The conference is structured to be hands-on, intimate and packed full of real-world knowledge from the trenches.

“It was apparent to me that you took great time and effort to ensure that the information presented was current and useful.” – Charles Schwab, 2011 Attendee

This year, the content centers around the content marketing lifecycle: Strategize, Create, Curate, Manage, Distribute and Analyze. Subject experts will address each topic along the life cycle.

Day one kicks-off with insight into each step along the life cyle.

Day two, through a series of case studies, digs deep into companies like Dell, Ogilvy PR, ServiceMax, SAS and more who have created successful content marketing programs.

For the complete agenda and to register go to Contentmarketingnow.com. If you register by February 29^th, you will save over $500 off the regular ticket price.

There are two primary formats for posting your content to Facebook: Status Updates and Shared Links. Using dlvr.it you can choose which format you post to Facebook. Below we describe each and provide details on the layout options available when posting via dlvr.it.

Status Updates
Facebook Status Updates contain contain text and links, and the formatting is basic. Status updates do not contain images or other media. The format is similar to the bare-bones nature of tweets on Twitter, however Facebook’s character limits per post are higher than Twitter’s. Facebook Status Updates posted via dlvr.it are capped at 420 characters, whereas 140 is the maximum number of characters in a tweet.

When posting Status Updates from dlvr.it, you can select which fields from your items to include: Title, Body and/or Link. The Status Update example below includes the Title and Link of the item posted.

Shared Links
Facebook Shared Links contain contain the title (linked), summary and (optionally) a thumbnail image from the content you are posting. The formatting of Shared Links is richer than Status Updates and Tweets — largely due to a) the inclusion of an image and b) the differing type formats for the Title and Summary portions of the post.

When posting Shared Links from dlvr.it, the Title (linked), Summary and Thumbmail Image are automatically included in the post. dlvr.it users may select the method for choosing thumbnail images. More on thumbnail image selection in our next Facebook Distribution 101 entry.

Setting it Up
You can select your Facebook posting format from within the Facebook Destination editor. Open the Post Content tab and set your Post Style as either “Shared Link” or “Status Update”. The set up process will guide you through additional Facebook configuration.

In a recent post, we wrote Four Steps to Deliver More Value in your Social Stream about customizing your stream to deliver more value to your audience. Networks differ, and the likes of Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn vary on many dimensions. Brian Solis recently posted statistics on user demographics for each social network. While the average age of a Facebook user is around 38 and they tend to friend people they know in the real world, the average age of a LinkedIn member is about 45 and they often connect with people they have never met for professional networking.

Despite audience/usage differences, the starkest difference between these networks is their limitation of character length. So we are forced to consider the “Headline Economy.” Think about it. On Twitter, you have exactly 140 characters to work your magic: capture attention and draw your audience in amongst a sea of other messages. Within those characters, you have to get eyeballs, tell a story, and hopefully invite an action to dig deeper. On Facebook, you have a little more leeway on character limits (about 400 characters), but still have to make sure that every word counts, and counts in a way that resonates with the people who read your updates.

With these restrictions, it seems that today’s messages are boiled down to a succession of headlines, fighting for the attention of readers. Customers are forced to become scanners and action is based purely on a few enticing characters. Questions follow – Are facts coming second to presentation? How will the world of journalism cater to this new attention span? Will we have to learn new skills in writing the perfect headline.

The ‘stream’ is becoming the accepted UI of content consumption. Have you ever stared at a real stream of water and tried to focus on one spot – not easy. How do you expect your readers to do the same with your twitter and Facebook accounts? You are one source of content they receive. Give them something to focus on. Make your headline standout.

Below is a very basic example of a few easy things you can do to add more relevance, branding and SEO prior to distributing your content to your social networks (Dlvr.it can automate much of the work to save time).

1. Simple Twitter item fed via a feed.

2. The same tweet but enhanced with branding and SEO.
“Dlvr.it Blog” was added as a prefix and “#Social_Media” was included as a postfix hashtag to help add more structure to the tweet while making it more findable in search.

Our advice for attracting readers? Keep it catchy, enticing, and most importantly relevant. Continue to fill streams with a variety of content, thought and invitation for discussion. Use filters and hashtags to provide context for your readers. These are the best ways to leverage the “Headline Economy.”

Want to post items that mention iPhone? How about items that mention iPhone or iPad? How about items that mention iPhone or iPad, but not if the item mentions Facebook? No problem.

Want to apply filters only to your headlines? To your headlines and bodies? Only to your categories? To headlines, and categories, but not body? You get the picture…

Further, we let you set filter rules for an individual feed, and to all feeds in a route. This lets you apply filters granularly to individual feeds, apply a filter globally to all feeds in a route, or combine individual feed and route level filters for even more sophisticated filtering rules. These filters help identify and present content specifically tailored to your audience. Make customized streams and ensure that each and every post contains only content relevant to your readers.

Interested in building your feeds in a thoughtful way, to your exact specifications? We make it easy to deliver.

I often hear from marketers, “There are just so many new tools to reach customers – I don’t know where to begin,” and “social media marketing is so complicated and overwhelming.” Many marketers just give up and turn to buying ads on Google because it is easy.

Whether you are a sole proprietor or Fortune 50 company, you are strapped for time and resources. How can you possibly keep up with site optimization, ad campaigns, budgeting, meetings, clients and now social media marketing?

I say it doesn’t have to be complicated. Just ask Casey Taylor (@JustOneCup). He applied my method  and quickly rose to the front page of Google in the competitive field of coffee. I don’t claim to be an SEO expert but sometimes just the simplest things can achieve the best results.

Casey asked me, “What do I need to do to succeed with social media?” My response, “Find your digital center.”  His response was laughter. He thought I was taking him to Yoga camp. I kind of was – Social Media Yoga Camp.

So what does it mean to ‘Find Your Digital Center?’ It is the best method to help you focus and not feel overwhelmed with the seemingly complex social media landscape. Your digital center is the beginning, it’s the core of your overall program.

It’s easy. Find the ONE activity that you can easily do on a regular basis. If it’s tweeting, blogging, photography, events, etc, focus on that one activity, master it and build your entire social media marketing program around it. That’s it.

Let’s build a digital center for a wedding photographer as an example.

Step 1.
Upload as many pictures to Flickr and tag each photo.

Step 2.
Next, update the status of all the other social networking sites you belong to (Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn) with something similar to “Just uploaded Napa Valley Wedding pictures .” There are tools to hook all your social networks together (Ping.fm, Dlvr.it).

In this example, Flickr is now the digital center and feeds all the other places where your potential customers are spending time. Plus, most social networks are a feeder to Google so you are covered there. You appear as a team of people working in your marketing department. Post once, publish everywhere.

Here’s another example. I recently spoke with a the marketing director at a regional bank and in ten minutes we found her center – events.  She was overwhelmed and she didn’t know where to start her social media marketing program. By asking her a few questions, I discovered her bank hosts events around personal finance. Perfect! Her digital center became Meetup. She built a community around that one activity, connected all her social networks and she was off to the races.

If the Dalai Lama were a marketer, he would tell you the same thing. Perform a bit of Social Media Yoga – find your digital center and just get off the starting block.

What’s your digital center?