Why You Need a Solid Content Strategy Plan – Make Your Content Creation Work
You wrote a blog post that you’re proud of. It has value. It’s well researched and it provides tons of useful tips. You hit publish and wait…and wait. Nothing.
There’s no denying it. Today’s market is all about your content strategy. Think about what you do when you have a question. You most likely reach for google and start typing.
“How to get a wine stain out of a white couch”
“Who wrote the song Stairway to Heaven”
“What are the top 5 vacation spots for couples”
Whatever the question – searching online is the go-to strategy. Your content strategy makes a huge difference. It decides if people come to you or your competition for answers.
Content marketing is one of the most valuable investments for your business. Compared to traditional marketing, Content marketing is less costly. It is also 3 times more likely to bring in leads.1 Business that use strategies like consistent blogs are more likely to get sales. 61% of online purchases result from reading a blog!
Despite content strategy being essential, 58% of B2B don’t have a clear content strategy in place. There is no denying that content marketing can make or break your business. So what is content creation and how can you use it in your business?
Content Creation From the Beginning – How to Get Started
Content creation is the core of every question you ask google. Whether it’s’ a how-to-guide or a simple recipe – it’s all content creation. Google answers about 4 billion questions a day from users like you and me.
It’s part of our daily life. Informing, educating, entertaining, or answering a question, we all consume content daily. Content comes in many forms:
Blogs
Emails
Podcasts
Videos
Ads
Offers
Content creation is at the core of your engagement with your target audience. The truth is…if you’re not creating content for your business, you’re behind your competition. Content means growth – plain and simple.
Getting started with content creation can be a daunting task. With so many topics and so much information, it can be hard to focus on any topic. To get started consider:
Who will be reading my content?
What problem am I trying to solve?
What makes me unique?
Your content should always match an exact type of person. Do NOT write a generic piece meant to capture *everyone*. It will not work.
You only have a few seconds to capture the attention of your audience. You must convey what problem you’re solving. You have only a few seconds to tell your audience that you’re there to address their pain points. Make sure you know what they are before you start.
With so much competition, focus on how you stand out. Make sure you get across how you’re different, better, etc.
Anyone working in marketing will tell you – content creation is the heart of your inbound marketing. So let's dig a little deeper into the world of content creation and strategy.
What Makes Good Content Strategy
So you’re thinking…great I’ll start creating more content to grow my business. The problem is not all content ranks the same. You can write amazing content only to find out that google doesn’t agree with you.
The difference comes down to your content strategy.
Consider this, if you’re traveling to a destination you need to know how to get there. You use GPS to figure out how. Your content strategy is your turn-by-turn directions to reach that destination. It's your GPS. Before you start creating content, you should make sure you have a solid strategy in place. If you don’t, you’ll get lost along the way.
Before getting started consider the 3 W’s – Who, Where, What.
Who are you creating the content for
Where are you publishing
What type of content
All About the Who
The first part of your content strategy should always deal with your target audience. Start by answering Who am I speaking to?
You want your inbound content strategy to be successful. Your readers must feel like you’re speaking to them. You should have a clear understanding of your audience:
Obstacles
Pain points
Challenges
Fears
Dreams
Ideal outcome
An easy way to get started with this is to create a profile. Write down in detail who your target audience is. Create a detailed profile and a personality. Write to that person.
Where
Like real estate and buying a house, the *where* matters. The type of content you are creating will be different depending on where it will be published. You wouldn’t create the same content for youtube as you would when writing a landing page. Where you publish will depend on where your target audience hangs out.
What
Once you have your who and where you can start focusing on the type of content. The type of content you create will depend on where your audience hangs out. You’re thinking of writing a blog on your website BUT your audience hangs out on Youtube. If you don’t identify this early on, you’ll be wasting your time with content that won’t reach your audience.
Once you’ve answered your 3 W’s, you’re ready to start creating. Keep in mind that the best Now you focus on making good content.
What Makes Good Content
When you’ve determined your 3 Ws, you have a clear idea of who you are writing for. Next is creating content that has… good content. It may seem obvious but we know, that not all content is the same.
With any piece of content you write, you have to keep two readers in mind. Google and your ideal audience. There are different components when considering each of these readers. For Google you’re taking into account things like
Headlines
Word count
Keywords
The list goes on. When writing for google, it’s important to understand SEO content. This determines how you will rank on google. It also impacts your organic traffic. For more information on SEO copywriting you can visit my blog here.
The other side of that is the human behind the screen. Storytelling is the heart of writing to your reader. Storytelling is key to any good content. Good storytelling can:
Create strong emotion
Encourage action from your reader
Increase authenticity
Using emotional techniques can help your story come to life. It will compel your audience to crave more of what you’re offering. Pair this with a strong call to action and you’ll see results.
Social Media & Digital Content Strategy
When it comes to your social media strategy, you may be thinking – I can post what I want when I want to. You can take that approach but I don't recommend it. Odds are you’ll be wasting your time and not seeing the kind of results you are hoping for.
When posting to social media, your strategy should still include the previous steps. You should have a clear idea of your audience. When posting to social media, your strategy should still include the previous steps. You should have a clear idea of your audience. For your social media content strategy, you need your KPI – a key performance indicator. These include things like:
Brand Awareness
Growing your audience
Grow community engagement
Having those three steps established then allows you to:
Drive traffic to your website
Drive leads and sales
Once you have this established, you need to set up metrics to track your indicators. Metrics can vary depending on your business. You want to understand:
how many people your posts have reached
your click-through-rate
your social engagement.
If you’re using hashtag performance and sentiment as part of your strategy, it is important to measure those metrics too. Any good social media strategy will include a sentiment analysis.
You can also use hashtag performance and sentiment. Sentiment analysis will show you how people are responding to your content. Once you have your indicators set, it’s time to focus on content based on your digital platform.
The type of content you post will depend on the platform you and your audience are using. The same thing applies here as when writing to google. Not all content ranks the same. Below is a short breakdown of the most common platforms2.
You may find this surprising but videos are the go-to for 500 million users daily. Users scroll Instagram daily for stories. Another 130 million users will tap a tagged product from IG brand accounts – Making shoppable products very popular.
Facebook users also tend to prefer videos. Users avoid text posts, especially with links.
Pinterest is all about the images. The platform is built around sharing and saving infographics. The best kind of content for this is vertical images.
LinkedIn is a valuable tool for marketing. It’s a great platform for lead generation. A variety of content can be used here. Depending on your performance indicators, you can adjust your content. If you’re looking for the most views – a single image or video tends to do best.
Twitter is a fast-moving platform. It’s easy and quick to get lost in the content. The strategy here should be focused on standing out – use images, and gifs.
Putting it all together
A great content strategy is having a plan in place. You must check your KPI so you can adjust as you go. No plan is bulletproof. You have to be willing to learn and grow along the way.
Keeping track of everything on your own can feel overwhelming. With a solid content strategy plan in place, it will take some stress off you.
Take some time to look at your existing plan. Do you have all the parts that make a successful strategy?
If you want a comprehensive content strategy plan, you can schedule a consultation here today.
