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Last Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted 3-to-2 to repeal regulations of internet service providers. Those regulations fell under a general title: net neutrality.

If you have questions — you’re certainly not alone.

How did this happen? What was the case for repealing net neutrality in the first place? And what, exactly, has the FCC voted to dismantle?

Normally, this is the part where I would say, “Relax — I’ve got you covered.” But for the sake of transparency, I’ll be honest. I’m not particularly relaxed — or happy, for that matter — about this decision.

And while I will, as always, answer some of the most common questions about the vote as clearly as possible, know this: It’s not easy for me to neutrally — no pun intended — report on the matter.

Perhaps the answers to these questions will provide some insights as to why.

1. What is net neutrality?

Net Neutrality is a collection of regulations that prevent internet service providers (ISPs) — like Xfinity, Spectrum, or Verizon, for example — from altering internet speeds or censoring online content. In other words, it allows free speech on the internet, without corporations deciding which sites or applications are allowed or blocked.

Net neutrality originally took effect in 2015, when the FCC approved net neutrality after years of debate, which included two rejections of earlier versions of rules and regulations. The tipping point came when Title II of the Communications Act — I’ll explain that in more detail in a bit — which essentially laid the legal groundwork to bar ISPs from obstructing online information and access.

The post-net-neutrality web came to be known as the “open internet”: a web where, as Free Press phrased it, users could “share and access information of their choosing without interference.”

2. What is Title II?

Here’s where the legal aspect of net neutrality really comes into play — but please note that this blog post is not legal advice and instead provides background information to help you better understand the background of and the vote to repeal net neutrality.

When we talk about the repeal of net neutrality, we’re really talking about a reversal of Title II of the Communications Act. In 1934, the Act was first passed to regulate mass media communication — at that time, it was things like “wire and radio“.

The Title II section of the Act was written to regulate “common carriers” like utility providers of electricity and telephone landlines. And when efforts were made to enforce net neutrality, the turning point came when ISPs were reclassified as “common carriers” regulated under Title II. It’s quite lengthy and can be read in full here, but using that reclassification as a foundation, the Open Internet Order went into effect, making the below, pivotal declaration (among many others):

” … carefully-tailored rules to protect Internet openness will allow investment and innovation to continue to flourish. … today we adopt carefully-tailored rules that would prevent specific practices we know are harmful to Internet openness— blocking, throttling, and paid prioritization—as well as a strong standard of conduct designed to prevent the deployment of new practices that would harm Internet openness. We also enhance our transparency rule to ensure that consumers are fully informed as to whether the services they purchase are delivering what they expect.”

But last Thursday, the FCC voted to repeal this regulation and oversight, which will reverse things like:

• The inability of ISPs to block or charge extra for select online content.
• The delivery of high-speed internet as a utility — like the aforementioned electricity and telephone landlines.

3. What are the arguments for net neutrality?

Fair Competition

They say that competition is good for the consumer — it provides the public with various pricing and provider options from companies both large and small.

As you may have noticed, in most U.S. regions, there isn’t much competition — if any — for ISPs or cable providers. Here in Boston, the market is largely monopolized by Xfinity, and in others, it might be Spectrum or Verizon. There’s very little room — again, if any — for smaller players, and without net neutrality, that same issue will extend to streaming content providers.

Take the Washington Post’s example of Hulu and Netflix (the latter of which expressly dissented the repeal). While those two (large) companies will still be able to compete fairly, mostly due to their respective abilities to pay the post-repeal fees required for faster content delivery fees — smaller players will have too high a barrier to enter the market.

Free Speech

This point might be the one that you’ve heard about the most. As we noted above, the Open Internet Order barred ISPs from censoring certain content, websites, or applications as they see fit. Now, those regulations will no longer be enforced.

And while such ISPs as Comcast promised to maintain net neutrality …

Comcast supports Net Neutrality. We won’t block, slow or throttle your data. https://t.co/BZKkzYRfRU http://pic.twitter.com/UF68eFtv2H

— Comcast (@comcast)
July 13, 2017

… since last Thursday’s vote, certain key pieces of its previous written commitment have been deleted from its website.

Here’s what @comcast removed from their Net Neutrality page. They no longer promise to:

-Not throttle back the speed at which content comes to you
-Not prioritize Internet traffic or create paid fast lanes
-Make internet accessible to low income familieshttps://t.co/tRoOTyATYk http://pic.twitter.com/LqhnwwYSGv

— Jon Henshaw (@henshaw)
December 14, 2017

4. What are the arguments against net neutrality?

Regulation = “Micro-Managing” = Restricted Innovation

Those in favor of repealing net neutrality, like FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, argued that such regulations were accomplishing little more than “micromanaging the internet.” And by classifying ISPs as utilities, net neutrality opponents say, it stifles their abilities to innovate.

