To properly promote Content Runner we needed a coherent sales and marketing strategy. The following blog post is a summary of our strategy with some actionable and tactical steps we are taking to implement it.

What are the core channels we are using to get the word out? Blog Posts and Twitter are the primary 2 channels where we invest the majority our time, but read on to find out how else we plan to drum up interest in Content Runner.

Consistent Blogging
3 weeks ago we started blogging every day on Content Runner. We are in this for the long haul so we’re not getting distraught that people aren’t finding and reading our posts, but eventually we will get you to read us! We are working on how to guides, case studies and practical content advice that will make your life easier.

Twitter
Following many of the influencers in the content space was an obvious first step. The next was creating enough compelling content, tools and other features that made for “tweetable events”. We made the conscious decision to provide as much useful information in our twitter feed as possible and to do that meant we had to put in a lot of work to build the things we wanted to tweet about. We also use Twitter to connect with agencies, users of Content Runner as well as writers.

Conferences
I attended Pubcon 2013 two weeks ago and the conference was a networking win for us. I was able to meet Russ Jones and we have followed up with some great conversations (and action) about some new features for CR – these will be live very soon!

In January we are attending NMX Live (formerly Blog World) at the Rio Hotel in Las Vegas. I’m particularly excited to try out their speed networking event, something that Pubcon has sorely needed for years, but for some reason fails to recognize.

Meet Up Events
Over the next 2-3 months we are planning to attend or sponsor Meet Up events up and down the west coast. The goal is to ask questions and find out as much as we can about the problems people are having with content creation. As we learn more we will take that feedback and incorporate it into the CR marketplace.

Last night I went to the Lean Startup Seattle Meetup event hosted by John Sechrest. We went through the fundamentals tenets of the lean startup movement and I found the class to be extremely refreshing and allowed me to think about CR in a new light.

Build Free Tools
Giving away free tools is an excellent way to build a customer base. We have a new tool coming out by the middle of November 2013, an Idea Generation tool that will allow you to input a search phrase and get Google keyword data along with up to date and relevant tweets. We think this will juice up your topic generation process – more details to come!

Email Outreach
If you have the right offer and the correct target customers you can achieve success with an email outreach campaign. We don’t use cold lists or other people’s emails, we have had some luck by looking through Google and finding companies that we think would benefit from using Content Runner.

You need a script to make email outreach work, here’s one that we have used with some success:

My name is Chad Fisher and I’m a co-founder of Content Runner, an online marketplace designed to bring together US based writers with people who need content.

I am reaching out to you today to see if you would consider trying out our service. Here are some of the benefits you will get from using Content Runner:

– Set your own price and make new writer relationships
– Manage all your writing projects in one place, track orders by status and make personalized notes
– Export articles with ease directly into WordPress or zipped up as RTF documents
– We pay writers for you, manage W-9’s and Copyscape check each article

I would like to offer you a FREE $30 credit on Content Runner to demonstrate our quality, is that something you would be interested in?

We have used shorter scripts with an even greater response, so this one above might be a bit wordy, the goal is to explain, connect with pain and then offer something of value.

Linked In
In general our Linked In strategy has been pretty non-existent. I maintain an updated Linked In profile here, but where we are missing an opportunity is to reach out and establish relationships with content thought leaders and agencies. We will be spending more time on Linked in 2014 and want to use that site to create new relationships.

Guest Posts
The next 3 to 4 months will see us doing a lot of outreach to sites to offer up content strategy advice and valuable information about new tools. We are going to push hard on this and as a newsworthy event or feature comes out we will continue to do outreach and create new connections.