on-page SEO factor after content.
For best performances, your titles should follow the subsequent rules:
– Optimal length under 60 characters for proper display on the search results
– Use your keyword in the title once, out of the question to stuff a title just with keywords
– Keyword should be among the first words of the title, the first if possible.
Whenever possible include modifiers in the title. Words such as 2023, “guide”, “best” help improve rankings for long tail keywords.
In my view, the title of your post is paramount in the hierarchy of on-page SEO steps. The headline will make or break the success of your post.
2. On page SEO Step 2: Assign H1 Tag to the Title of the Article
The H1 tag is very important for SEO, so verify if your CMS properly added it to your title.
H1 tag should be used only once on a page and include the target keyword.
3. High Quality 1000+ Words Content
There is a huge debate about what that high-quality content means. As a consequence there is a myriad of indirect methods that in a certain way can measure the quality of the content: the number of visitors, repeat visitors, time on site, shares, comments, etc.
Useless to say that unique content is the norm. Avoid publishing duplicate content, for example for a guest post, because you have real chances of getting penalized by search engines.
High-quality content is easy to digest and attractive as designed. Organize the content in short paragraphs, emphasize keywords with a bold format, and use bullets to break blocks of text.
Nowadays the trend is to write long-form content as it was established that it ranks higher and is perceived as providing more value. Writing 2000+ words or even 3000+ words posts becomes the standard.
4. On-Page SEO Step 4: Enrich your content with visuals
Besides high-quality content, formatting that content is of out-most importance. Insert charts, videos, and entertaining images to retain attention, increase time spent on that piece of content and shrink the bounce rate.
Visuals improve the quality of content, making it more informative and attractive, thus boosting user interaction. Search engines highly appreciate that.
5. On-Page SEO Steps: Absolutely Include Images Optimization
Image name and image Alt Text should include target keywords. At least one of the images should include the keyword you run for. Again, this is a detail that helps search engines determine the subject of your post and it’s an on-page SEO technique that you should not ignore.
6. Insert Target Keyword within the First 100 Words
The first 100 words of your article should include the target keyword to help search engines identify the subject of your content.
Most probably this comes naturally, but just in case don’t skip it.
Concerning the keyword density in your post, there is no magic formula, but don’t overuse them, it’s subject to downgrading in search results. Use one keyword in the beginning and within the post where it makes sense, including semantic variations.
Here is what Matt Cutts from Google says relative to keywords density:
7. On-Page SEO Steps: Exploit the Power of Latent Semantic Indexing Keywords
Latent Semantic Indexing Keywords are related words or synonyms used by search engines to score the relevance of a page. Use a couple of them within your post.
8. Assign H2 Tags to Subheadings
Subheadings should also have tags, H2, H3, H4. The target keyword is to be inserted in at least one subheading.
Like in the example below:
9. Updated Content
Search engines are more interested in fresh content. As such updating content, especially for time-sensitive content is decisive.
Google, for example, displays the date of the last update.
The dimensions of the modifications made to a certain post are important too, removing irrelevant parts, and adding more content surpass just changing a few words. Update your post frequently and boost your rankings.
10. Insert External Links in Your Content
This seems to be a common mistake in not using outbound links. But it is a simple, easy SEO strategy to increase traffic. Its major advantage is that improves the quality of your content and helps search engines establish the topic of the respective page. External Links do not miss any on-page SEO checklist 2023.
It’s important to pay attention to the sites you link to and aim for those with high authority. Renowned sites like Forbes.com or Entrepreneur.com, or major actors in your niche, like HubSpot.com for Inbound Marketing, are more than reliable and trustful, as they provide quality content that your readers will highly appreciate.
And even more, your site will gain credibility.
11. Insert Internal Links in Your Content
If external links are very important, inbound links are also important. Interlinking is a strategy to keep the reader more time on your site while passing from one page to another. Inbound links prove that you are also offering supplementary information besides your page content.
Drop 2-4 links among your posts. And use as anchor text the corresponding keywords. Place them just since and when they are necessary and pertinent.
12. Insert Social Sharing Buttons
Social sharing is not actually a ranking factor but has an indirect role. Social media buttons help expand the audience that arrives on your site.
13. On-Page SEO steps: URLs Should Be SEO Friendly
It is well known that the first 3-5 words that appear in a URL bear higher importance.
Consequently, the permalinks should be short, relevant, and include the target keyword.
Loading speed is an SEO ranking factor and a compulsory on-page SEO technique. User experience is highly impacted by the site’s loading speed. Statistics say that users would not come back to a site that loads in more than 4 seconds.
71% of US businesses use Instagram, 90% of top brands included Instagram in their marketing strategy, and 25 million accounts belong to businesses.
Instagram has 89 million monthly active users only in the US and 80% of users outside the US, which means a global penetration and ad revenue. It is the social network most preferred by teenagers, 72% of them use this platform every single day.
And what’s even more interesting for businesses 72% of users actually bought a product they noticed on Instagram.
Instagrammers spend on average 53 minutes a day on the Android Instagram app, according to Instagram. Over 4,2 billion posts receive “likes” daily, and 75% of users act after visiting a post (for example visiting a site).
