This is a guest post by Dina Mostovaya.

The role of PR professionals has evolved significantly. Numerous global studies show that nowadays, a head of communications plays the part of a company’s business partner, becoming critical in the process of achieving the firm’s business goals.

Gone are the days when PR solely provided support; now, it is recognized that communication must have a strategic focus. The definition of public relations has expanded and now includes activities such as managing social networks, developing blogs, implementing email marketing campaigns, participating in events, and more. In essence, the goal is to use a wide range of channels to effectively convey the brand's key messages, mission, ideas, and values, all of which ultimately convert into tangible business metrics and leads.

In that context, Iliyana Stareva’s "Inbound PR" is an excellent guide on how to create content that helps generate inbound inquiries and provides data with which to measure the impact of strategic communications. I first read this book a few years ago, and still consider it one of the most useful.

This is a guest post written by Andriana Moskovska. 

Over the years, content marketing has proven to be a valuable tool for businesses. It turns out that 88% of marketers use content marketing for their marketing strategies. This figure may sound promising, but did you know that 63% of businesses don’t have a documented content marketing strategy?

We often hear the phrase “content is king,” which is true. But the question is, how do we run a successful content marketing campaign that will actually stand out?

The first step in achieving this is to create a marketing plan. When your plan is all set up and ready to go, then you can take the first step in achieving your goals.

Over the years, experience has taught me that without a strategy, success is just a matter of good luck. On the other hand, with a good strategy, you will be taking less risk, and your efforts won’t go to waste.

Here are the five things you need to consider for a successful content marketing strategy.

5 Key Elements of a Successful Content Marketing Strategy

This is a guest post by Edyta Kowal.

The temptation to deliver as many leads as possible can be very strong on the part of marketing teams. But at the same time damaging. After all, it’s all about inspiring the customer to visit the store and make a purchase, and not just browse around and leave empty-handed without even exchanging a single word with the sales assistant.

One marketing buzz term we’ve all been hearing over and over again is optimisation. We optimise costs, methods, and procedures to save time and money. Then why is it so easy to fall into the trap of only looking at the number of leads and not their quality? After all, busted budgets, Sales resources, and even brand image are at stake.

Let me talk to you about my top strategies for generating leads in SaaS (and not only). 

5 Proven Strategies for Generating Leads in SaaS

#1. Define who you are speaking to

2020 is here and I hope you are excited and ready for it. 

I also hope you've got your goals set up and if you work in marketing or PR, you have your work goals as well. 

But to achieve those professional goals, you'll have to be aware of what's going on in the industry and consider what might make your job easier or more difficult, what could be an opportunity or a thread. 

Threads especially must be considered early as these are risk factors that can ruin your efforts. 

So what should you expect in the world of content marketing in 2020? 

Quite a few exciting things. And some pretty logical focus areas. 

I've picked out three key trends that in my opinion are crucial and you can check out the other seven in a nice infographic below.

Content Marketing Focus Areas in 2020:

This is a guest post by my friend Kareem Mostafa from tribetactics and author of Original Series: How to create binge-worthy, B2B content that drives revenue.

It's not really rocket science what we content marketers wake up and try to do every day: get attention.

We seek to build attention by creating content. Many of us believe that the goal is to create content that is merely better (whatever that means) than others in the same industry in order to stand out - believing that our buyers are perfectly rational human beings. 

Spoiler alert, they're not. They're emotional beings who watch YouTube, Netflix, and listen to Spotify and iTunes as much as you do.

We're not competing for attention from others in our industry. The world is not that clear-cut and perfect. We're competing for attention with virtually everything in our buyer's world. We're competing for attention with Netflix. 

Exactly what is our plan to do that? 

One thought that comes to mind is that Netflix create their own original series on a regular basis. Somewhere along the way, a (very) small group of marketing pioneers began getting the trick - and started creating their own brand original series as well. Wistia, Mailchimp, Ernest Packaging, HubSpot, to name a few. 

And you can do it too. Here's why you need to consider it.

5 Reasons Why You Need Original Series in Your Content Marketing