Content Marketing

by Mauricio Romero Mauricio Romero | May 3, 2019 3:37:11 PM

 

Marketing de contenidos /content marketing

Marketing and advertising have changed. 75% of people no longer believe in ads or traditional advertising. 80% of people run a research on the internet and social networks before making their buying decision. What people are looking for, is content, and they run away from advertising.

This new behavior of buyers took place thanks to the access to information that they now have. Before buying, instead of making the decision based on the brand that they are familiar with, thanks to years of traditional publicity, clients now investigate all the options that they have and, afterwards, choose the one that is best for them.

They look for ways to solve the problem that they have, or to find the product that they need, online. This is the reason why your company must create content about the problems that it helps to solve with its products and services.

What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a technique in which written or audiovisual content is created based on the solutions that companies, brands or products offer to their clients. This content is distributed digitally on websites, blogs, videos and social networks.

Content is the best way to help a client move forward in his buying decision, since traditional advertising is not enough, as it was before.

With these contents, the buyer learns about how to buy and evaluate the options that he has, so that the decision he takes is the one that suits him better.

What Does Content Marketing Solve?

  1. Content Marketing helps people make a decision about a way to solve their problem via a product or service.
  2. Helps brands reach people when they are doing their online research for solutions and brings them to the company's website. This also increases the traffic of a website and thus, improves its online presence.
  3. Educates consumers on the value proposal that a company or brand offers. Remember that an educated consumer better recognizes the value of what your company does and is willing to pay well for it.
  4. It creates not only a sensory connection but a rational connection as well. By doing so, the buyer feels more comfortable with the decision he'll take.
  5. It helps people follow a brand on social networks and digital media since they are offered useful and within-context content/information, and not only publications of dogs and babies that might get lots of likes, but help them solve nothing.
  6. Is 62% less expensive than traditional media and attracts three times more potential clients.
  7. Content is the best long-term digital investment. There is no need to pay Google in order to appear in its "best results". Your company can reach the first places by simply creating very good content.

Which are the Results of Using a Content Marketing Strategy?

The results of using these strategies are:

  1. The increase of website visitors attracted via search engines such as Google.
  2. Creation of a real community on social networks, one that's truly interested on the content of the company or brand.
  3. Generation of new prospects who want to know more about the company's solution and will contact a sales representatives directly.
  4. More and better sales. Thanks to the helpful company's content, the prospect receives the message that we are here to help him solve his problem and not just to sell something to him. That's why doing this strategy well, with a good implementation, will result in an easier sale.
  5. Helps to solve each and every one of the questions that have been asked to your sales teams before, so they can be answered digitally. This saves time to your sales people and shortens the buying cycle.

How can you Create a Content Marketing Strategy?

A good content strategy must keep in mind the following aspects:

1.- The content that your clients are looking for

The basis of creating this strategy in order to attract people who are looking for the solutions that we have, is to put ourselves in their shoes. Know well how their search begins, fully understand how they write their questions on their computer or cell phone. This is what keywords are in SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

content marketing SEO

Start with your sales team. They know all the questions that potential clients make over and over again.

2.- Interesting/relevant content

It's not enough to understand their questions. We must give them an answer in the best possible way, as impartial and honest as we can. Consumers are looking for content that helps them understand if the company, brand or product, can solve their problem. So we must not only talk about our value proposal, but also about how it can be compared with the competition's. One of the most powerful content to help make a decision, is the one that offers reviews and comparisons.

3.- Customized content

There are several ways to do this. The first and more general one is by creating specific content for your buyer persona. What is a buyer persona? It is a fictional profile that you'll create in order to segment your clients based on their uses, customs and lifestyle. It'll help you understand the different ways in which you can serve your customers and understand the difference between customers as well. This is how you'll make content that specifically solves what customers have on their minds.

The second way is by using Inbound Marketing techniques in order to send a more personalized content to each of your customers, content that will be truly useful for them.

4.- Content format

Depending on the resources of your company, the content can be offered in different formats: written, audio or video. If the budget and time allow it, in all three.

Each format has its own specific characteristics and people choose the one they like best. So we recommend you always offer one same content:

  • On your blog (written format)
  • On your podcast (audio format)
  • On your YouTube channel (video format)

So people choose the one they like best, regarding the topic they are interested in.

5.- Editorial Calendar

Publish, publish, publish.

An editorial calendar based on the list of questions that must be given an answer to, has to be created in order to produce all the contents. This is where 80% of companies fail in their strategy, since planning good/relevant content is not an easy task to achieve, it takes up time and resources.

You have to offer constant publications for the strategy to work since the search engine algorithms take into account the periodicity with which you publish content. Those who publish little and without periodicity are less recommended in the results.

Another problem that may arise is looking for perfection in our contents. This always stops publication. You have to balance quality content with being able to publish on time. An editorial team helps you decide when a content is good enough for publishing.

6.- Advertising your content

advertise your content on social media

Once all this effort was done, you must advertise this content in your social networks and your mailing lists. This content must be segmented based on your customer's interests, so as not to send irrelevant information to everyone.

This is how you'll delight your customers with interesting and helpful content. Your followers community will be really interested in interacting with you.

You can learn more about his strategy and its planing on our "Game Plan", which you can download for free:

Download for free DataBranding's GamePlan

Content Marketing and Inbound Marketing

Content marketing is the best way to attract prospects to your marketing and sales funnel. Yet, within the Inbound Methodology, this is only the beginning. There are still other stages of nurturing and closing that need to be carried out so that the investment works on its fullest.

If you are interested in learning more about Inbound Marketing, take a look at our contents, with which we explain how everything works. And if you want advice on how to make a successful strategy call us.

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