TMCnet Online Community News
Using Your "Story" on an Online Community: How Parlance Increases Referring Traffic and Broadens Market Reach with Stellar Content
Step 1: Uncover What Your Marketing “Story” Should Be
Every company should strive to identify what their marketing “story” should be before embarking on any new campaigns, and fortunately, Parlance has a great story to tell. As the first unique vendor of speech enabled call routing solutions, Parlance’s managed service approach is a proactive, customer-driven model that differs from many of the “off-the-shelf” competitive services also available in the marketplace. Parlance prides themselves on proactively monitoring their systems, working to resolve problems, and optimizing their products to get the best possible return for their customers. These values are what make their company and services unique, and serve as the foundation for Parlance’s marketing story.
Step 2: Determine Where Your Story Should Be Shared
Once their marketing story was developed, Parlance then needed a place to tell it. Immediately, they started looking at different possible avenues that would reach their target audience and increase their presence in new markets. They researched different media options and places their customers were going to find information – like TMCnet. Once this research was gathered, two avenues immediately jumped out as a place for Parlance to advertise: Banner Ads on related industry sites, and a TMCnet online community.
Step 3: Identify Your Online Community Objectives
Parlance chose to build an online community to serve multiple purposes; tell their marketing story, yes, but to also fill a resource void that Bedard was feeling as a “one-man marketing team” trying to juggle too many initiatives at once. The task of generating content, which is undoubtedly one of the most important marketing activities a company can do, was often pushed to the back burner due to other conflicting responsibilities. Therefore, Bedard saw an online community with TMCnet as a great opportunity and asset because “content is created on a weekly basis [on our behalf] and added to our channel, which had SEO benefits for our website.”
4: Create a Community Content “Map”
Even if you outsource your online community content development, in order for the full potential of the site to be realized, all involved parties need to be engaged and active in the content-creation activities. This means sharing ideas for new articles, and working together to contribute innovative pieces like videos. For example, Parlance’s COO Joseph Maxwell and Mark Bedard worked with the TMCnet video team to shoot a series of educational videos, which were released onto their online community according to a pre-determined schedule. Videos are one of the best content pieces to have on your site, and since Parlance did not have the abilities to create a professional video on their own, they partnered with their TMCnet team to create a series of videos together.
The concept of scheduling the release of videos ties into one of the most important things community managers or sponsors need to do to ensure their site’s success – create a content schedule. This is a very important initiative for Parlance, and one they’re focusing more and more on in the year ahead. Currently, they create and use a quarterly content road map that takes into consideration all the corporate initiatives for the upcoming months, and highlights what messages their content pieces should have to meet various objectives. This, according to Bedard, helps them stay aligned with their messages and any TMCnet-generated content, corporate newsletters and press releases. They also provide this map to their TMCnet editors to provide fresh article ideas that are also related to their broader company goals. By giving the content map to their editors in advance, they are also helping their team by giving them time to research and develop truly meaningful, educational pieces. By having all the “puzzle pieces” in place in advance, Parlance’s messages remain consistent and strong, further positioning them as true industry leaders.
And Remember…Content Matters, But So Does Design
In addition to having consistent corporate content and messages, Parlance is also equally as focused on having a visually appealing site that houses all their content. Parlance is currently enhancing the design of their company website, and subsequently updating their online community with their TMC (News - Alert) designer to incorporate any new branding in order to maintain consistency, which Bedard states is “a nice value-add to have all included in the online community program.”
Enhancing the design of your company website is important, especially if you have an online community that directs traffic to it; if you are sending people to your website you want to be sure it’s as robust, informative and “sticky” as possible. According to Bedard, “we have a lot of data and knowledge in this area” so by having that information first and foremost, you are increasing your chances of converting interested visitors into educated buyers.
Although Parlance is a leader in their industry, there are still new markets to be conquered where their brand recognition might not be as strong. Therefore they are not only using their online community to increase their brand awareness, but to launch new products and services as well.
Measuring Results
Parlance’s Auto Attendant community receives a high number of unique visitors per month – around 1,947 per month over the past 6 months. Between that and the increasing number of page views the site receives, Bedard is pleased with the traffic it drives back to their company website, stating “TMC remains our number 1 referral back to our website.” Although these tangible results are important, Bedard also notes the benefits of “intangible” results like brand building, getting the Parlance name out into new markets, and increasing search engine rankings for multiple long-tail searches- all of which he also views as successful outcomes of their marketing efforts and reasons to continue sharing their “story” in unique and powerful ways.
Connect with us and join the conversation: What best practices do you have to share from building an online community for your business?
About TMCnet Online Communities
TMCnet Online Communities are news-generated, content-rich portals that position your company as the leading “go-to resource” for your industry group. TMC has been building Online Communities for over 10 years, and continues to be the market leader at developing these successful sites for our customers. To learn more about the TMCnet Online Community program, please contact Anna Ritchie or call 203-852-6800 x 107. You can also visit us online.
Anna Ritchie is product manager for TMC's Online Community Program. Previously, she worked as a change and communications practitioner for a global consulting firm, and as a freelance marketing and communications specialist. She received her master's degree in English from Seton Hall University and her bachelor's degree in English from Loyola University.
