Content marketing helps you to win – and makes you money, and we’re going to show you why. Conversely, if you don’t have a content marketing strategy, you’re already losing out, and will only continue to fall behind competitors that do. If you don’t have a content marketing plan in place, you need one ASAP.
What is Content Marketing?
Content marketing is a marketing focused on creating, publishing and distributing valuable, relevant content for a target audience. What do we mean by “content”? Content is information that is useful for your audience and potential customers. It helps them learn something that’s beneficial for them – like answer a question, solve a problem, explain a “how-to”. It makes people’s lives better, adding value becauses it gives them something they want when they go looking for it. That’s what’s in it for your audience. What’s in it for you? It helps you:
- Attract attention and generate leads
- Expand your customer base
- Generate and increase online sales
- Increase brand awareness, establish authority, and earn credibility
Content marketing is the heart of today’s marketing. There’s no other single thing that is more powerful, no better long-term strategy than content marketing. It builds brand awareness, connects you with your target audience, builds trust and allows you to demonstrate your authority, aids your SEO efforts, and is the substance that fuels your social media marketing.
More Companies Are Using Content Marketing
In B2B companies, a whooping 93% of marketers use content marketing. Nearly 8 in 10 (78%) of CMO’s believe custom content is the future of marketing. And CMOs at the largest technology companies report that content marketing is a critical initiative.
Why? Why are so many marketing professionals taking content marketing so seriously? Because…
Content Marketing is Profitable
Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing and generates about 3 times as many leads. It costs less and earns more. Who wouldn’t want that? And year-over-year growth in marketing’s contribution to revenue is 6x higher for content marketing leaders versus followers. Hubspot found that 82% of marketers who blog see positive ROI from their inbound (content) marketing.
Content Marketing Improves Customer Experience With Your Brand
Content marketing also creates a connection to your customers, enhancing your customer’s experience, and building deeper connection to your brand. The vast majority (82%!) of consumers feel more positive about a company after reading custom content. Likewise, 80% of business decision-makers prefer to get company information in a series of articles, versus an advertisement. According to Gartner, 64% of people say the customer experience is even more important than price in their choice of a brand, and that by 2020, that customer experience will overtake price and product as the key brand differentiator. This is huge!
Content Marketing Leaders Gain 7x More Site Traffic
Marketers who craft useful, valuable content that adds value to their audience experience drastically more site growth (over 7x more) than their competitors. Distributing your content on leads readers back to your site directly. Your content distributed on social media (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Slideshare, etc) or through your opt-in email lists, or newsletters, can earn shares by readers who find it valuable and that, in turn, leads to more site traffic for you. And — content drives higher conversions once they get there. Content marketing leaders have conversion rates nearly 6 times higher than competitors.
Content Marketing Helps Your SEO
Content has keywords in it, keywords which hopefully you are already working to rank on in search engine results. As content earns views – and useful, relevant content should earn views – it can also increase your domain authority and earn inbound links connecting to your content.
SEO requires content; it doesn’t exist without it. Content marketing gives you that. In order to effectively do SEO, you need words, articles, blog posts with substance that people actually want enough to look for. That content has keywords which aid your SEO. What’s more: your content is permanent enhancement to your site. Every new URL from each piece of content can be indexed by search engines and boost your organic ranking, especially for long-lasting value of “evergreen” content (content that stays relevant for a long time).
Final thoughts: Need Help? We’d love to help.
So, now you know how much content marketing can do for you. You see why almost everyone else is getting onboard the content marketing train, and you’d like to not be left behind yourself. You want more traffic, better conversion rates from that traffic, better connection with your audience, more positive vibes from potential customers, and better site ranking. You may be wondering how to get started. If you’re not sure where to begin, or even if you’d just like to talk and get more information, we’d love to help.