While the days of everyone screaming ‘content marketing!’ at the top of their voice are almost a thing of the past, content is still playing a major role in the online marketer’s armory. Simply put, if your business isn’t creating an efficient strategy, you can bet your life that your rivals are – and you run the risk of falling behind them.
The good news for startup and small business owners is that there is a raft of intelligent tools and technology available to give you a helping hand. In today’s guide, we’re going to go through a few of them with you, and hopefully, they might help you form a successful content strategy that brings you the success you need. Let’s take a closer look.
Persona generation
One thing you have to get straight before writing a single word or creating a unique infographic is to establish who you are talking to. The idea here is to create a buyer persona, based on the reasons why they choose you ahead of the competition. Now, all marketers do this for their business, in a variety of different ways, pulling data from all kinds of sources. But if you want a head start, head over to MakeMyPersona, and it will walk you through the entire process. It’s a great little tool that will help you build up a targeted customer profile in no time at all.
Content creation and collaboration
If you aren’t already using Google Docs for collaborating and editing documents as you create them, it’s probably time to start. It’s such a simple, straightforward tool to use that makes the entire process super simple. You can also link it to your calendar events, so planning ahead becomes a simple task and keeps everyone on the same page.
Idea generation
Struggling to work out what your customers want to hear? If so, there’s a simple way to find out – create an AdWords account. Most of the time content marketing focuses on organic results, but there are significant benefits of using AdWords. While AdWords results are hidden in numerical terms, you can get a real gist of high-performing keywords by using its Keyword Research Tool. Ultimately, all the big companies in your industry are paying big money for clicks on particular keywords – and they aren’t just throwing money down the drain. Use this information to infuse high-paid keywords and phrases in your content, and you can create entire, profitable strategies that almost guarantees results if your work is good enough.
Distribution
Of course, it doesn’t matter how great your content is – creating it is only half the battle. You also need time to promote it, or the simple truth is it will never end up being read. Email is, without doubt, your ultimate weapon of choice, as it means your content ends up in the inboxes of your ideal customers. MailChimp is a good starting point, although there are plenty of other excellent tools out there – such as Marketo, for example.
Ultimately, the technology exists to make our lives easier. And despite the fact that great content is often time laborious, there’s no doubt tech can help you get your strategy in a fantastic place. Good luck!
