Every marketer knows that content marketing is the way to go. But if you’re like most of us, you might not be clear on how to create a content strategy that is built on a solid framework and can deliver strong results.
This post will walk you through the steps needed to put together a sound content strategy.
It’s time to get serious about your content marketing efforts and make sure your organization isn’t just producing random blog posts but instead is investing in smart, strategic thinking around every piece of content it creates.
| Takeaways |
|---|
| 1. Understand your target audience and their needs. |
| 2. Set clear and achievable goals for your content strategy. |
| 3. Create valuable and relevant content that resonates with your audience. |
| 4. Choose the right distribution channels to reach your target audience. |
| 5. Consistently measure and analyze the performance of your content. |
| 6. Adapt your strategy based on audience feedback and industry trends. |
| 7. Focus on quality over quantity when producing content. |
| 8. Establish a consistent brand voice and storytelling approach. |
| 9. Incorporate SEO techniques to improve content discoverability. |
| 10. Collaborate with influencers and industry experts for added credibility. |
Define Content
Content is a product of planning. It’s the result of research and strategy, which means that it’s not just about creating content for the sake of creating it, but rather building a strategy to produce content that serves its purpose.
Content is a combination of words and images. Content marketing is so much more than words; visuals are an essential part of any good content marketing campaign because they help convey ideas more effectively than words alone can do on their own.
That’s why you should always include images in your blog posts, social media updates, ebooks etc.
Content is a means of communication: It’s vital to understand this point if you want your content to have an impact on others that it won’t be effective unless people actually read it!
You must also make sure that your message isn’t too complicated or boring so as not lose readers along the way (which will happen if they get bored!).
What’s more important though? Content strategy – this refers back again to my earlier point about having clear goals planned out before getting started with any project.”
Crafting a content marketing strategy that truly stands out requires a deep understanding of the B2B landscape. Check out our comprehensive guide on constructing a content marketing strategy to drive meaningful engagement and results.
Hire A Team With Skills
Your content marketing team needs to be well-rounded. There’s no way around this: a good content marketing strategy takes time, energy, and resources. To build it properly, you need to hire a team that has both the skills and experience necessary to succeed.
Mix of skills: You need people with different skill sets on your team so they can contribute in different ways.
For example, you might have someone who is an expert at writing blog posts and someone else who excels at social media management; or maybe one person is responsible for managing the editorial calendar while another handles analytics reporting and so on.
Mix of roles: On top of their specific role within the organization (e.g., writer or marketer), each person should also play a part in creating an overall strategy for content delivery across all channels/channels where business objectives align (e.g., LinkedIn).
These roles include strategist (who identifies growth opportunities), project manager (who ensures everyone stays on track) and strategist (who identifies opportunities for growth).
Focus On Your Audience And Their Needs
One of the most important things to do when creating a content marketing strategy is to focus on your audience and their needs. How can you help them? What questions are they looking for answers to? How can you become a trusted resource for them?
If you don’t know who your audience is, it will be very difficult for you to craft messages that will resonate with them or help them achieve their goals. You need to work out who exactly is consuming your content before deciding how best to reach them.
Generating demand for your B2B product involves a strategic blend of tactics that resonate with your audience. Discover the 12 proven ways to generate demand for your B2B product and build a content marketing strategy that converts.
Understand The User Journey Through The Purchase Phase
The user journey is the path a user takes from first encountering your brand, to becoming an active customer, to referring and promoting your product or service.
The purchase phase of the user journey is where you make them buy, which leads us nicely into…
Content marketing is about having conversations with potential customers, at every stage of their journey and it’s up to us as marketers to understand how these conversations change along with each phase.
Start With A Website Audit To Eliminate Under-Performing Content
Before you can build a content marketing strategy that deserves the name, you have to clean up your existing content. Content audits are key to this process.
To start with, ask yourself why you want to audit your website in the first place. Simply put: if you don’t know what’s working and what isn’t on your site, then how can you know what to improve?
You need something measurable for it truly counts as part of a content strategy and that means getting rid of under-performing pages.
So they don’t count against the total number of pages viewed by search engines like Google or Bing when ranking sites in SERPs (search engine results pages).
