Marketing Worth Watching
A lot of people are talking about content marketing at the moment from lots of different angles – some focusing on SEO, others on enriching user experience on websites, some looking at just rationalising all their channels to make sure everything is aligned and coherent.
The most interesting thing for us about content marketing is this: creating content that acts as marketing, but is something interesting and useful in its own right. In many ways, it’s about creating marketing content that provides the same benefit as the product itself.
In other words – your Nike trainers will make you fit, so their content marketing – workout suggestions, tools for managing your exercise – does the same thing. Your Nivea skincare is simple and effective – so their pre-roll videos on Youtube show you simple and effective life hacks.
We find it fascinating that companies have started to realise the power of creating content that people might actually care about, might actually find useful – even if it’s a slightly softer sell – rather than just bleating on about why their product is amazing.
Here are ten tips on how to improve your content marketing strategy:
1. Always bear this question in mind: What could you put out as content that your customers would actually care about? Most brands start with the product. Flip your thinking and start with the audience’s lifestyle and needs.
2. Be genuinely useful. Think about, for example, how you can improve people’s lives, save them money, make them fitter, solve their problems. That’s what people are looking for online.
3. Think about customer need states, and what form of content matches what your message is. Your audience might be on Facebook, but that might not be where they solve the problems you can fix.
4. Spend some time thinking about your brand message. Because channels like blogs, Twitter, video and so on get set up independently in silos, it’s easy to strategise for each individually. But all your content should be focussed on your brand positioning – if it’s not, why are you producing it?
5. Be part of a bigger ecosystem. If you’re a food brand, for example, you’re not just dealing with people’s hunger – you fit into a much broader lifestyle pattern and attitudinal structure. Create content that matches this broader mindset.
6. Avoid white noise. There’s no need to create content for the sake of it. The relentless speed and ephemeral nature of social media makes it feel like you have to – but much better to have four really compelling and valuable videos on YouTube than constant meaningless chatter.
7. Think about sharability. The reason that infographics, text-on-image jpegs and gifs and so on have become so prevalent is that they provide social users with ready-to-share content about things they love, expressed better than they could have.
8. “How to make an omelette” is more interesting than “latest egg news”.
9. Use your expertise. You are experts in your field – get that information out there for people to see and make yourself easier to find.
10. Don’t forget about activation. One of the misunderstandings of content is that what you produce is all there is to think about. If you don’t get it out there you might as well not make it.
Aside from anything, we’re all making content already – whether social posts, blogs, emails, product videos or articles. So maybe it’s time to start strategising, to make the most of it and make it as compelling for the end user as possible.
This blog was originally published on Futureproof Thinking
Pete Gomori 