Why is a content marketing strategy important?
You need to create a marketing strategy that is tailored to your business and target audience to stay true to your brand and make your marketing materials more effective. It is essential to appraise each resource in terms of how it contributes to the strategy as a whole, and then make any necessary changes. A content marketing strategy that includes various types of content (e.g. blog posts, infographics, ebooks, etc.) from different angles (e.g. from the perspective of the company, the customer, etc.) can help educate customers, nurture prospects, and close sales.
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How does SEO fit in?
In practical terms, SEO and content marketing are the same thing.
To appear highly in search engine results pages, you need content of high quality. If you want to know which keywords to target in your copy, you will need to use SEO.
SEO should be at the heart of any content marketing strategy or campaign. Optimizing your content can help you update your brand messaging for a modern audience, outrank competitors for high-value keywords, and keep your web pages aligned with Google’s sitemap preferences.
If you are looking to improve your content marketing, SEO is often the best place to start.
Ranking factors
There are various ranking factors to take into account when practicing SEO. Google has stated that there are over 200 different factors that the search engine takes into consideration when it is crawling and indexing web pages. The algorithm will serve your pages to searchers based on how your site and your content fare in these assessments.
While some ranking signals are stronger than others, the exact weight that each one holds is often not revealed by Google. What we do know is that the top factors include:
- Links.
- Content.
- RankBrain.
- Direct web traffc.
- Mobile responsive design.
- HTTPS.
- Anchor text keywords.
- User behavior signals
To put it simply, anything you publish online needs to 1) get links from credible sources, 2) be useful to readers and 3) have a high click-through rate and amount of time spent on the page.
SEO and content are two inseparable things. You can not have one without the other.
Benefits of content marketing
There are many benefits to employing a content marketing strategy. This eBook contains 99 examples of great customer service.
Some of the most prominent benefits include:
Reduced marketing and sales overhead.
Low barrier to market entry.
Stronger lead generation and qualification.
Measurable, actionable results.
Higher search engine rankings.
Unifying the sales and marketing teams is a goal that every company would like to achieve but it is not something that is commonly achieved. When content marketing is used, both departments’ work affects the same goal, making it simpler to align them.
The marketing team can use information from sales calls and customer feedback to help them, while the sales department can share marketing materials with people they are trying to sell to.
What does your organization want to achieve? This is a clear way to look at the benefits of content marketing. You can connect your commercial goals to specific content marketing goals and plans.
If you want to improve the quality of your leads, a targeted lead nurturing campaign would be very useful. Creating organic content and investing in social media would be a good way to achieve thought leadership.
Content marketing campaigns give you the power to achieve any objective without wasting resources on short-term strategies or costly advertising.
B2C v B2B content marketing
Content marketing applications are industry-agnostic. Companies need to connect with customers through advertising no matter what their target market, location, language, or product may be.
In general, B2C is more reliant on platforms like social media and ecommerce that are more focused on the consumer, as well as being mobile friendly and having shorter form assets. Sales cycles are shorter than they used to be, and customers expect a high level of service.
In contrast, B2B content marketers are more likely to use LinkedIn, longer pieces of collateral, account-based strategies, and strategies for reaching smaller, specific audiences. The timeframe for sales cycles can vary greatly, sometimes taking months or even years. Additionally, the customers may be requesting proposals (RFPs) worth millions of dollars.
Brief history of content marketing
Content marketing has been around for centuries, though it wasn’t called that until recently.
Common opinion credits Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard’s Almanack as the first example of content marketing, if you take a broad view of the term. Franklin created and promoted content that his audience wanted to read in order to increase awareness of his local printing business.
In 1900, Michelin began publishing guides to Parisian attractions for an audience of 3,000 automobile owners. Jell-O created and distributed recipe pamphlets door to door to generate interest in just how versatile Jell-O mix was for the average homeowner four years later.
Proctor and Gamble became successful by broadcasting soap operas with Product placements aimed at stay-at-home moms before the internet was created. In the 1950s, Kellogg’s adjusted their advertising and branding to target children, which resulted in increased cereal sales.
Nowadays, huge companies are in control of the internet, and social media networks have replaced traditional advertising methods. You will not be successful in a B2C or B2B enterprise if you do not use content marketing in its modern form.
How content marketing relates to traditional marketing
Traditional marketing is a form of marketing that uses more conventional methods that were used in the past and are still used today. By this we mean:
Direct mail (brochures, flyers, coupons, cards, etc.).
Print advertising (magazines, trade publications, billboards, etc.).
Telemarketing (cold calls, etc.).
The above channels were perfected decades ago. And while the old formats were useful at the time, they don’t work well for a modern digital audience.
At their core, these techniques:
Exist only for a minimal amount of time.
Generate low-quality leads.
