Content marketing

Engage potential customers with your business using content marketing. Follow the step-by-step content strategy on this page.

What is content marketing?

Content marketing is a marketing method that engages potential customers by providing them with content that actually moves them forward.

The focus in this form of marketing is not on the product or service, but on the added value for the (potential) customer.

What is content?

Very briefly a step back, because it is important to have a uniform picture of exactly what content is and what forms there are.

Content in this context simply means content. The tricky thing is that this is too general a term. On a website, content includes a text, image or video. But a white paper, e-book, or case study is also content. Therefore, some structure is desirable.

Basic elements

Content always consists of: text, image, or sound, or a combination thereof. With these three basic elements, numerous content forms have been created over the years.

Content Forms

Content comes in various forms:

The following content forms are frequently used in content marketing:

• Articles: blog articles, interviews, case studies, etc.
• Posts: news releases, press releases, etc.
• White papers & e-books
• Videos: vlogs, explainer videos etc.
• Visualizations: infographics, charts, models
• Manuals: how to's, roadmaps etc.
• Checklists
• FAQs

Why is content marketing effective?

Content marketing works because potential customers appreciate it in the long run when you help time after time, thereby solving their problems. They get to know you as a problem solver. The thinking is that if you do this well and consistently, they will eventually reward your help with a commission.

The law of reciprocity plays an important role here, it reads:

Reciprocity is the mutual obligation within a relationship to reciprocate a gift with a counter-gift. (source: Wikipedia)

This law actually works quite simply: if you do something for another person, the other person feels obliged to do something in return. This is especially true if you do something for the other person time after time, as in content marketing. You give first, before you take.

Don't believe this is really how it works? Then think about the candy you get with your restaurant bill. The only reason for this, is the law of reciprocity. In fact, customers then tip more! Prof. Robert B. Cialdini even showed with the peppermint experiment that giving more candies results in a higher tip(Cialdini, 2016).

Content marketing is best described as a flywheel. It can be laborious to get going, but once it's spinning, there's no stopping it! The flywheel really takes off when you genuinely surprise your potential customers with your content. Many of them will be inclined to share the content via social media, for example. That's when your reach really multiplies!

Content strategy in 8 steps

A well thought-out content strategy is the foundation for good content marketing. Follow the steps below to form a content strategy for your organization.

1. Determine goals
2. Buyer persona research
3. Content marketing audit
4. Content marketing plan
5. Content mapping
6. Content planning
7. Content creation
8. Evaluation & optimization

1. Set content marketing objectives

Content marketing goals align with other marketing objectives. At Bright Digital, we recommend viewing content marketing as a key component in an inbound marketing strategy.

In the inbound marketing model, there are three distinct steps that may be viewed as milestones:

1. Attract
2. Engage
3. Delight

Content marketing goals you derive from these. In doing so, also analyze where the most gains can be made to set the right priorities. Is attracting new visitors to the Web site lagging behind? Then make that a priority objective. Are the number of visitors doing well, but not converting them into enough leads? Then make lead generation the primary objective.

It is also possible to set additional "soft" goals for content marketing. For example, a common goal is thought leadership. This means that the market sees you as an expert within your field. As a leader within your field even. These types of goals can be inspiring, but the downside is that they are very difficult to make SMART.

2. Get to know the needs of your buyer personas

The goal in both content marketing and inbound marketing, is to best advance the potential customer. This requires in-depth knowledge of the target audience.

A buyer persona survey gives you insight into the needs of your ideal customer. Therefore, our advice is to conduct this research as early as possible in the process. The insights you gain will definitely help you along the way.

In addition, a keyword research is an excellent addition. This research is wrongly associated purely with SEO. This is a shame, because in addition to SEO insights, a keyword research also provides detailed insight into the (online) needs of the target audience and the terminology they use.

3. Content marketing audit

Time to take stock of where you are now. You do this with a content marketing audit. You make an inventory of what efforts have been made, what output this has produced and what the results were.

Make an inventory of whether sufficient content is available for each phase in the buyer journey. After all, the customer's journey on the way to a purchase and the changing needs that accompany it are an important part of content marketing thinking.

4. Content marketing plan

A plan of action for content marketing does not have to be a lofty plan. In fact, a pragmatic plan has a higher chance of coming to fruition. Therefore, keep your plan short, but powerful.

