Organic marketing is the foundation of any successful online business at all. Yes, paid advertising is valuable in driving immediate targeted results and can be an important tool for many businesses, however when you turn off the campaign, the leads stop coming in.
Organic marketing is the long-term strategy. It’s the strategy that, when done right, will bring you in leads and always growing traffic for years to come.
Here is a good example of what I am referring to: Over 25% of People Click the First Google Search Result
Being on the first page of Google Search, no less being the first to be seen, doesn’t happen by accident. It happens as a result of effective, successful use of your organic marketing tactic, SEO. Contrary to what you have heard though, organic marketing isn’t just SEO. YOUR specific organic marketing strategy will include many different platforms and mediums that will allow you to provide value to your audience.
If your here, you must be ready to reap the benefits and connect with your audience, learn what organic marketing truly is and what you need to do in this complete guide to getting it right.
Organic Marketing Is
Organic marketing is the umbrella term for nearly any marketing that is not paid and pushing ads in front of you. These all fall under organic marketing:
Original Blog content creation
Organic Social media marketing
Subscriber Email List marketing
SEO
Non-sponsored link building
Podcasts and speaking engagements
Collaborations with other colleagues or brands. Anywhere or anyone that can mention you and your brand.
The channels you use depend on your audience and brand. One of the best websites in the world to follow is Content Marketing Institute. They produce Daily, Monthly and weekly content and reports, such as This Report that found the top 3 organic content distribution channels are:
All Social media (Deeper Break down by Channels)
Website/blog (Original Content Creation)
Email / Subscriber lists
It doesn't matter which channel and platform you choose, organic marketing is based on creating and providing value for your followers. It is not about pushing ads to your audience. Though you might be including a call to action to buy or connect, the overall goal is to provide true value for them, let them connect with you and your brand on a personal level..
Organic Marketing is NOT
Organic marketing can be accomplished on just about any budget, but saying that, you have to remember, it doesn’t work if it’s not done right. Doesn't matter if it costs you pennies or thousands, it can blast you into space or leave you 6 feet under.
Organic marketing isn’t just about creating content, just to create content or to be on social media just to be on social media, this is your business, it actually requires attention to details. To be consistent and relied upon.
A blog post that is only 300 words, is NOT SEO-optimized and is not written well, will do you way more harm then it will do you good. It doesn't look good for your brand and it is a giant waste of your time, which is the most valuable thing you own. It won't rank you in google or drive one ounce of traffic to your website either.
For every piece of Original "Organic" content you create, share and send to your audience, you need to be clear on your intent:
is this valuable to my audience?
What is the goal of this article, video, photo shoot?
How can we measure impact and ROI for our campaigns?
Does our ideal client and true fans, even care about this?
Organic marketing requires clarity and intention, regardless of what platform, app or website you’re using, even your own.
Haley Fox
Organic Marketing in Action
When you have a good SEO and link building team, this is the type of thing you will hear and see.
In the six months we worked together they saw a 99 percent increase in organic traffic. Content Manager, Mrs. DeCosta, shared:
“Our visitor numbers, sign-ups, and sales are all averaging at an all-time high right now. All of the backlink work we did together made a HUGE impact on this! Our organic numbers are STILL rising and our posts are still being impacted by the SEO juice we’re still seeing from many of your links.”
Check out this amazing #1 Ranking in SEO on Google article: Link Building Case Study: How I Increased My Search Traffic by 110% in 14 Days
What is the Value in Organic Marketing?
Brands and Companies struggle to see the value in organic marketing. It is because, unlike paying for an ad, the (ROI) or Return of Investment is not immediate. Organic marketing takes time and lots of effort to work,
However, unlike paid advertising, the greatest value is the benefits that come with organice marketing —including leads, sales, traffic, brand impressions, and brand authority—that do not stop just because you no longer have a budget to feed ads.
While paid advertising is valuable in driving targeted leads in a quick manner, organic marketing is the true long game. Organic marketing is all about putting in the time and money right now now to reap the benefits for years to come, endless years to come.
