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Weekend Favs November 28 written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing
My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week.
I don’t go into depth about the finds, but encourage you to check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from an online source or one that I took out there on the road.
These are my weekend favs, I would love to hear about some of yours – Tweet me @ducttape
7 Super Simple Ways to Get More From the Content You’ve Already Written written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing
Content marketing plays a critical role in pretty much every business in every industry even more so today. If you’ve been in business for a while, you probably have a stockpile of content that you’ve created over the years.
As content ages, it starts to collect dust — it’s out of date, tactics change, it’s buried deep in the archives, and it’s not doing anything for your business. Not only can repurposed content increase your traffic 300%, but it’s an easy way to get more ROI out of what you already have.
If you want to save time on content creation and draw new traffic to your site, do these 7 things.
Some content never goes out of style. Many businesses have created foundational content that provides readers in-depth information on their industry, and this content can continue to be useful for years. But just like anything that’s getting up there in years, it sometimes needs a refresh to regain some of its old sparkle.
Take our content here, for example. We’ve written thousands of blog posts over the years on just about every digital marketing topic. Something like a foundational piece on SEO can remain relevant for a long time, but some of the specifics will need to be updated as search engines change their algorithms and best practices shift.
Refreshing content and republishing anew, with an acknowledgement that it’s been updated to reflect the latest on the given topic, is one of the quickest and easiest ways to repurpose your old content. This allows you to hang onto any goodwill that particular link has garnered in terms of ranking over the years, while introducing it to a whole new audience and allowing it to generate even better standing in search results.
Blog posts can get boring after a while. Reading through one after the other demands a lot of focus from your audience, and today’s consumers are looking for new ways to engage with content.
Video has become hugely popular of late and can add a lot of visual interest to existing pages. Plus, if someone’s unable to read through an entire blog post, they may have the time to watch a quick video that provides a summary of the information in the post.
You can incorporate other forms of media, too. Infographics are a fun, eye-catching way to repurpose your content. Check out this article from Visme for some great tips on making an infographic.
Podcasts are another popular medium, with 62 million Americans tuning into their favorite shows each week. For simple steps to get a podcast up and running, check out this post on our blog.
Because you’re creating dynamic media to accompany the existing content, it’s easier to script out what you need and get it done. You can quickly distill the blog post down to a handful of bullet points and from there create a video that riffs on those key elements.
Again, this saves you time in the content creation process and allows you to attract a new audience to this content. While someone might not have wanted to read 1,000 words on the topic, that infographic that hits all the highlights might be just what they were looking for.
Creating content takes a lot of time. You need to put together a thoughtful strategy and build your content calendar around that. Then there’s the process of actually making the content itself. Blogging involves research and revision; video and podcasting means you need to adopt production skills and be able to edit video and audio.
If you go through all the trouble of creating content in the first place, why not get as much mileage out of it as possible?
Let’s say you own a home remodeling business. A while back, you posted a video walking prospective clients through the ins and outs of the kitchen renovation process, from budgeting and planning to selecting materials to managing construction timelines. The video generates lots of views and drives traffic to your website. You know that the content is useful to your audience and helps win attention for your business.
Don’t just leave it at that video! Instead, get the video transcribed, so you can easily convert it into a blog post. (I love Rev for fast, accurate transcription services).
You can even take it a step further by using the audio from that video and transform it into a podcast episode. Suddenly, your one piece of content has multiplied into three. And that provides more opportunities for you to reach your audience through the medium that works best for them.
Social media is a vital channel for businesses of all sizes. You can take content you already have, and repurpose it in different ways for social as long as it aligns with your overall social media strategy.
Your existing blog posts are packed with social media gold. Pulling snippets from your blog posts are a great way to quickly develop social media friendly content AND drive traffic back to your website. You can do things like:
Developing content, recording, and editing a podcast episode takes time. Instead of only utilizing the audio, why not transcribe your podcast episode and turn it into a SEO-rich blog post. People consume content differently. By offering a written version of your show, you’ll reach more people because you offer content that can suit multiple people’s preferences.
Most businesses have their content scattered here, there, and everywhere. There are videos and podcast episodes on various pages on their website and hosted on external platforms. Their blog posts are so numerous they could rival the National Archives. But the content is scattered, so it’s not actually serving a purpose.
If you want to get the most out of this content, you need to organize it around hub pages. I’ve described hub pages as your own mini-Wikipedia on your website. You start by identifying a broad topic that’s of interest to your readers. For example, we work with a lot of local businesses, so we’ve created the Ultimate Guide to Local Marketing hub page on our site.
From there, we walk local businesses through everything they need to know to supercharge their marketing efforts. We cover the basics of Google My Business, paid search, SEO for local businesses, and reviews and competitive analysis. Under these broad topics, we’ve gathered together relevant content.
