Quality content is at the heart of good marketing. Here, we’ll cover seven creative content marketing strategies that will help increase sales and improve your brand.
There are so many aspects to marketing. Networking, collaboration, and advertisement are just a few.
While all of the above are crucial to a good marketing strategy, there's one type of marketing that doesn't get nurtured as often – creative content marketing.
We get it. [quotesright]Generating constant interesting content to improve SEO and build an audience of dedicated fans is time-consuming. [/quotesright] However, it still needs to be a part of any business' marketing strategy in the age of the Internet.
If you're a bit lost on how to start creative content marketing for your company, don't worry. We've got you covered. We put together a guide packed with seven creative content marketing strategies that you can implement into your marketing strategy ASAP. [quotes]Increase sales, help your business grow faster and improve your brand[/quotes] with these super useful creative content marketing strategies.
- Create ultra-shareable content.
Two of the many goals of creative content marketing are to build an audience and build a better customer relationship with your supporters.
[quotesright]When you create content that is easy to share, engagement is more likely[/quotesright] to happen. Think about the content you usually share in your personal life. It's probably something you felt was relatable or enjoyable to read, right?
Everyone, including your potential customers or brand supporters, is more likely to share content across social media that is relatable.
It's hard to properly measure what's relatable and what's not when it comes to shareable content. More often than not, it will be an experimental process:
- Hire quality writers to write for your website.
- Generate content.
- Facilitate sharing by implementing "share on social media" plugins into all content that is posted.
- Keep track of what's popular and what's not.
- Generate more content that is similar in subject, theme, or structure to your more successful posts.
A good method to see what's being eaten up and what's not is to use link tracking.
It's important to note that if your creative content marketing strategy isn't up to par, it doesn't matter how fantastic your content is. Be sure to have a solid strategy to get eyeballs on your content before you expect to see traffic happening.
- Make sure there's value.
When a business provides something valuable to its customers, that business is likely to have more regular customers.[quotes]When it comes to generating content, you need to provide valuable solutions to problems your potential customers may have. [/quotes]
This can happen through creating tutorials, writing guides that break down how to do various things, or even through visual entertainment.
When people view your content and feel satisfied by what it provides, you've established your value – and potential supporters will turn into customers.
- Always use the top social media platforms.
The majority of the content you generate will be shared via social media over any other method. While hitting all the major social media networks is great, it's important to identify what your main targeted networks will be.
To select the ideal social media network, look at your customers and your company's brand and match the interests and audience.
Is your business a news, celebrity gossip, or political publication? Twitter will definitely be your target social media network. Writers and people who are interested in journalism will most likely retweet your content.
Is your company a cosmetics brand or visual art magazine? Instagram is the ideal social media network to target, as it is very image-based.
Consider other massively popular social media networks:
- Tumblr
- Google Plus
[quotes]Check out the kind of content that is regularly shared on these networks.[/quotes] If your content is similar, it may be a social media network to target for sharing.
As mentioned previously, it is important to make your content shareable with social media buttons at the end of every post.
Be sure to create social media accounts for your business as well. Share your own content regularly.
- Invest in online advertising.
Online ads are a great way to promote your company. This is especially true if your advertisement is attractive and can grab the attention of viewers.
Social media ads are a very useful element to incorporate into your creative content marketing strategy. Not only can social media ads drive traffic to your company's social media accounts, but [quotes]in most cases, social media ads aren't very expensive.[/quotes]
Networks such as Facebook or Twitter are pretty reasonable. You can also customize your advertisement experience to target a specific niche of people with a simple click of a button.
[quotes]Start small and experiment[/quotes] with the lowest-cost option for advertising on different social media networks. If you see results, it may be worth it to invest in wider-spread advertising or regular advertising.
- Keep an eye on popular content marketing websites.
Inspiration is key when it comes to creative marketing. Get inspired by the best of the best.
Follow major creative content generators on social media as well as blogs that are centered around content marketing.
- Create some seriously high-quality media.
This is probably the most important tip on our list. [quotes]Generating quality content is crucial to getting anywhere[/quotes] with creative content marketing.
Blog posts are very popular when it comes to content marketing. However, there are a ton of other ways to create quality content that don’t involve regular blog posts:
- Images
- Infographics
- Charts
- Videos
- Interactive games
- Livestreams
- Other forms of media
All of these fall under the umbrella of creative content and should not be ignored in your strategy.
[quotes]Don't skip out on the "quality" part either. [/quotes] The main goal of generating creative content is to make it shareable and likable by viewers, and in turn, boost your company's popularity. If your content is boring, poorly made, or just plain useless, you won't be going anywhere.
This may not seem like a simple task, but creating quality content isn't as hard as you think. Here are four key tips on what to do:
- Length and optimization.
A majority of users will be accessing your content on a mobile device like a tablet or smartphone. Be sure your website is optimized for mobile device access.
You want to do this to make your content easier to read, of course. But you also want to avoid Google's new algorithm punishment of websites that are not optimized for mobile. To keep your viewers satisfied and your SEO out of harm's way, optimize.
- Mix up the media.
If you are making a blog post, don't just publish a wall of text. Break it up with white space and different forms of media. Include an image in one spot and embed a video in another. This makes the content much more enjoyable to read.
- Have standards.
Ask yourself a few questions:
- Is this blog post entertaining to me?
- Are my images, infographics, and videos made well?
- Is all of the information discussed in this media truthful and well-researched? Did I fact check?
- Is the grammar and spelling in this piece of content on point?
- Is all my content original, and if not, am I legally allowed to use it?
- Is there an aesthetically pleasing quality to this content?
[quotes]You're representing your business or brand with the content you generate.[/quotes] If the content isn't good, entertaining, or downright untruthful, you're sending a bad message about your brand.
Always double and triple check your content before going live. It would even be wise to hire someone to do this for you, as it can be time-consuming.
- Format the right way.
Your content needs to follow a logical order and read well. Have you ever come across a blog post or essay that was poorly edited with random headlines? Did you want to keep reading?
Break up walls of text with headers that logically make sense – not too large and not too small. Use bold and italic formatting as needed for a more conversational and organized tone.
Also, be sure to use a font that's aesthetically pleasing.
- Stay organized.
Follow a calendar. Keep your team in touch with each other. Make brainstorming easy to do and outlining simple.
[quotes]We're talking about a creative process here. [/quotes] A team that can't stay organized, keep track of what's being shared, and easily exchange ideas for content isn't a productive team. Making collaboration simpler is crucial to the creative content marketing strategy.
Your team's calendar should include everything from strategies to guidelines for content. Stick to regularly scheduled meetings for brainstorming sessions. Marketing team software and apps like Asana are very useful in the sense.
By staying organized, you're saving yourself a ton of time. Over 60 percent of marketing specialists say their biggest obstacle when it comes to generating content is time and organization. Take care of this problem early on and stick to your strategy.
How was our guide to creative content marketing strategies? Got a tip you'd like to add? Email me and let me know. feedback@focalpointcoaching.com
