According to the Content Marketing Institute, 60 percent of the most successful marketers utilize a content marketing strategy, while 73 percent use content marketing successfully to nurture subscribers and audiences. Content marketing is a quintessential aspect of SEO, and with both tools effectively optimized, any website can rank at the top of search engines. If you need help with SEO, find a top SEO agency near you for help!
What are Content and Content Marketing?
Content refers to any audio, video, or text material on a digital platform intended to convey information. As already stated, it may be in audio, video, text, or a combination of the different forms. Content marketing, therefore, is creating and distributing strategic content to attract an audience to drive action.
This action can be utilized to buy products or services or to increase viewership. Content marketing is a strategy that involves disseminating digital content to inform, stimulate interest or create awareness of a product or service.
How content marketing works
There is no hard and fast rule when it comes to creating content. However, some stages marketers go through to produce quality content include:
- Awareness stage
It is important to identify your targeted audience. For example, you would want to decide if you want to target a specific age group, gender, social class, or other demographics. Afterward, you should note a problem or concern specific to the audience. It is helpful to be knowledgeable on the subject matter to provide adequate information.
Whether or not you are, you should gather or carry out extensive information on the topic at the stage. You can do this by carrying out surveys or questionnaires or looking up materials on the topic. That can help you discover the most searched problems of your target viewers.
- Consideration stage
In the consideration stage, you create solutions to the target audience’s problem. You should provide detailed information on the audience’s challenges and offer solutions. One of the most effective ways is to offer solutions related to the services or products you sell.
That is the best way to key into why your services are great for the audience and establish their trust. It is also a great way to transition into the conversion stage. For example, if you’re a wedding planner, you should discuss the benefits of hiring a wedding planner at this stage.
- Closing or conversion stage
Closing is a crucial stage for every content or digital marketer. You should explain why you’re the best solution for the audience or potential buyer’s challenges. It is the phase where you get the audience to perform a specific action with a “call to action.”
That prompts you to encourage your target audience to perform a task (such as checking out a website) or buy your product or service. It is usually marked with a call such as “click the link,” “buy now,” or “sign up” to access the solution. You may also offer an incentive such as a free trial or discount to encourage conversion.
Importance of content marketing
Below are some of the benefits of content marketing:
Content marketing is a proven strategy for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Creating content that your audience is likely to search or search constantly is a great way to rank high on search engines. Several statistics have proven that content marketing is one of the most effective ways to attract traffic to your site.
Seventy-two percent of businesses report that content marketing increases their leads and engagements. It is also a great way to provide a competitive advantage for your business. Profitwell data reveals that 47 percent of buyers check out three to five pieces of content before speaking with a sales rep. Hence, companies with blogs get 67 percent more leads than businesses without blogs.
- It is cost-effective
It is a cost-effective marketing strategy with high chances of generating strong returns on investment if effectively utilized. It is less expensive and strenuous than traditional marketing, where you have to create ads, commercials, or fliers and distribute the materials in person or pay for dissemination.
It is an even more effective form of marketing. Demand Metric reports that content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing yet generates approximately three times as many leads as traditional marketing.
- It helps to establish trust with your audience.
Content marketing is a great way to build trust and relationships with your audience and potential buyers. By providing information and solutions to their challenges, they feel positive about your brand and are encouraged to buy your products or services. Providing useful content is also a good way to build and maintain a positive brand image. According to Demand Metric, 82 percent of consumers claim that they feel positive about a company that delivers custom content and is more likely to buy from such a company. Seventy-eight percent feel a relationship between themselves and a company after reading custom content.
- It helps produce organic sharing of content.
Creating useful and custom content helps readers feel positive about your brand, inspiring them to share your content across social media and other platforms. This way, your viewership increases organically, and you can be a reference when people need solutions on the subject matter. It can also help establish your expertise in that field, generating sales and revenue.
- It helps you understand your audience.
If you’re ideally following the awareness stage, you can get a good understanding of your target audience and their top challenges. Another way is by examining the traffic data your site attracts over time. You can analyze the demographics of people that consume your content and which pieces of content are the most successful. By doing this, you can produce content that would most likely get engagements and conversion.
