Your customers and prospects want to get high-value content from your business, and what’s more, in a way that feels natural and organic rather than distracting.
Summary
Content marketing, is a marketing technique with a lot in common with inbound marketing, a method popularized by, based on content creation and focused on the customer.
Content marketing can help your business in all stages of its sales funnel, from the attraction process to satisfaction, including the engagement of your target audience.
By focusing your efforts on creating an effective content marketing strategy, you give yourself the means to improve your lead generation, develop your brand awareness, boost your conversion rates, increase your business and even establish yourself as an expert in your industry.
The recipe for achieving these goals is ultimately quite simple: content marketing consists of publishing written and visual content online to attract more prospects to your business.
By content, we mean variously written, audio and video communication media such as blog articles, pages on your website, electronic books or e-books, infographics, videos, podcasts, etc.
That being said, content marketing isn’t just about publishing content haphazardly, it’s about getting your target audience to understand it.
This involves adapting the content of the pages of your website, videos, white papers, e-books and publications so that your target audience finds them by the incoming route (inbound), that is to say, an natural rather than through the “outbound” route.
Today, and you certainly know it, outbound or outbound marketing strategies, such as traditional advertising, are no longer as effective in generating consumer interest.
In 2022, your content needs to reach your audience naturally.
But how to do it?
This is what we will see in this guide dedicated to content marketing.
I – Definition of content marketing.
Content marketing, is the process of planning, creating, distributing, sharing, and publishing content through various channels, such as the pages of a website or mobile app, social media, blogs, podcasts, press releases, print publications, etc.
Thanks to content marketing, your company can increase its visibility and brand awareness, reach its target audience more efficiently and boost its sales.
What are the benefits of content marketing?
Thanks to content marketing, your company will be able to…
- Inform and educate its leads and prospects on the products and services it markets
- Show its leads and opportunities how its products and services can solve their problems
- Boost your conversion rates
- Create a sense of community around your brand via “Brand Content.”
II – The different types of content marketing
There are many types of content marketing that you can incorporate into your overall marketing strategy.
Here are the most common:
1- Online content marketing
Online content marketing refers to any content distributed online, and more specifically on the pages of your website.
An online content marketing strategy can help you rank your website at the top of the SERPs, i.e. search engine results in pages and, therefore, position your content right in front of the eyes of people who search.
2- Blog content marketing
Blogs are essential for implementing any inbound marketing and content marketing strategy. They bring many possibilities regarding creativity, choice of topics to cover or market objectives to achieve.
Additionally, a blog allows you to promote other content and blog posts via links, add social sharing buttons, and even incorporate information about the products you market.
Social networks, with more than 4.2 billion users worldwide, represent a veritable Eldorado for digital marketing, and more specifically for content marketing, and this explains why so many companies are investing in Social Media. Marketing.
Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Twitter or Snapchat are ideal for spreading and sharing quality content, be it posts, photos, videos, etc.
4- Podcast content marketing
The podcast has become a natural phenomenon, as proven by the millions of people who listen to this type of content on platforms like Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
In 2022, more and more companies have adopted this content marketing channel that appeals to those who put off reading.
Podcasts can be on any topic you choose, and you can set the frequency, episode length, and more.
5- Video content marketing
This trend goes well beyond content marketing: today, most consumers prefer to learn about a product or service through a video.
So video marketing can boost your conversion rates, improve your ROI, and help you build lasting relationships with your audience.
You can further share your video content on many channels: social media platforms, landing pages, websites, etc.
6- Infographic content marketing
Infographics have recently emerged and have quickly become trending content. They can present informative content and data in a readable and easy-to-understand graphical format.
Thanks to a mix of short statements, simple formulas, clear images and graphics, infographics are an excellent communication vehicle that can effectively convey the idea you are trying to get.
7- Advertising content marketing
Unlike inbound marketing, content marketing includes paid and intrusive levers because advertising is, first and foremost, content, be it text, visual or video.
Paid Ad Content marketing can help you reach a large audience and allow you to position yourself wherever you want to expose your brand.