It is because organic marketing well help you to create a foundation that will generate leads, connect with your audience, provide value, and build a consistent flow of traffic to your website. With organic marketing you:
Provide value that keeps people coming back for more, longing for more when there is none.
You will Rank for keywords that allow you to reach your ideal client through Google search as well as other search engines and those keywords continue to grow and rank as time goes by.
You don’t just sell, you actually connect with people and other brands.
All of this leads to an engaged audience that knows, likes, and trusts you and your brand, which in turn leads to more sales and more conversions. But, pairing organic with paid advertising is a true winning combination for brands who want to see results now and are ready to put in the work to keep those results coming, even after the ads are no longer being run. That is what true Organic Marketing will do.
LARGE - Key Organic Marketing Factors
This is not a one size fits all marketing strategy. Not all organic marketing is created equal. A badly written social media post or a crappy email will not drive you any leads and doesn't have a way for you to connect and continue to connect with your fans. To always have the benefits of organic marketing, you need to consider a several key factors. In my years of doing organic marketing, I’ve found those factors to be:
Value in the First Approach
Organic marketing is all about the value. While ads drive immediate traffic and sales, organic marketing does the same thing over time by building connections with your audience. But that only works if you take a value in the first approach, approach. This human-centered way of thinking about marketing is necessary if you want to leverage the long-term goals.
But, don’t let this mindset keep you from optimizing for search engines and reader engagement. For instance, in the terms of content creation, some people in marketing would say: “Focus on the reader and forget about things like SEO.” Honestly that is dumb, it should be “Start with the reader and back it up with the SEO.” A value in the first approach refers to getting the value for your company and while also giving value back to your audience.
OH YEAH - Marketing Research
Organic marketing will only work if you know your audience and what they are looking for. It won’t work if you simply rely on your assumptions. This means you can’t ignore doing your due diligence and research. When you take time to do AUDIENCE RESEARCH, you know who you’re speaking to, what they want, what gaps you fill, and how you can provide the value that organic marketing makes possible for these people and your brand. Make sure to back up your content plan, all your social media posts, your email blasts, and all your keyword choices with the data that you find. Some areas to do good research include:
What is the best time to send emails?
Attention Grabbing Subject Lines
Social Media Posting times
Meet your audience where they are (social media, country, etc)
What are their wants and needs?
Keywords and backlinks for Blog articles
Find the gaps of information in the industry
Always know what your competitors are doing
YOU HAVE TO TEST
How do you know what is or isn't working if you’re not testing it out? As with any other area of your business or marketing campaigns, you need to live and breathe the information: always testing.
Organic marketing is never a one done process. It’s an always evolving evolution. As your business grows and evolves you will also find that your consumer needs will change and so does your marketing. This is why getting clear about your intention for every piece of content you create and share is critical. When you know what the goal is, you can then test to see if you are actually achieving that goal.
The best way to of testing is to create monthly reporting a priority. There are tons of platforms that can provide a monthly report that includes metrics like changes in organic traffic, the leads generated and earned, top-performing content, social media growth, click throughs and more!!!.
This is so important because when you track the data over time you find patterns. These patterns tell you what’s working and what’s not and you can use that data to optimize what you’re doing.
My absolute go to tool is this: The Most Powerful All-in-One SEO Tool Suite
Slow Baby Steps
When it comes wo organic marketing, quality trumps quantity every single time. This is why I recommend starting small and building from that foundation. Don't be a bull in a China shop, for example: don’t try to be active and engaged on five social media platforms right from the very beginning. Instead, do the research you need to learn about your audience and where they are most active and start there. Master that platform by taking time to create content that resonates with your you, your audience and your personality, test what’s working, and most importantly, engaging as often as possible—and then add in other platforms from there.
The baby steps philosophy goes for all of your organic marketing needs, like creating blog content, doing link building or even doing a photo shoot. Your frequency and consistency should depend upon how much you can put into it as well, not how much you can do just to do it and do it right.
