Content marketing is about creating and sharing online content that will increase your traffic through organic search –Google, Bing, etc. its relevance from an organization perspective is simple math. If you can increase your site traffic, you’re also increasing a larger pool of prospects, and more prospects lead to more revenue and profit over time. The reason content marketing has become so important today is the value of organic search to your organization compared to other acquisition channels (such as social media, email marketing, paid search, and referrals).
The goal of any digital marketer these days is to rank on Google and drive sustainable client acquisition and organization growth. Unfortunately, nothing is easy and content marketing is no different. Getting your positions takes time and effort, and maintaining them with constant site optimization and link building requires constant work. But, it’s worth it!
Now that you know the purpose of content marketing, I break it down into steps to help you create and promote content that will quickly add value to your organization.
1. Identify your target audience.
So often when I talk to people about content marketing they often forget the most basic steps-identify your target audience. Many industries want to skip this step just dive right in don’t! Ignoring this step is like deciding to sell steak at a vegan restaurant –you’ve likely missed the mark.
Identifying your target markets should always be the foundation of any marketing, let alone content marketing. In this situation, the best practice is to start developing client personas. If you haven’t already, this can be accomplished by analyzing both quantitative data (e.g. Google Analytics) and qualitative data (e.g. feedback, surveys, etc.) of your site. That’s because client personas should help you create the kind of content that’s useful, relevant, and helpful to clients. It will also help you to better identify the written tone and develop a more effective and relevant brand personality to maximize the impact of your content.
2. Do keyword research.
Once you know who your clients are, it’s time to find relevant and useful content for them that will also help your organization. This is done by conducting and analyzing keyword research.
What is keyword research?
It’s an analysis of the keywords and types of titles that people search for. Taking the vegan restaurant example again, if you don’t use this step to generate great ideas and opportunities, everything on the menu might as well be poor! Use the information you’ve gathered from your identified client personas to brainstorm a variety of content ideas that you think will be relevant and useful to them.
Why do I keep mentioning relevant and useful words?
Basically, for any content marketing strategy to be successful, it must meet both criteria to create an impact on your target audience. For example, if you produce content that is neither relevant nor useful to them, why would they become your client? Once you’ve finalized your content ideas, you’ll want to start identifying keywords and phrases associated with those ideas that your clients are searching for.
3. Identify and allocate resources.
Next, you’ll want to map out who will be producing your content. If you have a marketing or content group, fantastic! If you are a small industry or individual, now is the time to dust off the cobwebs and get out your ergonomic keyboard! By this time you will have identified your client personas and planned the content you want to produce and mapped out the structure. Now comes the hard part – preparing it. Again, I have heard many people say that they are not good just readings content and don’t have time to avoid other activities.
Do not be afraid! There are other options. For example, freelancers like me can be incredibly quick and competent at taking your homework and writing it. Some of the other best online resources for finding highly qualified, experienced, and competent writers specializing in on-page SEO are the likes of Fiber or work.
4. Create a content calendar
This part is pretty straightforward but can be extremely effective for mapping out how you tap into your audience as well as showing Google how active you are. A content calendar doesn’t need to organize and spread your content promotion and take advantage of key dates, times, and trends if possible.
Simply put, it shows that you’re an active resource and haven’t stopped producing new content. And Google loves content! It’s also worth noting that even minor edits to pages on your site can be seen as updated content by Google. In general, the more regular content is refreshed the more favorably Google will look at your website because your website will look almost brand new when it is crawled again. Always think about attracting your clients as well as Google.
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