Many business owners lack a content marketing strategy and, in some cases, are even unsure what a content marketing strategy is or why they should implement one.
A good content marketing strategy will get you more traffic, warm-up visitors, and convert people visiting your website from prospects into customers.
But content strategies are far from equal concerning their overall success rate and ability to captivate and nurture audiences.
So what does a successful content strategy do?
Naturally, it will set you apart from your competitors, put you in a position to get traffic from search engines and generate sales and revenue for your business.
This guide means to provide an overview of how to plan and launch your next winning content marketing strategy.
If you want to build your brand's reputation, a content marketing campaign can help you achieve many goals in your business.
A well-crafted content marketing plan can boost your business's revenue significantly.
In this guide, we'll introduce you to the necessary steps of running a robust campaign in four different parts:
- Marketing Basics
- Types of content
- Content ideas
- Final tips
There are some fundamental content marketing principles that you must master to create a successful campaign.
What is content marketing?
Content marketing is the process of organizing and delivering content to readers to nurture and convert them into customers.
Nowadays, there are many ways to promote your goods and services to the marketplace, and content marketing has become one of the most practical tools among brand owners. It's about promoting your company through content that includes developing webinars, blog posts, photos, and many media pieces to leave a positive impact on your target audience.
Many businesses choose to outsource contest marketing campaigns to digital marketing services. It’s best to focus on companies that specialize in content marketing as successful content marketing is an art form.
Here is a good resource that ranks and reviews the best content marketing companies.
Establish your target audience
Whether you are writing a blog post or creating a new webinar campaign, you need to determine who you are writing the content for.
Having a clearly defined audience will keep your campaign ideas flowing.
You would be surprised to know how many companies skip this step.
Do you talk to your kid in the same way you talk to your boss? Conducting market research is the first thing to do that includes analyzing target marketing demographics.
To set a successful foundation for your marketing campaign, you need to determine which specific customers are most likely to purchase what you have to offer.
Think about your target audience's occupation, geographic location, income, and interests to learn how you speak and market to them.
Help customers solve problems
Appropriately crafted content can help people solve real issues. This can be done in the form of blog posts but also in how you conduct and operate social media.
If business owners don't create the right social media strategies, they would be underutilizing the potential of reaching a higher percentage of their target audience.
If the business uses to interrupt customers instead of providing real value, their brand reputation could be damaged.
According to Harvard Business Review, building trust with customers is what matters most in the marketplace.
That's what an engaging campaign does: helps the potential prospect solve problems and overcome pain points.
If you give your target prospects the information they need, you'll have considerably stronger brand recognition and the ability to convert prospects into customers.
Content marketing is not only about telling people about your product, you should also provide a solution to their query as well.
Focus on Genuine Content
Don't be robotic when it comes to producing content. Write about what your customers struggle with in a real and genuine way.
Talk to your target audience to find out what their problems and pain points are.
Make words short and straightforward so your reader can understand the message you are conveying.
For example, using a sentence such as "refine your workflows to drive success and revenue" might be an overwhelming statement.
Marketing campaigns target humans, so avoid using complicated language unless you are confident that type of communication will resonate best with your brand.
Concrete expression destroys clichés and helps customers solve their problems. Moreover, it makes your advice actionable. In other words, the reader should have better tools to improve their business immediately.
Provide tools, steps to follow, or any necessary information, so the reader gets a grasp on alternative solutions to their problems.
Layout a Consistent Strategy
Let's start transforming your ideas into a tight-knit and consistent strategy.
As mentioned before, most content marketing pieces range from articles, infographics to interactive content and videos. The Ahrefs blog explains various tactics to increase your company's traffic, depending on the kind of content.
The Internet allows users to locate material in less than 10 minutes that otherwise would take hours in a library. Readers want to save their time finding well-researched information in just a few lines. Therefore, reading about the latest trends in the industry can drive a lot of traffic to your business over time.
Create Convent that Converts
Focusing on value will always win in the end when it comes to content creation and making sales from that content.
To get the best results, focus on writing from the perspective that you are trying to help your readers, not that you are trying to sell them something.
Ironically not focusing on selling can be the key to selling more as you are focusing on building a relationship with your readers.
Eventually, selling a product or service is likely what the ultimate goal is, but focusing on that initially (instead of focusing on a relationship) will make it challenging to get good results with your content marketing strategy.
Writing about what you believe in will make readers feel like they can identify themselves with your content.
