If you haven’t heard of the PESO marketing model, it basically takes the four media types – paid (P), earned (E), shared (S) and owned (O) – and merges them together to establish awareness and authority for your brand. The model is the brainchild of Gini Dietrich and was featured in her book, ‘Spin Sucks.’
It has become one of the mainstays of digital marketing because done well, it builds authority for your brand. Having authority showcases your company as a thought leader.
People see you as the experts in your field and, of course, the search engines see you as experts too because your content builds authority and credibility; so it’s good for your human customers and the search engine robots too.
So what are the four cornerstones?
Here we are not talking about trade press advertising, but Google Ads Search (PPC), LinkedIn Ads and email marketing.
This is traditional PR – getting your brand’s name in print and on screen via press releases, case studies and thought pieces in the trade, local, national and international media.
Otherwise known as social media, it can be used internally and externally to create engagement and community amongst your target audience.
The content you create and upload to your website and/or blog. You own the platform and control the messaging; you tell the story the way you want.
Now, the alert amongst you may be looking at this and thinking why is owned media last on the list, surely that’s more important than the others?
Of course, you’re absolutely correct, but it would be much harder to remember OESP! Making things easier to recall, however, is good branding practice and so PESO it was named!
One of the keys to a successful PESO campaign is building a thorough understanding of your target audiences. What keeps them awake at night, which social media platforms they engage with, what keywords and phrases they use to search for information and the type of questions they have at different stages of the buying cycle.
Then it’s about taking the Genghis Khan approach (Genghis only had a small army, but his meticulous approach to battle meant he overcame foes with much larger armies than his). In short, he always had a tailored plan for each enemy and he stuck to that plan.
Having a weekly plan for all your PESO activity will keep you on track and make sure you have regular activity in each of the four cornerstones of the system.
You’re looking to build trust and authority; to do so you will need to be engaging and authentic. Your content will need to address your audiences’ concerns and interests at each stage of their journey, from initial interest through to conversion pieces and ‘closing’ articles.
For most of our clients, their sales cycle is fairly long and so we tend to lead with customer testimonials and case studies to build confidence. We earn coverage in the trade media, on and offline, to improve authority and back it all up with social and paid media to generate sales leads.
As most of the elements of a PESO campaign are digital, it is easier to measure the effects. Using tools like Google Analytics you can track how many times a blog post or piece of content has been shared. With paid campaigns, of course, you will know exactly how many clicks and conversions your campaigns achieve.
Earned media is perhaps harder to assess. These days, however, most publications have websites and they post your release and case studies to their site with links to your own website. So again, this will give you an idea of the exposure you are getting.
Another measure of success is if you can influence the sales cycle length. If you work out the average sales cycle period prior to the campaign launch, you can set a goal to beat it by the end of the campaign. And finally, of course, you can look at the bottom line – have revenues and profits increased?
Personally, I’m not sure there is such a thing when it comes to marketing. Carried out professionally and diligently, however, there is absolutely no doubt that the PESO model will help you build authority, trust and sales for your brand.
If you’d like to learn more about the PESO model or would like help implementing a campaign, give Alan Myers a call on 0116 278 7788 or email: ideas@leapfrog.uk.com