10 evergreen resources for SaaS content marketers to level up their skills
One of the best and worst things about SaaS content marketing is that it’s constantly developing and changing.
It appeals to the people who seek growth, aren’t content with doing the same thing every day and have an affinity for the written word.
But SaaS content marketing can also be overwhelming. As a marketer, you’ve got campaigns to run, reports to complete, stakeholders to manage, people to talk to and blog posts to write. Plus, you’ve got to keep up to date with your industry so you can tailor your editorial calendar accordingly.
I struggle with this myself. How can you ensure your skills as a content marketer aren’t stagnating in 2021 and beyond? The world of content marketing itself has changed tremendously in the last decade. Content now needs to be empathetic, purposeful and customer-first, instead of pushing products or adopting a salesy tone.
I’ve compiled some of my favourite resources and thought leaders I read regularly to keep up with the exciting world of content marketing.
1. Animalz
I love resources with actionable advice, and Animalz’s blog delivers. Lots of fantastic concepts here about content strategy and how to approach writing as a content marketer.
Some of my favourite posts that changed the way I think about content marketing:
We Need a Slower, More Thoughtful Approach to Content Marketing:
Publishing more content to fill an editorial calendar isn’t always the answer.
Content is typically free for readers, they pay with their attention. There’s millions of pages out there filled with content, but only 24 hours in a day.
The Four Forces of Bad Content:
Avoid unsubtle product showcases like smuggling a product CTA into an ostensibly “informational” article, it ruins the reader's experience. Instead, write about the problems your product solves and not the product
Spend more time creating content to answer the ‘How’ question, rather than ‘Why’
2. Jimmy Daly, Founder of SaaS content marketing community Superpath.io and seasoned content marketer.
Jimmy (yes, former marketing director of Animalz) now runs a fantastic community dedicated to SaaS content marketers' professional development. I’ve not come across another community that’s laser-focused on the content marketer’s role. His blog covers content strategy, content management and execution. He also writes evergreen articles and has a mini-course on content marketing on his website and newsletter.
Favourites include:
Blogs Are Libraries, Not Publications:
A counterpoint to the “publish as many posts as possible” to improve your organic traffic; resulting in a haphazard approach to content strategy. This post covers the “Why”, whereas the Hub and Spoke post covers the “How”.
The Hub and Spoke Content Strategy:
Blog posts are often not strong enough to survive on their own. But if they are grouped (and linked) together strategically, they can thrive. (Another take on HubSpot’s pillar page & topic cluster approach to content strategy)
Choose one short-tail keyword per hub. One keyword is plenty if there's sufficient search volume. Think of your Hub as "landing content" -- it's a landing page/table of contents/ultimate guide hybrid. It's designed for two purposes: 1) discovery and 2) navigation.
Spokes are posts that dive deeper into related ideas mentioned in the Hub. These posts should all link back to the main post with a mix of targeted, short- and long-tail anchor text.
3. The Marketing Student; written by David Fallarme, HubSpot Asia’s former head of marketing
David’s another figure on LinkedIn who provides tons of value in his content. Blending high-level strategy advice with actionable advice, there’s lots of wisdom to unpack in his articles. He also runs the APAC Marketers Roundtable; a community for marketers in APAC and writes on The Marketing Student.
Marketers come across tons of charts and analytics in our line of work. Handy guide to reading charts and what to do about the data from a macro lens. Plus, a very smart way to use Google Trends data (perhaps an idea for a post for your own company blog?)
What is the job of the Marketing team?
This one hit on a deeper level. We as marketers love focusing on tactics and strategies. But what are we doing all this content stuff for, anyway? How does your role as a marketer contribute to brand awareness, business growth, and success on the tactical level? This one is a great explanation I can get behind.
4. Alfred Lua, Marketing lead at ReferralCandy
I like Alfred’s content because he approaches it with the heart of a learner - someone who’s not afraid to document his journey and share what he learns along the way. Mostly product and content marketing focused here.
How B2B Is Becoming Increasingly B2C2B
“B2B software is now not just built for teams or the entire company but also for individuals.”
Why did a marketing campaign work? How do you assess your own marketing knowledge? Alfred talks about assessing marketing efforts with more specific criteria to fine-tune your explanation of why a piece of marketing is good or bad.
“For example, instead of evaluating an ad as good or bad, try to explain why the ad is good or bad. Is it bad because it is irrelevant to you so the targeting is wrong? Is it good because the copy described your pain point in the exact words you would use?”
My Blog's Organic Traffic Is Falling. Now What?
Hits the nail on the head with a very specific problem all content marketers have come across and offers a calm, step-by-step process on how to systematically break down the problem and find solutions.
6. Joanna Wiebe, Copyhackers
Conversion copywriter Joanna Wiebe is another of my bookmarks when it comes to writing copy. Many principles here can also be applied to content writing.
The Ultimate Guide to No-Pain Copywriting
I have this post bookmarked and in reference every time I need to write new copy for a landing page or website. Perfect mix of actionable steps, examples of world-leading brands and explanations.
An Ultimate Guide on … Ultimate Guides
Joanna goes meta on this post. For people writing and scoping out comprehensive, long-form blog content on a single topic, this tutorial is gold.
An Ultimate Guide is actually an educational long-form sales page; designed to move your prospect through stages of awareness, just like a long form sales page does.
An Ultimate Guide supports your sales team by pre-selling a product or service, so that when a person actually gets to the end, (your reader) is in a superb place for your sales team to reach out to.
7. Henneke Duistermaat, Enchanting Marketing
Henneke’s blog articles are a cozy read; as far as business blogs go. Peppered with hand-drawn illustrations and written in an earnest, conversational style, you feel like huddling up in blankets and talking to her like a trusted friend.
Enchanting Marketing focuses on the craft of writing. She shows business writing doesn’t always have to be dry and boring. She shines in her deep analysis of established heavyweights in the business writing and copywriting scene and unpacking how great content & copy gets made
Favourite starting posts include:
How To Write Seductive Sales Copy Like Apple (guest post on Neil Patel’s blog)
6 Persuasive Writing Lessons From the World’s Most Famous Car Advert
8. Blogging for Business by Ahrefs
A full content marketing course by Ahrefs. And it’s free!
Lots of content covered here: from blogging goals, growing a blog how to analyse traffic potential and ranking difficulty of a search keyword and finding great content ideas.
Your content marketing playbook is all here - perfect. And it’s a meta look at content marketing - did you realise the course itself is a piece of content marketing for Ahrefs’s software? Very well done.
9. Marketing Examples by Harry Dry
Another fantastic resource with clear visuals, Marketing Examples uses … you said it, examples to get his point across. Topics include lesser-focused on aspects of content marketing; content distribution, creating landing pages that convert and creating a website that converts email subscribers.
10. Smart Blogger
Another one dedicated to the craft of writing, Smart Blogger is known for their extremely well-crafted, in-depth guides. The tone of their content can come across as in-your-face salesy and brash at times, but if you can get past that, there’s tons of gold for SaaS content marketers. Plus, they practice what they preach - their posts are a fantastic reading experience.
My favourite bookmarked posts from Smart Blogger, fantastic to refer when you’re editing your writing:
18 Writing Tips That’ll Actually Make You a Better Writer (2021)
583 Sensory Words to Take Your Writing from Bland to Brilliant
801+ Power Words That Pack a Punch & Convert like Crazy
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In closing:
As a content marketer myself, I find upskilling and learning to be (mostly) a fruitful experience. I hope this list of resources for content marketing professionals helps you separate some of the wheat from the chaff on your journey to content marketing success.
Got a favourite source to recommend? Let me know!
