Is Your Content Marketing Crippled?

You love content marketing. So you write great posts every now and then.

Of course, you aim to sell your way to success through them.

But even after investing a lot of time and money, success seems a faraway star.

Why?

The harsh truth: What you’ve been doing until now is not content marketing – it’s crippled content marketing.

“Wait, what?”

Yes, that’s also content marketing, except it’s not based on a strategy. You can’t expect to gain authority, credibility and success from it.

Today, we’ll talk about what constitutes a powerful content strategy – one that helps avoid pitfalls, opens floodgates to unstoppable revenue and assures sustainable success.

It’s not just about writing (or publishing, for that matter)

A good content strategy should be based out of these four tenants: creation, publication, promotion and governance.

Writing great content is of no significance until it’s published on the right channels and until the world gets to know about it.

By the same coin, content creation, publication and promotion need proper governance, so that results get constantly measured. So that you can observe, improve and try out even smarter things. So that your content marketing stays compelling and keeps on getting you results.

Also Read: ResultFirst Introduces Content Marketing Services

Now, let us take the four tenants one by one.

Creation

Content creation requires a professional team – team that knows how to play with words and get under your audience’s skin. Outsourcing content most likely won’t get you the desired results so you should employ an in-house team. Pro tip: Start small. Dream big.

Once you’ve the manpower, it’s time to:

• Determine your business objectives.
• Determine your target audience. Observe them. Find out where they are. Figure out what they want, what excites them.
• Discover the language they use.
• Do competitive analysis.
• Identify why you are the best, why people should trust you and buy from you.
• Write. Write even more. Never (ever!) spin/copy content for its own sake. This will help you take care of your SEO, too.
• Try out different content models, such as live webinars, infographics and whitepapers, to better engage with your audience.
• Refine your voice, headlines, hooks and approach constantly.

Remember: Only helpful, valuable and meaningful content can help you make massive waves.

Publication

Polishing and auditing are a part of publication. They help ensure that your content is optimized for search engines and actually gets read by your target audience (and their network).

• Never underestimate the editorial iteration part, for it becomes more and more important as your business grows.
• Choose the most relevant channels to publish your content.
• Your blog is your best marketing channel so always give more attention to it and build an editorial calendar for it.

Also Read: Questions To Address And Strategies To Follow For Content Marketings

Promotion

Post publication, you need to market your content so it drives your audience back to your site.

• Decide how you’ll promote your content.
• Build your social network.
• Don’t just think about social media. Think about options such as email marketing, too.
• Listen to your audience.
• Choose the tools you may use.
• Promote like crazy.

Governance

Last but not least, governance.

• Measure and monitor the results. For example, does your ROI match up to what you expected; how well did your content fared off in engaging with your audience, on social media, your blog or any third-party site…
• Ask yourself whether you need to improve your strategy or add a little something to it.
• Think about how you’ll overcome the pitfalls.
• Take the necessary course of action and keep on improvising.

Did we miss something? Any suggestions? Please leave your valuable opinion in the comment section.

 Also Read: Using FOMO In Your Content Marketing Strategy