How to create a good content strategy?

How to create a good content strategy

Whether you're just starting out in content marketing or have been using the same approach for a while, it never hurts to review your content strategy plan and make sure it's up-to-date, innovative and engaging for your prospects and customers - no matter when and how they want to buy. If you're having trouble planning for the year ahead, or need some fresh ideas to incorporate into your plan. In this article, we'll discuss what a content strategy is, why your business needs a content marketing plan, and the steps you need to take to create one. We will also look at some examples of effective content marketing strategies for inspiration.

What is a content strategy?

A content strategy is a plan to use content (audio, visual and/or written) to achieve business goals. A successful content strategy engages your target audience at every stage of the funnel and keeps their attention after the purchase. Let's say your business goals include increasing brand awareness. To achieve this, you can implement a content strategy that focuses on SEO to increase your site's visibility on search engine results pages (SERPs) and drive traffic to your products or services. New business owners may assume that a content strategy is a nice-to-have, but it's not necessary at the outset. However, producing high-quality content can be invaluable in building trust with new audiences and long-term success. Essentially, a good content strategy is the foundation for the attraction and delight stages of the customer journey, which follow the framework of inbound marketing. In addition to attracting customers to your brand, you can use content strategy to enable sales and satisfy customers. In addition, with 70% of marketers actively investing in content marketing, it is critical to develop a good content strategy to compete in your industry. When developing a content strategy, you need to answer a few questions. Let's dive into them now.

1. Who will read your content?

Who is the target audience for your content? For how many audiences will you create content? Just as your business can have multiple types of customers, your content strategy can be aimed at multiple types of users. Using different content types and channels will help you deliver content tailored to each persona.

2. What problem will you solve for your target audience(s)?

Ideally, your product or service will solve a problem that you know your audience needs. Likewise, your content will coach and educate your audience through this problem as they begin to identify and address it. A good content strategy supports people on both sides of your product: those who are just figuring out what their key challenges are, and those who are already using your product. Your content reinforces the solution(s) you offer and helps build credibility with your target audience.

3. What makes you unique?

Competitors are likely to have a similar product to yours, which means potential customers need to know what makes yours better - or at least different. Perhaps your main advantage is that your business has been in operation for many years. Or maybe you have a unique brand voice that sets you apart from your competitors. To prove why you're worth buying from, you need to prove why you're worth listening to. Once you've figured that out, you can infuse that message into your content.

4. What content formats will you focus on?

To figure out what formats to focus on, you need to meet your audience where you are. While you may be tempted to start a podcast or YouTube channel, first find out where your audience lives. Otherwise, you could be wasting your time creating content that either won't reach your audience or won't capture their attention. Once you've identified the best formats, start budgeting to assess what resources you can allocate to implement this strategy.

5. What channels will you use to publish?

Just as you can create content in different formats, you can publish on different channels, from your website to social media. Again, this will reflect where your audience lives. If your audience prefers long-form video content, you may decide to publish your content on YouTube. If you have a younger audience that prefers fast content, you could opt for TikTok and Instagram. More on social media content strategy is discussed in the step-by-step guide later in this article.

6. How will you manage content creation and publishing?

Figuring out how you will create and publish all your content can be a daunting task.

Before you implement it, it's important to establish:

• Who is creating what.
• Determine who will create what and where it will be published.
• When it will go live.

In a small team, this can be quite simple as you may be the sole decision maker. However, as your business grows, you may need to work with multiple content teams to develop an effective process.

Today's content strategies prevent clutter by managing content by topic. By designing your content calendar around themes, you can easily get your company's message across and, over time, establish yourself as an authority in the marketplace.

Why should marketers create a content marketing strategy?

Content marketing helps businesses prepare and plan for reliable and cost-effective website traffic and new lead sources. If you can only create one blog post that generates consistent organic traffic, an embedded link to an e-book or free tool will continue to generate leads for you over time - long after you click "Publish". A reliable source of traffic and leads from evergreen content gives you the flexibility to experiment with other marketing tactics to generate revenue, such as sponsored content, social media ads and distributed content.

What's more, your content will not only help attract leads, but will also educate and build awareness for your brand.

How to create a content strategy framework

• Define your purpose.
• Conduct a personality survey.
• Run a content audit.
• Choose a content management system.
• Determine the type of content you want to create.
• Upload ideas for content.
• Publish and manage your content.

Now let's dive into the specifics of creating a content marketing plan.

1. Define your goal.

What is the purpose of developing a content marketing plan? Why do you want to produce content and create a content marketing plan? Know your goals before you start planning and you will be able to better determine what is best for your strategy.

2. Conduct a personality survey.

To develop a successful plan, you need to clearly define your target audience for your content - also known as your buyer personas. This is especially important for those just starting out or new to marketing. If you know your target audience, you can produce more relevant and valuable content that they will want to read and convert. If you are an experienced marketer, your target audience may have changed. Are you looking to target a new audience or expand your current target market? Do you want to keep the same target audience? Reviewing audience parameters with market research every year is essential to growing your audience.

3. Run a content audit.

Early on, most brands start with blog posts. If you want to explore different formats, run a content audit to assess your best and worst performing content. Then use this information to inform which direction to go next. If you've been up and running for a while, it's worth reviewing your content marketing efforts and results over the past year. Figure out what you can do differently in the coming year and set new goals. Now is the time to align your team's goals with those of the rest of your organisation. Whatever stage you're at, a content audit will help you determine what resonates best with your audience, identify gaps in your topic clusters, and brainstorm fresh content ideas.