Advertising can be an exciting complement to all your organic marketing initiatives (SEO, inbound marketing), and many mediums allow advertising content to be shared, such as social networks, landing pages, banners and sponsored ads.
Now let’s go further and look at the strategic aspect of content marketing.
III – What is a content marketing strategy?
A strategy is, above all, a plan that is designed to allow you to achieve your objectives.
So, a content marketing strategy is about designing, planning, implementing, and distributing your brand’s content marketing materials.
Be careful not to confuse the content marketing strategy with the content plan or content calendar, a tool designed to help you organize the implementation of your content in an orderly manner.
Why does your company need a content marketing strategy?
Studies show that nearly 40% of businesses don’t have a content marketing strategy.
Thanks to such a strategy, you will go from a rudimentary and inefficient method of creating and distributing content to an organized system integrating specific objectives, performance indicators, and even continuous improvement processes, for, in the end, a substantial efficiency gain.
Here are the essential elements that must be integrated into your content marketing strategy.
IV – The essential components of an effective content marketing strategy
A results-driven content marketing strategy should include these five fundamental elements: audience personas, brand positioning, a value proposition for your owned media, a business case, and finally, a marketing plan. ‘stock.
Let’s see what is behind each of its elements and how you can implement them.
1- Audience personas
If you are familiar with digital marketing, you necessarily know the “buyer personas”, these fictitious representations of your categories of ideal buyers/customers.
The same principle applies to content marketing: you can’t create compelling branded content if you don’t know your audience.
Your first step will be to identify the audience you are trying to target with your content.
To do this, you can establish a robot portrait of your existing specific customer categories, research your activity sector, see what your competitors are doing in this area, and above all, eliminate all customer profiles. An audience that doesn’t match your offer.
You must clearly and briefly describe to your collaborators and all stakeholders involved in creating your brand content what your audience persona looks like.
2- Brand positioning
With clearly defined brand positioning, you’ll be able to deliver a consistent shopping experience to your audience and build a powerful brand image across all of your content marketing channels.
Here are some questions that are a good start in determining your brand positioning:
- What is your Unique Selling Proposition, that is to say, the selling point that differentiates you from your competitors?
- What issues or “pain points” does your product or service solve?
- Who are your main competitors, and how do they market their brands?
- How is your offer better than that of your competitors? What is your expertise? What is your skill?
3- Value proposition for your “owned media.”
To establish your brand as a credible content creator and publisher, you must define an “owned media” value proposition.
For a company, owned media are its communication channels, such as its website, social media accounts, blog, newsletter, etc.
Defining a value proposition for your owned media will help you find a point of differentiation in your content strategy and compete more effectively with your competitors.
Here are the questions you can think about to define this fundamental marketing element:
- What unique value will your content bring to your audience?
- How do you plan to stand out from other content creators?
- Why should audiences follow your different content channels?
4- Business case
Providing high-value-added content is an integral part of a successful content strategy.
But in addition to attracting new readers and subscribers, content marketing should move your business forward and help it grow.
Therefore, it is essential to identify the business objectives your company must achieve and determine how content marketing will help you achieve them.
You can understand the benefits, costs and risks of implementing a content marketing strategy in your business through a business case.
5- Action plan
Finally, it would help if you established an action plan to list your primary content marketing campaigns and projects for the coming year.
To do this, think about how you can achieve the content marketing goals you previously set for your business.
In your action plan, include the following information:
- The content formats.
- The priority topics and themes you want to address
- Content distribution and promotion channels
Now that we’ve listed the main elements to include in your content strategy let’s take a detailed, step-by-step look at how you’ll build it.
V – The seven essential steps to create a complete content strategy
The long-term planning of your content strategy will allow you to anticipate all the challenges and allocate your human and budgetary resources effectively.
The following seven steps will help you develop and implement a content strategy aligned with your marketing and business goals.
Step 1: Determine the story you want to tell your audience
As we said in the last part, your target audience and its fictional representation must be at the heart of your content strategy, just as buyer personas are the basis of any marketing strategy.
