It’s commonplace for brands to now hire agencies to create content in order to grow their business. Content marketing is now the big thing in the digital world – content eccompasses blogs, videos, whitepapers, infographics and guest blogs – all of these things help to drive engagement and build brand loyalty. Loyal customers buy more things; it’s a snowball effect – engaging or educating people through un-salesy content in order to gain their trust.
Creative marketing agencies are paid lots of money to develop content and embark on the development of content without a strategy seems much a like a hit and hope to many. Somewhat like being in a dizzy daze – bashing a piñata with a blindfold on with just a slight hope of releasing the treats on the inside. By going ahead and creating a content marketing strategy, you have effectively taken the blindfold off and are now bashing away, sweets and treats flying all over the show! You can see what you’re doing and the rewards are greater and more easily achievable.
So, why should content marketers embrace strategy planning and what will be achieved by doing so?
Why bother to even create content?
Content marketing and content strategy are not new phenomenons; using content to sell or engage has always been around – content marketing is not content strategy though. There is a difference, but you can’t have one without the other – strategy is nothing without the execution of good content and visa versa. Everything that a brand produces is effectively content, it must all share a tone of voice or have a feeling which is geared towards creating an overall brand – a tweet or a video, an advert in the paper. All must share similar ‘vibes’ – we have all seen what happens when a brand gets its social accounts hacked and the fallout that occurs! It’s clear to see when this happens – keeping in-line with the strategy is key across all of your content output. Keep content consistent.
Where to begin?
- Find the audience
- What is your message?
- What is your USP?
- What are your aims?
When you have established all of these, only then as an agency or brand should you start to create content. It’s more than just a big brand theory – time is money and if your content team is creating content with no real collective aim, the results will be less than impressive. Planning extends to creating calendars, deadlines, conducting brainstorming sessions, client meetings – basically anything to ensure the content being created is the right content.
Find a tone of voice
Plan your titles and create ones which will encourage users to click – click-through rates will improve if you offer titles which are intriguing. Even the broadsheet newspapers are now adopting a tabloid approach when creating their article titles – it’s more noticeable that their titles are now created to either shock or make readers laugh. Try this with your blog titles – sit down as a content team and brainstorm ideas for the future.
Your content should fall into one of these emotional categories:
- Funny
- Sexy
- Shocking
- Controversial
- Cool
- Random
- Cute
- Uplifting
Plan on the results
Data is very much in vogue within the modern digital marketing realm, the phrase ‘Big Data’ appears to be trending across the lips of marketers in 2014. Use the data you receive from your content to tweak the next lot of content you release. See what is working and what doesn’t. Discard any ideas which you feel will not work in the future – data is as integral to marketing as content is – technological changes have created this shift.
Consumers are now digitally empowered, the fragmentation of media channels has disrupted the media mix. Content needs to be consistent across all channels and content can now be whipped up in record times – be reactive!
Play the long game
We mean this in two ways; firstly you should have a long term plan for all the content you are producing – there is no point in short-termism when creating your content strategy. This extends to planning blog posts each week or month for an extended period of time (the length of your client’s contract) – but it’s all about babysteps. By offering potential customers snippets of content, you can build a subscriber base – each ‘snippet’ of information should collate to fulfil an overall message. Be specific with your content production, finding niche subjects for blogs instead of creating vague posts which cover everything – even the most creative of writers will run out of things to say!
Secondly, embracing longform content is now an accepted and a successful tactic to improve your online results. Google algorithms have now changed, they give more credence to longer and better quality content – a web page will rank higher if Google’s Panda and Penguin algorithms deem the content on the page to be relevant or from a well-respected publisher. Become that publisher.
Prioritise
If you are adopting a longform content strategy or you have a large number of clients, you will definitely need to develop a plan in order to prioritise workloads. You may be creating five blogs a month, along with a written report in order to update them on the results of your campaign – you should be flexible and have the ability to switch around your workloads to make sure the client receives the work they have paid for.
Find the right balance between quality and quantity, your content strategy will make this easier to achieve!
Under the bonnet
Digital agencies are funny places, a fusion of creative minds all tinkering away in their respective departments. There is the content team, data, web development, links, client services; your plan will make sure all work in cohesion to embrace your content strategy. A creative agency buzzes with the minds of young employees, their ideas are the lifeblood of the campaigns which are being created for clients.
