Tips for boosting the brand’s content marketing strategy

By Ben Gold

Content marketing has become a widely established practice. Businesses use content marketing to engage customers, drive traffic to their Web site and increase sales.

A greater focus put on content marketing brings with it an increase in competition.

Boosting your content marketing strategy is less challenging than you may think. Business marketing loans can be used to employ content marketing strategies and improve your marketing techniques without breaking the bank.

Here are tips for boosting your content marketing strategy in the new year.

Analyze data, adjust and set marketing goals

Before altering your marketing technique, analyze your current efforts and results.

Establish your strengths and pain points. From there, you can figure out what adjustments you can make to improve your overall strategy.

For example, you may not be generating enough leads and may want to target a wider audience.

Maybe you have made a New Year's resolution to get back to the gym or to eat healthier in 2019. What about setting a career-based resolution for the new year? Create a list of steps to improve your marketing action plan.

Identify and influence your audience

There is no one-size-fits-all marketing technique that works for every type of user. That is why you need to plan out ways to determine who your audience is and how to reach them.

Defining your audience can help guide all your marketing strategies, such as business social media tactics, content creation and advertising.

Targeted content should address customers’ questions and help them solve a specific issue or challenge.

If you have been in business for a while, you probably know your target audience.

You can choose specific demographics to target, based on age, location, gender, income and occupation. Or you can think more about the personality traits of your typical consumer, including:

• Values
• Attitudes
• Lifestyles
• Behavior
• Interests/passions

If you are uncertain of your ideal consumer, check out your competitors to see how their audiences affect their marketing tactics.

Once you have figured out who your target customer is, you will have a better idea of how to boost your content marketing strategies to align with their interests.

Get active on social

According to a Social Media Examiner report, 96 percent of small business owners use social media, but only 92 percent strongly agree that it is important for their business.

Some small business owners do not know the value social media has in boosting content marketing outcomes.

Whether you are onboard with social media or not, it is here to stay.

If you have not already created a social media strategy, make sure you are proficient in all the major social media platforms. Then start working out how you can improve your social channels to attract and retain customers.

Boosting your content marketing plan can be as simple as scheduling daily posts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Instagram. Or it could be as complex as monitoring the reach of every single post and searching for buzzwords.

Ultimately, you decide how far you will go to increase your social media presence.

Vary content for different stages of the sales funnel

Go viral with video: If you have scrolled through Facebook recently, you will notice the large presence of videos on your newsfeed.

Creating video content is an effective way to boost your content marketing strategy and gives organizations an opportunity to reach customers in a natural, accessible way.

Try making videos of product demonstrations, customer stories and other insight related to your company. It is important to keep your videos short: 1 to 2 minutes is a good benchmark.

According to Cyberclick, the format of the videos you present is as important as the content.

Filming with smartphones and tablets tempts us to create vertical videos.

However, videos in the square format have higher levels of engagement and take up 78 percent more space in the Facebook News section.

Make use of additional features, such as adding closed captions for the muted video watcher, to improve your view count and recognition.

Using premium and gated assets

While video content draws in consumers at the top of the sales funnel, downloadable assets better suit folks who are closer to the purchase stage. This content might appear in the form of ebooks or white papers for which readers must enter their contact information to download. Or they could present themselves in the form of free consultations and product demos.

Premium and gated assets can help shift a user from considering using your product to deciding to use it. Plus, you capture the contact information to nurture those leads.

Drive your data

It is not just about content creation. Using data is just as important in boosting your content marketing strategies.

Consider employing A/B testing strategies. A/B testing is when you compare two versions of a single variable to determine which version is more effective. This might take place over the course of a few weeks or may happen over a few months' time.

A/B testing can be used to increase Web site conversion rates and improve the overall effectiveness of your marketing communication.

NOW THAT YOU have ideas for boosting your content marketing plan, it is time to put them to action.

Employing content marketing strategies may require supplementary cash. Here are some ways you can use capital from a small business loan to boost your content marketing plan:

• Invest in pay-per-click and other social media campaigns
• Hire marketing and content experts
• Advertise in industry-specific media
• Use email and direct mail marketing

Ben Gold is president of Irvine, CA-based QuickBridge, a privately-held financial services firm providing small business loans and short-term working capital. It has ranked two consecutive years on the Inc. 500 Fastest Growing American Companies list. Reach him at bgold@quickbridge.com.