Being Good At Content Marketing: In Talk With Josh Spilker
Content marketing is easier said than done.
It takes years of practice to have both users and Google love and reward your content.
Josh Spilker is a writer and author who has found the sweet spot.
He is currently the Head of Marketing at Friday, a remote work tool that helps you be more productive and efficient.
Josh shares his tips, advice, and learnings on Medium, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
In this interview, he shares his secret to succeeding at SEO, philosophies that inspire him, and his secret passions.
1. For someone who’s just starting out in the content marketing field, what are a few things they should do to establish their credibility?
If you’re just starting out, then you need to build credibility.
- I would learn and comment on Twitter and LinkedIn.
- Take a few low-cost projects from Upwork or other places that can help build credibility.
- Offer to do a few projects for companies on IndieHacker or something similar.
Get your work out there and engage with other professionals. Be consistent at it and it’ll help you make friends and connections which will help in the long term.
2. As a marketing professional, how important is it to have a personal website?
I go back and forth on this. It depends on what you’re hoping for. It’s good to have a portfolio. But if you want to write about your hobbies or something like that, then make it different than your portfolio site.
Don’t try to do everything on one platform. If you want to build a website, decide what objective it will fulfill first.
3. What’s the secret to getting good at SEO?
LOL, I’ll let you know when I’m good. SEO really depends on the circumstances, the company, the industry, competition level, customer interest, and all that.
I tend towards content marketing, and there is a little bit of overlap with SEO on that.
If you’re coming from a technical background, you can be better at SEO from a different angle than someone with a writing background.
The secret is to help the user first and stay consistent at it.
4. What are some of your favorite SEO/Keyword-research tools?
Keywords Everywhere, Ahrefs, SEO Minion, MarketMuse, Clearscope, and Frase are good for content marketing optimization.
5. What’s the difference between a good marketer and a great marketer?
Uh…I’ll let you know if I ever figure it out. In my opinion, great marketers are consistent, know there isn’t a magic bullet, and temper their expectations. They keep at it even when it doesn’t make much sense.
Great marketers have to build in time for experimentation, but you have to earn the right to experiment first.
It’s hard to come out of the gate with a lot of new ideas if you haven’t first proven yourself to a client or new company.
6. What has been the hardest challenge for you in the content marketing field? How did you overcome it?
The hardest challenge is waiting on the traffic. You have to have an investment upfront.
Plan on it being long-term, and do other stuff like social promotion and/or SEM in the short term if you need faster results.
The hand-off between paid demand gen and organic search traffic never goes smoothly, but it can be done.
7. What are some of your philosophies that inspire you in your work?
I’m a Christian and have always valued this verse from a book in the Bible called Philippians:
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.”
8. What’s your secret passion?
I like paddleboarding on rivers and oceans. I read a lot of fiction and have a master’s degree in English Lit. Huge NBA basketball fan.