Internet Marketing Archives -

Content Calendars That Actually Work: A Practitioner’s Guide

The calendar is infrastructure. The content is personality.

The goal isn’t a perfect plan. It’s a plan you can actually keep.

By Linda Pophal, MA, SPHR – Strategic Communications, LLC

A content calendar (also called an editorial calendar) is a planning tool that maps out what content an organization will publish, in what format, on which channels, and on what schedule—typically planned one to three months in advance. An effective content calendar balances evergreen and timely content, builds in flexibility for responsive publishing, and is designed around a publishing cadence the team can sustain—not around an aspirational schedule that collapses on contact with competing priorities.

Many companies and individuals these days continue to be focused on creating and distributing content in a never-ending cycle. It’s a cycle that demands new ideas, new copy, new images, new hashtags, new social media posts, new, new, new, new, new…

At the same time they need to ensure that their content is relevant and, to the extent possible, capitalizes on current events, news cycles, holidays, and emerging audience interests.

That can be a challenge.

Content calendars can help. Or hurt.

Continue reading “Content Calendars That Actually Work: A Practitioner’s Guide”

The 2026 Content Marketing Imperative: Know Your Audience

If you can understand who your shadow buyers are and what they need, you’ll get to a place where you truly know your audience.

Copy that resonates requires knowing your audience—intimately. How are you doing with that?

By Linda Pophal, MA, SPHR – Strategic Communications, LLC

Audience understanding in content marketing is the practice of developing specific, research-grounded knowledge of who your target readers or customers are—their challenges, motivations, behaviors, and preferences—and using that knowledge to create content that resonates precisely rather than broadly. It is widely considered the foundational competency of effective content strategy: content that doesn’t know who it’s for cannot connect with anyone in particular.

Every day, without fail, two very different kinds of content appears in my inbox and on the various social media channels I follow.

One kind captures my attention and gets me to start reading, sometimes dragging me down a rabbit hole that I really wish I hadn’t been dragged down…

The other kind: meh. Generic, boilerplate, trite. Copy that literally any brand could have created. It’s not personal. It’s not specific. It doesn’t speak to me.

The difference between those two experiences has nothing to do with budget, production value, or even writing skill. It comes down to one thing: how well the brand actually knows its audience.

This is not a new principle.

Continue reading “The 2026 Content Marketing Imperative: Know Your Audience”

LinkedIn Newsletters: Best Practices for Success

You should be using this cost effective marketing tool

LinkedIn suggests that LinkedIn Newsletters are one of the most effective features for content distribution, and they’re certainly growing in use but individuals and companies. But, do they really offer value, and in what way?

We sought input from LinkedIn experts who are using LinkedIn Newsletters—some with a great following and some just starting out—to get their insights, best practices, and actionable tips on how to make the most of this platform to grow and engage with a LinkedIn audience.

What you need to know about leveraging LinkedIn newsletters

Continue reading “LinkedIn Newsletters: Best Practices for Success”

Best Practices for Finding, Connecting With and Engaging “Shadow Buyers”

Are invisible prospects costing you sales?

Today’s digital commerce environment means that marketers can learn a lot about consumers who are interested in their products and services. But while that can be a boon for marketers, it’s not something that all prospects feel favorably about.

In fact, a rising number of consumers are actively taking steps to avoid being detected. They don’t want the bother. They don’t want the intrusion. And they don’t relish the feeling of violation that comes from being served up offers immediately after checking something out on your website.

How to bring them out of the shadows

Continue reading “Best Practices for Finding, Connecting With and Engaging “Shadow Buyers””

Using Generative AI (GenAI) to Create Video Marketing and Sales Content

GenAI tools are dramatically simplifying the video production process

Video used to be very expensive and time-consuming for companies and individuals to produce. Then, with the widespread adoption of smartphones that came with the ability to capture video seamlessly, and an associated drop in viewers’ expectations of high-quality output, the cost and time requirements for video production have declined precipitously.

The most recent impact on the cost and time required to produce video content is generative AI (GenAI) which has become a transformative force in video production across the entire creation process.

Ongoing Popularity of Video Prompts Adoption

Continue reading “Using Generative AI (GenAI) to Create Video Marketing and Sales Content”

Evaluating New Entrants to the World of Gen AI

GenAI Tools You Need to Know About

ChatGPT, a generative artificial intelligence (gen AI) tool, was released by OpenAI, and that tool was soon quietly followed by other entrants to the space, including Perplexity and Claude. Then DeepSeek burst onto the scene, far from quietly, in January 2025. Almost immediately, tech companies started to worry because DeepSeek supposedly represented a low-cost option, but now experts are saying that may not be the case.

But DeepSeek isn’t the only disruptive entrant in the space. There are a continually growing number of tools and features that content creators need to know about.

Staying on top of a continually evolving GenAI landscape

Continue reading “Evaluating New Entrants to the World of Gen AI”

A Step-by-Step Process for Gen-AI Search Optimization

Preparing for the World of GenAI-Driven Search

As more and more consumers are turning to tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity instead of Google when they’re looking for answers to questions, or doing research, brands are taking notice.

Long-term reliance on Google search, and traditional approaches to search engine optimization (SEO), aren’t necessarily relevant in this rapidly changing search environment. Google search isn’t going away, but GenAI-driven search is having a growing impact.

What do you need to know, and do, to make sure your website doesn’t fall into oblivion?

Key Recommendations a One-Year Plan

Continue reading “A Step-by-Step Process for Gen-AI Search Optimization”

Future-Proofing Your Search Strategy

The Future of Search is Now

The search landscape will continue evolving as AI capabilities expand and user behaviors adapt, requiring strategies that remain effective across multiple scenarios.

Raju Dandigam, engineering manager at Navan, predicts the next evolution: “The upcoming evolution of generative AI search will introduce text and voice and image and video as fundamental input methods. Businesses need to develop content that sounds right because AI agents now merge voice assistants with smart devices.”

AI-generated content with a human touch

Continue reading “Future-Proofing Your Search Strategy”

AI Tool Integration Best Practices

Using AI Responsibly

The responsible use of AI tools in content creation and SEO strategy requires balancing efficiency gains with authenticity and quality standards.

As organizations adapt their content strategies for AI-driven search discovery, many are simultaneously exploring how AI tools can enhance their content creation and optimization processes.

This creates a dual challenge:

Continue reading “AI Tool Integration Best Practices”

Risk Management and Adaptation in the GenAI-Search Era

AI Search Brings New Risks

The AI search landscape presents new risks that require proactive management strategies while maintaining resilience in traditional search channels.

Pankaj Kumar, founder of Naxisweb, warns about a fundamental shift affecting established content: “There’s no such thing as SEO being replaced, but it’s certainly getting widened in scope.”

Adapting to new search paradigms

Continue reading “Risk Management and Adaptation in the GenAI-Search Era”