By removing regulations, opponents argue, ISPs will be free to “catalyze innovation,” according to statements from Verizon. And while supporters of net neutrality argue that its reversal will actually minimize competition, its opponents say that it will help boost it — by way of the freedom to build better networks and charge accordingly for access to them.

“We are helping consumers and promoting competition,” Chairman Pai stated prior to the vote. “Broadband providers will have more incentive to build networks, especially to underserved areas.”

However, this innovation may simply come in the form of the ISPs’ freedom to charge more for higher speeds, which potentially holds serious repercussions for businesses that rely on such in order to operate — and further increases barriers to entry for smaller and emerging companies. That could actually minimize competition, as opposed to the Chairman’s arguments, and the higher cost could be passed onto the consumer.

There Was Nothing Wrong With the Internet Prior to Net Neutrality

This one is fairly intuitive. Net neutrality opponents have argued that since the internet worked just fine prior to the 2015 regulations, it will continue to operate normally and satisfactorily without it now.

In a blog post published the day prior to the FCC vote, Comcast Senior Executive Vice President David Cohen wrote that “there is a lot of misinformation that this is the ‘end of the world as we know it’ for the Internet.”

In other words, supporters of net neutrality are overreacting to its repeal — and should stop treating it as something, in the words of Commissioner Brendan Carr, “apocalyptic.”

5. Is net neutrality dead for good?

Not yet, exactly — here’s what happens next.

First, it was discovered that public comments in support of the repeal were fabricated, with plagiarizers leaving pro-reversal comments under the names of people who are no longer alive.

New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has compiled a database that allows users to find out if names of their relatives or loved ones were used in this manner — as was the case for designer Morgan Knutson. And while these findings alone most likely can’t invalidate the FCC’s vote, they could support congressional efforts to maintain net neutrality.

And about those efforts: Over a dozen senators, including Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Ed Markey of Massachusetts, are working to present a Congressional Review Act — the process that allows Congress to counter regulatory rulings from federal agencies — that would nullify the FCC’s vote. It’s worth noting, too, that if such an Act did reverse the vote, the FCC would not be able to act to repeal net neutrality again.

In sum, the FCC’s vote has carved a very clear, accessible path for the aforementioned changes to become a reality — but they haven’t gone into effect yet.

And as for what the vote means for small-to-midsize businesses, as we mentioned before, there may be repercussions as a result of the potential for more steeply-priced access to the high-speed internet that so many of us rely on. But until these changes actually take effect and regulations are officially dismantled — pending the Congressional Review Act — it’s too soon to tell.

As always, I’m open to your take on the matter. Feel free to reach out to me with your thoughts and questions on Twitter.

Featured image credit: “We Love Net Neutrality action at Verizon with Light Panels – Photos by Alex Garland” by Backbone Campaign is licensed under CC BY 2.0 / Cropped from original

As marketers, we spend a lot of time planning, writing, and experimenting with content to grow our audience and get prospects into our sales reps’ pipeline. But that doesn’t mean well-crafted content stops playing a role when we hand those prospects over to sales.

Did you know that reps spend about 15% of their day leaving voicemails? And only 20% of all sales emails are ever opened. This means 80-85% of sales outreach efforts are going unnoticed by those prospects you’ve worked so hard to capture with content.

In fact, research shows that decision makers touch at least five pieces of content before they buy. But only 20% of salespeople actually use content to engage prospects and clients. For marketers, this leaves us with a big question: how do we leverage the content we’ve created to help salespeople bridge the gap, engage more prospects, and close the deal?

Bitly’s and HubSpot’s marketing teams both put significant effort into sales enablement, which is why they teamed up to generate a resource on the subject: 30 Ways Sales Can Leverage Content Marketing to Close Deals. Click here to get the full-length ebook, or read on for some quick tips.

Use Content to Land the First Sales Conversation

You only get one shot at a first impression, and content can help you say more in a short window of time. Whether you’re the one landing the first sales call or helping a rep land it, leveraging personalized content can help start that important conversation.

For example, Mobile application NoWait used personalized content as the foundation of their product launch. NoWait’s product allows diners to remotely add their name to a restaurant’s waitlist. Since the company wanted to target the CEOs of restaurant chains, they segmented out the top 30 to target with highly customized content.

The company loaded up personalized videos on iPads and sent them to these CEOs in customized packaging. To date, the app is used in more than half of the companies they targeted.

Here are some other ideas you can try out using content to land that first sales call:

• Build custom landing pages that populate the prospect’s name, company logo, and value props catered to their business needs.
• Host a live workshop that walks through industry best practices and helps troubleshoot common issues.
• Read up on the latest blog posts from your target companies’ blogs. Follow up on a recent content pieces with additional tips and tricks they can leverage.

Here’s an example of a personalized email HubSpot recently sent to some of our contacts database to re-engage them with our content: 

Use Content to Get Past the “No”

If a prospect isn’t receptive to initial conversations about your product, it isn’t game over just yet. There are still ways to continue the conversation.

