Q&A Interview: If you [Content Market] it, They Will Come with Laurie Galazzo (Inbound Marketing Manager, AppTweak)

Starting a business can be as simple as filing a form and paying $25 (in Michigan). Yet, how do you get the word out and acquire customers once you're open for business? Enter content marketing. Today we had the pleasure of talking with Laurie Galazzo, who discussed some of her experiences running the global content marketing strategy for Belgium-based ASO tool, AppTweak.

Incipia: Laurie – you’re quite active in the content marketing space for AppTweak, from Medium to Quora, to Youtube, to Twitter, to blogging and probably a good many more channels. Which channels have been the most successful in helping accomplish your inbound goals?

Laurie: Indeed, I believe that an effective inbound marketing strategy starts with the selection of the right channels. These channels must be carefully chosen, not only according to the objectives and the audience targeted but also according to the current trends.

I would definitely say that blogging is for us one of the most successful ways to drive qualified traffic and increase leads. App Store Optimization (ASO) is still very unknown and its specifics remain quite fuzzy to app developers and marketers. By creating easy to read and jargon-free content covering ASO best practices and principles, we are able to spark our readership's interest.

Valuable and insightful content is nowadays much appreciated. Most importantly, it is easily shared by readers to their own audience, which multiplies the reach drastically. By providing quality and useful content, readers gain trust in the company and end up testing our tool.

I will point out two other very successful channels: Twitter and Quora. Twitter is a great social media platform because its content focuses on the essential and it is more business-oriented than other channels. Plus, Twitter makes it very easy to share content (RT or Like). It also enables us to find new prospects or partners with the various filters and the hashtags available.

Quora also brings us a lot of qualified traffic which often ends in sales. This channel allows experts to answer specific questions and assert their authority in their field of expertise. Again, this increases trust and brings new visitors.

Driving traffic is one thing. Driving qualified traffic is another, and actually the most important. By focusing on specific topics, groups and channels, you can definitely increase awareness, trust and conversion.

Incipia: How are you and AppTweak innovating in the content marketing space?

Laurie: We’re focusing on providing our audience with simple and easy to understand content helping our readers in their app business. We’re also doing many guest posts as they increase our reach to a wider audience while providing valuable backlinks.  

We’ve also launched the ASO University, which is a series of video tutorials teaching App Store Optimization. Visual content is very important and much appreciated. We’re planning on increasing our efforts in this area. We’re indeed working on adding new videos in the coming future.

Also, and this might not be directly tied to content marketing but more to general marketing: we’re very close to our customers and prospects, as we dedicate a lot of time and resources to our customer support. We always reply and don’t hesitate to spend some time answering questions or solving problems within a few hours.

We believe that maintaining customer satisfaction is crucial and even more important than driving new customers. This strategy is also reflected in our content material, as we try to retain our readership as much as possible.

Incipia: Does your strategy or tactics change from country to country? Do people respond differently depending on where they live?

Laurie: People usually do behave differently depending on where they live, according to their cultures, beliefs and background. However these differences have not been significant in our case, so we’re currently only sticking to communicating in English and mainly keeping the same tone. In the future, we will probably localize our efforts in other languages and differentiate our strategy according to regions.

We have actually noticed a higher difference in responses cross-industries rather than between countries. A game studio will not respond in the same way as an e-commerce or an indie developer. We usually adjust the tone of our communication according to our clients and/or groups/platform we’re addressing.

Incipia: What were some things that you learned about digital marketing from your schooling vs on the job?

Laurie: Although I learned a lot during my studies, I must admit that being in the field has taught be even more. During my courses, I learned to structure my work following a certain methodology. Theory has helped me understand and respond to many various challenges, but being confronted with situations in the real world gives a whole other dimension.

My job at AppTweak is my first job and my first experience in a tech start-up. I am learning every day. Not only have I learned a lot about App Store Optimization and mobile marketing, I also discovered a lot of new tools like Intercom, Dapulse, Slack, Trello, etc. which all help us daily.

Plus, my experience at AppTweak shows me every day that Inbound Marketing is a question of regularity and that the effects generally appear after a while, just like SEO and ASO. Patience and perseverance are two important values that I learned at work.

I’ve also improved my communication skills with customers or prospects and learned to close deals.

Incipia: Let’s say that you were to start your own business tomorrow. What would be your top 3 priorities for building a strong inbound strategy from the get-go?

Laurie:

1. Create a blog with regular valuable posts and guest posts. I’d share and promote each article regularly on various social media platforms.
2. Create and customize various social media pages and profiles for my new business, with a unique strategy on each of them.
3. Implement a strong SEO strategy to maximize my website’s visibility on various search engines.

Incipia: Do you have any closing thoughts?

Laurie: Content Marketing can bring successful results and a massive increase in new prospects, at a very low cost. It is important to focus on providing valuable and insightful content according to the targeted audience, without being too sales-y.

Creating a mix between multiple channels is a great way to increase the effects of content marketing. E.g: sharing blog posts on various social media platforms and/or groups will help to increase the reach.

I’d definitely recommend to any business to implement a rich Content Marketing strategy as part of their global strategy.

Incipia - Lastly we’d like to turn the table and give you a chance to ask us any question you like on the topic. Send us a question back!

Laurie: What do you think of the new iOS10 and how does it affect your work?

Incipia: iOS 10 brings with it massive new opportunities to our business, as we are both an app development and marketing firm. In a development sense, iOS 10 allows us to tap into a whole new type of apps (that is proven to be much more popular than the Watch or TV OS) by developing apps for iMessage; iOS 10 also provides us with the exciting new ability to access the power of Siri and perhaps even Apple Maps (OpenTable and Uber are now). From a marketing sense, iOS 10's biggest change is the release of Apple's app store search ads, which opens up an incredible new 1st party marketing channel that we are looking forward to helping clients optimize. That said, the growth of "limit ad tracking" in iOS 10 does make our job of marketing a bit more difficult. 

Laurie Galazzo is the Inbound Marketing Manager at AppTweak App Store Optimization tool. She is in charge of representing the company in the digital space. My daily routine involves the creation and the spread of valuable content; the implementation of an engaging social media strategy; public relations and customers satisfaction.

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