Sales enablement is quite the buzzword these days, but for good reason. When done effectively, it can have last impacts on a sales organization. It can shorten the sales cycle and strengthen the entire sales process. Sales enablement has the ability to increase conversion rates and drive new revenue while simultaneously saving your salespeople precious time. 

In today's business environment, your sales team is not only competing against the sales teams of your competitors, but also the busyness and expectations of your prospects. Sales enablement gives sellers a competitive advantage and empowers them to do more with their time and make smarter decisions along the way. Whether your company is just starting to dabble in the sales enablement game, or have already gone all-in, this article will cover the four key components to finding success with sales enablement. 

Your blog is a digital hub for the valuable, educational, and entertaining content you create for your target persona. Its goal is to increase awareness, drive traffic to your site, generate leads, and establish authority – leading to profitable customer action.  

But running a successful blog is a challenge for some businesses, and it requires constant analysis to ensure your current content strategy is effective. This can be done by reviewing the content you’ve created, assessing what worked or didn’t work, and creating a plan of action to improve going forward. Or in other words, conducting a blog audit.  

This process can help you uncover what content resonates most with your ideal prospects, and in turn, guide your content strategy and increase your awareness, engagement, and even conversions. It gives you a high-level view of how well your blog is (or isn’t) performing, and identifies gaps and opportunities in your blog strategy.  

The good news: it’s not as complicated as it sounds. And if you’re wondering where to start, what to evaluate or how to apply your findings, we’ve created a simple system to help you evaluate your own blog and begin seeing real results from your content. 

Occasionally we get the question, "Well, why do we need an inbound marketing agency if we have an in-house marketing department?" Good question. 

Inbound marketing agencies should not be competing with marketing departments; they should be partnering with them. This is how we do business differently at LeadG2. In fact, marketing and sales directors love us! We are an extension and an arm of their in-house marketing team that allows us to focus on areas we are experts in, and allows the marketing team to complete other vital marketing tasks. 

When you invest in a new effort like inbound marketing at your company, or you enter into a partnership with a marketing agency, everyone expects to get results. No one does marketing for marketing’s sake. We want to establish our brand, build an audience, convert leads, grow a pipeline, accelerate deals through the funnel, and ultimately grow revenue. Unfortunately, that doesn’t always happen. Instead of experiencing the euphoria that comes with achieving goals, you suffer the frustration of unfulfilled potential.   

Lead flow is a very important, and often-overlooked, step when building an inbound marketing or lead generation strategy. In this one-minute video, I touch on what lead flow is, who is involved, what the process looks like, and more.

Looking for a business, product, or service? Need a good how-to video? Just "Google it." Google has made accessing the information we need readily available and easily accessible. Consumers can find businesses, services, and products with a click of a button and faster than ever before, making it vital that your business has an online presence.

There was a time when writing a few good blog posts a month was enough to engage readers and keep them coming back. Today, however, there is much more at stake. User experience, or UX, plays a critical role in delivering quality blog content.

While it has its roots in design, UX - in this aspect - refers to how readers interact with or experience your content.

Are they able to understand the message you’re conveying? 
Can they find the information they’re looking for?
Is the content formatted in a way that captures - and holds - their attention?

When factoring in UX, quality content goes beyond the words on the page. It involves a number of considerations that can influence whether a reader bounces (leaves your website after viewing a single blog post) or stays to learn more about your business and what it offers - ultimately leading to a conversion. It’s not enough to have good content, you must also create an enjoyable experience for those reading it.

A few years ago you started to blog. It went well. Your brain was fresh, and ideas for new articles flowed. But then life happened. You got busy at work, and you got busier at home. Before you knew what happened, your once-a-week blog update slowed to once-a-month. And then it slowed further to one new update every few months. And then you woke up one day and realized that you haven’t posted an update to your blog in over nine months. 

Lack of time is an easy excuse. However, I guarantee you that if your blog was producing the results you thought, it would, then you would find the time. Let’s be honest. It’s not really the lack of time. It’s the lack of results.

Are you using content in the sales process? How do you use content in the sales process?

Likely, your marketing team has created a large amount of great content that's not only beneficial for lead generation, but is also helpful for lead nurturing. This content could range from informational blog posts to ebooks, checklists, or industry guides. 

In this video, I share one important way to utilize content in the sales process that many salespeople overlook. This one, simple tip can help improve a salesperson's sales performance.

Does blogging help with SEO? 

Hubspot explains that, "Blogging helps boost SEO quality by positioning your website as a relevant answer to your customers' questions. Blog posts that specifically use a variety of on-page SEO tactics can give you more opportunities to rank in search engines and get customers to visit your site."

What are the benefits of blogging?

• SEO
• Thought Leadership
• Education for Prospects and Customers
• Attract Qualified Leads
• Content for the Sales Process
• Lead Nurturing
• Lead Conversion
• And MORE!

So, how can you utilize this tool to benefit your business? The expert team at LeadG2 has put together a list to help you optimize your blog posts for search. Use this checklist with each post you publish to help you increase your search rankings and drive quality leads to your site before your publish and distribute your posts.