Your audience isn’t just buyers, however, and includes individuals who may begin to engage with your brand long before they purchase.
Thus, providing content that can attract potential customers before they enter the buying journey is essential.
First, you will need to attract them to your brand universe.
Then, feed your prospects with content explaining how your products or services can be helpful.
Additionally, being a go-to source of information can help you build a community of brand ambassadors who will create awareness through word-of-mouth.
Energy drink brand Red Bull is a prime example of a brand that knows how to create content for its audience, not just its customers.
Thus, Red Bull does not focus on its products but instead covers many topics that interest its target audience, especially extreme sports.
It’s easy to identify Red Bull’s target audience: relatively young people, passionate about sports and adventure.
The content offered by Red Bulls allows its audience to identify with the brand and encourage loyalty far beyond the simple purchase of drinks.
Step 2: Determine your content marketing goals
To determine your content marketing goals, you need to take a step back and think about your business’s leading marketing and business goals.
Then think about how the content can contribute to those larger goals, which are usually specific to your business.
Finally, identify the marketing performance indicators — or metrics — that you will choose to evaluate your content marketing performance; in other words, what types of figures and data will allow you to verify that your objectives have been achieved or not?
These performance indicators can be primary (revenue generated by your content marketing strategy, number of converted leads, etc.) and secondary (organic traffic, SEO ranking, etc.).
Also, keep in mind that your goals are necessarily linked to your financial resources and the capabilities of your team, things to consider when setting your goals.
According to recent research, the development of brand awareness, the acquisition of traffic and the generation of leads remain 2022 the main objectives of companies that bet on content marketing.
But we encourage you to always look at the big picture and consider content marketing integral to your overall marketing strategy.
When you define the objectives of your content strategy, it is also essential to consider the specificities of your sales funnel.
For example, B2 B’s sales cycle tends to be much longer than in B2C. Thus, choosing a Multi-Touch attribution (a marketing measurement method that determines the value of each point of contact a customer has with the brand that led to a conversion) would be best when analyzing the performance of your content and the definition of your KPIs (key performance indicators).
Now let’s look at some tools that can significantly help you during this step.
You are undoubtedly familiar with the SMART method (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-bound), widely used by companies to define their objectives, and which is still relevant.
For more flexibility and to help your business become more agile in an ever-changing environment, consider testing the CLEAR method (Collaborative, Limited in volume and duration, Emotional, Appreciable, Refinable).
Your CLEAR objectives are defined according to the following criteria:
- Collaborative: your goals encourage teamwork
- Limited: they are limited in ScopeScope and duration
- Emotional: they represent a source of motivation for your team
- Appreciable: they can be broken down into micro-objectives
- Refinable: they can be redefined according to the circumstances and your needs
Step 3: Audit your existing content
A content audit is a process of organizing, analyzing and improving all of your existing content. This is essential to get the most out of your web pages and save resources.
According to a recent study, more than half of companies with successful content marketing in 2021 conducted at least one content audit in the past year.
Thanks to the implementation of an annual content audit, you will be able to answer the following questions:
- What content themes and keywords work best?
- Which content formats generate the most engagement and conversions?
- Which channels generate the most traffic?
You can perform this type of audit yourself using specialized tools like Ahrefs, the Yoast SEO plugin, Buzzsumo, and even Google Analytics.
Step 4: Develop an Editorial Plan and Content Calendar
Planning your content allows you to allocate your resources appropriately, see which workflows take more time and effort than expected, and adjust your content marketing strategy accordingly.
1- Set priorities
First, you need to set your priorities.
What is called prioritization remains one of the essential elements of effective planning.
If you prioritize your actions, you minimize the risk of failure and keep the possibility of considering experiments likely to improve your results.
You can prioritize your actions in various ways, considering, for example, the resources you will need to create your campaigns, the potential gains, etc.
You can decide which campaigns, topics and formats to feature in your plan.
2- Find relevant topics
Second, you need to find relevant topics.
Start by thinking about the main themes you want to address this year.
