Marketing concepts have come a long way in recent years. Today, customers have shut off the traditional world of marketing by fast-forwarding through television commercials and becoming immune to advertisement banners online (Source: Content Marketing Institute, 2015). Buyers no longer want to hear what marketers have to say. As a result, marketers have been forced to turn to different tactics in an effort to get buyers to listen to their messages.
In the past, sales people and employees were considered the experts of the products that they were selling. Today, we see a shift as buyers are becoming the experts by proactively reaching out to brands and businesses for their help (Source: Marketo, 2015). In B2B sales, 80% of business decision makers prefer to get company information in a series of articles versus an advertisement (Source: Meltwater, 2015). In fact, the sales process actually begins before companies even know given that consumers spend an average of 79 days conducting research before buying (Source: Marketo, 2015).
What is Content Marketing?
Content marketing is derived from a much larger concept known as inbound marketing. Inbound marketing is “a methodology that focuses on creating quality content that pulls people toward your company and product” (Source: Hubspot, 2014). It is used by companies as a way to attract, engage, and delight customers online (Source: Inbound Marketing, 2015). According to Hubspot, 6 out of 10 marketing professionals consider content marketing to be a subset of inbound marketing, whereas 10% consider the reciprocal to be true (Source: Hubspot, 2014).
The concept of content marketing has been around for quite awhile; however, mastering content marketing is almost like an art form. According to the Content Marketing Institute, “content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience, and ultimately to drive profitable customer action” (Source: Content Marketing Institute, 2015).
While this is a great starting point to understand the basics of content marketing, the concept actually goes much deeper. In essence, content marketing is the art of communicating with customers and prospects without selling (Source: Marketing Institute, 2015). Instead of pitching your products or services, like with traditional marketing, you are delivering information that makes your buyer more informed to make buying decisions (Source: Marketing Institute, 2015). Buyers don’t want to feel like they are being told the same sales speech over and over again. They want to hear the information that will answer their specific questions and solve their individual problems.
Interested in changing buyer expectations? May I suggest reading my previous post, How and Empowered Buyer Impacts the Sale Process, found here.
Benefits of Content Marketing
If you have never considered integrating content marketing into your efforts, you are missing out on a number of benefits that content marketing can provide for your company. First and foremost, content marketing helps to establish you as a thought leader by providing existing and potential customers with interesting information while driving your SEO (Source: Nectafy, 2014). Providing information to audiences that is backed up with facts is viewed as more credible to buyers. Meanwhile, 60% of business decision-makers say that company content helps them make better product decisions (Source: Marketing Institute, 2015). Giving the buyer all of the information that they could possibly need means that you are actually helping them make better and more informed decisions, while at the same time, speeding up the sales process.
Content marketing also helps to increase your brand awareness. Today, buyers do their homework before deciding to contact a company. The average buyer guides him/herself through 60% to 90% of the traditional sales funnel before even contacting your sales reps (Source: Marketo, 2015). The buyer knows exactly who you are before you even know that they exist. This is exactly why content marketing is becoming a crucial aspect of the marketing process. As prospects and buyers search the web for answers, your brand continues to be visible (Source: Marketo, 2015).
The more valuable the content that you publish, the better able you are to establish your position as a thought leader. This in turn leads to better brand awareness and eventually increased brand preference. Increased brand preference is extremely valuable as it helps to further establish your brand as a thought leader in your industry and ultimately strengthens the relationship with buyers (Source: Marketo, 2015).
The empowered buyer views having a strong relationship with a company as extremely important. Through content marketing, companies are able to position themselves as a helpful resource to their existing and potential buyers, building up their trust in the company (Source: Nectafy, 2014). The stronger the relationships companies have with audiences, the better, as those relationships will ultimately drive sales (Source: Nectafy, 2014).
Want to learn how to understand your customer better? May I suggest reading my previous post, What is a Buyer Persona and How does it Influence Digital Content, found here.
A further benefit of content marketing that is worth mentioning is cost. Content marketing is a great marketing tactic because it provides greater reach at a lower cost (Source: Marketo, 2015). However, doing so will also require time and patience given that it is not a short-term strategy. Over time, having a variety of valuable content will assist you in reaching more qualified leads and interested buyers (Source: Marketo, 2015). It is important to note that while content marketing may be less costly than alternative forms of marketing, other investments of time, effort and patience will be required before you see any noticeable return (Source: Nectafy, 2014).
Most Common Content Marketing Mistakes
As I previously mentioned, content marketing is like an art form. Mastering it takes time and patience. If you’re currently incorporating content marketing into your efforts, or considering doing so, it’s important to discuss some of the common mistakes that marketers are making.
