The importance of a content marketing strategy
28th October 2011
What is content marketing?
Content or educational marketing is the idea of educating your target market with valuable content. By creating ‘thought leadership’ which will support your target market and/or customer with the current challenges they face, as well as making their lives easier, it can position your business more advantageously compared to one that just sells a product or service.
Content marketing focuses on marketing ‘expertise’, educating customers and prospects and giving away free information that can build a customer’s trust in your business, add perceived value and generate new business. Content marketing opens up a range of new marketing channels.
Types of content marketing
The following are types of marketing that can be used as content marketing:
- White papers/guides
- Blog
- Case studies
- Video
- Webinar
- Seminar
- eBooks
- Podcasts
Using content marketing
Content marketing can be used within your website, landing pages and email marketing, as well as being shared across social media and by your sales team.
The benefits of content marketing
Content marketing has the following benefits:
- Generating leads: guides and white papers could include forms in which people provide their contact details in exchange for the free information. This is a way to generate leads in addition to leads that come through from the website. Leads can then be nurtured over time through autoresponder emails until they’re ready to buy
- Higher search engine rankings: generating more high quality content for your website and utilising ‘long tail keywords’ within articles
- Content can harness more diverse marketing channels
- Providing a reason to contact customers/prospects through email marketing
- Content can be shared with others, encouraging word of mouth
- Positioning the business as experts with an informative view on the industry, rather than simply selling products or services
Getting started
To get started think of topics that are of interest to your target market…what are their burning issues? What are they unsure of?
What content can you write or produce yourself? Are you better at writing or do you want to get your face in front of a video? Also ask yourself how much time you have. If you need to outsource it there are agencies that can do this for you too.
