4 easy ways to enhance your content strategy
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What can a show about nothing teach you about content strategy? A lot actually! Our upcoming webinar compares the satirical, societal norms from television’s Seinfeld to your own content strategy. This presentation shares 4 easy ways you can enhance your content strategy.
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4 easy ways to enhance your content strategy
- 1. 4 Easy Ways to Enhance Your Content Strategy Taylor Pettis, Director of Marketing
- 2. What can you learn from a show about nothing?
- 3. 9 out of 10 businesses are “doing” content marketing but, their success rate is only about 30%
- 6. Why does content matter? Content is at the heart of everything! It’s how you communicate with your audience. Don’t forget, people consume more content in the digital era than ever before so it’s important you: • Cut through the clutter • Provide relevant information • Solve your customers problems • Make your audience happy
- 7. What is content strategy? Content strategy refers to the planning, development and management of content. It’s the design that places the right content, to the right user, at the right time through strategic planning and governance.
- 8. What is content marketing? 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 – ultimately to drive profitable customer action.
- 12. 4 Content Strategies Right Place Right Message Right Time Right Plan
- 13. Right Place Know your audience and the places they visit
- 14. Know your audience. Is it relationship George or fun George?
- 15. Buyer Persona “A persona is a fictional (or semi-fictional) description or your ideal or target customer. The description is backed by real data and research about your existing customers, and typically include customer demographics, goals and motivation. It’s also common for persona descriptions to list personal interests or hobbies as well.” http://bit.ly/TDM-Persona
- 16. Measurement and Analytics Use data insights to validate the right place for your audience: • Website Analytics • Point of Sale Data • Post Purchase Surveys • Social Reviews • Other Forms of Data http://bit.ly/TDM-Web-Analytics
- 17. Overall Business Strategy Content marketing follows content strategy. Content strategy should follow your overall business strategy. The tail doesn't wag the dog. • Overall business goals and objectives • Target audience needs and concerns • Never create content for content sake
- 18. Right Time Know when people will be receptive to your
- 20. Content Calendar Pretty self-explanatory, plan what content: • Will be created • When it will be created • What consumer needs it meets • Where it will appear or be delivered • How it will be measured or evaluated i.e. deliver Festivus content during Festivus season
- 21. Consumer Journey Map Diagram that illustrates the steps your customers go through in engaging with your company, whether it be a product, an online experience, retail experience, or a service, or any combination. http://bit.ly/TDM-Journey-Map
- 22. Marketing Automation Automate marketing actions to seamlessly reach your audience at the time that is best for them… Oh, in the right place too!
- 23. Right Message Are you sending the right message to your
- 24. Does your message stand out from the crowd?
- 25. Hot Buttons Solution Content Type CTA | Offer List your audiences frustrations inside a matrix. For each frustration, list a way that your product or service resolves their pain points Website, Blog, Ad, Video, Podcast, etc. Is there an ask or an offer associated with this content Frustration A Solution A Video Back to School Sale Frustration B Solution B Blog Free Estimate Create content based on your audience's needs http://bit.ly/TDM-Persuasion-Equation http://bit.ly/TDM-Headlines-eBook
- 26. Topic Clusters Mind mapping strategy that places your customer needs at the center with your resolves to their needs mapped out as nodes.
- 27. Communications Brief Create a brief for each campaign, product or project that begins with a communication objective and how you will achieve your messaging goals.
- 28. Point of View Structure Messaging strategy to help your target audience change by brainstorming: 1. Status Quo 2. Flawed Approach 3. Consequences of No Change 4. New Way 5. Likely Outcome (From Corporate Visions, primarily B2B workshop, but easily reworkable for all audience types)
- 29. Speak to Your Audience (From Corporate Visions)
- 30. Brand Integrity frontify.com brand management Programs
- 31. Right Plan Pull all of your strategy together and begin
- 32. Good things can come from a process.
