The world is slowly moving from traditional advertising and choosing to use digital spaces for advertising. This makes companies embrace the use of audio, video, and written content online as a marketing strategy. However, even as more businesses seek to embrace digital advertising, many people find it challenging to craft the right content strategy for their business online.
Investing in the right content strategy makes improving your reach, being innovative, and planning easier. It also gives you a chance to determine when to post content, how often to produce content, how often you can post it, and how to measure results.
What is a content strategy?
A content strategy is a documented plan outlining your marketing goals, the stories and experiences you would like to share, and the roadmap to achieve this. It gives you a plan and approach to attracting an audience and how to create and distribute content (audio, visual, or written). A good content strategy should be anchored on goals, flexible in approaches, and comprehensive.
How to create the perfect content strategy?
1.) Define your brand
Before crafting a content strategy, you need to define your brand clearly. By correctly positioning your brand, you make it easy to provide the right experience when it comes to your customers and audience. When making the right brand, it is essential to consider the following: who are your customers? Which potential customers do you want to use your product? This will be pivotal when identifying your target audience as a whole. You also need to ask yourself what kind of experience you want your customers to have when they use your product or service and if you are already providing them with it. In addition, ask yourself what makes your brand unique from competitors.
2.) Content strategy goals
Even as you define your brand, it is essential to ask yourself the main objective or goal of your content marketing plan. Craft these goals around the outcomes that you want to achieve. When setting the goals, you need to include what you want your content plan to achieve, what kind of reach you want, the key performance indicators, and how you will measure your results. You also need to outline what you will do before and after to achieve the goals.
3.) Conduct a proper audit of your content
To know where you are headed, it is essential to take stock of the past. Taking a look at the content and conducting a proper audit of the content is one way of doing this. This will help you know which areas are performing well and where you need to improve. You can do this by collecting the most recent content you have posted and the analytics on the content you have made in different categories. After a review, place the content along with the most performing and underperforming areas. Another way to conduct an audit is to compare it with those of your competitors. Some of the content areas you need to check on include the audio, visual and written posts and the messages and feedback relayed by customers, the audience, and your staff.
4.) Determine the right content to offer
Once you have appropriately performed an audit, you should consider what kind of content you would like to produce for your company. Some of the main categories include:
- Brand – Talk a little about your story, when you started the company, and what it is about. You can also talk about some of your goals.
- Talent – Tell about the culture of your workplace and how you have aligned it to your brand.
- Editorial – Give your readers some kickass content that can make them more informed, educated and entertained, or uplifted.
- Products – Create content about products and services you offer.
Once you have mapped this out, you can choose the avenues you would like to pass this information through. For instance, you might consider using podcasts, newsletters, videos, blogs, and articles on your websites or social media handles.
You also need to carry out research about keywords and search engine optimization. By researching keywords, your content is likely to rank higher on search engines and attract more people. Remember, proper keyword research is the backbone of developing the right content for a software development agency.
5.) Publish and manage your content
It is essential to design a content calendar that you can use to track content. This will help you choose where to post content, when to post it and when to plan for campaigns. In addition, it is an excellent way to keep you and your team accountable and ensure that content is published consistently.
6.) Measure and research your results
It is essential to keep track of how your content is doing online. This means you have to measure and research your results properly. Some things you can keep track of include:
Sharing metrics will help you know how much your content resonates with your audience, what your audience is sharing the most, and why.
Consumption metrics– Keep track of content pieces that are being viewed or read more by your audience. For instance, you can note the number of times a blog has been read or rewatched by your audience.
Lead metrics– Find out which content pieces resulted in more traffic on your website overall. Did they lead to direct sales?
Once you have this data, you can put together a plan regarding your future content plans and tweak your plans for better engagement.
Conclusion
Content strategy is a key pillar for digital advertising. You need to have the right strategy to get people involved in your business and for them to engage with you. What are some of the content strategies you have used? Did they work for you?