Content Marketing
At its core the internet is an information medium much more than an entertainment medium. We turn to the internet when we need to learn something, find something or connect with someone.
“Content Is King!” is the mantra of many internet marketers and is often referred to by search marketers as the secret to success in Google rankings…but the origin of the term comes from non-other than Bill Gates (in 1996)! The benefits of offering great content pays dividends in search results (and traffic), in social media freshness and engagement, in marketing automation nurturing, in establishing brand and thought leadership as well as improving relationships with your existing and prospective customers.
Content is hard, but planning makes it easier.
If content marketing is so wonderful, why doesn’t everyone do it? First, it takes a lot of time (and potentially resources) to generate content. We’ve all experienced that monthly newsletter we had planned, that quickly reduced to quarterly then twice a year and now, maybe makes it out annually. The first step in our content marketing offering begins with defining the strategy and messaging approach. By defining who you want to talk to, what you want to talk about and the cadence of messaging, you’ll be light years ahead and can focus on generating content instead of trying to think about what to create.
Content helps search
Google’s algorithm has hundreds of factors – but in their list of top five components (Meaning of your Query, Relevance of Webpages, Quality of Content, Usability of Webpages, Context and Settings) all center around content to provide quality results and great user experience.
Content helps social
Keeping your social streams active and engaging comes from having a steady stream of new content. Using a solid content strategy, you’ll often find that your core pieces of content can be repurposed into an array of social postings filling your social feed without the need to generate new content daily.
Content helps marketing automation
Your site visitor who read one article, is likely interested in other topics you’re talking about, but they may not take the time to search your site (or more likely they aren’t in buying mode on that first visit). With marketing automation you can re-engage visitors and help move them through the consideration path with efficiency and relebance
Content helps branding
Good content shares your opinions and expertise, and when developed properly supports and amplifies your brand positioning.
Where does good content come from?
Custom created content is always the best source, but there are a lot of good curated content offerings that you can adapt and personalize as well. In our content offering, we typically work with our client’s in-house experts to identify topics and then curate messaging through:
- a team of experienced writers (after all no one writer can write for all audiences/industries)
- libraries of industry specific content
- third party and custom research
Developing your content strategy
Our content services can be packaged as part of your search engine optimization (SEO) plan, integrated into your social marketing initiatives, and incorporated into your web development efforts. We can also provide a holistic content approach that spans across your digital initiatives if desired. To get started, we offer a Content Marketing Action Plan that will help deifine your overall content strategy, messaging topics and platform requirements.