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Paul McKeon

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President, The Content Factor

166 points

Experienced marketing, communications and technology practitioner. Product manager at Digitial Equipment Corporation and Hayes Modems. Founder and president of Crescent Communications. Partner and Chief eBusiness Officer at Ketchum Public Relations.

Founded The Content Factor in 2005 to assist clients with content marketing.

Feb. 24, 2011

Paul McKeon and 4 other people answered this question

B2B Marketing Best Practices: What are your 3 tips for developing marketing collateral?

1. Pick a target reader--a persona, if you will. Direct the content to that reader. You'll find that writing for one person, instead of a wide audience, keeps you focused and helps you use an easy-to-digest, conversational style that speaks to the target audience at ... more

General Management

Feb. 22, 2011

Paul McKeon answered this question

What measurements are the most important when evaluating the success of an annual marketing plan?

Debbie, you will hear a lot of advice from people who are more into the statistics and analysis than I am, and what they suggest will probably be very useful. Their advice will be based on numbers of leads, quality of leads, costs of leads, ... more

Marketing Metrics

Feb. 17, 2011

Paul McKeon and 3 other people answered this question

Why would you argue that prospects today are harder to reach?

Prospects are harder to reach, but more because they have taken control of their vendor relationships and their buying processes--not necessarily because they are being over-marketed to--at least, no more so than anyone else. We are all being bombarded with over-marketing every day; most great ... more

Demand Generation

Lead Generation

Feb. 14, 2011

Paul McKeon and 6 other people answered this question

How do you decide where to publish your content - your blog vs. 3rd party sites?

Marketing with content means placing that content where the buyer will see it. The buyer now controls the buying cycle. The buyer decides when and how to do research, and when and how to engage with possible vendors. Content drives that process for the buyer.
So, ... more

Feb. 3, 2011

Paul McKeon answered this question

What are some cross-training techniques that you use to help align your sales and marketing depts?

I wish more companies considered cross-training to help align Sales and Marketing. We did our own research and discovered that it’s a lack of understanding and mutual respect were the primary causes of misalignment in B2B organizations. And, in our Focus Roundtable last week, all ... more

Jan. 21, 2011

Paul McKeon and 2 other people answered this question

What are the biggest misconceptions about content marketing?

I'm seeing posts that indicate that many folks equate "content marketing" with web site information architecture and search engine optimization. Maybe it's an issue of semantics, but I see Content Marketing as something much larger.
Content Marketing is enabled by the web and social media, but ... more

Content Marketing

Marketing Campaign

Marketing Strategies

Jan. 12, 2011

Paul McKeon recommends this answer by Dan McDade

MaaS (Marketing as a Service): Is this a new category or repackaging of media or ad agency services?

Good points, Paul! Service providers today are viewed more as labor arbitrage than strategic partners. Until that changes, and until senior executives learn that they are going to have to step in to fix alignment problems between marketing and sales, we will continue to be ... more

Advertising Agencies

Business Services

Content Marketing

Jan. 7, 2011

Paul McKeon and 3 other people answered this question

How effective are customer surveys, really?

You might be thinking of customer feedback surveys, but survey results can also yield terrific marketing content. My firm has conducted surveys for clients, and published the research as a white paper, or used it in ads and brochures. By surveying customers, you can identify ... more

Customer Surveys

Market Research

Market Research Methods

Jan. 7, 2011

Paul McKeon and 1 other person answered this question

Google's decline: why are so many internet thought leaders lamenting the decline of Google?

I'm not sure why Internet thought leaders are concerned about the quality of Google's search results (unless they work for Google)--because it doesn't matter, when we keep our eyes on the ball. Marketers--be they large corporations or kids with cute YouTube videos--forget that SEO is ... more

Content Farming

Content Scraping

Jan. 7, 2011

Paul McKeon published a brief

Secrets of Case Study Winners

Content Marketing Strategies

Writing Content

Jan. 6, 2011

Paul McKeon and 4 other people answered this question

How to make Marketing departments accountable for their performance - best practice suggestions?

With all the analytics, CRM, and marketing automation tools out there, it is relatively easy to quantify marketing success. Of all the numbers available, determining which numbers are the best measure is a matter of preference and may vary by industry--Craig has started here with ... more

Jan. 6, 2011

Paul McKeon and 4 other people answered this question

What Is a Good Approach for a Lead Nurturing Campaign And How Do I Get Started?

I hear this question quite a bit. The key for me has been to think of the buyer's process of buying, instead of the company's process of selling. I break down the customer's buying cycle into 4 stages and try to think of the types ... more

Marketing Automation

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