In terms of engagement, Instagram surpasses all other social platforms with the best interaction rate situated at 2,2% per follower.
Engagement on Instagram is superior to that of Facebook posts, according to a BuzzSumo study.
Businesses are rapidly catching the trend and paying attention to Instagram, 2 million advertisers are present on Instagram. And 80% of Instagrammers follow at least one business account.
Rough conclusion:
Instagram is a leading social network that you cannot afford to skip. Nowadays it is one of the best if not the best social platform for brands to engage with their audience. It is a not to be missed opportunity for businesses to present themselves in front of a more engaged and targeted audience while using slimmer budgets.
Instagram is primarily a visual platform, photo-centric and lately video-centric. Instagrammers have the possibility to post images, videos, and Instagram stories, and record live videos. And before deciding to use Instagram as a marketing platform for your business, you need to take into consideration several Instagram best practices.
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Instagram Best Practices: Your Profile on Instagram Has to Be Optimized
If we think at the fact that while searching for brands users are preferring Instagram face to Google, results that your Instagram profile and feed become paramount.
You have some fractions of seconds to make the best impression possible, consequently, do your best to convince visitors you deserve to be “followed”.
First of all, it’s a no-brainer to repeat the fact that you should convert your account to an Instagram business account. This way you will get access to Instagram insights, promotion for posts, and ways to connect easier with your audience like the “Contact” button.
A great Instagram profile should have:
An optimized bio
Your bio is your chance to clearly explain what your business does, how you help your clients, and why you stand out on a certain topic. This is the element that will decide if a viewer will become a follower.
Your name should be your business name if possible consistent on all the platforms you are present on.
Insert keywords to target your audience and facilitate the users’ understanding concerning your activity and your offer. Help them establish if you are relevant to them and if they want to engage with your content.
With Instagram allowing only one link, the one in your bio, you have to maximize its usage. In general, businesses use this link to send traffic to their website or to a specific landing page. Ensure you have a landing page optimized for mobile since Instagram is in majority a mobile platform and its users use it mainly on mobile.
Creating a branded hashtag for your business, it’s a great way to increase engagement. Mainly while promoting campaigns like contests or user-generated content.
Another element that impacts heavily on the engagement you can drive to your profile is using a call-to-action. Insert a relevant call-to-action and tell your followers either to subscribe to your list, to shop on your feed, or to visit your website or your landing page.
Foundr bio
An optimized profile
An attractive, aesthetic, and good-looking feed plays a major role in enticing more followers and increasing engagement. So, if you want to find visitors, attract them to your profile, and convert them into leads and customers, you need to invest some effort to build a nice feed.
The overall aesthetics of your profile is important, the attractiveness and the first impression of your feed will decide how fast you grow your following on Instagram. Thus, pay attention to it.
Be consistent with your editing style to ensure a natural flow of the whole profile. Use just a few filters, not all of them, if you prefer a certain style like bright colors, or fade tones stick to your choice for the whole profile.
If you plan to use user-generated content, again be consistent and curate it to fit with the line and design of your profile. Here is an example of aesthetic feed:
Optimized posts
Having a visually appealing feed is crucial, but you must also optimize your posts. On Instagram, you can post photos (the most common form of post), carousel posts, reels, and videos, which are a powerful driver of engagement. If you want to optimize your posts on Instagram, this deserves a look to enhance your video editing experience.
Instagram Is Evolving
Instagram strives to become a platform that supports businesses in their endeavors to attract and interact with clients, thus their top priority is Instagram for business because this way they can monetize better their platform.
Logic!
Last year, were launched plenty of new features to help businesses: new advertising types, new partnership tools, and capacities to increase traffic and sales.
Since the platform is continuously changing you need to stay informed on the new changes and tools that are released and how you can profit from them for your business.
To see positive returns on investment from Instagram you have to know the platform, your audience, and how you can use it best to achieve your goals.
The New Instagram Algorithm – New Instagram Best Practices
Recently you may have noticed a decrease in engagement registered by your Instagram feed. It’s because of changes in the Instagram algorithm.
This algorithm is the one that decides what you see in your feed and in which order. For businesses, this is very important as they are interested to make their content seen by as many users as possible. The algorithm uses a set of criteria to decide how many users will view a certain post, and these criteria include the number of “likes”, the number of “comments”, etc. The more the better and more users will see your post.
As a consequence to be successful on Instagram, you need to optimize the Instagram algorithm.
Engagement on Instagram is very important. The number of likes, views, comments, and shares impacts greatly the number of users that will see that post. Hence, you need to optimize your posts to have the highest engagement rate possible. Besides engagement as a quantitative measure, sometimes is also important the interval of time needed to receive that engagement, and how fast a post receives engagement.
Another important detail is scheduling Instagram posts when your audience is most active. This way you increase your chances of receiving higher engagement faster.
Dwelling time gains momentum, and the length of time spent on certain posts counts in the Instagram algorithm. Together with great photos, you should have exciting captions that retain longer the attention of a visitor.
Favorite accounts, those that your audience visits, likes, and comments on regularly will be privileged, and more content belonging to favorite accounts will appear on her feed. Your audience will see more content from the category she engages with, likes, and comments.
New content is always preferred by Instagram’s algorithm, so recently published content will appear more frequently in feeds.