Essential elements

Short, but powerful, in other words. However short a plan may be, there are some things that should not be missing:

• Deduction of objectives and associated KPIs.
• How you plan to achieve the objectives.
• The place (and degree) of content marketing in relation to other marketing methods.
• Where you will deploy content marketing: what themes, campaigns, PMCs?
• What is needed for implementation: people, processes and systems

Content marketing models

Models help you structure and shape the content marketing plan. Two pragmatic models are:

3H model

This model divides your content into three types:

1. Hero content: this content is meant to create reach. it has a high appeal and share factor.
2. Hub content: this content provides consistent reach to your target audience and is usually offered periodically to the target audience through email marketing, for example.
3. Help content: this is the basis of content marketing. This content is found (with a handful of help from SEO) because it actively helps customers move forward.

The pyramid shape of the model indicates that the further down you go in the pyramid, you need more content. So you need more help content than hub content and you need more hub content than hero content.

6C model

The 6C model is all about making the right combinations. The model has the following six Cs:

• Channels: the channels through which you distribute the content.
• Content: the types and types of content.
• Community: the places where content is shared.
• Crossmedia: the extent to which different channels are used interchangeably.
• Comfort: the ease with which the customer can access and share the content.

Tip:
The right combination of channel and customized content for that channel promote comfort. This enhances interaction (engagement) and the potential customer is more likely to respond, share the content and feel engaged.

5. Content mapping

Content maps help you come up with content ideas for content marketing campaigns.

The content map focuses on the buyer journey phases, because we have the ambition to create the right content for the potential customer for each phase in the buying process.

For each buyer journey phase you define:

1. The main question of the buyer persona.
2. As many sub-questions as possible derived from the main question.

Then you do content ideas with a small team of up to 6 people. The content should provide answers and/or solutions to the buyer persona's questions. For this reason, a buyer persona survey -before content mapping- is essential!

Once the content ideas are formed, determine which content forms best fit the ideas. Try to come up with more ideas at this stage than you can now put into action. This way you will have substance for the future!

When do you use which content form?

When to use which content depends on your buyer persona and content strategy. However, for inspiration, the Content Marketing Matrix of Smart Insights offers a solution.

In the matrix, you will find the four content types in the form of four quadrants. The content types are placed within the quadrants. As you can see, the content types "Entertain" and "Educate" are related to the beginning of the buyer journey and the content types "Inspire" and "Convince" are related to the end of it.

Don't pin yourself down on it

Use the Content Marketing Matrix for inspiration, but no more than that. By this we mean: don't pin yourself to it. For example: in the matrix, an article (article) is associated with the initial stages of the buyer journey and this content form is placed at the intersection of educate and entertain.

This is not surprising, because many articles are indeed written for the awareness phase and aim to teach the reader something in a (slightly) entertaining way. However, articles can also very well be deployed at the end of the buyer journey and thus can indeed be written to convince or inspire the reader. It just depends on what kind of article you write.

6. Content planning

It is wise to plan all content in advance. This way, you stay well thought out and consistently under the attention of the target audience. In addition, the entire team knows where they stand and what needs to be done when.

Content is planned using a content calendar. You include in this:

• Content creation: when will the content be created?
• Content publishing: when will the content be published?
• Content distribution: when will the content be distributed?

A digital content calendar is a useful tool for planning these things and assigning tasks directly to team members.

7. Content creation

In the previous stages, all preparations have been made to create content in a thoughtful and planned manner. Now it's time to start writing! (and/or recording).

Tips for content creation

• Buyer persona central: put the needs of your buyer persona at the center of your writing.
• Create a framework: start by writing down point by point what you want to cover and then come up with a working title and subheads for the text.
• Provide structure: make sure a text always has a clear introduction, core and conclusion.
• Employ storytelling: tell a story, or use an anecdote. This drags people into what you want to convey.
• Review: re-read the text at another time. Do this at the time of day when you are most focused.
• Use images: a picture says more than 1,000 words. Reinforce your message with homemade images. These don't always have to be masterpieces!
• Pay attention to the title: think of the final title at the end so that it covers the exact point. Pay close attention to the title. This is a determining factor for people to read your text or not!

8. Evaluation & optimization

In step 1 you determined your goals for content marketing. In this phase you monitor whether these objectives are met.

Of course, the success of content marketing, not only depends on the strength of the content. The marketing channels always play an important role and when lead generation is an objective, conversion also plays a crucial role.

Of course, with content marketing, it is important to evaluate the quality of the content. There are a number of KPIs in Google Analytics that can help you do this. Consider session duration and bounce rate. However, it is important to realize that these KPIs have some snags. For example, session duration is influenced by bounce rate. In addition, there are some other considerations that you need to take into account when steering on these KPIs.

Agency, or do it yourself?

At Bright, we recommend never completely outsourcing content marketing to a content marketing agency. After all, the success of content marketing is all about the quality of content. You your colleagues have by far the most knowledge of your field. That knowledge is needed within content marketing.

However, we are convinced that a collaboration offers added value. Take advantage of our years of expertise in inbound marketing.