- 33. Build | Measure | Learn • Create a culture of testing • Let data drive your decisions • Optimize your content and your campaigns http://bit.ly/TDM-Learn-From-Mistakes
- 34. Other Resources • A/B Testing (http://bit.ly/TDM-AB-Testing) • Keyword Research (http://bit.ly/TDM-Keyword-Research) • Fall in Love with Content Marketing (http://bit.ly/TDM-Love-Content) • Content is Queen (http://bit.ly/TDM-Content-Queen) • Proofreading Checklist (http://bit.ly/TDM-Proofreading-Checklist) • Content Audit Template (http://bit.ly/TDM-Content-Template)
- 35. Get Creative • Guinness Book of World Records • Michelin Star Restaurants • National Anthem at Sporting Events http://bit.ly/TDM-Comedy-Content
- 36. Other Examples • Anything Red Bull does • Squatty Potty • Dollar Shave Club
- 37. Thank you. Taylor Pettis taylor.pettis@threedeepmarketing.com Tweet me: @tpettis
Notas do Editor
- Content is a HUGE topic. I feel like I could teach an entire college semester on it, I’m guessing some schools are starting to do this – HOPEFULLY! There’s also an organization, The Content Marketing Institute that is designed to educating marketers on this topic. Knowing there’s a lot to teach and learn here, I attempted to simplify a massive topic into 4 Easy Ways, but there more like categories for content strategy. For that reason, I provide lots of outside links for you to reference later on… I also stick to some high level descriptions here knowing I’m giving you links for more information, but if you have any questions or want me to dig into greater detail on anything, let me know. Finally, I tried to make the presentation memorable. I know that retention of new information occurs when you link a new concept to a known concept. I feel like most people are familiar with the television show Seinfeld, so hopefully adding some elements of their show makes this a bit more fun for all of us.
- Seinfeld was known as the “show about nothing”. But was it really? In reality it was a show about social norms… And communication! It’s fitting to learn communication strategy from a show all about communication. Hopefully you’re able to take away some new concepts that help your content seem less about NOTHING and a bit more about quality communication with your target audience. So let’s get started!
- How many people are doing content marketing? How many people feel their successful at it? I guess it all depends on how you define success, but most businesses tend to agree that success is conversion. Conversion in most cases is a purchase, it could be registering for an event like this one – it could also be smaller micro-conversions like signing up for an email newsletter or agreeing to a free estimate. The point is, there is some type of value exchange with a conversion – it’s more than a visit to your website or clicking through from an email. Those actions tend to be more vanity metrics and not performance or conversion metrics. With that explanation, does anyone’s opinion change? Now you get the point. People are doing content marketing, however everyone is not successful. That’s why this topic is so important! Before we dig into the tips for content strategy, let’s think about why roughly 70% of companies fail at content marketing.
- Are you a chucker? I get it... And honestly I’ve done it before. Just like someone passing me the ball and I immediately shoot the ball. I’ve had someone approach me with an idea or an assignment of you know what we should do… Or you know what would be great… And we rush to deliver it before ever thinking about strategy, business objectives or how the piece of content will be supported in the future. I believe the 70% of marketers who are not hitting their marketing goals are chuckers! They don’t have a plan and they’re making it up as they go. Another reason, or another definition of being a chucker is giving up on a marketing campaign too soon. Not every campaign drives immediate results… Content Marketing is a long term strategy, in fact most people will tell you - you need to stick with it for at least a year before you can make any judgements on it. So don’t be a chucker by throwing out what could be successful marketing campaigns too early.
- Just like anything else, background information is necessary before diving into the details. So, what is content? I think we can all agree content is substantive information. Whoa, an ambiguous definition I know. My point is that content can take the shape of nearly any format. Blogs, websites, emails, paid ads, social media, text messages videos pictures, music, books, poetry… Literally any type of format to share your story, their story, or your brands story. I’ll also get into some creative forms of content towards the end showing the variety you can use. Just think RED BULL!
- Content matters, it really matters. It’s how you communicate with your audience. You could say, I talk to my customers on the phone. Well, your script or what you say is your content, right. Even this presentation and what I’m saying now is content. Yes, content matters because 1. it informs, 2. it influences, 3. it educates, 4. it entertains and much more. It matters in marketing for many reasons, especially these four which I feel are most relevant.
