As our recent blog mentioned, many of us are working remotely during the current COVID-19 environment. For some, that may mean fewer projects, reduced hours or simply more time spent at home. While we engage in social distancing and work away from the traditional office setting, now is a good time to catch up on your reading and expand your knowledge of the marketplace. Today’s blog is a compilation of our favorite informative resources for marketing, business and entrepreneurship.

Podcasts

We love podcasts for their convenience and opportunity to listen to live or pre-recorded interviews. With some live events being canceled or at least put on hold, interviewers are stepping up to the demand with more podcast content. For marketing related topics, listen to these sources:

1. Vengreso’s  “Modern Marketing Engine” and “Modern Selling Podcast” are two podcasts that provide expertise on increasing revenue from the marketing and sales perspective. Vengreso’s mission is to help sales and marketing professionals succeed in the digital sales ecosystem.
2. Copyblogger FM is a weekly, short-form broadcast hosted by Darrell Vesterfelt and Tim Stoddart. The cast of rotating experts analyze the week in content marketing, copywriting, email marketing, conversion optimization, mindset and much more.
3. Youpreneur, hosted by British entrepreneur Chris Drucker, is a podcast focused actionable tips to promote brand development and personal brand in the 21^st century.

Blogs

Consistent, casual and often short-form blogs provide a valuable platform for brands to stay connected to their stakeholders, whether they are prospects, customers, employees, vendors or strategic partners. At the same time, they are resources for marketers to use to stay ahead of the curve when it comes to creativity and innovation in marketing today. Here are some of our favorites:

1. MarketingProfs provides blogs in the form of how-to articles and infographics covering the latest marketing tactics, tips and strategies. They share blogs from their own writers, and also feature blogs from a variety of experts in other fields and businesses.
2. Content Marketing Institute publishes content by professionals with experience in content marketing at mid and large B2B and B2C organizations. The goal of their content is to advance the practice of content marketing. With daily content and authors from a variety of fields and expertise, their blogs span an ever-growing spectrum.
3. Vickie Sullivan is a well-established, experienced and trusted thought leader. Her expertise ranges from PR and branding to speaking and sponsorship to general life advice. We enjoy the wide range and playful tone of her content in combination with practical guidance.
4. Hive9’s unique perspective is focused on how marketing and technology work together. Often pulling from recent studies and new technological advancements and trends, this blog is a great place to get MarTech updates with a balance of useful tactic and strategy guidance.
5. B2B Marketing Zone is not a source of original content, but rather a useful, aggregate resource to find a multitude of B2B marketing blogs and articles. Curated by CMO Council and Aggregage, B2B Marketing Zone acts as a “front page” for the timeliest content discussing the business-to-business space and its relation to current events and recent trends.

Webinars

Webinars are great resources not only for education but for connection. With today’s digital conferencing software, webinars help us share information and expertise while allowing us to communicate virtually with peers and experts. Some excellent sources include:

1. Marketo is a company of digital marketing experts with knowledge of product innovation, a vibrant community of marketers and a robust partner ecosystem. Their ongoing webinar production includes live attendance, but also provides the option to view previous webinars on-demand.
2. B2B Marketing has a varied collection of content mediums, but we recommend their webinars. With rotating guest experts, B2BMarketing takes on conceptual topics like how to engage with your customers in addition to practical subjects such as how to augment your workforce with artificial intelligence.
3. BusinessWatch Network is a great resource for a huge variety of business-oriented content, tailored to your specific interests. While you can access any of their content on-demand, you can subscribe to specific newsletters that compile the best digital resources in that specific field, such as finance, human resources, manufacturing and, of course, sales and marketing. While they have content of all kinds, their webinar selection is particularly rich with many subjects based on current events and recent findings.
4. Smartfinds Marketing develops webinars in conjunction with other experts to share insights on marketing, advertising, SEO, social media and website building. They combine big concepts of business with strategy building and tactic implementation. In fact, Trade Press Services had the pleasure of participating in a recent content marketing webinar with Smartfinds that you can view here.   

Guides

More in-depth than blogs or articles, these ebooks, guides and white papers are built to provide a more complete understanding of widely known subjects, followed by step-by-step direction for active implementation. Explore some of these resources:

1. Hubspot remains one of the most popular sales and marketing resources available with a wide variety of content and recognizable brand and voice. On top of actionable tips and guides for marketing and sales tactics, Hubspot regularly develops reports and compiles statistics based on their market research to support their guidance.
2. Influence & Co is a content marketing company with a great library of guides and white papers to propel your thought leadership, lead generation and content distribution.
3. Salesforce is a well-known CRM platform, but they also share great content. In particular, Salesforce focuses on developing successful customer relationships, and provides guides and playbooks that give great advice for sales and surrounding departments.  

Online Events and Summits

Our ability to create online events has been rapidly growing. With the recent social distancing requirements, many events are quickly trying to adapt to the digital space. These adaptations show us how lucky we are to live in a technological age that allows us to stay readily connected to others all over the world. 

1. Social Media Marketing World is an event that features workshops from more than 100 of the world’s top professionals who specialize in marketing with Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Messenger, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Twitter. Other topics include social strategy, social advertising, content marketing, video marketing, analytics and customer advocacy. While SMM World is an in-person event in San Diego, they offer full-access tickets to digital users who can’t be there in person, making this a wonderful resource for distance learning.
2. Adobe’s Digital Experience Conference moved to be an online-only event, giving free live and on-demand access to registrants. This online summit features talks from Adobe leaders about software uses, industry product innovations and best practices for the digital experience.

Books

Books will never cease to be one of the most in-depth and expert sources of information. Some books we recommend include:

1. “The Thought Leaders Practice” by Matt Church is a practical blueprint built for experts looking to position themselves as the leading information expert in their field. The great thing about this book is that it is not simply a collection of grand concepts and ideas; it’s a functional roadmap to financial success and details the actions you should take at each step along the way.
2. “Everybody Writes” by Ann Handley acknowledges that we’re in an age of connection with constant content production. Handley writes, “If you have a website, you are a publisher. If you are on social media, you are in marketing.” From that angle, she provides tips on how to write better, rules of writing, common tactics and tools.
3. “Competing in the Age of AI: Strategy and Leadership When Algorithms and Networks Run the World” by Marco Iansiti and Karim R. Lakhani is a new book covering some of the most recent changes in technology. It is no doubt that artificial intelligence is changing the landscape of business, and this book does its best to provide strategies and tactics that help leaders stay competitive within technological advancements.
4. “The Power of Habit” by Charles Duhigg is a psychologically-based book that provides businesspeople with insights into harnessing their own potential. Duhigg shares scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and recommends practices for how they can be changed. With this knowledge, he provides readers with the power to achieve success in business and any other facet of life.

Stay Engaged and Connected

There is no question about it—these are stressful times for all of us. Experts agree that in times of distress it can be helpful to focus on what we can control rather than what we can’t. One thing we can control is our commitment to maximize our efforts during the current business and social disruption. Take time to listen, read and communicate with others. Use these resources to expand your skills and knowledge, both professionally and personally. Above all, to help manage feelings of tension and isolation, find time every day to practice gratitude, engage in positive thoughts and emotions and reach out to others.