Key Steps for Creating an Effective Content Marketing Strategy

Many online businesses employ content marketing as the most efficient way to attract new customers, improve sales and drive traffic to their site. However, in order to make your content more persuasive, you need to establish a solid content marketing strategy.

An effective content marketing strategy has become a key factor in terms of the production, planning, promoting and measuring content. According to the latest Content Marketing Research, 83% of the B2B marketers interviewed employ a particular content marketing strategy, but only 35% of them have documented it. In order to develop a strategy that will boost your search engine, email marketing and social media results, you need to think through all the objectives. Three basic steps for creating a specific, measurable, attainable and reliable marketing strategy are:

• Research
• Creation
• Distribution and Promotion

1. Research

The crucial part of creating an effective content marketing strategy requires getting to know your competition and audience. Only this way will you be able to understand and address the demands of your target audience. In order to make the research factual, you need to include some basic questions like:

• What kind of content does my target audience like and share?
• Where online does my target audience spend most of time?
• How can I best reach my target audience?

Since most traditional market research methods lack efficacy and reliability, the experienced marketers are increasingly turning to online communities to improve their research outcomes. Unlike other survey techniques, social media, for example, analyzes target users by the sets of their traits and interests. Additionally, it was noted that social media has a 100% higher lead-to-close rate than outbound marketing, which is one of the key indicators of their efficiency.

Creation

The first step in creating firm content is to choose its type in accordance with your demands. For instance, if you strive to increase signups, the effective content will include product demos, video tutorials, targeted social media campaigns and publications such as ebooks and white papers. On the other hand, for the companies whose goal is to drive people to lead generation forms, webinars, live product demos, contests and gated content would be most effective.

Once you have determined the type of content that addresses your needs best, you need to make it as persuasive as possible. There are several aspects you need to keep in mind at all times:

• The schedule
• The idea
• The brief
• The creation

Furthermore, creating content is a complex project that entails various different elements, such as setting deadlines, hiring writers, copy editors and videographers. Above all, it is of vital importance that each member of the team knows where they fit into the project and what their responsibilities are.

Distribution and promotion

Once the specific piece of content is completed, it needs to be distributed and promoted. The Social Media Marketing Industry report shows that B2B marketers use approximately 13 content marketing tactics, most popular of which is social media content that is used by 92% of companies. Considering the findings of the recent surveys, marketers are ready to explore the potential of different distribution channels.

Now, there are three distinct ways for you to promote your content via social media:

• Paid social media, which requires employing ads in order to attract attention to your content.
• Earned social media, which refers to organic shares and mentions that your content receives from other users on social networks.
• Owned social media, which includes using channels like YouTube, Twitter and Facebook to attract traffic to your content.

Apart from social media, there are other highly efficient ways of promoting content, including eNewsletters, articles on a website, case studies, research reports and many more.

Although a sturdy content marketing strategy may be a time-consuming and complex process, it is often more than necessary. You owe it to both yourself and your business to do everything in your power to gain a competitive edge. By following these three simple steps, you will manage to create original and persuasive content that will differentiate you from your competitors. What more can you ask for in this unforgiving dog-eat-dog world of modern business?