- Before I get into areas of content strategy, let’s understand what it is overall… More definitions from and inspired by the Content Marketing Institute. Content strategy is drawing up your playbook. Don’t be a chucker, run a play according to a plan. That’s how winning sports teams score more, it’s how amazing architecture is built, it’s how memorable content is created – whether it’s Seinfeld programs or marketing your brand.
- Content marketing comes from your content strategy – unless you’re a chucker. Basically it’s the outcome and what’s delivered from your strategy. It’s the strategic approach to create and distribute your content based on your strategy.
- Let’s cover some differences and make sure we’re on the same page. Strategy = Plans Marketing = Executes
- Strategy = Manages Marketing = Produces
- Strategy = Guides Marketing = Delivers
- The title of this presentation is 4 ways to enhance your content strategy. Like I said at the top, these are more areas of content marketing than strategy itself. Here’s what we’ll cover. I should also point out that I organized these in a way I felt worked for this presentation. There isn’t necessarily a concrete sequential, because ALL these strategies need to be considered and executed in order to be successful. So, let’s begin! Some of these are general because I provide additional assets for you to checkout on your own time, but please stop me or ask questions as we go.
- I’m going to start with RIGHT PLACE. Anyone who watched Seinfeld knows this place. The cast visits it in every episode. So aiming to reach Jerry, George, Kramer or Elaine here would be a pretty good idea. Do you know where your target audience visits? It could be a physical location, or a virtual location. I can tell you I visit my email, Facebook and Twitter everyday, so those are good locations to find me.
- Your audience will act different in different locations. How is this relevant, well some people might not like personal messages on LinkedIn and others might not like work messages on Facebook. You get the point, you not only need to know where your audience is, but also think about relevant platforms.
- Buyer personas are a key step in reaching your audience in the right place. Knowing who your target audience is, their interests and frustrations provides a foundation for you to understand the right place to reach them. For instance, you wouldn’t use a newsletter advertisement to reach an audience who doesn’t order the paper. And you would direct someone who likes YouTube videos to a long, boring article. Personas are more than just going through the exercise of understanding how and where to communicate with your audience. There also an easy way to inform and onboard new employees, contractors and agencies. It’s a consistent way of describing your audience that will create consistent strategy and messaging. You’ll notice some areas cross here, which is another reason why there isn’t really a concrete sequential order to these 4 areas. Additional learning – blog post I wrote covering mostly the errors marketers make when creating their personas along with some tips on how to avoid them.
- Measurement and analytics – this truly could go in any area of content strategy, but I put it in the right place. Also, I can’t emphasize the importance of measurement and analytics enough. I know people say we’re in the digital age, but that is TOTAL BS! We’re in the DATA AGE! Everything (nearly everything) online can be measured! Use it to inform your strategy. By looking at analytics it helps you make informed decisions about your strategy. So why is this the right place? Well you can use analytics to tell you where people are finding your content – now you know where to place more content where it’s working and less where it’s not. Are your visits coming from SEO | Paid Media | Email Campaigns | Social Media | - It can tell you where to put your content. You can also you measurement and analytics to drive nearly every area of your marketing strategy. For that reason, here’s a cool resource teaching you more about analytics and how to configure a meaningful measurement model that helps you move past vanity metrics and into ways you can use data to inform your marketing decisions.
- Right place… As well as all of the other areas I’ll mention needs to be driven by your overall business objectives. Don’t let the tail wag the dog. The reason I put this in primarily in the “right place” column is I’ve heard from lots of different brands. This company is sponsoring this, Tweeting that, or advertising there – WE NEED TO DO THAT TOO! Or, I heard from someone who knows social media and online stuff really well that we should do – fill in the blank. My point being, if you follow these shiny objects or chase a squirrel every time it’s in your yard, it’s easy to get off strategy – WHICH RESULTS IN NOT APPEARING IN THE RIGHT PLACE.
