What is Content Marketing?

CONTENT IS KING.

Well-written, engaging content should be the central focus of any marketing strategy. Content marketing is a technique used to create, generate and distribute valuable content in any format in order to attract and engage your target audience.

The ultimate goal of content marketing is to entice your customer to take an action that fulfills your company’s or product’s goals.

WHY USE CONTENT MARKETING?

content marketing can be used for many purposes, all of which add value to your product or brand image. Your content should educate or entertain your visitors with the ultimate goal of showing them how to act or feel about a your product or company.

Your content can also help you target your prime audience and draw them to your website. content marketing works best when it is created to be entertaining, informative and memorable to your target audience, as they will be more likely to remember, return to, and share your content.

The right type of content won’t need to be heavily promoted – your target audience will do that for you because they like it so much.

Below are stats that confirm why content marketing is highly beneficial:

• 61% of buyers say they feel better when they see custom content and are more likely to buy from that company.
• 90% of consumers find custom content useful.
• 37% of marketers say that blogs are the most valuable content type.
• 7 in 10 say they would rather learn about a product from a collection of articles versus an ad.
• B2B companies with blogs generate 67% more leads on average than non-blogging firms.
• Blogs give sites on average 437% more indexed pages and 97% more indexed links.
• 87% of B2B marketers use social media to distribute content. See more on social media marketing here.

DEVELOPING YOUR CONTENT MARKETING STRATEGY

Some marketers might believe that content is easy to generate and can be created within a moment’s notice. However, the highest quality, memorable content often requires months of planning and implementation. Even the fastest writers need to follow a plan, have time to research, and lay out their thoughts in an engaging, well-designed way (Learn more about creating great content here).

An appropriately planned out content strategy will provide you will more responsive content. 30% more articles will be forwarded on or shared with others if they are informative, entertaining, and serve a purpose for the reader.

When developing your content marketing strategy, take the time to:

• Review your current content and determine what your customers are responding to (what’s working) and what they’re ignoring (what’s not working).
• Develop a refreshed plan for creating quality and current content for your site.
• Set up an editorial calendar and align it with your other marketing efforts, like traditional media or PPC advertising.
• Track your results after the changes are implemented so you can see what content is responsive and what still needs improvement.

THE BENEFITS OF ADAPTING A NEW CONTENT MARKETING PLAN

• More visitors will come to your website from search engines (See here to learn more about generating traffic through your content).
• Visitors will spend more time on your sites because they’re engaged in your content.
• People will share your content more on social sites like Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.
• More visitors will take action on your page because they found your content useful and desired more of it.

EXAMPLES OF GREAT CONTENT MARKETING

There are many companies that have adapted well to online content marketing by implementing strategies from their traditional marketing. content marketing before the internet existed was in the form of magazines and other printed materials, and offering great, engaging content was a necessity for success.

Below are great sources to review and see quality content at its best:

• Coca-Cola Journey: Excellent example of connecting the internet to their offline activities.
• Lego Club Magazine: Fun and entertaining.
• River Pools & Spa Blog: An informative, relevant blog.
• CopyBlogger: Fun content that connects well to their marketing goals.
• Kraft & Family Magazine: Provides ways to use their product effectively through recipes.
• Smosh: High-quality, entertaining content that doesn’t require a strong offline presence.

WHAT WILL YOUR STRATEGY BE?

As more companies begin to develop stronger content marketing strategies, the need for excellent content is higher than ever. Once you see the results of quality content, the need to fully integrate it into your marketing strategy will become apparent.
Quality content has the potential to change a single reader into thousands, and this is done through developing quality, engaging, informative and relevant content for your readers.

Knowing that CONTENT IS KING is the first step in creating profitable websites, blogs, advertisements and articles online.

“Traditional marketing talks at people. content marketing talks with them.” – Doug Kessler