Instagram Best Practices: Using Instagram Stories, Carousel, Reels, and Instagram Live
Instagram Stories
If 2017 was the year of Instagram stories, 2018 will be the year of their further proliferation.
Instagram stories are the expression of the video content trends translated in Instagram terms. Because video is on the verge of great expansion, it’s natural that features like Instagram Stories will gain in popularity. Capabilities like clickable links or geo-stickers are meant to support this evolution.
The most important aspects of Instagram Stories that businesses can profit from are:
– Stories Links – today it’s possible for all accounts having more than 10,000 followers to insert links in their Instagram Stories. This is most helpful for driving traffic from Instagram to your site
– Stories Highlights – their major plus is that they exist on your account forever until you decide to delete them, in comparison with common Stories that are live for about 24h. Instagram Stories Highlights will populate the center of your profile, below your bio, and above your feed. They are a major strength for businesses as they allow them to expose the content that their users should view first. Instagram Stories Highlights can help creatively market your business and become a great traffic driver and followers magnet.
Some ways that Instagram Stories can be used for business are:
· For the promotion of your products/services
· For gathering feedback from your community
· To strengthen engagement among your followers
Instagram Stories
Instagram Carousel is a new feature and creative way to attract attention. Can be used with high efficiency for:
· launching new products
· series of photos of different events, conferences, workshops
· showing progress, before and after sessions for product usage, programs, etc.
Instagram LIVE
If Instagram Stories are a success, Instagram Life is the raising star. A Later survey confirmed that about 55% of businesses surveyed were planning to use the “live” feature this year.
Even if going “live” is not exactly very comfortable for businesses in general, this feature is a great tool to drive engagement and reach new followers.
Instagram Life can be used in various ways:
– To launch new products/services or to promote them
– Host webinars, workshops, and tutorials to encourage participants to sign up for your mailing list
– Organize promotional sales or various discount campaigns exclusive to Instagram
Instagram Influencer Marketing will be a $3,8 billion industry in 2021 and has been demonstrated to be a highly effective and less expensive way to drive business growth.
Why are influencers successful in driving results? Because they dispose of a well-targeted following who trusts them.
On Instagram using influencers is an effective way to increase awareness and boost sales. Influencers act as trusted middlemen, introducing and recommending your business to their followers.
If you are on a tight budget, consider using micro-influencers. These are accounts with smaller followings, generally between 1000 and 100,000 followers, but they are more accessible and also enjoy high levels of trust from their followers. In some cases, micro-influencers have better engagement rates than larger influencers, and you might be more successful using more posts on a micro-influencer than on a prominent influencer within the same budget.
Identifying the right influencers or micro-influencers to help you reach your Instagram goals can be difficult. But if you define clear goals and consider the best criteria for selecting the influencers to work with, things are much simpler.
When choosing an influencer consider the criteria such as:
Engagement on Influencer’s account. This is a key metric, as the higher the engagement rate, the more attention followers pay to the influencer’s content and act on his advice. Target engagement rates of 2-3% and higher rates of 4-6% are even better and those posts that surpass 10% are judged as “viral”.
Influencer’s target audience. You need to choose influencers that have a similar audience to your target audience. If you are a kitchen appliance brand you will want to partner with influencers like chefs, cooks, and mom bloggers in the cooking area. So, you can get your products in front of a larger following that could be interested in them.
Followers number. This has relative importance if we take into consideration that engagement rates tend to decrease as the number of followers expands. The sine qua non condition is to have the same target audience.
Costs. You will have a budget for this type of expense that you have to fit it. So, this is an important detail. A common practice on Instagram is to offer your products/services in exchange for sponsored posts.
Also, in the Instagram world in your relationships with influencers, you can use the “share for share” (S4S). This is one of the best ways to reach new audiences and increase your following. Getting shouted out by influencers will have a tremendous impact on your account. In order to obtain a share-for-share deal you have to exchange valuable content with the target influencer.
Finally, everything reduces to providing valuable content.
Another way to leverage your network of influencers to promote your business is through a simultaneous social media blast called thunderclap. In essence, this means establishing a certain time when you and your target influencers will promote in the same time your business/products/services. This is a very good method to reach the most extended audience possible.
Instagram Best Practices: Advertising on Instagram
Instagram ads are another tool for expanding your reach, increasing your following, and boosting engagement on your posts.
As organic reach on Instagram is on a downward slope, it may be necessary to invest in ad campaigns to reach your goals. The easiest way to use paid ads on Instagram is to use boosted posts. It’s as simple as clicking on the “promote” button. And Instagram will take charge of “pulling” a relevant audience for your post.
More businesses are considering using paid ads on Instagram. However, you need some expertise to see good results from your Instagram ads campaigns.
This is one of the most important ways that drive income for businesses. Instagram is used as a modality to capture leads that will further convert to clients. You attract new leads through your posts combined with powerful calls-to-action which invite your visitors or followers to click on your bio link.
It is wise to insert a call to action every 20 or 30 posts so as not to become too pushy and drive away your followers.
Affiliate Marketing
Another way to monetize your Instagram account for business is to promote other businesses’ products and services via affiliate marketing and earn a commission. Explore the best affiliate programs and join the ones that align with your niche and audience.