At Neil Walker Digital, we’re inclined to say the content team is the most important aspect of any online marketing aspect. However, without the support of teammates the content will be unprepared for being unleashed onto the web!
How can the whole agency help the content team?
- Web developers – make the content look fantastic, including layouts and any graphic design / html the content may require.
- Links – The links team can give your content more punch, they will dissect it, injecting relevant links into the body and html.
- SEO – Optimising your content for search engines is the biggie, content should be written naturally and filled with quality informative words which gain the trust of customers – by getting SEO specialists to look over the content afterwards they can adjust it which will directly improve results.
- Client Services – The client services team are the link between the agency and clients – keep each other informed, communicate strategies with one another. The content team should remain in cahoots with client services to gain a commercial awareness into what sort of content the client wants – They are on the frontline!
- Social – By using Facebook, Twitter, Google + and other social networks, the social team will speak to customers directly and share the content that the content team creates. They will know what is working, they can gauge this by the comments or retweets that are gained for example. The content team should ask them the social team which content pieces have received the best results and move forward with that information – tweak your approach if need be!
- Data – The all important data team can create graphs and infographics which translates results into results which are more dissectable – Data is important, you should mould your content strategy around the results the data team provide.
A successful content strategy will incorporate all areas of the business, talk to each other and offer your skills to the other department. Create a strategy which involves each area of the agency and uses each individual’s skills in the right capacity.
Use tools
It can sometimes be difficult to dream up new ideas in order to fulfill your content strategy, there are tools out there which can help your content team develop. We have developed our very own amazing tool here at the Neil Walker Digital Group towers, the ‘Content Marketing Ideas Generator’ is the brainchild of our network science geeks and helps the content team to create titles, topics and craft amazing content for clients – take a look!
By using an ideas generator, or even creating your own, you can ensure you are producing consistently fantastic work on time, which will impress clients and potential customers alike!
We are a communications industry
Our job is to communicate what is great about a brand in order to generate more sales. Simple. But this does not excuse the difficulty we have in communicating internally with one another. Content marketers need to know what a client wants while clients need to know what content marketers are creating – by laying out a framework with specific ideas in the pipeline, trust will be gained between both parties and content of a higher quality and relevance will be rolled out.
Everybody loves a good story, it doesn’t matter which technology you are using – the art of storytelling remains the key to unlocking the trust of your audience. Deliver content which fits within your strategy – build trust, offer value and quality, always connect with your core audience.
By storytelling we don’t mean ‘one upon a time in the land of [insert brand name here]’ – we’re talking about a story of a brand built through consistent targeted content, which is created with the audience solely in mind. Forget salesy content – punters will see you coming, stories should connect emotionally and intellectually.
Create a plan (and stick to it)
Don’t jump straight in at the deep end, and always think long and hard about which form of content will be best for your customers. Content is the new advertising, consumers are wary of marketing and are well clued up – now, much more than ever.
Offer customers a chance to engage in a meaningful way, offer them information for free and optimise the content for each client. If you are a car leasing firm you should look a broad range of topics – talk about the latest supercars or Jeremy Clarkson, for example, make it relevant to your audience. Branded content needs to connect with the right people – embracing a strategy and planning will help to shape who your audience is – and help your brand to make the right impression on them.
Mastering your content strategy and output may seem like a daunting prospect, but the only way you can find out is to try. Try different platforms and see what works, remember:
- Planning
- Creation
- Distribution
- Engagement
Each client should have its own unique content strategy – change the emphasis of your content, adjust accordingly with the differences in audiences and remember to always evolve your ideas. The digital marketing industry is ever-evolving, and that means you should be as well!
Look to satisfy customers, make them think – stimulate their minds, earn the right to turn them into repeat visitors. Content curation can only work through a combination of planning, networking or data science and utilising the right marketing tools. Captivate your audience, become a publisher – be mature about it and do not underestimate the power of content; nobody really clicks on adverts anymore!
Dedicate time to creating a content strategy, it will pay off!
Are you a content marketer in charge of a content team? How do you embrace strategy planning in your work? Join in the conversation at @theukseo now!