Content Marketing: Why Bother?

The world is rapidly changing, turning our entire life into a heavily technological action field. A pivotal point in history was the advent of the Internet, which caused an irreversible impact on every aspect of human existence.

It has turned the world into a so-called global village and put an individual’s life into one small gadget. It touched everyone and everything, causing substantial changes and adaptations in the routine processes that seemed to be firmly settled long ago.

When any answer can be found online, you do not need to ask someone for assistance, recommendation, or advice. Whether you need to buy a house or help with essay writing for college, the first place to look for it is the Internet.

Thus, the notion of content marketing has become essential for many businesses in the efforts to promote their products and services and make them the first item you will find. However, the concept is often doubted by marketers and business analytics, giving rise to an interminable debate: does content marketing work?

How Technology Changed the Business

The business world is probably one of the first settings that were directly influenced by the incredibly fast technological advancements. The expansion of the Internet and its steadily growing popularity driven more by the natural human excitement over something new forced a considerable change in perspectives and priorities.

To be noticed, businesses had no other choice but to adapt to the environment, in which the potential customers spent most of their time, thus moving online.

Today, it is impossible to imagine an entity without some presence on the Internet. Even a private truck owner who offers his field transportation services to the neighbours in a small Bangladesh village seems to have a webpage.

Moreover, many entrepreneurs, especially small ones, do not see the need in establishing brick-and-mortar outlets to carry out their businesses. Often, a mere Facebook profile appears sufficient.

Why Content Marketing?

Predictably, the way of conducting business affairs has changed drastically. Heavy online presence in today’s digital economy caused the shift in priorities, bringing content marketing to the fore. And although some marketers and sceptics cast doubt on the usefulness, value, and even appropriateness of the term itself, it has gone as far as establishing the whole Content Marketing Institute (CMI).

According to CMI’s official definition, content marketing is a strategic approach to marketing a business to provide “valuable, relevant and consistent” information that would attract the definite target audience and result in “profitable customer action”.

More specifically, the focus of the strategy is on establishing a relationship with the potential consumers, which can be achieved through creating content that directly relates to these target customers. Thus, considering the digital environment today’s businesses operate in, the approach is more than justified.

Numerous surveys and studies provide varied data on content marketing usage. According to them, 53% of businesses apply content marketing strategies while 56% of marketers advocate a positive correlation between personalized content and engagement rates growth; it increases site traffic 7.8 times and attracts 1 million unique visitors monthly; and while ad blockers are used by nearly 200 million users, they spend about 37 minutes reading articles online. The statistics are indeed compelling. Nevertheless, there exists an opinion that content marketing is not working.

Why It Might Not Work?

Any marketing strategy requires thorough preparation and research. Content marketing is not an exception. It is impossible to publish a blog post and get increased user traffic the next day. It does not work this way. Thus, several stages should be well-thought-out.

• Clearly define your goals. They should be attainable and measurable in correlation with the relevant metrics.
• Define the target audience. Scrupulously study their preferences, wants, and needs. Create a clear picture of a potential consumer you want to attract.
• Identify the format of the content to create. You should be sure that the chosen format will match the buyer persona you have just developed.
• Imagine the detailed journey of the potential consumer. Think about what stages they would go through and what channels they would use in search of the needed product or service. Then, create content for each of these stages.
• Keep in mind SEO practices. The best post will never be seen if you do not adjust it to the search engine realities.

If a marketer fails in some of the mentioned stages, the effort may be in vain, growing the disappointment in content marketing. With a well-defined goal and a clear image of a potential customer, you will know what content to create.

Webpages, reviews, and press releases, blog posts and social media posts, forum comments, apps, and even pricing guidelines constitute content marketing medium. Postings should be frequent, substantial, and SEO-guided. But above all, this content must be of value.

A simple blog post for the sake of some content will not be recognized by a search engine, will not attract the reader’s attention, and will not help you win the potential customer. Many specialists say that content marketing is all about storytelling. Well, actually, yes.

But the story you tell should be appealing, timely, and to the point. Wherever you publish a post, you want to be sure that it will be read, “liked”, and shared for a better-guaranteed result. It may take some time to come up with something of real value to your target audience, but the outcome will be reflected in revenue.

Indeed, many skeptics often doubt if content marketing is worth the effort at all. Nevertheless, the compelling statistics are quite eloquent, proving considerable benefits experienced by the businesses engaging in it. In the time of the digital economy, when the smallest private business operates online in the first place, content marketing becomes a strategic technique that cannot be avoided.

But of course, publishing a blog post and leaving comments on social media is not enough for the successful marketing of products or services online. Wise content marketing goes far beyond that, utilizing meticulous strategies to prove that it works and pays off.