Focus only on a couple of products and promote only products that you tried and really liked. Finally, it’s all about providing value to your audience. If your audience loves the products you promote, your revenues through affiliate marketing will skyrocket.
Sponsorships
If you have a decent following, you can monetize it via sponsorships. Sponsorships are another manner to earn income on Instagram.
Instagrammers can work with other brands that sponsor their content. Sponsorships can amount to hundreds or thousands of dollars for one single post or even more.
Be consistent with your posting schedule, your content type, and your general feel if you want to attract sponsorships. And also act proactively and approach the brands you would like to work with, it might materialize in a nice income stream.
Advertising
Another valuable way to drive revenue is through advertising. Meaning is paid by complementary businesses to feature their brand in front of your audience. This happens via caption and, of course, a call to action.
All you read above are relevant tactics and best practices for Instagram that can help you use this social channel to increase brand awareness, and drive traffic, leads, and customers for your products and services. Just keep in mind to always provide value and simplify your audience’s endeavors.
An effective website will serve as your digital outlet and online business card. Consequently, you need to know what the best content management systems are.
This is basically the venue that will leverage all your other content marketing channels.
The platform that you use must therefore be flexible enough to keep evolving with the changing times in order for your content to offer solutions at the right time and to the right people.
When it comes to the best CMS there’s no one-size-fits-all, you only need to identify the one that offers all the features that you need to build a successful website.
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What Should You Look For in the Best Content Management Systems of 2023?
All blogging platforms available come with different learning curves.
If you are just starting, as a beginner with zero technical background, you’ll want a straightforward content management system. As you grow with your blog you may want to add more features or customizations to maximize its effectiveness.
Blogging platforms can be classified into two categories:
i. Content Management Systems (CMS)
This is software hosted on a server and requires a connection to a domain name that you have to buy. CMSs offer endless possibilities although they come at a cost. They allow you all the freedom to customize as you please, especially if you know your way around deep technical stuff.
ii. Blog Publishing Services
This is a platform where you sign up to create your blog; meaning you do not need a server. Plus, you use the sub-domain of the hosting platform. Obviously, it is easier to use particularly if you’re not coding savvy and when you want to spend almost zero to set it up.
With that said, the best blogging platforms in 2023 will include a perfect mix of both categories mentioned above together with the following basic features:
a. Text editing functions – A good platform must offer a wide variety of inbuilt editing options. For instance, it should offer an auto-save function, a preview function, or even a basic grammar editor.
b. Customization – A great platform must offer you themes and templates you can play around with to give your blog the look you desire. Some platforms offer a variety of templates for free while others offer them at a premium rate. Others will allow you to create from zero if you don’t like any of the offered themes. So, what you pick will depend on your needs and your technical know-how.
c. Comments function – an engaging comments section is what helps grow your blog. This feature must therefore be enabled and be as interactive as possible.
d. Scalability – As your blog grows; you want a platform that will handle all the content without slowing it down, so you can keep growing without limiting your potential.
e. SEO tools and features – You obviously want traffic to your blog. Optimizing your content for search is therefore of absolute importance. So, you need a platform with inbuilt optimization tools to help you optimize your content. Some platforms offer you SEO suggestions as you type, this is what you need. Alternatively, if your ideal platform does not offer this tool, you can install third-party tools or plug-ins. If all this is not available, use the SEO best practices skills you have to create your content.
f. User-friendly – When starting, you really need a simple-to-learn and use platform, whether you’re a developer or a rookie. Thus, pick a platform that’s less complicated but gets the work done and gets going.
Other things to consider when picking the best blogging platform include the purpose of your business, your goals, as well as your needs. Your niche is another key element that you want to consider. For instance, if you prefer visual content, then you want to consider platforms that support multi-media content. If you prefer social, then you want to consider a platform that supports social media and so on.
Without further ado, here are some of the best content management systems for 2023 in detail:
The 2023 statistics show that WordPress powers 39.6% of the internet. Launched way back in 2005, this is by far the most flexible content management system that has evolved into a multi-purpose CMS with loads of features and themes. It offers both free and premium services. Basic blog hosting is free while additional features such as extra storage or a custom domain name come at a fee.
The flexibility mentioned above comes to play when you have to configure your blog according to your taste. This includes picking a theme from the hundreds offered, the fonts, the plug-ins, and so on. For a newbie or someone that’s not a developer, this may take quite some time to get done. However, it pays off when you get used to it.
WordPress prides itself on a thriving community that offers quick solutions to any challenges you may experience and offers expert support when that’s what you need. They also take care of all your security issues and accept credit card payments through an available plug-in. It’s therefore a great platform with unlimited potential for growth.
The price starts at $4 monthly for personal plans but there is a free version for non-commercial blogging. The free-for-life plan includes a subdomain, community support, jetpack essential services, and dozens of free themes.
Launched in 2006, Wix was initially meant for building websites, but it has a blogging segment. It’s one of the most popular content management systems because of one simple reason: it’s incredibly easy to use. The easy drag-and-drop tools enable you to add items to your blog or website.
So, for beginners or non-techies, this is one of the best CMS. If you’re a developer, you have the option of starting from scratch and building your customized blog or website.
