Content Marketing and why you should be doing it

What is content marketing?

Content marketing is a customer-centric marketing strategy that allows businesses to create quality, relevant, engaging, sharable and consistent content to attract a defined audience.

It allows businesses to generate leads through increased brand engagement, leading to a loyal customer base and, ultimately, increased revenue.

Statistics show that businesses are becoming less reliant on traditional advertising methods. Businesses understand that consumers conduct the majority of their research online before purchasing a product and/or service.

Indeed, in today’s market, there is a high chance that customers who purchase a product or service in store have done their research beforehand.

In order to stay competitive in this ever-changing market where the consumer is increasingly happy to do their research before making any executive purchasing decisions, companies need to make sure they stay ahead of the curve by creating searchable, creative content that can easily highlight the strength and services of their business.

Regardless of whether you are a big or small business, it is critical that you create user-friendly content that is easily found. You should be ‘there’ when consumers seek you out! Seize the opportunity to provide valuable content when you have a captive audience. The objective is to create a conversation around your brand or product.

So how do you create good content?

The best way to create engaging content is through storytelling. Use the platforms at your disposal (social media, your website, etc) to your advantage. Show your business’ personality through your content. Your posts should feel authentic and not like ‘marketing’. Customers have better recall if they associate positive emotion with your brand. Round out your content with a call to action. You may find that this results in a more engaged audience.

Your creative, storytelling content can take many different forms, including: blogs, infographics, listicles, how-to guides, YouTube videos, and social media posts.

When you create different content for different platforms however, it is critical that your tone changes as required. For example: the tone used on LinkedIn should be more professional compared to the tone used on Instagram, which attracts a younger audience and justifies a more conversational style of communication.

Once you have created the content, you should actively encourage prospective customers to subscribe and/or share the content with their network.

If you have the ability to create all your content in-house, content marketing can be a very effective and inexpensive marketing strategy.