What makes you different from the competition?
That is an excellent example question that could be reflected in your content.
Intercom's director said content that has reliable testimonials are worth reading and, therefore, will have better interactions with readers.
Tell stories about your business to express simple messages, and people will connect to your content more than your competitors.
Write how-to content
If someone decides to spend some time search for content, it's because they have an interest in learning something new.
Physical-based product businesses such as Raspberry Pi create new projects based on this idea to engage more users.
You can go in many different directions with creating content.
Focus on creating something interesting, such as using email strategies or enhancing conversion tracking in social media, and turn it into a post.
The best content marketing companies include content creation in many of their packages. It’s best to work with a company that has a good reputation for delivering quality content as this is very important to your web visitors.
Over-Deliver for Best Results
Many people think you have to hold back when it comes to content marketing.
That is totally false…
By giving your readers the best experience possible (by not leaving anything out), this gives them the sense that they can trust you and you are an authority in the industry.
You can always sell your content in other forms other than in written blog form such as video courses, membership areas, or exclusive Facebook groups.
When it comes to what you include in the blog posts, try not to hold anything back.
The goal is to get readers excited about the content you shared and by not cutting material off too short; this will give them a positive experience.
Focus on value, and you'll have a winning content marketing strategy every time!
People love exclusivity and what better way to attract customers than giving them helpful information that holds nothing back. This doesn't mean you have to publish your company's private information; it's just about sharing a study or valuable perspective based on business data or a customer's experience.
How to Create Content Ideas
Are you feeling stuck with creating content marketing pieces?
Try to focus on creativity and genuine, helpful information. That mindset can do wonders for your ability to come up with ideas.
All great marketing experts suggest listening to the mind of your target audience for inspiration.
Creativity is not about producing ideas from nothing; the role of a creative marketer is to connect all the available information from the customer knowledge and the product.
Observe your target audience in their everyday life to understand how to structure campaigns. Here are some key elements to guide you during this process.
Find out your target prospects knowledge level
Use social networks such as LinkedIn and Twitter to check out what type of content your target audience searches for and enjoys reading.
Seek to identify your target audiences pain points
We talked about understanding your target audience's problems, but how do you determine what they are?
The Internet can be a great resource to search and figure out what are some of the pain points and challenges your target prospects are facing every day.
Look for public Facebook Groups, Quora, or Reddit and read many reviews about what people are asking for.
Have they solved their problems?
Saying "this is the solution to your problem" will never be the same as saying, "we know you have already tried this and it didn't work, do this instead."
The reason is simple; readers feel understood and are thankful to get help from content pieces. You'll see this kind of tactic in SaaS businesses like ZenDesk to increase customer retainment.
Show your customers why your product is useful to face any challenges they are going through.
Tips for Creating a Successful Campaign
Once you become an expert in your product, you can start promoting the product's features through a campaign.
Set S.M.A.R.T goals
Is your campaign realistic? How will you know if it's successful? Who do you want to reach? Setting SMART goals is a great way to establish a successful objective. SMART stands for specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time-based.
Plan your campaign marketing content
You already have goals, and you have even produced great content. Now you just have to make a content calendar or roadmap for sharing your content.
Some strategies are more productive during a particular time of the day, others in specific events or holidays.
For instance, you wouldn't want to post your content on a summer break if you are working on a campaign related to Christmas.
Consider your budget
You might not have a dream budget during your first marketing campaign, but don't worry! Beginners can start a campaign with no investment.
Moreover, some resources can help you fund your content campaign.
Make adjustments to your strategy if it's necessary or run a shorter campaign.
Four questions to run your first campaign
1- Does the campaign help the customer? Are you focusing on value or just trying to sell your products?
2- Is the content unique? Don't copy other websites for the reason of plagiarism as well as a penalty from Google (duplicate content).
3- Is my campaign actionable? Readers should be able to immediately apply the information to their problem using the tools or steps you provided.
4- Does my campaign convey what I want to say? This is one of the most critical questions. You should feel proud of your content all the time.
Creating great content marketing campaigns is not something you do overnight. It's a recursive process that depends on every action you take.
If the process overwhelms you at all, here is a list of top content marketing companies that can do most (if not all) the work for you.
If you are reading this guide, you are already taking the right steps. As long as you have a professional team working on creating consistent content, you're on the right track to satisfying prospects and making them interested in your brand.