It has over 500 templates that are categorized into hobbies such as crafts, e-commerce section, and personal section. Another unique feature of Wix is that the blog you create on this platform is supported on mobile devices such as tablets or smartphones. Thus, your readers can easily access your content on the go.
They propose a wide selection of templates and designs, you’re able to add your own captions and links to images, and you’re able to insert videos from either Vimeo or YouTube and it’s also possible to personalize your image galleries.
When it comes to editing, as said above, Wix is great on mobile, so, you can actually update your blog from your mobile device. Isn’t that just great?
You can monetize Wix by adding custom ads via HTML elements, however, on the free plan, branded Wix elements will be shown too. In terms of support, they have a strong customer support system that helps you out whenever you have an issue, via phone or email.
Both premium and free plans allow you to launch a blog from your Wix site. However, if you want to use your own domain name, you’ll be required to sign up for a combo plan for $13 per month. And this will spare you from all the Wix ads.
Pros
· They offer dozens of templates that you can customize.
· They offer built-in stock of free videos and photos.
· They allow you to build your site from scratch or use templates, it’s your choice.
· It’s very easy to set up using the drag-and-drop tools.
Cons
· The free plan is quite limited and shows Wix ads on your site.
· Third-party apps are limited.
· It’s difficult to change a template once you choose.
· The e-commerce tools are only limited to the premium plans and even then; they’re still a little limited.
· In comparison with other content management systems, the features they offer are rather limited.
Wix pricing of the premium plan starts at $8.50 per month, but you can add a custom domain for $4.50 per month.
It’s best for professional bloggers and also for business-centered blogs.
This platform is a community of great writers, journalists, and bloggers among other experts and it continues to grow in popularity, especially because of the few features that make it an easy-to-use platform. For instance, its sign-up process is just like that one of a social media platform. You just create an account and get started there and then.
The first thing that you might notice with this platform is that you can’t have your own domain. Instead, you’ll have a URL like https://medium.com@youraccountname.
Launched in 2012 by Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter, Medium is mainly focused on your content rather than your brand. Meaning you can create content about your brand and customize your layout by adding your logo, your headers, or brand colors. In terms of personalizing your account and content that’s about all.
As a publisher, this platform is absolutely free of charge and it will help you reach like-minded people who take your content seriously without being distracted by ads because Medium has no ads.
With that said, readers do pay a subscription fee to be able to get customized top-rated content. They’re charged $50 per year, so when you get many readers applauding your work, you get paid and this money is from the readers themselves.
Medium has a partner program and once you sign up for it, your publications are reviewed by Medium’s editors if your content is stellar, they recommend it to subscribed members and that’s how you get a chance to earn money.
When it comes to editing your content, it offers a pretty clean drag-and-drop easy-to-use tool. Your work and any changes you may make are automatically saved and as you proceed typing, you get to see how your completed post will appear to your readers.
It truly is the minimalist of all blogging platforms when it comes to design, it’s a size that fits every average blogger. They want you to focus on the written words with zero distraction.
Who should best use Medium? Anyone who loves words and has a flair for them. This is the best free blogging platform out there.
Pros
· You have over 60 million word lovers waiting to read your content
· Offers a brilliant typography with a completely professional look
· Business friendly
· Monetization option with the Partner Program
Cons
· Almost no customization, all blogs have the same look
· You can’t link to a Google account to get Analytics.
This old spot is one of the best blogging platforms out there. It’s a free blogging platform simple enough that anyone can use it with ease. If you already have an existing Google account, then you already have a Blogger account that comes with a domain name, if you want your custom domain name, you have this option available.
It offers a wide range of templates that can be personalized. And since it belongs to Google, it integrates very easily with other Google tools such as Google Analytics, Google AdSense which will enable you to monetize your blog by displaying relevant ads on your pages.
Plus, it allows you to edit HTML, and add images and widgets to your blog, something that’s not very popular with other blogging platforms.
With this said, it can be a little limiting as far as basic tools are concerned: it doesn’t allow you to add new features and you’re restricted with few design options. It’s pretty retro. Another limiting factor about Blogger is that it caps the number of characters you can use (does Twitter come to mind? Guess who founded both?)
If for any reason you get stuck and need help, you won’t get much help here. They have no support system. And since Google is known to kill their products, it means your blog will be vulnerable to whatever decisions they wake up to.
Pros
· It’s absolutely free and user friendly
· Does the hosting and maintenance
· Offers templates you can pick from
· Easily integrates with other Google tools and products
· It has a good anti-spam tool
Cons
· Doesn’t offer many blogging tools or designs
· Integration with third-party apps is nil
5. CMS Hub
This is one of the best content management systems in 2023 particularly because of its full integration with HubSpot’s marketing tools, a built-in CRM, and other service tools. It allows you to customize your blog as you wish. If you don’t want to use the built-in themes, you can create your own.
Here you get to use the blog editor coupled with the built-in SEO tools to create optimized content with numerous interactive elements available and gives you the option of previewing your post before publishing. Another unique feature of this platform is that you can create content in different languages in order to reach a global audience. How cool is that?