- Right time and right place can intersect at points (emailing at work, during work hours). You’ll notice nearly all of these strategies have some crossover, which is why they’re not a concrete sequential order again. The “PUFFY SHIRT” could even be considered content and I think every agrees on this episode that wearing it on a morning show was not the right time. And there’s good timing and bad timing. The funny thing is, your audience will rarely recognize or complement you on your good timing, but bad timing means your message misses them completely. Or even worse, THEY REMEMBER IT WAS BAD TIMING AND IT LEAVES A BAD IMPRESSION. Here’s an example of that.
- More proof that timing is everything. Know when people are observing so your content hits are the right time. Of course in this case George wishes he would’ve suppressed his audience – and that’s another good point. I had an experience with DELTA AIRLINES. My wife and I booked a flight and two hours after booking my flight I received a FREE companion certificate I receive annually as a medallion member. That was not the right time – I was angry. I had just purchased a flight and in the same day the send me a coupon for a free flight! So recognize right time can mean both when to send a message and also when to restrict content from certain segments as well.
- What better way to schedule well timed events than a calendar. A content calendar is exactly as it sounds, you plan what content will be delivered into market at the appropriate times. So you’ll deliver your Steel Pole and Tinsel Sales messages around Festivus season, right? This image intentionally has soft focus, because I don’t want to share all of this brand’s publishing dates, but you don’t need to overthink content calendars. Hubspot, Marketo and tons of other MarTech software companies offer free template of these in exchange for you email address. However, I prefer to create my own. And it’s pretty simple, just create a matrix that includes what’s being created, who’s creating it, where it will live, how it’s shared and your CTA or what you’re asking your audience to do.
- Customer Journey Maps are a way of visualizing your content calendar and other strategy documents. Rather than staring at an excel sheet you see communications mapped to your customer’s experience and their journey towards purchase. Most include common stages like this one AWARENESS | CONSIDERATION | PURCHASE | POST PURCHASE. These can also be a little bit of a chicken and egg situation, as some will develop the journey map first and then create the content calendar. Both work and depending on your situation one might work better than the other. Here’s a resource I contributed to IBM’s Think Marketing. I originally titled it “What the FUD is a Journey Map” and their editor changed the title. If you read the post, you’ll understand my original title.
- Final item I’ll cover in right time is delivering the message. Both the calendar and the journey map help you strategize when people should receive messages, however executing them is another item to consider. I know what you’re thinking… Execution is Content Marketing and I thought you were talking about Content Strategy!?!?! And yes, you’re correct, but here’s a bit of a grey area. There’s a number of different ways you can deliver you message. Are you going to manually send marketing email campaigns, Tweets and other fun stuff? AS IF! Marketing Automation software allows you to schedule all of your marketing activity. Most platforms allow for both time based publishing or behavior based publishing. If you’re not doing this already, you need to look into it. My website updates are scheduled on when to publish, email campaigns scheduled ahead of time, Tweets and Facebook posts – you betcha. Basically all digital marketing activity can be handled through these platforms with a little something called Omni-Channel marketing, but that’s another topic. There’s lots of platforms out there. Watson from IBM, Pardot from SalesForce, Infor from Epiphany, Hubspot is a good one for smaller companies. We tend to use Watson Marketing most often. I even have a link to a video IBM created featuring our work with Red Wing Shoes. You might even recognize a face in there – yes, I’m talking about me. You’ll recognize me! The point being, marketing automation allows you schedule messages that are the right time for your customer which can often be outside of your work hours, it can be triggered based on behavior, and it’s seamless which reduces the opportunity for errors. So check it out. Two final comments on Marketing Automation. First, it’s more than just email. Some people do use the MA platforms for email only, but that means that not using all of their software features. And 2, it’s the best way to expand your content without adding too many resources.
- No description needed here… How will your audience respond to the message your sending?
- How many people thought she would respond to George’s advance? Not too many, and that’s the humor. I shared this because it’s funny, yes. But it’s also important to note that what you assume is the best content or message for your audience isn’t always the case. Another reason data, testing and sound strategy are essential to successful marketing.