The most common mistake is thinking that content marketing should be separate from other marketing tools. Those who are not engaging in any sort of content marketing also fall under this category. No matter what type of marketing strategy that you use, content marketing should be part of the process (Source: Marketing Institute, 2015). The reason for this is simple, you cannot market without having great content - it’s virtually impossible (Source: Marketing Institute, 2015).
Next, it may be that you are just not publishing enough content. In the digital world today, content is king. Not publishing content regularly and frequently means that you’re not properly exercising content marketing. In fact, those that commit to regularly publishing content reap the biggest rewards in terms of website traffic and leads (Source: B2B Marketing Insider, 2015).
Donald Trump has made some pretty big mistakes when it comes to his content management skills this election. To learn about the one tool that Trump didn’t have (but every sales rep should take advantage of), check out our previous post, “A Lesson in Content Management and Communications from Donald Trump”.
As I mentioned above, you cannot market effectively if you do not have usable content. Marketers commonly forget to utilize the information that they already have (Source: B2B Marketing Insider, 2015). When it comes to B2B content, 60-70% of it goes unused (Source: B2B Marketing Insider, 2015). Instead of starting from scratch, look to the content that you already have created- this is a great starting point without investing more time and resources at the outset.
You’ve created the content, so now what? It’s time to distribute! Another common mistake is not properly distributing content. Spending money and time on content is great, but if your don’t distribute it properly, who is going to read it?” (Source: B2B Marketing Insider, 2015). Without an audience, your content and efforts have gone to waste and you won’t benefit or see any measurable results. Content should be created for audiences as an information tool that they can actually use. The content should provide information about your industry, not just your products. Talking about yourself too much is a major turn off to customers and can severely impact your content marketing efforts. The fact is, empowered buyers just don’t want to be constantly bombarded with a sales pitch (Source: B2B Marketing Insider, 2015). Doing so will only make them trust you less.
Finally, and importantly, not focusing on your content title is a major mistake that marketers are making - and an easy one to fix if you think about it! As many as 8 out of 10 people read the title of your content, but only 2 out of 10 then go through the whole content (Source: Written, 2015). If the title can't even grab the attention of your reader, they simply aren't even going to open it. Putting effort into your titles is also important from a SEO standpoint because incorporating keywords and phrases into your content titles can enhance your SEO.
Interested in learning about how to properly use content marketing through Social Media? We walk you through the do’s and don’ts of social engagement for more effective use of digital content in our post, “Content Management and Digital Success Through Social Media”.
How Sales Enablement Can Benefit your Content Marketing Strategies
The use of sales enablement software can benefit your content marketing strategies, helping to seamlessly integrate content marketing into your current marketing strategy.
Haven’t heard of sales enablement? May I suggest our previous post, “What is Sales Enablement? A Sales Enablement Definition for 2015”, found here.
There isn’t a modern marketer out there that would accept a content marketing program that didn’t measure results (Source: Knowledge Tree, 2015). So how do you measure these results? Through sales enablement, marketing teams have the ability to measure efforts through data analytic software and also have the ability to measure the effectiveness and value of the content that they are spending time and money producing.
Sales analytic software also gives marketing teams the ability to track what content is used in a sales presentation, and how long was spent viewing and digesting that content. Sales enablement helps marketing and sales teams understand what content is of interest to buyers at different stages along the decision journey and this in turn helps them create content that is more specific and similar to the content that customers found interesting.
In a recent study done by IDC, research shows that 80% of the content created by marketing teams isn’t even being used by sales reps (Source: Sales Force, 2015). This could be because the content being created isn’t relevant, there isn’t enough content, or sales reps have a hard time finding the content. Using the best sales enablement solution will ensure that sales reps have the content that they need to really succeed. Through mobile sales applications, sales reps can customize content 'on the go' and tailor it to meet the needs to their customer. Ultimately you will get stronger and more valuable sales conversations when you utilize sales enablement technology.
Remember: content is king! If you are not creating sufficient content, or any content at all, you are missing out on valuable sales opportunities.
Interested in sales enablement software? Don’t know where to start? May I suggest my previous post, How to Determine the Right Sales Enablement Software, found here.
[RELATED CONTENT] For more information on the topic of content marketing, including trends, challenges, and strategies to mitigate those challenges, please feel free to download the eBook below.
Digital content marketing is playing an ever increasing role in sales process and late-stage closing. All the trends from the eBook above point to a need for improved digital content management capability and multi-channel excellence. If your sellers and marketers struggle to connect content to the right buyers, request a demo and let us show you what unencumbered reach feels like.
