You've surely heard the phrase "content is king" ad nauseam. This statement hasn't lost its relevance since the crisis began; in fact, it's more pertinent than ever. A recent Euromoney report suggests that companies could triple their investment in content marketing over the next three years. Indeed, within B2B companies, the sector's turnover is expected to reach 75 billion euros by 2016.
According to this survey, the primary objective of content marketing is to increase brand awareness (78% of marketers affirm this), improve brand image (67%), boost lead generation (60%), promote new products and services (53%), and foster customer loyalty (50%).
All these benefits highlight the importance of placing content at the heart of any communication strategy. But where do you begin?
Tips for Your Content Marketing: Your Strategy, Step by Step
If you need to implement these actions in your company or want to focus on personal branding – the most common method for professional self-promotion – this short guide will help you develop an effective content strategy. Take note!
1) Define your current situation. Before deciding where you want to go, you need a clear understanding of where you are. To do this, thoroughly analyse these three variables:
a) Brand image. Ask yourself about the company's financial situation and its core business. A SWOT analysis will be very helpful here, reflecting your weaknesses, threats, strengths, and opportunities (hence the acronym).
b) Define market trends, what your competitors are doing, and their marketing strategy. Also, assess their presence on major social media platforms (e.g., how many followers they have, how often they publish their own or third-party content, whether they conduct PR activities, etc.).
c) Audience. List your buyer personas (i.e., your typical customers), their behaviour, your desired target audience, and your corporate reputation (or your own personal reputation) – in other words, how you are perceived.
2) Set your objectives. As Seneca said, there is no favourable wind for a ship that does not know where it is going. This maxim explains the importance of considering what you want to achieve and setting a goal/goals for your business. Common objectives include increasing web traffic or lead volume, gaining visibility in Google searches through SEO strategies, improving the company's social reputation, reaching a new demographic, or boosting sales. Whatever your purpose, these milestones must be based on measurable and achievable goals within a set timeframe.
3) Understand your audience. Before you start generating content, ask yourself a crucial question: who will consume this information? To simplify this analysis, we recommend evaluating the following aspects:
a) Sociodemographic profile. This includes age, marital status, nationality, place of residence, educational level, professional occupation, income level, etc.
b) Tastes and preferences. Considering your audience's preferences and hobbies is an essential aspect of any content strategy.
c) Needs and pain points. Closely related to the previous point, gathering information on this issue will help you understand what concerns your audience.
d) How can you help them? Once you've defined the problems and concerns of your potential audience, consider what content – related to your business activities – could be useful to them.
4) Consider the content you will create. In this fourth phase, you need to decide what content you will generate and in what formats (news, photos, videos, infographics, e-books, online webinars, tutorials, etc.). While all are valid, it's important to consider which best suits your audience's requirements. Additionally, these two aspects should be taken into account:
a) The characteristics of the social networks where it will be published. These traits relate not only to their specific features (e.g., suitability for text, video, or image) but also to the interests and needs of their users.
b) The stages of the buying process that internet users are in. For example, a first-time website visitor is different from someone who regularly receives company newsletters, has downloaded a guide, or attended a live streaming conference.
5) ...and how you will do it. Just as it's important to choose what content you'll produce, it's crucial to consider what processes and resources you'll need for its creation. Below, we summarise some common actions, along with the tools and professionals associated with them.
a) Topic research and content curation (internet access and documentary sources / journalists and documentalists).
b) SEO strategy (keyword research tools / experts in optimised content).
c) Copywriting (word processor / journalists, writers, or copywriters).
d) Image and infographic generation (design and photo editing software, such as Photoshop or InDesign / designers).
e) Online or offline layout (design and pagination programmes, content management platforms / designers, front-end developers, and programmers).
f) Video production (specific software, such as After Effects or Movie Maker (very simple, but free) / digital journalists or video editing experts).
g) Publication and social media management (blogs and social media profiles, management platforms like HootSuite / social media managers and community managers).
h) Results measurement (web analytics tools, such as Google Analytics / web metrics experts).
To all this, we should add potential SEM actions aimed at achieving paid dissemination or traffic (for example, through Google AdWords or Facebook Ads campaigns).
6) Choose where to publish them. Consider which platforms you will use to disseminate your content: blogs, social media (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, Pinterest...), your corporate site... It's not mandatory to have a presence on all social networks, only on those used by the company's target audience. Keep in mind that opening a social profile and not updating it, far from being beneficial, can harm the company's image.
7) Implement an editorial calendar. Once you've decided on the formats and themes you'll use, it's time to plan when they will be published. A good idea to keep track of when each post will appear is to use a monthly calendar, such as Google Calendar or a similar online template. It's advisable to choose a tool that allows for collaborative work, enabling two or more people to consult or update information simultaneously. Furthermore, this habit will help you schedule your posts in advance.
Regarding publication frequency, remember that this will depend less on the nature of the chosen medium and more on your ability to produce quality content. It's better to reduce how often you share an article or video if that ensures useful and relevant content.
8) Measure and analyse your results. There's no point in having a brilliant content strategy if its results aren't monitored using tools like Google Analytics, Sistrix, Searchmetrics, or eTracker. Only by understanding the performance of each publication in terms of web traffic and interaction can you eliminate actions that aren't yielding the expected results from your content strategy and boost those that perform well.
Need Help with Your Content Strategy?
If you have questions, want to adopt a content strategy that boosts your traffic or conversion results, or wish to improve your existing one, contact us or call us on 93 532 93 78. We will analyse your situation and needs and advise you without obligation. We look forward to hearing from you!