A traditional outbound marketing strategy is when businesses actively seek out an audience by interrupting other forms of content. This is an example of why viewers tune in to radio; for the music and the commentary, not the ads that come in between. Readers buy magazines for the ideas and information they provide – not just for the advertisements that appear every few pages.
Traditional marketing can be frustrating for customers, especially when it comes to large-scale marketing campaigns.
Content marketing adheres to an inbound model. Instead of spreading your message through ads, you can attract leads through organic content. This means that consumers should be able to find quality products on their own time.
Web traffic from search engines, social media, email and online domains is more qualified and more useful to you as a business, than if you spent thousands on a 30-second radio ad or print mailer to a small radius of homes. Content marketing online gives you the opportunity to connect with anyone who has an internet connection at any time.
Even though modern marketing tactics are available, there is still a place for traditional marketing tactics in business. This infographic looks at how inbound and outbound marketing can work together, and the history of their relationship.
10 Ways Content Marketers & SEO Pros Can Boost Client Lifetime Value Right Now
1. Email Marketing
The Coronavirus pandemic changed consumer behavior massively, with brand loyalty taking one of the biggest hits.
COVID-19 has caused 60% of consumers to change their shopping behavior, most often in favor of convenience or value.
Email is a great way to keep in touch with your loyal customers and make sure they don’t forget about you.
Each communication you have with someone should be beneficial to them and address their specific needs.
You can offer your client extra support with their email strategy, even if they already have one in place.
2. Social Graphics
It is beneficial for your business to assist your clients in maximising their content creation investments.
If you’re a blogger, consider adding 4 or 5 social graphics to each blog post. These might include “quote cards” with expert insights or minigraphics that highlight statistics from the article.
Images are an important part of blog posts, adding visual interest, breaking up dense text, and providing descriptive alt text for search engines and readers with differing abilities.
Canva is a great way to get started, or you can use a VA to save yourself some time while adding new revenue.
3. Market Research
COVID-19 has forced many companies to change the way they operate, including adding new products or services, or completely transforming the way they serve customers and clients.
The market your clients were in one year ago may be completely different than the market their customers are in now.
SEO professionals and content creators are prolific researchers.
How can you use your inherent knowledge to help your clients?
You could make yourself available on an hourly basis to do market research and create new customer personas.
4. Keyword Research
Similarly, your clients’ keywords may be out of date.
The companies may now be competing with entirely different businesses, especially if the main business category has changed.
You could say that the restaurant is thinking about transition from dine-in to prepackaged pickup meals service, or that the arts and crafts store is thinking about transitioning from selling supplies to selling online classes with home-delivered supply kits.
The intent and motivations of their target customers could now be entirely different.
Additional services you could offer your clients next month include keyword research.
5. Google Posts
Make it easier for local businesses to be found in Maps and through organic searches that are specifically looking for businesses in their area.
Google wants to see that businesses are regularly updating their local listings and using Google Posts to share news, offers, photos, and other engaging information.
If you already produce content for a client’s blog or social media, you can add Posts as a weekly or twice weekly supplement to your package.
6. Review Management
If your clients’ businesses receive online reviews, the number of reviews may go up during different stages of lockdown, reopening, and operating under various public health recommendations.
Some businesses may have lost key staff who used to handle review responses, which could explain why there has been a decrease in response rates.
I would like to schedule a meeting with you to discuss how you are managing your reviews.
Make sure your employees understand the importance of customer reviews. Reviews are not only an extension of your customer service channel, but they can also help you increase sales and improve your local ranking.
If you are familiar with the company, you could offer to help them respond to reviews.
7. Crisis Communications
Every company should have a crisis communications plan.
It is extremely important for companies to keep customers updated on any changes in service.
Both customers and employees want to know what is happening inside the companies they interact with.
If your clients aren’t being honest about their situation, it leaves the door open for speculation and rumor. They need reassurance and stability.
8. UX Testing
Companies that had to adapt and reinvent themselves quickly may be staring back at a mess of new blog posts, landing pages, informational or product pages, and more created during the height of their crisis.
Would you like me to take a look at all the content you’ve created over the last six months? I can help improve the user experience, add internal links, and update any old content.
This may not be necessary, but if clients are unaware that this is something you’re able to do, they probably won’t offer you the chance.
And I’m sure you’ll do a better job for them than Simon, the accountant’s son, who is doing online learning from home and needed something productive to do.
9. Documentation
A lot may have changed for your client companies.
New or different policies, workflows, and procedures may be required for internal and public-facing aspects of the product or service.
If your client does have in-house resources for creating and updating documentation, they may be overworked at the moment.
10. Remote Teams Support
When the lockdown first hit, getting people connected and figuring out the technical glitches were the priority.
Most employees today know how to use Zoom, but the challenges in remote work are becoming more complex.
Zoom fatigue is real.
Having a work-life balance has become more difficult, which may be causing more gender inequality in virtual work environments.
