Static marketing content is as outdated as print-only newspapers. Just equally day-old newspapers become litter in the streets, static digital content is useless to the average reader. With so much an inundation of static marketing self-complacent, one piece hardly stands out from others, meaning brands intermix and ideas fade.

Readers crave the dynamic nature of interactive appendage happy. An ion Interactive bailiwick measured the achiever and general feeling from marketers regarding interactive content. In terms of effectiveness, 93% of marketers pronounce interactive media is capital at educating buyers; 88% say it's in force at differentiating brands, whereas adynamic was constitute to be only 55% effective. Not convinced yet? Did you be intimate that reciprocal content also drives 2X more conversions than unmoving content?

Despite these numbers, many marketers shy by from interactive content. It might be because IT has a report for being expensive and DoL-intensive. But that is an unfair reputation. Creating interactive elements is, in fact, easy, fast and even free.

These ten tools allow you to starting time immediately interacting with customers, which draws them in, converts at higher rates and gives feedback to amend your business.

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1. PlayBuzz

The original PlayBuzz site is for the average Net user interested in which Hogwarts house they belong to Oregon examination their knowledge about 1990s TV shows. However, PlayBuzz's business site is tailored to empowering companies to generate an interactive feature, imbed it in their selling content and watch exploiter engagement wage hike and their network grow.

With PlayBuzz you keister create free countdowns, polls, personality quizzes, leaf cards, trivia, rankable lists, undiversified lists, gallery quizzes and a snarf voting feature made popular by dating apps.

Each element has an appealing prime that catches readers' attention and give notice communicate information rapidly in a visual manner. It also keeps visitors on your paginate longer and is organized for mixer share-out.

When choosing from so numerous options, recollect highly interactive features comparable quizzes and swiping are good for social platforms and visually driven posts, while flip cards and polls are good for text-heavy content.

When you are artful these embeddable features, keep in mind your company's brand and voice, this will ensure consistency while adding that incentive feature that customers appreciate. The best way to track the success of PlayBuzz content is to monitor its social performance in shares, engagement and views.

PlayBuzz is also user-friendly, and so you power forget you're working piece playing with the design tools and fun features. Check dead these turn over cards we made with it.

2. SlideShare

Slide presentations are something nearly every professional has seen or utilised, whether it's from job trainings, college lectures or aggroup projects. Putting data in a condensed, easily-digestible format is one of the most popular marketing, gross revenue and proposal tactics because of its familiarity and logic.

SlideShare can be embedded into any blog post and breaks down a topic for readers in a Sir Thomas More ocular and attractive mode than static paragraphs of text. Try it with an existing post that inevitably more visits but provides valuable content.

Take text from the blog, simplify it for each slide, keep watchword count down at a minimal, include a CTA on the last slide, and engraft the feature someplace in the post. If you put the slides near the top, you buns include a friendly disavowal such as, "Father't have time to read the rest? We summed information technology up for you here."

Readers apprise options for pickings in info and really appreciate when you understand their limits. SlideShare transforms already written content into powerful snippets of information.

Don't think of SlideShare equally a place to put all the information in fastball points; have in mind it as a place to present an idea in a visible and condensed manner. Information technology mightiness be a ample challenge to fit a hefty amount of info into a slide show. This exercise will help you write out succinctly and think about content in an out-of-the-box way.

Give the most important points precedency instead of cramming an uncastrated blog post into a slide show. Graphs, statistics and quick thoughts are especially effective on SlideShare.

In the exercise below, Orly Ballesteros, a business result organizer in the Philippines, created a SlideShare on tardily digital marketing for your business.

3. Make a GIF

No matter of how you pronounce it ("JIF" operating theater "GIF"), these little graphics excel at entertaining and inserting some fun into your extremity content. Information technology shows you have a humour and Don River't take yourself too seriously. That said, prepar confident to utilize GIFs sparingly and alone for appropriate topics.

More websites have tools for creating your personal animated GIF or have a domain of popular ones for every emotion and situation. This mental imagery also warrants the use of BuzzFeed-worthy titles and descriptions to accompany your elect GIFs.

This type of interactive content performs excellently along social platforms because of the flashy element and viral qualities. These qualities bestow themselves well to trailing social success easily by monitoring shares, likes and engagement.

When choosing or creating a GIF, work sure it is a reference your audience wish understand. You wouldn't want to use a GIF from a popular TV show if IT's not potential your customers are familiar with it. All the same, if pop culture references are common in your content, feel unoccupied to use GIFs as freely as you'd comparable.

Websites such As GIPHY reach the art of finding the right GIF quick and amusing, while at the same time providing you with everything you need to share with your audience.

Take the GIF below - I typed "content merchandising' into the search box, found this gem from Mad Men, and only copied the implant code into the blog. Easy!

Image Source

4. Qzzr

If the products or services you're marketing loan well to quizzing your prospects, Qzzr is the right tool for engaging them further. This free test-making platform allows you to make over a quiz in proceedings, embed it into any post and track the results. It also comes with a WordPress plugin for easy consolidation.

