Simple Tips to Improve Your Content Marketing

According to the Content Marketing Institute, content marketing generates more than three times as many leads as outbound marketing while costing 62% less; and content marketing has six times higher conversion rates than any other method.

However, in order to reap the benefits of content marketing, a clear strategy must be in place.

Here's what you should do if you're just "getting started" with content marketing and want to make sure it's effective.

1. Define Your Goals

Consider why you want to create content and what you hope to achieve with it. Do you want to increase the number of leads you generate? Increase your company's exposure? Showcase your industry knowledge? By thinking about your business goals, you can easily develop the rest of your content strategy and determine which content assets to use.

2. Build or Refine Your Buyer Persona

Buyer personas give you insight into your prospects, allowing you to comprehend their business pain points, goals, and day-to-day business issues. If you understand the business issues that your prospects are facing, you can begin to create specific, targeted content to assist them in resolving those issues.

With high-quality content tailored to your target audience, you can demonstrate your understanding of their business problem(s), demonstrate your knowledge and expertise, and gradually position your company as the solution.

3. Run a Content Audit

Before you begin creating new content assets, go over your existing content (if any), repurpose it (if possible), and try to identify any content gaps. After reviewing your existing content, map it to specific buyer personas and the stages of the buyer's journey: awareness, consideration, and decision.

4. Research Keywords

While search engines now place a greater emphasis on topics rather than specific keywords, keywords continue to play an important role in your overall content strategy, particularly when attempting to understand what your prospects are looking for. Avoid using generic keyword terms because people searching for these terms may not be looking for what you have to offer – and these terms will be highly competitive, so avoid them.

5. Promote!

Now that you've created high-quality content for each stage of the sales funnel, it's time to promote it through channels relevant to your business and target audience. You can increase the exposure of your content, improve brand awareness, and drive interested parties back to your website by promoting it across these channels – all of which will help generate leads. In addition to promoting your content, you should have an editorial calendar in place to ensure that you are always creating new content on a regular basis.

Content is the most effective and cost-effective way for interested parties to find your company online and return to your website. To reap the benefits of content marketing, you must first develop a strategy and then review it on a regular basis. Take the time to assess your content, buyer personas, and social media strategy to ensure that everything is working as well as it possibly can.