For local business owners, this repository of information is a gold mine. Rather than having to search through our thousands of pieces of content, the most relevant ones are organized nicely for them in the hub page’s table of contents. Suddenly, this page becomes a go-to resource. Visitors return again and again to go deeper in depth on the topic, and share the posts with their colleagues. Search engines take note of this behavior. They realize that the content is useful, and suddenly our hub page moves up the SERPs.
When done correctly, hub pages can get your local business ranking on the first page of results for relevant search terms. And you achieve that strong ranking by repurposing and reorganizing existing content, rather than having to start from scratch.
If you have a series of blog posts around the same topic, you can create a new piece of content by compiling them into an e-Book to use as a lead magnet. You can use each blog post as a chapter of your e-Book, make the content in each blog post a little meatier, and write an introduction and conclusion. Then, you can use a free tool like Canva to compile these posts together. This e-Book is a great way to help you build your email list and reach more people with the content you already have.
Creating content takes a lot of time and work. Repurposing your existing content allows you to get the greatest benefit from that investment. Not only does repurposing give it a new life and introduce it to a new audience, it can also help you boost your SEO standing and grow your reach even further.
How to Pass on a Family Business Successfully written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing
Marketing Podcast with Jonathan Goldhill
In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interview Jonathan Goldhill, adviser, coach, consultant, trainer, facilitator, and business therapist with 30 years of experience in his craft. He has been guiding closely-held and family-owned businesses since 1987.
Jonathan Goldhill is the author of Disruptive Successor: A Guide to Driving Growth in Your Family Business.
Jonathan Goldhill is also the founder of The Goldhill Group which provides strategic thinking, execution planning, and accountability coaching to businesses.
Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please!
This episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by Zephyr.
Zephyr is a modern, cloud-based CMS that’s licensed only to agencies. The system is lightweight, easy to use, and incredibly fast. And with an array of beautiful themes to choose from, you can get your clients’ websites up-and-running quickly and with less effort. Or, if you’d rather build a custom site, Zephyr includes agency services to be your plug-and-play dev shop.
Zephyr is passionate about helping agencies create great websites for their clients. To learn more, go to Zephyrcms.com.
For small business owners, virtual office services offer all the advantages of renting office space without the rent.
Most virtual offices offer similar baseline services, including a professional mailing address with mail forwarding, a phone number with voicemail services and (often) a receptionist, and usually physical office space with wi-fi for meetings and on-site work.
That doesn’t mean all virtual office services are the same. But with so many offering such similar base packages, figuring out which one is best for you and your business can be a trial.
We’ve examined dozens of virtual offices and narrowed them down to the very best.
Read detailed reviews of these below–plus, tips for finding the right price, the best virtual office options for different situations, and our method for picking the right virtual office.
Opus Virtual Offices provides basic office solutions at an attainable price. They have over 500 locations in North America, making them accessible to business owners in all 50 states, Canada and Puerto Rico.
Opus’s services are simple, straightforward, and great for new business owners setting up their first virtual office. Their basic services package includes full mail and phone services plus a live receptionist during business hours. And if you’d prefer to read your messages, Opus will convert all your faxes and voice messages into emails and send them right to your inbox.
The best part? All of the above is included in a flat monthly fee of $99. No hidden fees, no extra costs.
They also offer a range of inexpensive add-ons, including texting, audio conferencing, and international call transfer. Most additional services cost only $10/month, with a couple going as high as $25/month.
And if you sign up for a year of their services, Opus will offer you one month for free.
One catch: Opus doesn’t offer any type of physical workspace. It’s virtual office services are truly virtual. This could be problematic for business owners who like to do things in person or require a physical location.
There’s also not a whole lot of room to grow. Opus offers the one basic package and its few add-ons, no higher-end packages or scale-up options, potentially making it a tougher fit for more established businesses.
But for a beginning business that does everything remotely, Opus is a solid starting point.
Davinci Virtual Office Solutions has a broad global reach and a great global reputation. With over 5,000 locations in 45 countries (and all 50 US states), Davinci is the virtual office provider for businesses that are, or plan to be, international.
In addition to a physical address with mail receipt and forwarding, Davinci offers in-person services at each of its locations, including lobby greeters, a registered agent, and a business support center. They also offer meeting rooms with A/V equipment, reliable wi-fi, and catering options.
Their live receptionist offerings are just as comprehensive. The basic package includes a local or toll-free number, live answering and call forwarding, voicemail management and more. A premium package is also available offering appointment scheduling, order processing, customer care, and bilingual receptionists–essentially virtual assistant services to take administrative tasks off your plate.
