The best inbound marketing campaigns have a foundation of quality content. It's what attracts and encourages your audience to interact with your business for the long term. The more a visitor finds your content for their needs, the more willing they will be to become a buyer. That is why every business should verify that creating relevant content is part of their inbound strategy.
In this article you will learn:
- The importance of an inbound marketing content strategy
- The types of inbound marketing content you can create
- Strategies on how to leverage that content
What is Inbound Marketing Content?
There is a big difference between creating random content and creating content that is specifically tailored to your target audience. If you create content with your audience's needs and problems in mind, then you are providing them with relevant and valuable information.
Successful inbound marketing takes into account a buyer's journey by publishing content that will prompt them to not only stay but become ideal customers in the future.
So, how can you do this? By creating different types of content most relevant and accessible to your target audience.
Here are some types of Inbound Marketing Content:
- Blogs
- Videos
- Podcasts
- Ebooks
The key to this strategy is utilizing each piece of content created to its maximum potential by being able to use the same content on different platforms just by changing the format. By delivering the same piece of content in multiple ways throughout your various channels, social platforms, and website, you are guaranteed a higher chance of success per each piece of content.The more great articles, blogs, and videos you post, the easier it will be for prospective customers to find your business.
Bottom line: leveraging content in your inbound marketing campaign is one of the most resourceful and successful strategies your business can utilize. Using each piece of content in various ways will allow you to reach the highest ROI on each of those pieces.
Here are a few things you can do to leverage your content marketing strategy:
Leverage your content by focusing on quality over quantity
You might have heard that in order to keep your site active by Google’s standards, you have to create new content every week. This isn’t wrong, but just remember that this advice applies mostly to search engine optimization.
Within the context of inbound marketing, however, quality standards are more important than the frequency of your posts. According to a recent CIO article, you’re more likely to engage users by posting one truly great article as opposed to a handful of non-inspired ones:
“By some estimates, only one-fourth of all content produced ends up getting any likes or shares at all – a powerful indication of overall performance. That means if you want to maximize the ROI of your content marketing campaign, you need to find a way to keep your content unrivaled in quality. If you’re keeping your time and monetary investments the same, you can achieve this by developing fewer pieces at a higher overall quality; one knockout performance piece is far better than even four or five mediocre ones.”
Remember, people don’t share mediocre content with their friends. It takes a really good article for someone to pass it on. Make your articles ones that people will race to share with others.
There’s nothing wrong with repurposing content
Typically, the problem is that when businesses prioritize quality, they sometimes don’t post frequently enough to consistently engage their target audiences. In this respect, your content might engage users, but it won’t move them along in the buying process.
That’s why businesses should repurpose content and squeeze as much value as they can out of each article. After your content makes its rounds on social media and in your marketing emails, it can resurface if it becomes relevant again.
This is where the different types of content can help. By being aware of all the possible avenues that could transform an older piece of content into a strong one again, you are maximizing ROI for your business.
For example, consider converting long-form content, like ebooks and white papers, to short-form content, like blogs. Or perhaps turning a key point in an article into an eye-catching image that could be shared on social media.
Diverse content attracts different users
It’s great to specialize with respect to content creation, but it becomes a problem if your content lacks diversity. If you only post blogs, for example, then you’ll attract one type of consumer.
There are many different preferred ways of receiving information within your own target audience and, as a marketer, it is essential to seize that opportunity.
According to a recent Huffington Post article, businesses should post different types of written, visual, and interactive content to engage as many users as possible:
“Using optimized static pages, blog posts, infographics, and video, you can reach entirely different people. There is a growing demand for ways to digest information more quickly than reading mostly text-based articles. Posting Infographics from your site on Pinterest or embedding videos from your YouTube channel can drive new types of traffic to your site. These are people who share interests that might become customers, but who don’t access data in the same way you might.”
By reconsidering your regular content formats, you will unlock a whole group of. potential customers you might have never come across.
Of course, you should post the type of content that engages your target audience. Just make sure you’re not excluding anyone in your content strategy!
Reevaluate your website content
It’s common for businesses to get so wrapped up in content creation that they forget about their website content. Any article you post, however, will never be as important as the text on your site. Reevaluate your website content and consider if it’s time for a change. Remember that you have to optimize it for SEO and target prospective customers at the same time.
Navigate your own website and look at it through your visitor's eyes, taking into account what might be hindering an excellent user experience.
Refresh your strategy
Having a good content strategy is essential for an effective inbound marketing campaign.
In order to share your products or services with your target audience, you must first ensure the content you provide is relevant enough to feature your website in search results.
If you can write read-worthy, shareable articles and promote them to your target audience. This kind of content will then nurture your visitors to potential customers and eventually help to generate even more leads.
Consider implementing these tips and understanding the importance of content in your inbound marketing strategies to see just how successful your business can become.
