Have you ever heard the phrase in digital marketing that “content is king?” This is often said because strong content marketing is essential to driving traffic to your website and generating leads. Good content will boost your SEO and build trust, authority, and a general rapport with your audience.
It can be frustrating if you’re constantly putting out content, and it feels like you’re not getting any returns for your hard work. You may need to look to the quality of the content you’re putting out. Here are a few of our tips to up your content marketing game.
#1 – Know the Purpose Of Your Content
Never create content simply for the sake of content. That is extra work for you, and your audience probably won’t gain any benefit from it. Instead, slow down and think about the purpose of the content you’re putting out. You may create a content brief to lay out this purpose before you create the content, especially if you hire freelancers to make videos, graphics, or blog posts for you.
Do you want to educate your audience about an area of your industry? Or explain how your brand can help with problems that they might face? What value does your content offer? What kind of experience does the content provide? Think about it from the perspective of what you want it to accomplish and from the perspective of what it offers to your target audience.
#2 – Know Who You’re Creating Content For
Speaking of target audience, you must also know who your audience is. Accept now that your content and your brand will not be for everyone, and that’s okay. You just need to perform very well for the people who are in your audience. The first step to doing so is to define who your audience is.
This is where it can come in handy to create buyer personas. You may create a few, each representing a different demographic. For instance, let’s say you have great new editing software. This could appeal to college students working on important papers, working professionals who want to produce polished work, or creative writers. You can create a buyer persona for each: a 24-year-old grad student working on a dissertation, a lawyer drafting legal documents, and a full-time author.
Each of these personas represents a demographic within your audience. However, you may need to aim different content at each group in order to be effective. Try to vary up your content to hit all the angles of your audience.
#3 – Be Consistent With Your Schedule
Your audience needs to know when to expect your content. Otherwise, it will be hard for them to follow it. If you write a blog, try to publish your blogs on the same day each week — or month, or on the 15th and 30th of each month. If you have a YouTube channel, pick certain days to post and tell your audience when those days will be.
The frequency of your content matters less than consistency. You can choose to post monthly, weekly, biweekly, bimonthly, or whatever works best for your schedule. But once you choose, make sure to stick to it.
#4 – Find Your Brand Voice
Do you want to create a brand that is friendly and laid back? Or serious and full of authority? However, if you want to express your brand, make sure that comes through in your brand voice. If you want a more fun brand, use exclamation points, bright colors, and upbeat statements throughout your content! For something more serious, keep a professional tone and back up as much as possible with data and statistics.
Just like you need to be consistent with your schedule, stay consistent with your brand voice. Your voice needs to be recognizable from one piece of content to the next. This is your brand’s personality, and it’s what your audience will connect with.
#5 – Choose Your Metrics and Track
Think back to the purpose of your content marketing. Is it to drive traffic to your website? If so, monitor your dashboard to see how much traffic has come to your site since posting your content. If the point is to generate leads, measure the number of leads you’ve created from your content. This will help you get a sense of what’s working and what isn’t. If something isn’t performing the way you had hoped, you may need to pivot in your approach.
