Facebook has more than 600 million users. Twitter has more than 200 million and LinkedIn more
than 100 million. Virtually everyone is interacting with some kind of online content.
Whether your business is consumer-oriented or B2B, the marketplace has changed dramatically in recent years – so much so that your content marketing strategy now plays a vital role in ensuring your company’s success. Maybe even your survival.
Content marketing strategy focuses on communicating with customers and prospects without making a direct sales pitch. That’s important because Roper Public Affairs says 80 percent of business decision-makers prefer information articles to standard advertising, and 60 percent indicate that content helps them make better decisions.
Here are four secrets that can help ensure your content marketing strategy is well-calculated to drive the results you want:
1. Make it intentional.
Alicein Wonderland’s grinning Cheshire Cat was right: you need a plan. You have to know where you’re going before you can identify the best way to get there.
So what, exactly, do you want to accomplish? Certainly your ultimate goal is to create leads and revenue, but you have interim goals, too. Your content marketing strategy should explicitly reflect those goals and integrate with your overall marketing plan.
Content can take many forms, such as blog posts, email or other e-communications, white papers, press releases, social media posts, photos, video, etc. Which of them can best augment your other marketing activities? The specific tactics you use will depend on your goals and your audiences. And yes, that’s plural – one of the best benefits of content marketing is the ability to address narrowly targeted customer groups.
Find out what your competitors are up to. Perhaps you can emulate them but do it better, but your plan should also specify tactics that will help clearly differentiate your brand and products.
2. Make it consistent.
People want information, not fluffy sales pitches. They want interaction, not the old style one-way information flow. And they fully expect what they want to be easy to obtain and assimilate.
Remember that online communication involves many company departments, not just sales. Customers and prospects also have contact with service, support, R&D and general corporate communications. The most effective content marketing strategy facilitates consistent presentation and key messages.
3. Make it good.
Your content defines you. Like everything else you do, it builds your brand reputation, which is why quality is paramount. Your content also builds loyalty because customers associate quality, useful information with quality, useful products and services.
A good content marketing strategy uses visuals as well as words – graphic illustrations, pictures, video – to boost quality. You have more opportunities than ever before to show your products in action, being used by real people.
The best content is easily sharable, by downloading or embedding. Overtly ask people to pass along your content by sharing, forwarding or liking it. We all know the value of word-of-mouth referrals.
Frequently update your content, to stay top of mind. But don’t forget that quality is always more important than quantity.
4. Make it better.
Developing effective content marketing strategy is a never-ending process. You use data and insight to develop goals, your goals determine content messaging and delivery tactics, and testing measures results, providing new data and insight. Constant tweaking and refining are the only sure way to drive continuous improvement.
Without tracking and ongoing analysis, you don’t really know if your content marketing strategy is working. So set some metrics that reflect your marketing goals, and monitor everything you do. Doing more of those things that are proven to be successful will keep you competitive and profitable.
Testing is vital, too. If you aren’t sure whether a particular type of content will work well for you, try it and track the results. You can also simply ask customers or prospects what they most want and need from you. Everyone loves to be asked their opinion, so you’ll build more customer loyalty along with gaining valuable insights.
Creating a truly effective content marketing strategy needn’t be mysterious. There are lots of specific tips you can learn to improve your implementation, but in the end it’s the basics that create the foundation for your success. And they aren’t really “secrets” at all.
The real secret to successful strategy is remaining focused. For more ideas on turning your strategy into maximum-effective execution, check out the top 10 takeaways from the 2010 Content Strategy Forum.