4. Choose a content management system.

Some vital parts of content management are content creation, content publishing and content analysis. To create, manage and track content easily and sustainably, you should invest in a CMS.

5. Identify the type of content you want to create.

There are many options for what kind of content you can create, from written content like e-books and blog posts to audio content like podcasts. In the next section, we'll discuss some of the most popular content formats that marketers are creating, as well as some tools and templates to get you started.

6. Brainstorm content ideas.

It's time to start brainstorming for your next content project.

It can be a daunting task to figure out how you're going to create and publish all of your content.
It's important to establish before you implement:

• Who is creating this
• Who will publish it
• Who will create it, who will publish it, when it will go live

7. Publish and manage your content.

Your marketing plan should go beyond the type of content you will create - it should also cover how you will organise your content. An editorial calendar will put you on the right track to publishing a balanced and varied content library on your website. Then create a social media content calendar to promote and manage your content on other sites. Many of the ideas you come up with will be evergreen (i.e.: just as relevant months or years from now as they are today). However, you shouldn't ignore timely topics either. While they may not make up the bulk of your editorial calendar, they can help you generate traffic spikes. Most people expect to incorporate popular holidays such as New Year's into their marketing efforts, but you don't have to limit yourself to these important marketing dates. If there are niche holidays that may appeal to your audience, you may want to post content on your blog or social media. Check out our final list of social media holidays - keep an eye on it when planning your calendar.

Types of content marketing

• Blog posts
• Ebooks
• Case Studies
• Templates
• Infographics
• Videos
• Podcasts
• Social media

These are the eight most popular types of content marketing you can create for your readers and customers.

1. Blog posts

In case you haven't noticed, you're currently reading a blog post. Blog posts live on a website and should be published regularly to attract new visitors. Posts should provide valuable content for your audience, which will encourage them to share your posts on social media and other sites. We recommend that blog posts are between 1,000 and 2,000 words in length, but it's worth experimenting to see if your audience prefers longer or shorter reads.

2. Ebooks

Ebooks are lead generation tools that are downloaded by website visitors after they submit a lead form with their contact details. They are typically longer, deeper and less frequent than blog posts, which are written to attract visitors to the website. But e-books are not only effective at the top of the funnel. E-books serve different purposes at different stages of the customer journey. Awareness e-books help educate a potential customer about a particular pain point and are an excellent lead capture tool. Content should remain introductory and informative. E-books can convert leads in the funnel by providing them with useful tools as prospects think more deeply about their needs. An ebook here can delve deeper into a particular problem and possible solutions, and include templates or calculators. Further down the funnel, ebooks should become more personalised and offer more sales content. Comparison guides or an ebook with case studies are beneficial for interested parties at this stage. E-books are the next step in the inbound marketing process: after reading a blog post such as this one, visitors may be interested in more information. That's where calls to action (CTAs) come in, which direct people to a landing page where they can enter their contact details and download an e-book to find out more valuable information for their business. In turn, the business that created the ebook has a new lead that the sales team can contact.

3. Case studies

A case study allows you to tell a customer story, giving credibility to the process. The case study is perhaps the most versatile type of content marketing because it can take many different forms. Case studies can take the form of a blog post, e-book, podcast or even an infographic. The aim is to show how your product has helped real-life businesses succeed. Before selecting a client for a case study, you need to identify the business area you are trying to create value for.

4. Templates

Templates are effective content marketing examples worth trying because they generate leads while offering tremendous value to your audience. If you provide your audience with template tools that save them time and help them achieve success, they'll be more likely to engage with your content in the future.

5. Infographics

Infographics can organise and visualise data in a much more convincing way than words alone. They are great content formats if you are trying to share a lot of data in a way that is clear and easy to understand. If you're ready to get started, get our templates to create beautiful infographics in less than an hour.

 
6. Videos

Videos are a highly engaging content medium and can be shared on social media platforms and websites alike. Videos require a greater investment of time and resources than written content, but since visual content still offers a high return on investment, it's a medium worth exploring.

7. Podcasts

Starting a podcast will help your audience find your brand if they don't have the time or inclination to read content every day. The number of podcast listeners is growing - in 2021, the number of podcast listeners in the US increased by 10% compared to the previous year. If you have interesting interviews or conversations to lead, consider podcasting as another content format to experiment with.

8. Social media

If you've been publishing content regularly on your own site for a while, start thinking about a social media strategy to distribute your content on social media. As well as sharing your content, you can adapt it to new formats and create original content specifically for each platform. Posting on social media is key to amplifying your brand reach and getting your content to your customers where you know they spend their time. Popular social networks include:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• Twitter
• LinkedIn
• Pinterest
• Snapchat
• YouTube

If you're starting a business account on any of the above social networks, tailor your content to the platform.

On Instagram, for example, users want aesthetic visuals. With feeds, IGTV, Stories, there's plenty of room to play. TikTok, on the other hand, appeals to the younger generation who want trendy, funny and creative short videos. Do a little market research to find out which platforms your customers are on and tailor your content to their expectations. Developing a successful content marketing strategy takes time, organisation and creativity. From laying the groundwork for a content marketing plan to adding tools to better manage your content, developing your strategy for the new year will be a no-brainer if you follow the steps and explore the resources here.