The 9 steps of a content marketing strategy

Content marketing is action that goes far beyond producing digital content. In addition to offering interesting information to the public, you should also think about the best way to distribute that content, in order to increase the audience.

A larger audience is synonymous with more business opportunities, and it is for this reason that the process with which it is intended to achieve that objective must be thought very carefully.

There are several steps in the content marketing strategy, going from the choice of information channels, through the selection of content to be published and their periodicity. Next we will see what steps this process involves.

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What is a content marketing strategy?

A content marketing strategy is the way in which the planning, management, development and distribution of content are grouped, in addition to the analysis of their impact and results.

Since each year companies are forced to produce more content and being very careful with what they publish, these strategies have become something of urgent necessity to keep organizations visible, and obtain advantages competitive.

It is not simply a question of informing about what the company does or will do, typical of traditional corporate communication. Unlike the traditional method, focused on the business, the content marketing strategy focuses on people, at the same time that it aims to improve the positioning the brand, building authority in its market and educating it, making it see how the organization can solve and solve the problems of the users.

This type of strategy is the way for the company to achieve up to four general objectives:

• Expansion in the market.
• Expansion of its offer of goods and services.
• Increase in sales.
• Increase in brand value.

The steps of the content marketing strategy

The content marketing strategy involves a series of steps that must be followed to ensure that the company disseminates relevant content to the target audience, in addition to increasing the number of sales and its relevance in the market.

1. Define the objectives

The first thing to do is define the objectives to be achieved with the development of the content marketing strategy. You cannot begin to change the dynamics of content creation if you do not know the goal you want to achieve.

This simple step is very necessary, since it will allow be easier to determine in the future which aspects are most relevant to the strategy. In addition, it will allow you to define the formats and social networks that will be used when sharing content.

It is in this step that the following questions should be asked: Does the company want to increase the digital community? Have more sales? Retain customers? Increase site traffic?

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2. Define the buyer persona

After having established the objectives, it is necessary to define the “buyer person” to whom our content will be directed.

But what is the "buyer person"? Its about stereotype of consumer to be impacted, a semi-fictional representation of what is understood as an ideal client of our organization. Before developing content, it is extremely necessary to understand who we are going to send the information to and that is why the figure of the "buyer persona" is so necessary.

It should not be seen as a synonym for target audience, but rather as a broader concept of that same. When you think about this figure, in addition to basic demographic information such as age group, gender or language of majority use, you will have take into account more personal aspects such as preferences, concerns, short and long-term objectives, way of behaving in Internet...

It is possible that, in case you have been generating content for some time, you want to expand the audience to whom it is directed, or change the current one. For this, it is crucial to review the parameters of the audience of the company or organization, conducting a market research every so often, preferably annually.

3. Do interviews with clients and prospects

Although we can have a more or less clear idea of ​​who our “buyer persona” is, to finish better defining it, it is convenient to do interviews with clients and prospects.

We must put aside the assumptions and intuitions about who is our ideal client, since, like all humans, we can make mistakes, and that does not suit us. This process is an authentic investigation, demanding the application of investigation techniques and effective methodologies.

4. Determine the content management system

Creating content is essential but, if that content is not properly managed, you can have a real chaotic library of resources that will not be able to take advantage of properly, in addition to that they will be unattractive for the audience to whom they go directed.

The content management system must be determined, organizing the activity in such a way that success is achieved when establishing contact with potential buyers of the product or service that the company offers. Some vital parts of content management are creating, publishing, and evaluating that content itself.

5. Determine topics

Determining what topics are of interest to the public is essential to be able to generate new content, which is interesting to you and which you share with your acquaintances. It is convenient for any company that its followers on social networks share the content that it publishes, causing it to gain more impact on the general public, in addition to attracting the attention of more people interested in what the business offers.

In order to determine themes, the trends and preferences of the general public must be analyzed and, in particular, what seems to interest the “buyer persona”. The best way to do this is by analyzing "keywords" or keywords, which are terms or sentences that users use when they use Internet search engines, such as Google or Bing.

Depending on the audience to which the contents are directed, one or other "keywords" must be chosen in order to guarantee the exposure and visibility of what the brand is publishing. Keep in mind that using "keywords" will imply having to produce content on themes that, perhaps, would never have occurred to the managers of the page.

6. Monitoring of social networks.

To know what the brand is talking about, it must have tools for monitoring social networks, in order to know which "keywords" are "trending topics". In addition, monitoring what the followers of the page do it is possible to know whether or not a published content has had the desired impact.

