What Are the Advantages of Content Marketing

What is it?

Content marketing is a strategic approach to marketing that focuses on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action. The goal of content marketing is not to directly sell a product or service, but rather to establish a brand as a thought leader in its industry and build trust and credibility with its target audience.

Content marketing can take many forms, including blog posts, infographics, videos, whitepapers, case studies, e-books, and more. It can be used to educate, entertain, and engage audiences and can be distributed through a variety of channels, including a company's website, social media, email marketing, and more.

Why do you need it?

1. Increase your brand awareness: High-quality content helps to establish a brand, or business, as an authority in its industry and build a positive reputation.

2. Improve engagement with your customers: By providing valuable information and entertainment, content marketing can help businesses engage with their key target audience and establish a regular following.

3. Increase your search engine rankings: Search engines tend to favour websites that regularly publish high-quality, relevant content.

4. Increase your website traffic: Consistent, high-quality content can attract more visitors to a website and help drive more traffic to the site.

5. Generate leads: By including calls-to-action and links in the content, businesses can encourage their audience to take a specific action, such as signing up for a newsletter, making a purchase or downloading information.

6. Cost-effectiveness: Content marketing is often less expensive than other forms of marketing and advertising and can provide a better return on investment over the long term.

How often should you publish content?

The ideal number of pages or articles to publish per month depends on several factors, such as your industry, target audience, marketing goals, and the resources you have available. Big Red can help you to determine this, but generally speaking, publishing 1 to 2 articles per week is a great starting point. 

If you're just starting out with content marketing or have limited resources, it's better to focus on creating high-quality content that engages your audience, rather than trying to publish a large volume of content. On the other hand, if you're in a highly competitive industry or have a large target audience, you might consider publishing more frequently in order to stay front-of-mind and continue to engage your audience.

Ultimately, the goal is to find the right balance between quality and quantity that allows you to achieve your goals and effectively hold your audience. You can adjust your publishing frequency as needed based on the results you see from your content marketing efforts.

Do I need a strategy?

Yes, you do. Having a content strategy is important for the success of your content marketing efforts. A content strategy is your route to follow in creating, publishing, and managing content that aligns with your overall marketing goals and business objectives. Without a clearly defined strategy, publishing content that supports your business goals can become unruly.

A content strategy can help you to:

1. Clearly define your target audience and their needs

2. Determine the types of content that will best engage your audience and support your marketing goals

3. Establish a content creation and publishing schedule that is sustainable and effective

4. Evaluate the success of your content marketing efforts and make data-driven decisions to improve your strategy

Having a well-thought-out content strategy can help you to create a consistent and effective content marketing program that drives results for your business. If you're ready to talk directly to your key target audience on a regular basis, we're here to help. To find out more, take a look at our Content Marketing services, or contact us quickly and easily now. Getting started literally takes a few seconds.