Content Ingredients: Which Are Right For You?
For a business, great content should make a statement, tell a story, illustrate the company's values, and lead customers to purchase. For customers to care, it should add value.
Here’s a graphic we use to remind us:
The key is in bridging the needs of both business and consumer. So, how do you know how to implement content marketing well? It begins with understanding what content marketing is and what it aims to accomplish.
What's Content Marketing All About?
We don’t need to reiterate the age-old mantra that "content is king,” you've been told time and time again about the importance of content, and you've likely invested in a content strategy of some kind already (if you haven’t, you know who to call!).
At the most basic level, content marketing is all about creating and distributing relevant, valuable, and consistent content to bring in or retain a target audience. At the end of the day, you want to drive conversions — but successful content is about more than that: If every brand insertion was about sales, you’ve become that friend at the party who won’t stop talking about themselves.
What you may be missing is the most crucial element of content — results. There's no secret magic ingredient aside from ensuring you’re adding value and not noise. But things to always keep in mind to be successful:
-Audience segmentation + Amplification - Who are you marketing to? Different audiences should not be addressed the same way, and keep in mind paid social is necessary for brands to get attention in a meaningful way.
-Engagement Rate - A good measure of whether your content was appreciated, Aim for an ER of 3%+.
-Reporting - Monthly reporting is essential to make proper pivots at the right time.
While content marketing is one of the most accessible tactics out there — it definitely takes some finesse to get it right.
How to Choose the Right Content For Your Business
Mapping the right content starts with knowing your customers, as we mentioned above. You can't hope to create meaningful content if you don't have comprehensive knowledge of your current and potential customers. Here are some questions to get the ball rolling:
What problems do they have?
What questions do they ask about your product or service?
What do they search on Google or other search engines?
What do they value?
What do current customers or clients have to say?
Where do they like to engage?
Finding answers to these questions will give you actionable steps to crafting content that converts.
Content Types for You
Blogs
Having a consistent and informative blog is a great start. Through relevant content that correlates with your product or service — you'll not only offer value to your customers but also build upon important search engine optimization (SEO) as well.
Keep topics within your industry, and write about what your customers would want to know. Use a pillar and cluster strategy to keep content in line with not only your industry but also other blog content as well. And finally, optimize it for SEO.
Here are some quick tips for keeping content friendly to search engines:
Discover 1-2 long-tail keyword focus that matches the intent of your target customers and use them in your post
Ensure mobile-friendliness
Optimize meta descriptions and use actionable language (CTAs)
Link internally when possible (but don't over do it)
Focus on evergreen content
Repurpose or update outdated content (or remove it entirely)
This is by no means a comprehensive SEO strategy for your blogs, but it can help them perform better and be a great habit to get into when creating blog content.
Infographics
Infographics are shareabie and can be coupled with blog content for maximum effect. With bold imagery and informative content, infographics can captivate your audience and generate a ton of traffic when used effectively.
Numbers and data can be boring — but that doesn't mean it's not crucial information that may be both relevant and informative to your audience. Spice it up with infographics for a low-cost way to keep potential customers engaged.
Videos
Video has quickly grown into one of the most effective and successful content marketing avenues. People's dwindling attention spans have created a need for new ways to engage audiences faster and for longer. Video marketing has become the solution.
As one of the more versatile and accessible mediums, video can be a fantastic way to keep audiences informed, entertained, and invested in your brand. You can take advantage of video on social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and LinkedIn — and it can be a sound addition to your social media strategy.
YouTube is another helpful platform, as it acts as both a social media channel and the world's second-largest search engine.
In fact, we named it our #1 choice for what's on the horizon and the future of content marketing.
Case Studies
For B2B businesses, case studies are a great way to illustrate your expertise by opening up doors into what your customers have experienced while working with you.
Great content tells a story, and case studies offer a narrative platform for showcasing the customer journey, from start to finish. Case studies can include:
The problem that needed solving
Campaign initiatives
Innovate solutions that drive the business forward
Data that measures and demonstrates the success
Case studies can encompass a wide range of initiatives, but they're a great tool for showcasing expertise and putting your results where your mouth is.
Honorable Mentions
With so many extraordinary content types, you have the freedom and flexibility to choose what works best for your business. Video and blogs can accomplish a wide range of results, whether it be informing your audience, demonstrating how a product or service works, or simply entertaining them. Infographics offer a great way to convert otherwise boring metric information into something digestible. Case studies are a fantastic way to demonstrate your expertise and aptitude within your industry.
However, these aren't the only types of content out there. You can get creative by utilizing a wide range of content types such as:
Checklists
Guides
How-tos
Memes
eBooks
Testimonials
Whitepapers
Influencer-related content
And more
Discovering which ingredient in the content trail mix is right for you isn't a "choose one" game. Instead, you'll need to combine a few content types that are most valuable to your customers in order to get the mouth-watering mix that ends with results.
Start Cooking
Now that you know all of the possible ingredients you can use to craft the perfect content strategy — it's time to get to work. Great content takes effort, but it also requires consistency. It's not something you can put out once in a blue moon and expect meaningful results, as your potential customers will lose interest or simply look elsewhere for the information they need.
If you’re interested in a content consultation with JBD, please reach out to us and we’d be happy to connect. hello@jbd.agency.
