Sample Content
This article explores the reasons brands fail to obtain success in their content marketing pursuit and provides ways to overcome these challenges.
Have you come to realise that your content marketing efforts aren’t providing the desired results?
You put up your web content, maybe some blogs and even go ahead to load them with keywords, but at the end of the day, you don’t get the traffic you expect or any traffic at all?
This has been happening to a lot of online businesses, and the reason could shock you.
According to a recent google trend survey, 91% of B2B firms utilise content marketing against 85% of B2C. However, only 5% of these brands stipulate that utilising content marketing actually pays them.
What could the lot be doing wrong?
No clear strategy
Only 37% of B2B and 38% of B2C firms have a documented strategy
Do you have a clear strategy? Do you know what success should be like for you? A target number of keywords and traffic you hope to generate in this month?
If your answer is “no” to any of these, then this is a good place to start.
Without a clear idea of what you are doing and why you are doing it, all your attempts on growing your SEO results are guessing games that will most often than not lead to no success. That’s why 37% of B2B in 2019 had a documented plan.
To get started, make a list of your top-ranking competitors, carry out some analysis on their domain to figure out what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong.
There are lots of free and paid domain analysing tools out there like Neil Patel Ubersugest and SEMrush. Leverage the one that works best for you and check out your competitors.
Jot down the following:
What has made their content successful
Areas they need improvement on
Their social shares. What platform do they share to? And who shares their content?
Having that down, go ahead and strategize the right approach to beat them at their own game.
No Nurturing for each stage of the buyer’s Journey
79% of generated leads never turn to purchase due to lack of nurturing
It is now pretty rare for a potential customer to work into your physical store to get all the convincing going even when they are just next block to you.
According to the GE capital bank retail report for 2019, 81% of consumers prefer searching out their product online before purchase. What does that tell you?
That the sales funnel is longer than before, and you have to do your best to lead your potential consumers from the point of awareness to the point of purchase.
As a business looking to bring in more customers through content marketing, there are three stages where you need to prepare the right contents to guide your prospects to the purchase door:
Awareness stage
Consideration stage
Purchase stage
Smart brands include an unofficial fourth stage that targets current customers to gain reoccurring sales and possible more awareness from customers’ referrals and feedback.
So, what content do you create to target these stages of the content marketing funnel?
Awareness — Social media updates and Ads, Blog posts, Infographics, Podcasts, Videos, Reports, whitepapers, landing pages, and eBooks.
Consideration stage — your brand whitepaper, guides, webinars, live interactions, case studies, email quizzes, and more.
Purchase stage — competitive comparisons (reviews), testimonials, customer stories, demo, consultations, free trial, detailed specifications, and discounts.
You haven’t invested and waited enough
57% of B2B brands hope to increase their spending in the next 12 months while only 2% desire to decrease
What does that stats tell you about investing in content marketing? It is worth the time and money!
Getting your content in front of your target customer takes more than just planning. It isn’t a get instant results kind of strategy. Instead, it is more of a long-term commitment with outstanding results able to provide 3x the results of paid search adverts.
As a content marketer, you have to expect to see your ROI within 3 to 6 months, with significant results knocking down your door around 12 months.
Whereas it takes time for you to see the results of your content marketing efforts, content marketing has a lower upfront cost when compared to paid advertising. Also, as the months roll by, your results start to pick momentum while your cost per yearly marketing decreases.
What does this all mean for you?
It means that if you are not doing the marketing in content marketing effectively, then your business content strategy is dead in the water.
Here are ways to begin effective content marketing:
Learn, hire, and apply SEO
Send email broadcasts
Pay to promote
Engage with your online and offline community
Get your site in roundups
Guest post in authoritative sites
Seek the services of influencers
Reach out to people of the same interest on social
Contents lack inspiration
Have you asked yourself, “Is this content good enough?”
There is a reason why Journalists, Press Release writers, Direct Response writers, and any other experienced writer with the creative juice are sort for when it is time to create content people want to read.
And that is?
They know how to bring out the shine on any topic!
When your content lacks inspiration, the right angle, and value to strike a chord in the reader’s heart, it becomes less likely for them to click or take your desired action.
Before you take up a topic, it is always wise to ask yourself these questions:
Before selecting your topic: Is this worth writing? Are there people who are out there looking for this information?
Before writing: How do I approach this topic? What is the right angle to write on this topic? Should I explore things from the opposing view? How do I outperform my competitors?
After writing: If I was the reader, will I deem this content worthy of my time?
These questions though seemingly harmless can get your creative wheel spinning in the right direction.
Alongside these, try to avoid these culprits of unsharable contents:
Hiring an inexpensive or inexperience writer
Picking up entirely boring topics
Writing on a topic without understanding your target audience
Lacking an idea of the kind of topics that your brand should focus on.
Closing Thoughts
With the huge long-term benefits content marketing has to offer brands, the search for impactful content that will be the next viral piece on the net or set community continues with some domains witnessing fiercer competition. Only those ready to meet the battle head-on and win the confidence of their target audience will find themselves on the top list.