Leveraging content also doesn’t mean just leverage your own content. In “no” situations, you can turn the tables and talk to the prospects about their content instead.

The most enticing sales emails are those that follow up on a personalized action.

For example, consider a sales rep who had emailed you a few times, but you never got around to replying them. After a few emails that went without a response, imagine that they followed up by citing a piece you had written for your brand.

For example:

“I saw that you recently published a piece on the Bitly blog about tracking the ROI of influencer marketing. Is this something your marketing team is interested in exploring and learning more about?”

This is a real example of an email sent to Bitly’s own senior content and community manager, Denise Chan. The sales rep then went on to suggest a follow-up call to discuss some strategies we were currently trying as well as suggestions on how to improve on our tactics.

Content is a valuable tool for nurturing prospects when they’re not quite ready to purchase or aren’t fully convinced yet.

Use Content to Build Relationships with Customers

The average business loses around 20% of its customers each year by failing to attend to customer relationships. And it costs five times more to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing one. Make sure you’re not forgetting upsells and additional sales in your sales engagement process.

Nurture customer relationships by sending content regularly throughout different stages of the customer life cycle. Or try inviting prospects and customers to create content or your next product with you.

Lays’ “Do Us A Flavor” contest is a really fun example of how crowdsourcing can both nurture relationships and improve your product. “Do Us A Flavor” was a year-long social media campaign which invited customers to help choose the next flavor of chip the company would create.

Crowd-sourced contests make customers more engaged and invested because they feel like they’re being heard and they played a hand in creating the product.

The “Do Us A Flavor” contest drove over 14.4 million public submissions, Lay’s brand’s ad awareness increased by 2%, and purchase intent increased by 1%.

Turn Your Customers into Evangelists

Go further with your marketing by turning customers into brand advocates. Then use those brand advocates to help your sales team close additional deals through case studies and referrals.

For example, ClassPass often runs referral deals that include benefits for both the new and current customer:

Think about brands you’re loyal to. What makes you so passionate about the product that you’d want to take the extra step to tweet about them or forward a piece of content you received in your inbox?

Chances are it’s because you trust the brand, you feel valued, or you have an emotional connection with the product.

Start nurturing your customer relationships by trying these techniques:

• Create a referral program that offers an incentive to customers who share your product by word-of-mouth.
• Open a forum, Slack group, or regular Twitter chat that gives your customers a sense of community.
• Open opportunities for customers to contribute to your blog or submit video content to showcase their expertise of the product.

Show Your Sales Team What You’ve Got: Sales Digests

Since sales reps spend most of their days in meetings or on calls, they don’t have much time to search for the most recent content marketing has put together.

Bring the content to the reps right into their inboxes. Repurpose the content from your marketing newsletter into a monthly or weekly sales digest. You can also include general industry content from other publications or companies for a different perspective.

Round up the top performing posts and include:

1. Key takeaways and talking points to use in a conversation
2. Target audience that would be interested in the piece
3. Features or products mentioned in the content piece

A Video Can Say a Thousand Words

In a recent survey, 43% of people reported that they want to see more video content from marketers. And more than half of marketing professionals worldwide cite video as the type of content that drives the highest ROI for them.

Video can be a powerful piece of supporting material at any stage of the sales conversation.

If you’re sending that first email, include a short 30 second video that explains what your product does and why you need to hop on a call to chat more.

If you’ve just wrapped up that first call, follow up with some video case studies and testimonials to keep your prospect excited about the product.

You can also encourage different members of your product and customer success teams to live stream on Facebook and Twitter. Research shows that visual content makes information stick. Win a permanent place in your prospects’ minds and hearts by weaving video content into your communication plan.

Don’t forget personalization! Use a tool like Vidyard to personalize your video messages for your prospects like HubSpot did in this example:

Automate Rep Follow-Through

A recent study found that companies who reach out to leads within an hour of first contact are seven times more likely to have meaningful conversations with decision makers than those who waited even sixty minutes.

But for most companies, it’s not possible for sales reps to keep up that level of outreach. That’s where email drip templates come in handy.

Draft together a few different sets of email drips that either trigger automatically or can be triggered manually by a sales rep.

Here are some examples to get you started:

• Send prospects a follow-up email with a short video demo right after they fill out a demo request. This keeps them engaged while they wait for a sales rep to reach out and schedule a meeting.
• A persona-based email drip for sales reps to send after their first conversation. Tailor the content depending on whether the recipient is a contributor or a decision maker.

Ready to do more with content?

We’ve covered 7 ways you can help your sales team leverage content to close deals, but do you want more where that came from? Don’t worry, Bitly and HubSpot put together 23 more tips for you to use in your own sales in marketing strategy in this guide, “30 Ways Sales Can Leverage Content to Close Deals.” Download now and get started.