These subjects must come from your work of audience analysis and competitive studies carried out upstream.
Try to generate a list of topics likely to remain practical and relevant over the long term.
When deciding if a topic is worth exploring, evaluate it on two dimensions: its usefulness to your target audience and its ability to impact your bottom line.
Several software you can use to automate and improve this process, such as Semrush’s Topic Research tool, which can give you ideas of topics to cover, related questions, possible sub-topics, and even headers to favour.
Thanks to this tool, you can focus on creating “evergreen” type content (which remains relevant even after several years), or the creation of thematic clusters, with ease.
Once you’ve created a list of topics, move on to full-scale keyword research using an appropriate tool, such as Google’s Keyword Planner or Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool.
Each subject can have several associated keywords, which can then help you design your thematic clusters.
3- Develop thematic clusters
Third, you need to develop thematic clusters.
Creating topic clusters or groups of topics is still one of the most effective ways to organize your content.
Thematic clusters are comparable to groups of interrelated content and include a central subject covered in what is called a “pillar page” or “pillar page” and several related sub-topics.
This approach is essential if you have large amounts of content to present on your website and want to strengthen your authority on a particular subject.
To give you a simple-to-understand example, if you are an agency specializing in SEO or digital marketing, you can dedicate a pillar page to SEO and create several cluster pages on related topics such as net linking, local SEO, technical referencing, etc.
Once you’ve figured out which topics are most relevant to your content hubs, put them on a content calendar to make your deadline-tracking job easier.
4- Analyze the competition
Fourth, it would help if you did some competitive analysis work.
It is essential to know what your competitors are doing regarding content and understand what themes, keywords and formats are working for them.
You can use a competitive content analysis tool or template to learn more about where your competitors are positioned, the main content formats they use (blogs, podcasts, video, etc.), the main topics they cover and the main keywords they target, their top performing content pages, etc.
5- Design your content funnel
Fifth, you need to design your content funnel.
Before starting your content creation process, identify all the stages of the customer journey because the content you will offer at each step must be different and meet the specific needs of each stage.
Start by mapping out your content marketing funnel and consider creating content for each of the following stages:
- Awareness: Focus your content on your prospects’ questions at the top of the funnel, becoming aware of their issues and needs at that time. Content created for this step can also tell your brand story and educate, inform or entertain your audience.
- Consideration: As your prospects move through the funnel, they reach the consideration stage and want to know more about how you can help them. Try to make them understand why they need your product or service to overcome the problem they are facing, and give the example of one of your customers who solved similar issues in the past thanks to your business.
- Decision: The content you need to offer at this stage should be thought out to convince prospects that your solution is the best choice for them. Showcase case studies, customer reviews, and other content that attests to your past work so that candidates can compare your expertise and know-how with the competition.
- Retention: In this step, you should emphasize different ways to get the most out of your product or service, as well as ways to fix common issues and new features in your products, to retain your customers.
- Advocacy: For this step, use content highlighting your brand to turn your customers into ambassadors. It could be about your company’s values, behind-the-scenes philanthropy efforts, or exceptional members of your team.
6- Organize your work using an editorial calendar
Sixth, it would help if you used an editorial calendar to organize your work.
Creating a content calendar is still the most efficient way to collect all the information gathered in the previous steps.
You can use this document to plan your content marketing campaigns, design thematic clusters and start producing your content.
Here are some key things to include in your timeline: topics, keywords, titles, categories, target dates, content formats, target audiences, KPIs, etc.
Share your content calendar across the enterprise. You can even actively involve other departments, like sales or customer service, to improve and make it more customer-centric.
7- Plan content production
Finally, you need to plan content production.
Try to find ways to make content production more efficient and create higher-quality content.
At the content strategy planning stage, think about all the solutions that can improve your content production cycles:
- Review your resources (budget, number of writers available, etc.)
- Map your content calendar and indicate approximately how many texts or articles you plan to write each month
- Find potential bottlenecks and optimization opportunities.
- Estimate the budget and time needed to produce an amount of content that will allow you to achieve your goals
- Decide if you will outsource content production entirely, partially, or keep it in-house.
