What IS Content Marketing?

“Content marketing is a marketing technique of creating and distributing valuable,
relevant and consistent content to attract and acquire a clearly defined audience—
with the objective of driving profitable customer action.”

–The Content Marketing Institute (CMI)

Everyone knows that content is critical—and obviously, your typical objective is to drive sales. But the #1 mistake you can make with your content marketing is to approach it from a traditional sales perspective. Content Marketing is NOT SELLING. Selling is a by-product of the experience you are creating with your prospects and customers. The intention is to engage your audience, creating trust and value in your brand.

 

How To Be a Successful Content Marketer

Follow These 5 Rules

 

1 Know your customer

You must be intimately familiar with your target customer base in order to create the kind of content that will engage them successfully. What are their pain points? What do they value? How do they like to feel? Not only do you need to know your customers, but you need to engage with them authentically.

 

2 Establish Objectives

Determine what you aim to achieve. You can start broad, then get specific. Your strategy is built to serve these objectives. If a new opportunity comes up you can ask yourself, “Does this initiative serve our goals?”. BROAD: “Generate more qualified leads.” SPECIFIC: “Increase attendance at our annual conference by 30%.” ROI? Establish how you will measure your success­—examples include: page views, shares or likes on social media, click-throughs, email opens, sign-ups, inquiries, conversions.

 

3 Think strategically

To meet your objectives and use your resources wisely you must make a plan. Without one, you’re just throwing darts in the dark. To start, create a content calendar and coordinate it with other initiatives and milestones (product launches, events, service changes). Are you blogging? Creating videos? Hosting webinars? Start small, but create a plan you can commit to maintaining. This is a LONG-TERM investment.

 

4 Invest

This is not the job for an intern or your HR Director. You need to create well-written content that authentically reflects your company/products/services. Headlines are EVERYTHING. If you leave the writing to someone who doesn’t use spell check, can’t “speak your language” and doesn’t know how to engage the reader, it’s a waste of your time and money.

 

5 Don’t Sell

I mean it. Don’t use these platforms to pump up all of the ways your can rock your client’s world—you’ll lose credibility and trust. Use content to build brand loyalty and move prospects naturally to the sale.

Looking for a deeper dive into content marketing? Check out my presentation: How to Conquer Content Marketing on slideshare.

If you need help with your content marketing strategy, let us know!