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How to Rank for “Best” Keywords

What do consumers really want? Pretty simple. We just want “the best.” The best everything. The best socks for running, the best shampoo, the best noise-canceling headphones to block out your annoying coworker whose name rhymes with Lyle.

With wanting the best everything, we often lean on Google to know the best everything. Searches for “best” keywords are increasing at a crazy rate year-over-year. No signs of that trend slowing down either.

So how do you rank for the “best” keyword? Today’s Listen has the answer:

• (01:30) Give up the goal of ranking for “best” keywords. Searchers usually won’t trust a blog published by Company A saying they are the best in the biz. Searchers tend to trust 3rd-party websites more for these searches.
• (02:28) Instead, you should leverage the current 3rd-party websites who already rank for that “best” keyword.
• (02:37) Go to those 3rd-party websites that rank for your desired keyword, reach out to them, and offer to pay them to place you in that article. Here’s a template for this approach.
• (04:30) Pitch and create new content for 3rd-parties. Find one of those 3rd-party websites with higher domain authority than your website, and pitch them the blog post idea that you think would rank really well for that “best” keyword.
• (05:52) Use dates! If you are hellbent on ranking for “best” keywords, add a date to your title. For example, “The Best Air Conditioners to Buy in 2018.” If this is already competitive in your industry, go deeper by adding the month as well as the year.
• (07:40) Let searchers know they’re getting unbiased results. That means you truly have to be unbiased and explain your methodology behind your rankings.

Good news/bad news: Today’s Listen is actually a video. But, there’s a link to the audio version on the page and there’s also a full blog post that goes along with this. You can really consume this one however you want.

Choose Your Own Adventure

Read

How to Shoot Professional Instagram Stories for Your Business

The video marketing wizards at Wistia have whipped up something all marketers will wanna take notes on. Including us. (Good thing we take notes on these articles already.)

When asked, “Are you making Instagram stories using only the Instagram app?” we let out a sheepish, “Yes…” Sound familiar? Hey, you don’t have to be like everyone else.

Today’s Read is all about how you can level-up your Instagram Stories with tips on shooting and editing, so your stories stand out from the crowd. There’s something for everyone in here – from shooting with just your phone’s camera to shooting with a DSLR. Here are some tidbits to get you started:

• Shooting with your phone’s native camera. Utilize those time-lapse and slow-motion effects for a slick look. You can also trim videos to fit IG’s 15-second window.   
• Shooting with your phone and some gear. Put your phone on a tripod, turn on some lights, and hook up an external microphone for a serious boost of quality. (Wistia will show you how to do this in detail.)
• Shooting with a DSLR. Now that you can pin your favorite stories to your profile, there’s even more reason to shoot something with high quality. You can shoot a vertical video with the help of a tripod and from there, keep taking it to the next level with sound equipment, lights, the works! (More on this in today’s Read.)

Don’t forget, Insta Stories are watched vertically, so flip that camera! And, if you need some background music for your stories, Wistia hooks it up with some free tracks you can use.

Still a ton of tips on editing and exporting to Instagram to explore! For the full tutorials and notes on which gear you can use, you know what to do →

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Super Bowl is Coming…

Whether you’re a football fanatic or passionately averse to the sport (raises hand), the ads that coincide with the Super Bowl are a Universal Good.

To tease the fast-approaching championship, M&Ms just released a short ad and it is majorly LOL-worthy. Danny Devito floating lazily a vat of chocolate? It’s like some forgotten scene of Always Sunny in Philadelphia. (Ohhhhhh, is that why Danny Devito is in this?)

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