- Determine if you need design, development, or any other team that needs to be involved in the production stage.
Step 5: Create your content
The quality of your content should be the priority, and it should not be sacrificed to, for example, produce more volume or seek to obtain better positioning quickly on the SERPs.
To create compelling and engaging content, adopt the following strategies:
Focus on originality
If your content isn’t original, it’s doubtful to capture the attention of your target audience.
Invest in people and resources that can help you do unique research, develop original ideas, and bring those ideas to life as engaging content.
Avoid posting content exclusively based on your analysis of other pages on similar websites that deal with the same topics.
Go the extra mile and always try to include your experience, your data, your research, and your opinion in every piece of content you post.
This will help build credibility and trust with your audience and create the conditions for organic growth.
Diversify your content
Certain types of content work best at specific stages of the sales funnel, while other types of content are more popular with a particular audience.
The ideal solution is to include a diverse mix of content formats to appeal to every part of your audience.
This selection must be made according to your customers’ preferences and after analyzing the performance of your content.
Here are some ideas for providing as much variety of content as possible to your audience:
- Video: classic recorded video, live event, online conference, podcast
- Text: interview, blog post, study, research, information, etc.
- Visuals: infographics, PowerPoint presentation
- Interactive: quiz, test
- PDS: white paper, tutorial, e-book, template, guide
However, you are not required to use all content types.
Instead, focus on formats that suit each stage of your sales funnel and appeal to your audience.
In 2021, the top two content formats favoured by content marketers were video and blog posts.
Reuse your content
Once published, the content can always be reused in a different format.
Here are some tricks you can use:
- Segment a long article or long video into shorter formats that you can publish as a series
- Turn a blog post into an infographic, podcast or video
- Compile short pieces of content to create a whitepaper or guide
- Use excerpts from your blog posts to create social media posts
Take advantage of user-generated content.
Including user-generated content (UGC) is a great idea that can help build your reputation and awareness.
Reviews, reviews, comments, photos and videos from your followers and customers have many virtues, and best of all, they cost nothing and are easy to share.
Step 6: Plan content distribution
Creating a quality, high-value content is essential for success in content marketing. However, it’s equally important to ensure that your content reaches the right audience at the right time.
Content distribution involves using various paid and organic channels to publish and promote your content.
When designing your content strategy, list the main channels you will target, analyze their past performance levels and see what you can improve.
Also, consider exploring new channels, such as influencer marketing and partnerships.
Statistics show that in 2021, social media (both organic and paid), email marketing, and organic search were among content marketers’ most used content distribution channels.
Your resources must be devoted in priority to the channels your audience frequents to give your content the best possible chance of being seen.
Finally, consider optimizing your content for organic search.
It is considered that today, organic traffic represents 70 to 80% of a website’s total traffic.
To rank your content well in search engine results, an exercise that is becoming more and more difficult, you will have to redouble your efforts to improve the quality and optimization of your content.
The user experience should be at the centre of this process, and you should always have the following in mind:
- The readability of your text
- Impeccable spelling and syntax
- The presence of visuals
- Keywords
- Meta tags
- Etc.
You can use tools like Semrush, Surfer SEO, or Clear ScopeScope to optimize your content for search engines and automate specific technical processes.
This tool can help you assess the quality of your content texts on several aspects (readability, SEO, originality and tone of voice) and even indicate the parts of your text that should be improved.
Step 7: Continuously analyze the performance of your content
Analyzing your content’s performance is essential to see if your content marketing efforts are working, to understand what type of content is best for your audience, and to move forward.
In 2022, it is estimated that just over 60% of e-entrepreneurs regularly analyze the performance of their content.
Luckily, several marketing analytics tools available today have customizable features, various types of visualizations and dashboards, and multiple integrations that can work for you. Help measure the impact of your content marketing strategy.
The main ones are Google Analytics, Semrush, Hotjar, Hubspot Marketing Analytics and Dashboard Software, Moz, SimilarWeb, etc.