Because Davinci has so many locations, pricing varies from one to the next, but basic office packages tend to run between $50-$200/month, with a six-month contract required. But those basic packages don’t include the live receptionist services, there are upcharges on some other services (again, depending on the location), and the first contract includes a setup fee of $150-$200, which few other virtual offices charge.
Are those extra costs deal-breakers? For an established international business owner who wants a physical office location with a wide range of services, probably not. But they do add to the bottom line.
Regus isn’t just a virtual office space company, they’re also an actual office space company. So if you’re looking for a provider that prioritizes physical locations, Regus is a good bet. They have over 1,000 offices in the US, and 2,000 more across 150 other countries.
In addition to virtual office services, Regus offers an office membership (starting at $207/month) and a co-working membership (starting at $93/month). Both memberships have 5-day, 10-day, and unlimited-day office access options. Regus also has rooms available for rent (starting at $19/hour) for everything from interviews to training sessions to board meetings to full-on events.
For virtual office services, Regus has three packages. Their basic package (starting at $37/month) has a physical address with mail handling and forwarding. Mid-level (from $150/month) adds on access to their business lounge and a local phone number with receptionist answering services. Top-end (from $207/month, basically their physical office membership) adds daily use of a meeting room and 5 days access to an office or desk space. Note that these prices are based on a 24-month contract, and will vary from location to location.
The flexibility of these plans is a plus for businesses just starting up or moving into a new area, as they can easily start out with only the physical address and uplevel later. The steep price jumps between the plans may be a lot to swallow, though. It’s also worth noting that Regus has had some billing issues that have led to recent low reviews on Trustpilot and similar sites.
Servcorp offers the most premium services and benefits of any provider on this list.
Their virtual office package includes all the address, mail, and phone services you’d expect from a virtual office (including a receptionist for calls). But that’s just the beginning.
It also includes three hours free daily access to co-working spaces, 8 hours monthly access to private offices or boardrooms, a personal assistant, top-end wi-fi with the option to have a unique personal login and password, and direct access to Servcorp’s business networking community. That’s a lot of benefits that most of the others on this list don’t provide.
Servcorp also offers a payment option no one else does: the ability to pay one month at a time. For companies with temporary needs or who aren’t ready for a two-year contract yet, this is a huge help.
The tradeoffs for Servcorp come in price and location. They’re the most expensive provider on this list by a wide margin, with their virtual office package (containing everything listed above) coming in around $700/month. They do have lower-level packages starting around $100/month for more basic services, though, so beginner businesses don’t have to completely avoid them.
They also only have nine locations that offer virtual office services, across four US cities: New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, and Houston. They get around this somewhat by including access to meeting rooms and private offices in any of their 150 other global locations, but that still makes using them more difficult (and potentially confusing) for businesses in other cities or countries.
Still, if you want the best perks and are willing to pay for them, Servcorp might be a great option for you.
If having a real person answer your phone is a top priority for you, look no further than Alliance Virtual Services. Unlike many virtual office providers who treat this as an extra, Alliance has a dedicated receptionist plan included in its virtual office offerings.
Alliance receptionists work in-person at Alliance locations to answer your calls Monday through Saturday. In addition to taking messages and handling call forwarding, they’ll also schedule your appointments and manage your calendar. The one tradeoff here is that using a local or toll-free phone number costs an extra $30/month, but since you’d pay a receptionist that much in an hour or two of work, it’s likely worthwhile.
Even better, Alliance’s packages aren’t anywhere near as pricey as you might think including a receptionist would make them. The base receptionist package, with 50 minutes of live answering time, starts at $95/month.
Alliance requires a six-month minimum contract and a $100 setup fee. They also charge extra for use of their physical spaces (starting at $10/hour). But if a virtual office with a dedicated receptionist is important to you, they’re definitely worth checking out–especially with locations in 50 states and 42 countries.
If you run a business where your employees need to interact with each other every day, but can’t actually get them in the same physical place (thanks, 2020), then what you need is a virtual office that acts like a real office. And that’s what Sococo provides.
Sococo creates an online office space that mimics a real office, complete with a digital floor plan and decor options.
Your employees will be able to interact with each other, co-work, give presentations, share documents, and collaborate–all as though they were in the same actual office. Users can even see the availability of their co-workers and “knock” on their virtual doors to start a meeting or ask a question.
To make all this workable, Sococo integrates with Zoom, Google Meet, and Webex, has tools for text, voice, and visual connections, and includes apps for both iOS and Android.
Sococo’s pricing is also different–rather than paying for a package of services, you pay for their entire suite based on how many users you’ll have. For 10+ users, you’ll pay $13.49/mo for each; for 100+, $24.99/mo for each. This dynamic pricing will be a plus for small businesses that need daily in-person interaction.
