Content Marketing is a marketing strategy based on creating useful content for a recipient and delivering it in an attractive form. Those can be articles for a blog, infographics, or short animations. The purpose of Content Marketing is to build a bond with a recipient, gain its trust, and encouraging it to a specific action, e.g. purchasing a given product or service, signing up to a newsletter, or contacting a company.
Goals of creating useful content
The Content Marketing strategy mainly focuses on building a long-lasting relationship based on trust between a brand and a recipient. Firstly, a well led marketing campaign must show the attractiveness of a given company. It should attract new recipients, and then engage those recipients in specific actions. They can be for example purchasing a given product, submit a review, or recommend a product to friends.
What are the most important benefits resulting from Content Marketing?
- Increase in sale of products and services offered by a company
- Distribution of content valuable for a recipient
- Gaining trust of customers
- Building long-term relationships with content recipients
- Building the image of expert in an industry
- Increasing the brand awareness
- Expanding the contact network
- Engaging recipients
- Acquiring sale leads
- Increasing traffic on a website
- Acquiring a great number of referrals
What connects Content Marketing and SEO?
High quality and usable content in the world of Google constitute as an important aspect of ranking. It is responsible for positioning and visibility of a given website in the search engine. A well selected and implemented marketing campaign, text optimisation, and use of internal link building translate directly into high SEO results. Therefore, an interesting and well oriented content is the base for effective actions, which can benefit a company in the long run. Good content optimisation enables high brand positioning through an organic range, a.o. thanks to practical information included in the content of our blog. Curiously enough, when the optimisation process is carried out incorrectly, the content can reach to too small recipient group and it will be necessary to use a paid advertisement in order to promote our message.
How to enrich text?
It is always worth to enrich published texts with CTA (call – to – action). Such button should show the benefit that a recipient will gain after clicking in a specific space, e.g. get a 5% discount on shopping in our shop or get a free e-book.
A call – to – action increases the brand awareness, builds bond with potential customer, and increases demand for offered services or products.
How to prepare a Content Marketing campaign?
First of all, focus on the content. The text that you publish must capture reader’s curiosity, absorb him, and in the end make him interested not only in a specific article, but also other products or services your company offers. An engaging content must increase the depth of given recipient’s visit, which quite often is achieved thanks to internal links. But let us start from the beginning, that is, five basic steps on how to prepare a marketing campaign:
- Define your goals. Describe in detail what you want to achieve in both micro- and macroscale. It is important that the goals are real and pursuant with the S.M.A.R.T. tool – Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.
- Define your personas, that is, specific recipients, whom your content has to reach. When creating the perfect recipient, take into account its hobbies, level of education, marital status, material status, lifestyle, or social-demographic features. Additionally, think what questions, hopes, or fears that recipient may have in relation to a specific product or service.
- Thorough analysis. Verify resources at your disposal, define a budget that you can spend on the campaign and other reserves necessary to carry out the campaign. Additionally, analyse what actions does your competition carry out and whether their strategy proves itself.
- Analytical tools. Check which tools allow you to measure previously selected meters in a feasible way, install necessary software or plugins, and familiarise with them.
- Start publishing. Prepare content and publishing schedule. Remember about proper formats and graphic dimensions on various channels.
Don’t forget about the details
Creating an engaging content is not a piece of cake. It requires a lot of consistency, regularity, and persistence. In order to properly operate in Content Marketing, you must take care of all details, i.e. ensure that a specific text answers all of reader’s questions while posts fit the recipient’s hobbies, sense of humour, or lifestyle. In order to prepare well, create a list of interesting contents and graphic forms, such as infographics, videos, or webinars. Remember to add external links in case of a blog article, e.g. an invite to a previous article.
When distributing specific contents, it is a good practice to also distribute them on private channels in social media, as this will positively influence the coverage.
What a company can gain through Content Marketing?
Here, the answer can be only one: a lot. Content Marketing hides a great potential. Well run campaigns give success. Remember to use the CM practices in every possible aspect of running a business activity. For example, when running an Internet shop ensure that each product has a unique description, as well as qualitative text elements, e.g. brand history or vision that might engage new customers.