How to Make Organic Marketing Work
Organic marketing is not as simple as sending out a crappy unthought, not well written email once a month, posting on social media when you feel like it, or creating blog content to check the box. To make it work and see real ROI, you have to do it the right way. This means investing your time, money, and resources into the various avenues where organic marketing can be most valuable for you and your brand. Consider what you need to accomplish to make organic marketing work for your business.
When to Hire Help
To do organic marketing right, you not only need support, but you need the knowledge as well, which might require you to hire help. With one or just a few people running your entire marketing department, you may struggle to see results and therefore lose sight of the value.
This may be why half of B2B marketers and 49 percent of B2C marketers outsource at least one content marketing activity. Outsourcing can be super affordable and a great way to get your organic marketing right while also saving the costs of hiring full-time W2 employees.
Whether you outsource link building or outsource your content creation, you’re also hiring experts who specialize in one or multiple areas, which can lead to way better results. You can outsource nearly any element of your organic marketing, including These:
Your Content creation and strategy Plan
SEO (Search engine optimization)
Link building (strong back link building)
Email marketing (strategies and campaigns)
Social media management and strategy - experts only
Podcast and speaking outreach and management - get out there
Video creation - Minimum 3 times a week, prefer per day
How to Set Up Attribution
A challenge when it comes to organic marketing is the attribution. Did that sale come through because they read the article or see my modeling post? Or did they see a video that drove them to the website first? Maybe they got the email blast? This is why it’s critical to think about how you’ll attribute as much of your organic marketing as you can with the tools you have—or by investing in new tools.
CRM tools can help you track where new leads and contacts come from. You can also use tagging features to make sure you’re tracking this effectively. Custom Google Analytics dashboards can also help you track the entire conversion funnel as well and finally, full-suite content management tools, like Hubspot, shows it to you in an easy-to-track location.
Create Good Workflows and Processes
Organic marketing doesn’t just happen, it never will. A proper editorial workflow, social media approval process and or email marketing content calendar will make it way easier to execute while holding everyone on your team accountable. Whether you hire a freelancer, agency, or contractor, it’s critical that you have the proper workflows and processes already in place.
I like to remind clients that this doesn’t require expensive software or new tools. Google Sheets can be used to keep teams connected and make it easy to track and plan—and it’s free to use. Don’t overthink it, but don’t miss this piece either.
See what others are doing is a great way to start this! I did this for a few months as it taught me sooo much, check it out! Get Paid to be on Social Media
Focus on The Content Development
Believe it or not, Content is the base of all organic marketing, whether you’re sharing it or creating it, doesn't matter. This is why you can’t overlook the content development process. A well-executed content development process ensures creativity, consistency, quality, and relevancy, all of which play into whether your content is a success or failure. Here are a few signs that your content development process needs an update:
If You are not publishing blog content consistently.
Your users and fans aren’t reading or converting.
Organic traffic is not increasing.
Your Social media posts aren’t being shared, commented on or engaged with.
You don’t regularly update your content.
Gaining Clarity Around Your Brand
Great organic marketing is built on a solid, clear brand. If you understand what your message is, who you’re speaking to, and what your values are, your content will stand out way better. This is because it will be unique to you and your personality that everyone loves. Otherwise, you’re talking to everyone and reaching absolutely no one. When this happens, you get lost in the crowd—and in marketing, there’s a lot of crowds.
Before investing in organic marketing, gain clarity around who you are, which will translate into everything you do from - How to Craft Brand Messaging Your Target Audience Will Love
Don't Ignore Organic Marketing—You’ll Lose
Organic marketing is a foundational element for any great online business and will absolutely drive leads, traffic, sales, and audience connections for years and years to come. That is if you do it right. While it may be hard to track immediate ROI and attribution from organic marketing, the long-term benefits are clear. Don't just learn something new either, learn it and delegate it to a specialist.
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