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We\u2019d all love to have the marketing budget of some of the giants\u2014Disney, AMEX, Coca-Cola.<\/p>\n
This article is not for them.<\/p>\n
This article is for the underdogs. Those who have just a couple thousand dollars every week to try to get their message out there, and who already have a few bits and pieces of content\u2014perhaps a few articles and some social media material.<\/p>\n
Here are our five quick tips on how to be savvy and boost that content:<\/p>\n
You need to know your audience to be successful\u2014at anything, really\u2014and creating powerful content is no different. Quite often, a refresher on your target audience is needed. Maybe somewhere along the way you forgot about your audience, or they changed. (Millennials are OLD now. For heaven\u2019s sake, half of them are still creating \u201cThailand Trip 2018\u201d albums on Facebook.)<\/p>\n
What\u2019s the best way to get your message across? How best to communicate and convince people to take an action? Where are these people, how old are they, and what apps are they checking multiple times a day\u2014perhaps when killing time at 4:25 pm on a Friday? These are the questions you need to ask.<\/p>\n
How do you figure this stuff out? Talk to your audience, and to those who know them well. Conduct interviews (with customers, customer service, sales people, and marketing people), conduct social listening, check out the online sentiment, and conduct keyword research. Once you\u2019ve got a strong grasp on what they\u2019re annoyed, confused, or unsure about, you have a goldmine of content opportunities.<\/p>\n
\u201cHeadline\u201d here means \u201cthe first bit of copy somebody reads\u201d. It could be the text on a YouTube title card, a blog headline, the first line of a Facebook post, or the H1 on a salesy landing page.<\/p>\n
Your content may be engaging past the first couple of sentences, but with millions of content pieces published a day, the first thing your audience reads must stand out. Make sure your \u201cfirst thing\u201d answers a popular question, solves a problem, or presents an interesting point of view. Clickbait titles can get tired, so you have to ensure that your headline is framed in a way that speaks to your target audience. Maybe that means using more emotive language, or perhaps it just means extracting your key point and making it your title.<\/p>\n
Consider also the younger demo\u2014your future customers. They are far more likely to use voice search. According to a study by Thrive Analytics<\/a>, 71% of 18- to 29-year-olds are using voice assistants, compared to just 39% of 44- to 53-year-olds. Since the way we speak is very different from the way we type, your content needs to adapt to natural language search<\/a>. Instead of focusing on keywords, you need to focus on answering questions in a relatable, human way.<\/p>\n Keep in mind that headlines should primarily be for people and not search engines. Marketing folks often spend energy trying to keep up with Google\u2019s algorithm changes, writing titles for high rankings. But in the end, Google wants to show what\u2019s relevant and what\u2019s proven to be popular through people\u2019s consumption. Know that quality content will always transcend any update.<\/p>\n It takes resources to produce good content. Don\u2019t spend it producing just one piece of content. Double-down on your content investment by repurposing.<\/p>\n Assuming you have some decent content already, consider taking it and reformatting it for other digital channels. Tweak copy for an email newsletter; repurpose user-generated content for image-heavy channels; or take a great blog post and rewrite the headline to create a social post and amplify that, driving back to your site.<\/p>\n There\u2019s also great benefit\u2014audience-wise and SEO-wise\u2014to updating your on-site content and blog articles periodically. Most content can be quickly polished, updated, and re-published again\u2014and achieve lifts in traffic and audience interest. Mine sites like Quora, Yahoo Answers, and Answer the Public. Is there a way to update your content by incorporating some of that engaging content into your own, and helping your target audience with a problem? Take inspiration from user-generated answers to burning questions across the internet.<\/p>\n (A word of warning, though: these sites are bottomless pits, presenting wonderful insights into humanity. You may get sucked in. Coincidentally, they also repurpose their own content for email marketing\u2014they do well for a reason, after all! You may get sucked in\u2026more than once.)<\/p>\n Take a look at your analytics. Do you have a particular page that is performing well? Can you analyze the data<\/a> and uncover why this could be? For some organizations, this could be a CTA-focused landing page<\/a>, but for others it may be other, more informative areas of the site.<\/p>\n Consider expanding content that is performing well and creating additional pieces of gated content, where users are prompted to enter at least a name, email address, and interests to gain access. This is particularly relevant for blog posts that are already generating promising traffic. Instead of a short 600-word article that is consumed, then quickly forgotten, expand on the subject matter by creating a list of helpful advice, placing it in an eye-catching template, and turning it into a PDF. Then put it on a landing page (with a great headline).<\/p>\n You\u2019ll then be able to generate a list of those who are most interested in reading certain topics. Treat your content like a business asset, not an expense. Make content go further and work for you.<\/p>\n \n Get exclusive insights into digital 3. Recycle the good stuff<\/h2>\n
4. Create gated content from existing content<\/h2>\n
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