Content marketing has been used for several years in different forms to attract audiences. While its mechanisms have evolved, the role of content marketing cannot be underestimated. It is the biggest tool to market a product. Think about it. Creating content tells a story to market your product or service to consumers.
Seems a sneaky yet smart way to attract eyeballs, right?
Content marketing can boost your brand visibility, engagement, reputation, leads, and sales all at once. But get it wrong, and you have created a recipe for disaster.
So, why not educate yourself on the topic?
Let’s take a look at what makes content marketing such an important marketing tool. We’ve also included a few tips and tricks to help you create effective content marketing strategies.
Content Marketing: What Is It?
Content marketing is the creation and distribution of content for marketing purposes.
That’s an easy way to sum up content marketing.
But content marketing involves a lot more than that.
Let’s look at the processes involved in creating content for marketing:
- Making a content marketing plan
- Defining content marketing goals
- Researching your market and audience
- Creating a buyer persona for your target market
- Creating a website, blog, and social media accounts to publish your content
- Researching SEO and creating the content
- Deciding where and how to distribute said content (distribution tools)
- Scheduling your content posting time and frequency
- Distributing and promoting the created content
- Studying the results of the content marketing campaign
- Updating existing content frequently
- Republishing old content
Forms of Content Marketing
There is a type of content marketing for every step in the buyers’ journey, from awareness to consideration to decision.
Awareness Stage
The first step in the buyer journey is making the consumer aware of your brand. This form of marketing has one clear goal — to build brand awareness.
Consideration Stage
The second step is to convince your audiences that your brand is trustworthy and can fulfill their needs.
The goal of the content here is to engage the audiences and gain their trust.
Decision Stage
The last stage of the buyer journey is where the audience becomes a consumer. The goal of this content is to get consumers to buy your product/service.
This is the best place to use your CTAs since the audience is already looking for them.
Create a Successful Content Marketing Strategy
Successful content marketing requires you to answer some key questions:
- What are your content marketing goals?
- How can you achieve these goals through content marketing?
- What audiences or consumers are you trying to reach through your content?
- How do you plan to deliver the content to your target audience?
- How do you plan to measure the result of your campaigns?
- What is your brand personality and how is it unique?
- What value does your content provide your audiences?
- Does your content stand out from your competitors’?
- What makes your brand a better option than your competitors’?
Answering these questions gives you the four key concepts of a successful content marketing strategy — positioning, value proposition, strategic plan, and business case.
Tips and Tricks to Use When Creating Content That Works
Use Personalization
Don’t let a large amount of content online discourage you. While the content on every topic may be overwhelming, not all of it is engaging.
Personalization is a useful strategy to boost engagement. Take a look at these statistics to understand the importance of personalization.
Lack of personalization in content is one of the major reasons consumers may not be connecting with your brand’s advertising.
Here are a few ways to make your content more personal and engaging:
- Make the content unique and original.
- Don’t be afraid to experiment or think out of the box.
- Give your brand a personality.
- Use geolocation to create location-specific content.
- Find out customer pain points and use them in your content.
- Provide consumers with the option to share your content.
- Use insights from consumer and market research data.
Add GIFs, Videos, Images, and Infographics
According to a Content Preferences Survey conducted in 2015, 91% of consumers are more inclined toward visual or interactive content rather than text-based, static content. Visuals are also processed faster by the brain. In a society where attention span has been steadily declining, visuals can help communicate loads of information at a single glance.
GIFs, videos, and infographics are different forms of visual content brands can use, each serving a distinct function. For example, a GIF is more sensible to use when you want to keep your content light-hearted and fun. Videos or infographics can be used when your content needs an accompanying visual document.
Research Content Topics, Style, and Tone of Voice
Having a clear idea about the brand image you wish to portray can help you in the long run. Companies don’t think it through and often end up regretting it later.
Since the tone of voice will be associated with the brand, it must be well researched.
You can research content from competitors or look at trending topics from bloggers and other sources. Make a list of content types audiences engage most with, and then find the content your target consumers love and study it.
Another aspect to look into is SEO and keyword research tools. These can help you understand how algorithms work and take actionable steps to make your content rank higher.
Create a Calendar
Creating a calendar is an important trick to creating content that works. Here’s why:
- A content calendar helps you plan ahead.
- It gives your team a schedule to work with.
- You can plan and create every post, video, and content in advance.
- You can tailor your content to generate leads during the pre-festive season.
- Apart from content, you can develop elaborate campaigns using a calendar.
- Having a calendar can also help you bounce back from setbacks due to unforeseen conditions.
Don’t know how to go about creating a content calendar?
Look at these top 10 tips to create a content calendar for your content marketing plan.
Create Actionable Content
The reader should be able to take decisive action after reading your content. This means your content should be highly relatable and personal to the audience.
The reader should connect to the message and be attracted to visit your website or buy your product.
Here are a few ideas to make content actionable:
- Address consumers’ needs and pain points immediately.
- Don’t add irrelevant information or images to your content.
- Make the audience feel involved by using interactive elements such as surveys, quizzes, and videos.
- Use CTAs (calls to action) at the right time.
- Answer consumer FAQs.
Final Thoughts
Content marketing can be overwhelming, but don’t let that stop you from experimenting with your own content ideas.
Do you have any unique tips and tricks your team likes to work with? Comment below!
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