The tradeoff is that Sococo provides no physical space whatsoever–not even a physical address and mail forwarding. So while it is clearly a virtual office provider, its definition of “virtual office” is somewhat different than those of the others on this list. If all you need is a mailing address and a receptionist, Sococo won’t be for you, but if you need to reproduce your office environment online, it just might be a lifesaver.
For many business owners, there just isn’t enough time in the day to get everything done. A virtual assistant (VA) or executive assistant (EA) can help by taking a wide range of administrative tasks off your hands so you can focus on running your business.
Intelligent Office is the virtual office provider that also provides VAs. Their VAs handle everything from receptionist services to client onboarding to travel reservations.
Called Intelligent Assistants, these VAs are an integral part of Intelligent Office’s packages. Each package begins with an interview to determine your needs and pain points, the challenges and goals of your business, and your to-do list, so the VA can immediately get started clearing your decks for you.
The biggest downside to Intelligent Office is location. IO has offices in only 20 US states and three Canadian provinces, so international businesses might want to look elsewhere.
They also have the least transparent website of any on this list, with no packages or pricing listed. Instead, they offer a free quote service with no obligation to buy.
EOffice prides itself on its community environment. The first co-working space to provide open-plan workspaces in London, it blends solid virtual office offerings with bespoke working environments designed to make each member feel productive, creative, and happy.
They also have an active, welcoming network that each user gets access to, including regular community and networking events. Startup owners and workers will find a lot here, as EOffice has connections with more than a dozen mentorship companies and angel investors who offer their guidance to EOffice members.
With locations in 60 countries, EOffice is another great virtual office provider for international businesses, though it only has locations in 11 US Cities.
Their virtual office packages focus on the basics: a professional business address and phone answering services, and they’re somewhat pricier than others on this list. The full package, including access to their co-working spaces, is close to $400/month.
They also offer an eCard membership option just for co-working, which gets you access to their community portal and one day pass per month (among other perks) starting at $39.75/mo.
But all their packages do include full access to the community, the ability to use any of their 250+ workspaces worldwide, and several other perks. So if you want a strong community aspect with your virtual office services, EOffice will be up your alley.
Now let’s look at the best virtual office services for different situations. As we noted earlier, what makes a virtual office right for you will largely depend on your individual needs. But there are a few factors to consider when comparing them against each other.
Since individual needs and fit are so important, let’s start there. Your ability to customize packages to your own needs, or at least to choose between multiple levels or options depending on those needs, will likely determine whether you can work with a provider or not.
Customizability allows you to pick the services you need and ignore the ones you don’t, which can save you money. It also allows you to start where you are and grow or scale up at your own pace, which not only saves money but removes pressure to grow too fast.
And having multiple options to choose between gives you flexibility to start using a virtual office provider at any point in your business journey, rather than having to be a beginner or a veteran, a big company or a small one.
The virtual offices that provide the best customizability and flexibility are:
On the other hand, if you know exactly where you are and exactly what you want, having a wider variety of options or a strong ability to customize might not be necessary for you. This is especially true for businesses that are just getting started, that want one particular perk or benefit above all, or that value a tangential yet important factor like community.
The virtual offices that provide the best specific services are:
While any virtual office provider can technically provide services from anywhere, the more locations one has, the more accessible they will be–especially if you want to use their physical office space as well as their virtual services.
International presence or strategy also matters here. If you’re not in the US, or you want to grow your business internationally, having access to locations in other countries will be vital for you.
The virtual offices with the most locations (in the US and worldwide) are:
The caveat with pricing for virtual office solutions is that the amount you pay determines the features and benefits you get.
Buying a lower-level package may only get you a few basic features, such as an address with mail forwarding but nothing else, while buying a comprehensive package will nearly always come with a premium price tag.
Some of the cheapest providers can also become the most expensive once you move up the ladder to their most comprehensive packages.
So we’ll evaluate the best-priced virtual office services as the ones that offer the most benefits at each of three price levels: basic, mid-level, and premium.
Best basic offering: Opus Virtual Offices (base offer, $99/mo)
Best mid-level offering: Regus (office membership, $207/mo)
Best premium offering: Servcorp (full virtual office suite, $700/mo)
By the categories above, Regus stands out the most. It has great customizability, lots of locations, and the best mid-tier package. No other provider showed up in more than two categories, and several only hit one. So by that logic, Regus is the best virtual office services provider.
But don’t forget about your individual needs! The best virtual office might be the right one for you, but it also might not. That’s why we showed you eight of them rather than just Regus.
If you love the internationality of Davinci, need the online office model of Sococo, think the virtual assistant from Intelligent Office would be a lifesaver, or just want to start with the basic setup of Opus, that’s okay too. Any of these eight could be the best provider, provided they’re the best one for you.