More companies – both BtoC and BtoB – are creating content as an integral part of their marketing and Digital PR. (MarketingProfs: Benchmarks, Budgets & Trends Report.) 76% of BtoB and 77% of BtoC firms are creating more content than they did a year ago and half of them will be spending more on content in 2016.
The tricky part is figuring out what to content to create and how to measure its effectiveness. Less than half (42%) of marketers engages in content feel that it’s actually working. This article offers advice on how to improve your content strategy in three ways:
Content: Theme, format, length and volume
Channels: Social, paid and email
Contributors: Writers, graphic designers and videographers
THE MISSING LINK – THE AUDIENCE
While these are valid areas to consider, unless you first establish and research your audience you can tinker with these 3C’s as much as you want and still miss the target. The reason content is best created by the Digital PR team is because it is a communication function. After all, the reason you’re creating all this content is to deliver a message and elicit a response. So you had better know who you’re communicating with and what they’re interested in.
Not rocket science, just basic communication theory.
Not some new and esoteric Digital PR technique. It’s been the backbone of effective communication since day one.
You need to know:
- Who your audience is
- What their reality is
- What they’re interested in (intent statements)
- What information they’re looking for
- What problems they’re trying to solve
- Where they look for these answers (that answers the channel question)
- How they feel about your brand (sentiment)
- How they feel about your competitors
- What content gaps and opportunities there are
Once you know these factors, deciding what kind of content to produce is easy. That’s when you can use the data in this excellent infographic about content tactics.
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