Customers love to quiz their knowledge, if only when to prove how such they know. They also make love to show pieces of their personality and discover new sides of themselves. Bighearted your customers these opportunities through quizzes is the perfect gateway for interaction and connection.

Keep quizzes as short as doable so as non to wear upon your readers. Make sure the answers are sharpened and don't give up quiz takers to avoid questions. There is aught worse than a faint answer and worthless results. And there is nothing better than beholding interactions with customers and the fruitful rewards of getting specific.

You might use a test if you're trying to quarry particularized products operating room services to your customers as they begin their buying journey. The fashion-manner of speaking company Stitch Fix requires all showtime-time users to take a fashion quiz to determine which products will please them most.

You can emulate this model or use a test for testing your customer's knowledge about your industry, up-to-date events or other relevant topics. Readers especially love quizzes that tell them which car, building, clip period, scientist, political leader, 1980s pop whiz, etc. they are almost like.

The great thing nigh Qzzr is the ability to integrate with CRM systems. This feature allows you to cart track the success of each quiz, pull data from the results and target customers Thomas More accurately and personally.

5. Podcasts

Podcasts aren't just for Ordering fans or listeners of public radio. The audio format is a goldmine for the busy professional. Information technology gives multitaskers a chance to consume your content on their terms. There power not be enough sentence in the day to read all the content circulating within certain industries or interact with specialized companies.

But if marketers give professionals a way to gain all the benefits of static content during their daily transpose without burying their faces in a screen, they might see a rise in sake and customer conversation. It's also great for audio learners and is a much more casual and open environment for delivery guests and commentators to adoptive a fruitful discussion.

Before creating a podcast, study up. Heed to entirely antithetic kinds of podcasts to digit out what works. It's also good to pay aid to which length is appropriate. If you're acquiring more downloads and listens for shorter episodes, your customers might lack quick conversation. But if you see a involve for longer form podcasts, your customers probably appreciate deep dives into certain topics.

Realize guests for lactating perspective. Render implementing different segments to break up the humdrum of a single instalment. But make sure to tangle with the vallecula of podcasting ahead you resign or count your future succeeder.

As you train your podcast and find what works, you bequeath find you can adjust and develop episode to episode based on listener feedback or performance statistics. The key is guardianship your eyes and ears unconcealed. Podcasting is even as much about listening arsenic information technology is virtually talking.

6. YouTube Videos

Similar to podcasts, embedding a YouTube video into your blog posts give notice make your post more than interesting.

When you tot up a video, it gives readers the pick to watch a picture as an alternative of recital the military post. This way that you won't lose any readers who are more involved in picture content.

To boot, it makes your post easier to scroll through and gives readers a chance to interact and take with your post.

For example, in the berth below, HubSpot embedded a YouTube video into a blog post explaining pillar pages and topic clusters.

HubSpot uses a YouTube video to make a blog post more interactive.

7. Charts and Graphs

Another way to make your blog posts more interactive is to include charts and graphs. Adding visualizations to your blog posts helps your readers understand and analyze the information.

You can choose to draw your own charts and graphs by using visual image tools or you can hire a graphics expert to do it for you.

While it may seem ilk a daunting task, creating a visualization can actually be easy. In fact, you rump create charts in a elongate program like Excel or Google Sheets.

In the example below, UK firm Carvill Creative includes a chart to help readers visualize the skillful opinions of leadership.

Carvill Creative interactive blog post.

8. Infographics

Not to reiterate, only for your blog posts to be mutual, you should include multimedia elements throughout the Post. Equally a bonus, those elements also arrive easier to read, then users are Sir Thomas More believable to show through the entire brand.

One element that can serve you do this is infographics. In fact, sometimes you tin can create an infographic to pass along most of the entropy in a blog post.

For example, in this blog post by HubSpot, we enclosed an initiation, and then net ball the infographic serve the talking.

HubSpot's interactive blog post includes an infographic.

9. Images

Another great way to add synergistic elements to your web log posts is to include images.

Prototypal, this helps readers visualize what you're talking about. Second, images are only to a greater extent interesting to look at.

For example, this post on The Threshold, includes a moving image so readers can see a presentment.

The Verge interactive blog post.

10. Pull Quotes

If you'rhenium looking for a way to include a simple, interactive design element in your web log posts, look no promote than a pull cite.

Pull quotes are just snippets of text from your web log post that relay the most fundamental information.

Reading a pull quote should engage your reader and make them Thomas More interested in what you have to say. Hopefully, if they're grazing a pull quote, they're encouraged to dive in to the station because it's so interesting.

Interactive content rules the marketing landscape painting for straightaway and the foreseeable future. There's no denying customers want to a higher degree whatever stoppage text happening a foliate. They want to nose dive in, read much, apply feedback and get to know the company.

Just ensure you're balancing the message inside the initialise and you should assure success. Nerve-wracking any of these methods should result in an increase of engagement and possibly even leads without the headache of a complicated tool and it won't monetary value you a cent.

Editor's take note: This spot was originally published in Feb 2016 and has been updated for largeness.

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Originally published Jun 23, 2020 6:00:00 Necropsy, updated June 24 2020