As this is a commerce-centric platform, it allows you to connect your blog to your social media accounts, and therefore it is very easy to promote your blog through automatic sharing. You can analyze your blog’s performance via built-in analytics and this can go a long way in boosting your performance and results.
HubSpot’s CMS allows you to add comments, edit or simply collaborate in the composer mode with other writers on the same content and see what changes have been made and by whom.
Pros
· Offers multi-lingual options
· Offers built-in SEO tools
· You can integrate all your marketing and sales activities with the CRM tools
· You can keep track of all your interactions with the potential audiences through all touch points like social media, emails, etc.
Cons
· It’s still relatively new so some functions may not offer depth, but they’re constantly improving.
This is a website and blog builder created by HostGator. It’s another pretender to the best content management systems top and is pretty easy to use. It has an intuitive drag-and-drop tool and templates that you can use to build your blog, business site, or online store.
Gator provides a one-stop shop for your blogging needs including hosting and is quite flexible in terms of customization of your blog. Their templates are split into sections such as beauty and fashion, business, music and entertainment, consultancy, etc. and this makes it very easy for you when picking the adequate template.
As features, they offer all the basic features required in a CMS plus some extra bonuses. For instance, you can get security certificates, web analytics, a domain name, and social media integration. Concerning the text, you can resize it, and switch colors or fonts easily. You can add images, videos or social media posts easily.
Gator offers great support that’s available 24/7 whether via phone, chat, or email.
Pros
· It’s seamless to set up and use
· It has social media integration
· It’s affordable in comparison to what it offers
· It checks your security, backup as well as performance
· You can easily add the e-commerce functionality
Cons
· They have no free version but they have a money-back guarantee
· They have limited features and extensions
· The premium plan is the only one that offers e-commerce features.
Gator offers 2 different pricing plans, the cheapest starts at $3.84 per month and here you get free hosting and domain among other features that will get you started. The premium starts at $5.99 and offers everything in the cheapest plan plus priority customer support. And the eCommerce plan includes everything for $9.22.
Gator is best for beginners and those that prefer an all-in-one blog hosting solution.
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If you’re a creative, artist or designer then this platform is for you! It offers a wide variety of posh award-winning templates and features that you can use without having to know to code. Plus, it integrates with Unsplash, Getty Images, and Google AMP. It’s strong on image-rich content as you can tell and these templates are fully customizable and mobile-optimized. After you’ve created your blog pages, you can take advantage of the SEO tools to ensure your content is optimized.
Squarespace integrates with social media. Therefore, after publishing your content you can easily share and promote it. They also have built-in analytics tools to enable traffic tracking, what your readers or visitors are searching for and how your content is performing in general. Other features include the ability to receive comments, the RSS feed provision and if your blog is intended for commerce, it has a category for that too. It supports audio files and newsletter sign-up forms.
With all this greatness, this platform is not the easiest to learn especially for beginners. It also may require you to upgrade to the business plan in order to get more editing options.
The SEO is not very straight forward but they have a detailed SEO guide to help you find your way around. You can’t install any additional modules or plugins and has no auto-save feature. Finally, the use of available plugins and themes may require some coding skills and therefore not the easiest for everybody.
Pros
· You get hosting and domain solutions
· Built-in security solutions
· Fantastic professional designs to pick from
· Ecommerce option
· Round the clock customer support
Cons
· A steep learning curve
· Can only use the platform features
· Limited third-party integration
· Limited number of contributors and pages on the personal plan
The pricing ranges between two plans, the personal plan that starts at $16 per month and the business plan that starts at $26 per month. You get unlimited storage and bandwidth on both, but with the business plan, there are extra features for marketing and the ability to create custom designs and an online store.
Squarespace is a great content management system for creative bloggers and professionals. It’s also ideal for business and portfolio blogs.
This platform is a complete content management system and is very popular with enterprise blogs and websites because of its superior performance. You can organize your blog and webpages within this platform and enjoy all the built-in editing features and content creation functions available. However, it doesn’t host, and this means you get hosted elsewhere.
Another aspect of Drupal is that it’s a little more technical and therefore may not be the best platform for beginners, but as a developer, it’s a great place to shine. So, if you are going to use it but have no technical skills then you may be required to invest in a professional developer in order to get started.
Drupal is even more powerful than WordPress and it’s ridiculously secure. This is one of the reasons it’s one of the best blogging platforms. It’s an extremely flexible open-source content management system and ideal for a large and complex blog. It offers some exceptional features and modules compared to other platforms.
It offers a very wide selection of page templates, content types, views, and blocks to help you create and manage your different types of content and this is particularly a much-needed solution for advanced bloggers running an enterprise that needs self-hosted solutions.
Pros
· It’s an excellent platform for building advanced and feature-rich blogs
· You can easily and seamlessly scale up your blog to a website due to its robust architecture
· You get access to a myriad of free features and modules as well as enterprise-level performance and security
· You get a variety of free templates and plugins to customize your blog
· Flexibility on the content type you can create plus an access control built-in system to manage your permissions
· Has a multilingual site support
Cons
· Not easy to use if you don’t have the technical expertise
As for Drupal’ pricing, it’s among the best free content management systems because it’s an open-source kind of platform.
It’s perfect for technical experts or developers, designers, and anyone else willing to learn some new skills.
