Remember the squirrel moment in the movie “Up?” It became a whole new phrase signifying our ability to switch from shiny object to shiny object. The constant pressure to keep up with the marketing Joneses is exhausting (with the added stress that the Joneses keep flaunting new technology, house additions, cars, and polished Instagram pages). But just because you look around and see other companies using shiny new tools and launching expensive marketing campaigns doesn’t mean you have to. In fact, you might be a lot better served by focusing on improving something you’re probably already doing; content marketing. Here are some content marketing tips so you can take a fresh look at your content strategy and find success - your own way.
Get Refined, Not Random
Most companies fail to see impact from their content marketing because the whole effort is haphazard. It often goes like this… Marketing Director: “We should have a blog, so we can benefit from SEO and content marketing.” Heads nod all around. “Great! Let’s post every week.” More nodding. “Sheila, you’re up first. Write a blog by Friday.” Vigorous nodding from everyone else; cautious nod with slightly raised eyebrow from Sheila. But then inevitably, Sheila gets too busy with her actual job duties and forgets about the blog… and so do her other colleagues when it’s their turn. When deadlines come, your team members throw together a post on a random topic, which gets pushed to your website because quantity is king, right? All that matters is that you have something on your blog, or does it?
That doesn’t even sound good in theory, yet it’s something to which so many businesses and marketers fall prey. Random content marketing isn’t a thing. In order to reap the advantages of content marketing, you’ve got to start sowing it with intention. If you’re investing the time in writing posts, why not take a few extra steps and make sure your topics offer value to your ideal clients? Here are some questions to ask, to help you land on subjects that resonate:
1. What is our company’s mission?
2. What makes us different from our competitors?
3. Who is our ideal customer/persona?
4. What are their pain points?
5. How can we bring them value?
Process Makes Perfect
After answering these questions, sit down with your team and create an editorial calendar based upon your answers. This sounds huge, but it’s basically a spreadsheet with suggested topics and dates for your content. It’s also important to assign posts to certain people, so you can give them plenty of time to research and write their content - and maintain accountability. Also, consider the mediums you’re using.
Is it all copy? Try some short video synopses of your top-performing posts (check out one we did with Scott the dog!), or add in some original images to break up the text. Finally, make sure each post goes through one to two thorough reviews from the best writers and editors on your team. They should be counted on to add some final polish and pizazz, so the content that makes it onto your website is doing you - and your customers - a favor.
Frequency of content is important (in terms of SEO and content marketing), but quality content will get you a lot further faster. The first step is coming up with topics that are valuable and relevant, and then making content creation a part of your internal process. Would you like more help setting a content strategy? Give us a call!
Work Habits & Productivity
Jay, the CEO of StringCan, oversees strategy and vision, building culture that makes going into work something he looks forward to, recruiting additional awesome team members to help exceed clients goals, leading the team and allocating where StringCan invests time and money.
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