There are several tools that allow us to take this step. To say a few. Hootsuite, Buffer, IFTTT ...

7. Monitor the competition

You have to be aware of trends within the area in which you want to have an impact, and know what companies similar to ours are doing. This is essential if you want to continue appearing in search engines when the public is looking for certain information related to the topics that our content covers.

Knowing what the competition is doing is basic, not only because it helps us to set guidelines, take some references and modify content making them more original. This can help you avoid making the same mistakes as competitors.

Some things that can be measured of the competition are the volume of competitors, how they communicate with each other, the traffic of the site, how often they post new content ...

8. Determine the content format

There is a lot of content that a company can create on its official website. These contents, depending on what is being said, may be more appropriate to present them in one or another format, such as, among the main ones, blog entries, e-books, infographics, videos and podcasts.

Blog posts

Blog entries are common on all types of websites, and they are usually published with some regularity to attract new visitors. The articles should provide valuable content for the “buyer person”. Typically, these blogs are between 1,000 and 2,000 words, although they can be made shorter or longer depending on the audience you want to reach.

Blogs, developed with SEO techniques, have many benefits for the company, especially if we have in Note that the blog or the website is the face of the organization, so it must be ensured that it is always updated. Products and services may be displayed on the website in an organized manner, as well as provide a clear way of how to contact the post author or content managers at general.

If blogs are made by correctly positioning the "keywords" and properly applying the techniques By SEO writing, your blog will appear in the first entries in search engines more easily.

E-books

E-books are very important tools in marketingespecially if they can be downloaded for free after having the potential customer fill out an online form with their contact information. They tend to be much longer and more detailed than blogs, but with less periodicity of publication.

Readers of the website content may have read some blog posts and want to know more. It is for this reason that the company should have this route covered, in order to satisfy the need to acquire a deeper knowledge of its audience.

Infographics

Are a closer and more visual way than the previous two options of presenting the information. These are large content formats to use if you want to share a large amount of data in a clear and easy, without the reader feeling overwhelmed by seeing a lot of scattered words on a topic that does not dominates.

Videos

It is usually preferred to watch a video rather than read a blog, for this reason, within the steps of the content marketing strategy, the elaboration of this multimedia material should not be left out of side. What's more, they are easy to share.

However, they have a disadvantage, and that is that they involve a greater investment in terms of time and resources than content in written format. Even so, and also related to infographics, taking into account that in recent years visual marketing has been gaining more and more importance, it is a resource worth investing.

Podcasts

Podcasts are a resource that has become very fashionable in recent years, especially if we take into account that they allow you to reach an audience that does not have the time or interest in reading written content frequently. This resource may be ideal if you have interesting people to interview.

9. Publish and manage content

The marketing plan must go beyond simply choosing the type of content to be created: it must be organized.

This can be done in several ways, but the fundamental thing is to have elaborate an editorial calendar that allows establishing the correct path to publish a library of balanced content, diverse and adjusted to what has been seen when analyzing and delimiting the "buyer person ”, making it relevant to the theme of the website but, at the same time, offering something new.

In this calendar, in addition to publishing content related to the topic to which the company is dedicated and what interests the "buyer person ”, important celebrations and holidays, such as Christmas, national and international commemorations and ephemeris.

Although it is convenient to have that editorial calendar well organized, you should not be extremely rigid when sharing content. Today is very volatile, making news appear which are opportunities that should not be missed. Developing content related to a current topic is essential to generate significant traffic peaks.

conclusion

As we can see, there are not few steps in the content marketing strategy. It is a somewhat long road, but necessary if you want to make the company have visibility in the field in which it is dedicated. Notably these types of strategies are focused on achieving sustainable resultsTherefore, complying with each of the phases outlined here is highly recommended.

However, you should not be rigid. During the journey you can find potholes and other inconveniences in which the objectives must be redefined initially raised, change the format of some content and, also, see to what extent the "buyer person" is really the one we have delimited.

Bibliographic references:

• Lindström, Martin (2010). Buyology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy. New York: Broadway Books. ISBN 9780385523899.
• Bel Mallén, J. I. (coord.) (2004). Communicate to create value. The direction of communication in organizations. Navarra: COSO Foundation and EUNSA.
• Capriotti Peri, P. (2009). Corporate branding. Foundations for the strategic management of corporate identity. Santiago de Chile: Collection of Company Books