Use The Five W’s To Plan Your Content Strategy
The five W’s are a great way to plan your content strategy. To start, ask yourself:
What is the problem or pain point you can help solve?
Who is your target audience? Do they have a certain demographic, job title or industry that makes them more likely to respond to your offer? If so, what does their average income look like? What do they like doing in their free time and how do those interests align with yours?
Where can you find this audience online and offline (consider social media platforms such as Facebook groups or LinkedIn groups)? Look for communities that share similar interests as well as forums where people ask questions about topics related to yours.
For example, if my blog were about dog training tips for small dogs then I would look within communities on Facebook which discuss these types of issues regularly (and also search for hashtags related).
Once there I’d try answering some questions myself first before promoting my content since this will build up trust over time.
But what if those methods aren’t working out so well? You may be missing something vital here: Why?
Why should someone care about what you have to say on this topic specifically when there are so many other resources available today exploring similar ideas with less effort put into making them appealing than yours might be (which makes it even harder still)?
It comes down again again back at knowing exactly who needs help solving their problems right now–and why would solving those problems benefit them personally enough in order not just give me advice but spend money too.”
In the noisy digital landscape, writing marketing content that captures attention and drives click-throughs is an art. Dive into our tips for writing marketing content that gets more click-throughs and enhance the effectiveness of your content strategy.
Choose Topics That Directly Relate To Your Business Goals
For example, if you run an e-commerce site and want sales conversions, choose topics that will inform people about your products and make them more likely to buy from you.
If you’re a CPA firm that wants to attract new clients in the New York area, write about things like “how small businesses can benefit from hiring a CPA” or “what are the tax implications of opening an office in New York City?”
Your content should be relevant not only for your audience but also for your company culture and mission.
If one of your goals is increasing brand awareness, then you’ll want to create content that attracts attention by catching people’s eyes with bold colors or striking headlines (like this one!).
Use Keyword Research For Topic Selection
To get started, you’ll need to figure out which keywords will be most relevant to your audience. Here are a few ways to go about it:
Use tools like SEMrush and Ahrefs to research the most popular keywords in your industry. These tools can also help you find long-tail keywords that may not be as popular but could still be valuable for your business.
Use the Google Keyword Planner tool to discover how many people are searching for specific keywords each month and what their average cost per click is.
Check out Google Trends, which shows you how often certain search terms were used over time, where they gained popularity and why certain topics became more popular than others during particular periods of time (such as during major events).
This information will help guide you toward topics that were most relevant during these times so that you can create content based on current trends rather than outdated ones from years past!
Embarking on a successful B2B marketing journey doesn’t always require a hefty budget. Explore our article with 9 effective B2B marketing tips for tight budgets to discover smart strategies that yield impressive results.
Plan Content Distribution
Once you’ve got your content marketing strategy in place, you need to plan how it will be distributed. If you’re not using a tool to help with this, then I would strongly suggest that you do so. A few popular options include Buffer and Hootsuite.
Buffer allows users to schedule posts across different social media platforms and monitor performance through analytics data – including how many clicks, likes, and shares each post has received as well as how much traffic it has driven to specific URLs within the user’s account.
Meanwhile, Hootsuite allows users to schedule tweets for later publication by day or by the hour; monitor their performance through analytics data (similarly to Buffer); track engagement metrics such as comments made on each tweet;
Manage multiple accounts with ease; create lists of followers who share similar interests; engage with those who mention their brand by following them back or replying directly via direct message when appropriate…
Build Relationships With Influencers
To find influencers who are interested in your topic and have a large following, look for people who regularly write about it. You can use social media to search for relevant hashtags or keywords, then follow those influencers on Twitter or Instagram.
If you’re looking to reach a specific industry audience (like if you’re an e-commerce company), then focus on finding industry leaders with large followings that have high engagement rates.
These are the influencers who will be most likely to engage with your content marketing efforts and help get the word out through their own networks.
Finally, keep in mind that having an established presence online is only one of many criteria that make up an ideal candidate for an influencer relationship with your brand. You also want to consider relevance: Is their audience similar to yours?
Will they take action based on what you share? Once you’ve identified potential partners based on these factors, reach out and introduce yourself!