Joomla! is a content management system that has been around for over a decade and is one of the most popular CMSs on the internet. It has built-in content management features that allow you to do multiple things from one dashboard. For instance, you can manage numerous users, and create custom content types in multiple languages all under the same umbrella.
It has powerful built-in functionality that makes it very easy for you to maintain your blog especially when you update it. Joomla, however, has a steep learning curve and needs a little more time to set it up. Even though it offers a limited number of extensions and themes, they are extra effective. For example, it offers a better drag-and-drop editor and enables star ratings on your content and it automatically publishes posts to your social media sites using these extensions.
Joomla! has a very active community and therefore getting support is an easy matter, whether through tutorials or forums. But it may be hard to find expert support to handle your customization issues.
Pros
· Compared to WordPress, it offers more built-in features
· It has a seamless update process that is super-efficient in giving you an easy maintenance time
· It’s not too difficult to set up
· They have ensured your problems get solutions through their thoroughly detailed support page
Cons
· Has limited extensions and themes.
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This is another best platform for blogging simply because of how straightforward it is to use. It comes with a wide range of easy-to-use tools and features including the popular drag-and-drop option convenient for beginners. It’s a popular platform for blogging, templates, hosting as well as web building and this is one of the reasons most business-oriented users prefer it instead of managing them separately.
Some great functionalities that Weebly offers include the ability to create complex layouts by adding image galleries or forms, additional sub-levels to your navigation buttons, and templates that are optimized for mobile (this saves you the trouble of additional editing for mobile publishing).
So, for the set-up, you can start with the free plan where you can first learn the ropes before getting on the paid plans. If you’re a developer hoping to tweak some things here and there, Weebly doesn’t make this easy at all because they seem focused on people who want to create a quick blog to use and update without doing the extra.
But if you’re creating a hobby or personal blog, you can get on the $6 per month Personal plan that has similar features to the free plan but with the chance to connect your custom domain for a more professional look. The next pricing plan is the Professional plan which goes for $12 per month. It proposes unlimited storage, password-protected pages, and a free domain. It’s a great plan when you want to offer exclusivity to your readers.
But whichever plan you go with, you’ll still be able to build your website and add a blog without coding as everything technical is easily and quickly taken care of by Weebly.
Experts have suggested that if you want to build your blog you should avoid the free and professional plans as they’re least tailored to fit a blogger’s needs.
With this said Weebly’s most highlighted features include detailed analytics on how your blog is performing, a great comments section, an archive, and social bookmarking to help your content go viral. It also enables scheduled publishing and basic SEO solutions.
Pros
· A straightforward drag-and-drop tool
· Mobile apps
· SEO features
· Integrates with Google Analytics
Cons
· Few features are integrated
· Third-party features are limited
· Exporting sites is complex
· Free plan carries Weebly subdomain and branding
Weebly is perfect for beginners as you’ve seen; you don’t need much technical expertise. It’s also great for websites that need blogging abilities and portfolio blogs.
If all you want is a simple yet versatile platform to launch your blog on, then look no further than Ghost. It’s ideal when you’re not into e-commerce. This minimalist blogging platform was founded by a former WordPress developer back in 2013.
Ghost offers neat and smooth editing and publishing without all the muddle of add-ons. It’s an open-source platform made out of JavaScript and may need some coding skills to set it up. Because it’s an open-source platform, you’re free to customize it and give your ideal kind of look and even add a custom code to your blog for ads.
While writing your content it enables you to preview it live and edit it as you go. It has a very simplified user interface that limits you on the number of pre-designed plugins and themes you can use. The self-hosted plan is free but has a steep learning curve and therefore not ideal for everyone. It will require you to download the software to your server and then get your own domain.
The basic plan offered at $29 a month includes a blog, a CDN, SSL encryption, and about 50k page views monthly. The Standard plan costs $79 per month and includes up to half a million page views monthly, extra resources, and priority support. The highest is the Business plan which costs $199 per month. For this, it will allow a million page views per month, almost zero downtime, and a subdirectory.
The limiting factors of Ghost include the difficulty in installation and the fact that you require web hosting to run a blog.
Pros
· It’s blog-centric
· Has a neat and de-congested intuitive UI
· Extremely fast since is written in JavaScript
· The hosted version requires zero setup
· Live preview of your posts
· SEO and social media powered
· Mobile page functionality
Cons
· Customizing the apps is no walk in the park
· The UI is too simplified therefore you’re limited in options
· Limited themes to play around with
· Requires expert knowledge if you’re to install it yourself.
Ghost is one of the best CMSs for serious publishers and bloggers requiring complex technical solutions or a budding online presence.
With an excellent easy-to-use UI for both expert and beginner bloggers, it’s no wonder Typepad has made it to this list of the best platforms for blogging. It comes with great flexibility including the possibility of publishing from email, mobile, or your web browser. It has a Theme Builder that enables you to create custom designs as well as an option for creating your own templates or theme modification with a customized CSS even though the Theme Builder is not too intuitive.
These designs are divided into layouts and themes, so you must first pick a template that will be configured to various layouts, and the number of these layouts is going to depend on the chosen template. The available templates are meager and repetitive. The widgets are also limited but can be acquired through a third party.
