The term Content Marketing is used quite often by all of us.
So many marketing books stress on this term’s importance, so it’s crucial now to ensure your firm’s content marketing game is quite strong.
When I was reading this book in the last week, it created a direct connection with my first ever book blog. If you haven’t read it yet, it's here
The book This is Marketing and Epic Content Marketing is similar in many ways, given that both talk about the redundancy that the traditional media brings in today.
So for a minute here, I would like to go back and ask you a similar question, which was the last print ad that grabbed your attention?
I would’ve also asked you a similar question for billboard advertising but well we all are home so it wouldn’t make sense :P
But the point that I’m trying to make here is that, traditional media is on the verge of redundancy.
While the book is definitely not specific towards the Indian scenario but the situation here is quite similar.
So if traditional media is redundant, what can marketers focus on?
Digital! Of course, that’s the most obvious answer.
But think, if the answer was so obvious, why would there be any marketing fails at all?
Wouldn’t every campaign succeed with respect to its end goal?
So the answer is not that obvious
And this is where the book Epic Content Marketing, comes in!
Let’s look at my top 10 learnings from the book and some examples for better understanding
Like every marketing effort, even content marketing has a focus that decides the fate of the result.
But more often than not, the focus of content marketing is around the product features.
How many times have you come across an ad that solely talks about the product feature?
Let’s look at an example.
While I totally agree that given a mobile phone, most of the consumers will be interested in the features or the look.
But it still has to be a blend of both, features as well as the benefits to the consumer.
Now if that’s not the focus we need, then what should be the focus?
Customers!
Of course, your customers are not interested in what you have to offer.
They are interested in what’s in it for them?
Let’s look at an example
This is directly talking to your customers, what do you get when you buy Nike?
Is the product compromised?
Definitely not, but it’s the perfect blend that’s needed for the consumer to react and act.
Clearly, the communication works way better here, in comparison to the previous example.
The book mentions that good marketing is the kind that doesn’t concern advertising done by someone else.
But rather focusses on developing content on your own.
So one of the things that I wish to highlight here is the concept of competition advertising.
Let’s look at an example
Now this one is kind of debatable.
But I feel, you don’t need to put down another brand to make your brand stand out.
Most of the time, brands believe that, when it comes to content development, they need to hire the best writers.
They might hire people who have been writing for a long time, but does that always work?
Not really, there are other ways in which your content can be better even if you don’t hire the best of content writers.
This can happen when you hire someone who might not be excellent with writing but knows the topic inside out.
Let’s take an example
If your brand works around the wedding, just hiring a good content writer might not work.
But, what if you get a wedding planner on board and then make him/her work on the content, this would be so much better.
Why? Because the person is writing from their own understanding and experiences.
We cannot expect our content marketing to be sorted by just one effort made at some point in time.
It’s a continuous process, it’s a process that takes time and constant effort.
So, you must work towards making each of your posts better.
I would like to take the example of the Marketing Empress here.
When I first started off, I was not confident in my writing skills but I worked hard towards it.
Constant and consistent efforts work in providing success in the long run.
I’m not sure how many of you have heard about Google’s research on Zero Moment of Truth.
If you haven’t, let me know in the comments if you would like me to cover that as a concept on the blog.
But the point of including this is that it’s believed that consumers need to come across your brand 10 times before they convert into a purchase.
Hence it becomes crucial to ensure that you don’t bombard your customers, but at the same time, you make yourself visible 10 times before expecting a conversion.
It is in this way that your Conversion rate will improve.
I cannot stress enough on this, in fact, forget the book, even in my personal life I believe that unless you can commit to something with your whole heart, you shouldn’t consider it.
You start your process of content marketing, you decide to send out email communications.
These can be shared with your most valuable consumers, who want to know about your company updates.
But imagine you send out 5 communication emails but stop after that.
You will have a few consumers engaging with those emails, and it stops suddenly, adding negativity towards your brand.
Content marketing makes sense only when you are talking about things that interest your audience.
Today, thanks to platforms like Google Analytics, you can know so many things about your audience.
Right from understanding the location of your audience, to their likes and dislikes, everything is available.
So you need to ensure that you are taking those points under consideration before developing content.
We are living in an extremely competitive scenario.
So it might be a good choice to think about marketing before you even come up with the content.
It’s like working backward, don’t write a beautiful piece and then think about how do I market this.
Instead, consider how you can market something and then come up with the content.
How will this help?
This will help because you will already know whether there is a need or interest in the minds of your consumers.
If not, you can avoid working on that content.
Most of the time we do things, that we believe are right or that we believe are interesting.
But that may not be the case, for everyone else.
I might think that a certain way of communicating is a better alternative, but others might not agree.
How do we find a common ground then?
We experiment, try different things, try a few types, and see the response.
The one’s that grab maximum attention, stick to only those.