Create A Content Calendar Or Editorial Calendar
An editorial calendar is a tool that helps you organize and manage your content. It can be as simple or complex as you want it to be. The key is that it helps you plan, prioritize, and measure your content strategy.
Using an editorial calendar helps:
Plan what content will be published at what time.
Organize the flow of information across different channels. For example: if I have a blog post scheduled to go live on Monday morning at 10 AM, I might put together a tweet or two ahead of time so they’re ready to go when the post goes live (and vice versa).
Prioritize which types of content are most important for each channel (e.g., video vs text vs images).
This can help determine where resources should be allocated to create high-quality content efficiently (for more on this topic see “A Guide To Creating Your Own Editorial Calendar [Infographic]”).
Include Internal Meetings And Deadlines On The Calendar
This is a very important step. In order for your strategy to be successful, you need buy-in from everyone on your team. This includes not just the content creators, but also salespeople and executives who aren’t involved in producing content at all.
Think of this process like cooking a meal with friends: It’s better if you share the work and everyone contributes their own ingredients than if one person spends an entire afternoon making dinner while everyone else watches TV or plays video games.
If there’s one thing I learned from my time as a college RA (Resident Assistant), it’s that having everyone involved makes things go faster!
When people feel invested in what they’re doing, they’ll want to make sure it ends up being good quality and when people believe in something strongly enough that they are willing to invest their time into creating it, then there is no stopping them from reaching success!
Email marketing remains a cornerstone of B2B communication. Dive into our compilation of the 13 greatest examples of B2B email marketing to draw inspiration for your content marketing strategy and make lasting connections.
Include Holidays And Special Events On Your Calendar
- You need to know when the holidays are.
- You also need to know when special events are, so you can plan around them.
Let’s start with the holidays. If you’re someone who loves baking cookies and watching movies, then Christmas is for you! But if it’s not an annual event for your business, then maybe Hanukkah or Kwanzaa is more appropriate for your needs.
Your content should reflect that for example, if Hanukkah is on December 6th this year and there’s a story about how to bake delicious latkes (potato pancakes), now would be a good time to promote it!
Conclusion
Content marketing is an extremely powerful tool for businesses of all sizes. All you need to do is plan your strategy and execute it. We hope our guide has helped you figure out what goes into a content marketing strategy that deserves to be called that. Remember these things:
Further Reading
How to Create a Content Marketing Strategy: Learn essential steps and insights for crafting an effective content marketing strategy.
Creating a Content Marketing Strategy That Really Works: Discover practical tips and strategies for building a content marketing plan that delivers results.
Crafting a Comprehensive Content Marketing Plan: Dive into the details of creating a comprehensive content marketing plan that aligns with your business goals.
FAQs
What are the key components of a successful content marketing strategy?
A successful content marketing strategy comprises several key components, including defining your target audience, setting clear goals, creating valuable and relevant content, selecting appropriate distribution channels, and continuously measuring and refining your approach.
How do I ensure my content marketing strategy aligns with my business objectives?
To align your content marketing strategy with your business objectives, start by clearly defining your goals. Determine how your content can address your audience’s needs while promoting your products or services. Regularly review your strategy to ensure it remains aligned with your business’s evolving goals.
What role does audience research play in content marketing strategy?
Audience research is critical in content marketing strategy. By understanding your target audience’s preferences, pain points, and interests, you can create content that resonates and provides value. This research guides your content creation process and helps you tailor your messaging to effectively engage your audience.
How can I measure the effectiveness of my content marketing efforts?
Measuring content marketing effectiveness involves tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) such as website traffic, engagement metrics (likes, shares, comments), conversion rates, and lead generation. Analyzing these metrics provides insights into how well your content is performing and where improvements can be made.
Is it necessary to adapt my content marketing strategy over time?
Yes, adapting your content marketing strategy over time is essential. Markets, trends, and audience preferences change, so your strategy should evolve accordingly. Regularly assess the performance of your content, analyze feedback, and stay updated on industry shifts to make informed adjustments to your approach.
Costantine Edward is a digital marketing expert, freelance writer, and entrepreneur who helps people attain financial freedom. I’ve been working in marketing since I was 18 years old and have managed to build a successful career doing what I love.