It’s integrated with Google Analytics with its own affiliate plan. Typepad is fully hosted and provides a rich variety of themes and plugins to pick from to personalize your blog.
One of Typepad’s highlights concerns the management tools. Its dashboard for instance has a sidebar with links to its key features including the robust statistics tracker that gives you a breakdown of your blog referrals and views to help better target your audience. It includes tools for comments moderation allowing comments block with certain words or phrases, etc. Another great thing is the built-in SEO tools that are pretty easy to use.
Its downside is that they do all the blog hosting and therefore you can’t be hosted elsewhere. As an expert, you may also not be able to make any edits as it’s centered on bloggers that may not have these skills.
Typepad offers several plans depending on user requirements.
It starts with the Plus Plan which costs $8.95 per month, allowing for unlimited storage, design templates, personal support, and domain mapping. The next plan is the Unlimited Plan goes for $14.95 per month – it offers you everything in the Plus Plan, a bonus customizable design, and the possibility to have unlimited blogs. The next tier has the Premium Plan at the cost of $29.95 per month and includes what’s offered on the other two plans plus around-the-clock support. The last plan is the Enterprise Plan which goes for $49.95 per month. You also get a free 14-day trial with all the plans.
Pros
· Has social media integration
· Supports live video and audio podcasts
· A versatile dashboard
· Integrates with Google
· Has monetization features
Cons
· Only 14-day trial, no free plan.
· Limited the number of blogs you can publish
· Limited widgets.
Typepad is best for professional bloggers, influencers, and large enterprises.
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This is one of the best free blogging platforms because it’s a hybrid micro-blogging platform that carries all the social networking qualities including follow, re-blog, reply, etc. Here you get to publish brief posts that may contain audio, images or videos, links, slideshows, or texts that are not as long as the regular old-fashioned blog posts but longer than Twitter’s 140 characters.
On this platform, users can republish your posts on their Tumble blog or even share them on Twitter. Publishing your content on Tumblr is quick and easy and absolutely free even though there are some paid templates offered. You don’t require bandwidth or storage limits when publishing, and you get a custom domain. The themes provided can be tweaked and customized and you have access to HTML codes that you can use to make any changes that you want.
This flexibility to customize is what makes Tumblr such a great place for those who like to express their creativity and stand out. For businesses, this is excellent because you will have your own domain, and in case you already have another registered domain, Tumblr can still host your site.
Some great publishing features offered are the ability to publish from your email, through texts or audio from your phone, post scheduling, bookmarks, and the ability to keep some posts or the entire blog private.
You can have guests publishing on your Tumble blog and have the possibility to view and approve before publishing. This collaboration makes working with partners or friends in the same industry quite easy and is best if you’re keen on engaging and fostering an online community.
Tumblr uses various functions to enable SEO and therefore doesn’t need much extra work on your part. It also doesn’t clutter your page with ads or logos because the user interface is clean and straightforward. Tumblr enables the use of third-party apps to add the extra functionality that you’re looking for.
This platform integrates seamlessly with social media such as Twitter and Facebook and allows publishing through these platforms as well. You can also keep track of your analytics related to any subscriptions you may get through your blog’s RSS feed, using Feedburner.
There are also a few things that can get you frustrated when using Tumblr: for instance, there’s a limit to the number of posts you can queue up, only 50 per day. You also can’t upload videos over 100MB and your audio tracks have to be in MP4 format. To add to this, if you violate any of their community guidelines they automatically suspend your account.
But overall, Tumblr remains one of the best free blogging platforms and continues to be a favorite of many because it’s an ideal platform for publishing multi-media content and allows great engagement with your followers.
Pros
· It’s free with a subdomain and allows you to connect to your custom domain name
· Extremely easy to set up and use
· Offers excellent social media integration
· A great place for quick blogs with rich media formats
Cons
· Limits on some features and has no room for expansion
This is a free site and is best suited for microbloggers.
Overall Takeaway
This list indicates what the best content management systems in 2023 can offer you, and depending on your blogging needs, they all offer amazing features that leave you spoilt for choice. For instance, if you’re looking for a flexible platform then you have WordPress if you’re creative and want a platform that helps you leverage on that then you have Squarespace.
If you have skills and a flair for words then Medium is your place of choice. If speed is your desire then get on board with the JavaScript-based Ghost. And if you don’t want to spend your money then there are many best free blogging platforms such as Tumblr. Whatever you want, one of these content management systems will offer you the solutions you need.
FAQs
How to choose the best CMS?
To choose the best CMS for you, you need first to establish some selection criteria. Such criteria may be cost, customizability, familiarity with the platform, flexibility, etc.
What is the most used content management system?
The most used content management system is WordPress, by about 40% of website owners.
What are the 3 different types of CMS?
The 3 types of CMS are open-source content management systems, custom content management systems, and commercial content management systems.
Which is the easiest CMS to use?
The easiest CMS to use is the one that you are most familiar with. Ones could say that WordPress is the easiest to use, as it’s the most popular and is the basis for a plethora of themes.
Which content management system is best?
The best content management system is the one that suits best your needs at a certain moment. There is no one-fits-all answer. It was a time when I considered Squarespace to be great, but things changed and now WordPress with a Divi Builder is my best option.
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