- Getting out of your head into your audiences. Planning the right message takes some time. Here’s a table that I like to use. You’ll also notice this fits well inside a matrix - just add the publish date and a few more minor details and you have a content calendar… Hot buttons – what are your audiences frustrations. Solution – for each frustration, how does your product or service make them happier. Content type – some elements of right place here…. Where are they going, create in a format that will reach them. CTA | Offer – depending on the content type, you may or may not have a CTA. In my personal opinion, nearly every communication should have a CTA or Offer – if you’re not asking your audience to take action in some way, shape or form – then you probably need to ask yourself should I really put this piece of content in the market. Some additional resources – Persuasion equation and Headlines eBook
- Another strategy. This one is slightly more visual. Just like the mindmaps your English teachers had you create for writing assignments. Place your audience hot buttons or frustrations in the center of the cluster and map out how your product or service resolves those frustrations. The items mapped now becomes content you should create – and it’s based on their needs.
- Developing a communications brief helps set expectations with you and writers. It’s the scoring rubric in many ways that provides an objective way of evaluating the content that is created. So, create communications briefs – ALWAYS! You can have these at the brand level, department level, campaign, etc. The point is to be clear about the message and tone and create the ability to be both consistent and efficient when working with consultants, agencies, writers and staff. And like the persona documents you share, these will help you move faster and eliminate errors and your company grows.
- Similar to how the communications brief is organized by what your audience is doing now and what you’d like them to do in the future. Here’s a workshop session we like to use at Three Deep called a point of view model. Essentially, it’s a brainstorming exercise that helps you flush out all the content that belongs on your communications brief.
- Right message is also perceived in the voice you have with your audience. I was tempted to include the Seinfeld clip of Jimmy, the guy who talks in the third person – jimmy likes to play ball, jimmy’s really fast… Anyhow, that didn’t make the cut. All kidding aside, I mentioned that a phone script or this presentation is content… And it is. Just like a conversation, nobody likes chatting with someone who only talks about themselves… And your content, website, marketing materials are the same too. Using “you” phrasing is an easy way to make it about your audience, rather than including “we” phrases only talk about your brand. It’s pretty straightforward, but you’d be surprised at how many brands TALK ABOUT THEMSELVES VS. THEIR AUDIENCE ON THEIR WEBSITE AND IN THEIR CONTENT. I like these basic examples at the bottom of this slide. It helps you get your head in the right frame of mind for developing you style content.
- Finally, with right message, remember brand integrity matters. My wife isn’t in marketing, but she never leaves the house without putting on lipstick first. Even when she was in labor, I packed the car and was ready to leave – only to find her putting on makeup before we left for the hospital. I’m guessing your brand doesn’t wear lipstick, but it does have a logo, brand colors, font and other characteristics you’ve invested a lot of time, money and effort into. So create brand boards to help onboard new staff members, contractors and agencies. Similar to your personas and communications brief, it’ll help keep consistency and efficacy.
- Finally the right plan. The Human Fund is a funny example of a horrible plan.
- Planning is a series of processes and I know not everyone likes planning… But our friend with the soup here, he has a plan or a recipe that makes amazing soup right. He also has a structure that people follow – while his is a bit more rigid for comedy, you can bet he’s not letting the tail wag the dog. He has his objectives and sticks to them. And you should too!
- Planning means being agile. Essentially putting together the pieces in the previous three areas, becomes this fourth simple strategy for content. However, it’s an independent category because in the DATA ERA nothing is perfect and you need to continually optimize your planning and campaigns for continuous improvement. You’ll hear lots of people talking about fail fast, or agile strategies of build-measure-learn. I wrote about this topic and you can learn more at that bit.ly. But the right plan is really about creating a culture of testing, letting data drive your decisions and continually optimizing your efforts. http://bit.ly/TDM-Learn-From-Mistakes
- More resources. I told you I promised a bunch of additional items. Here’s a whole list of reading that will help you round out the planning area of your strategy.
- In wrapping up, I’d like to urge you to be creative. As I mentioned at the top of the presentation, content can be in nearly any format. It’s more than just blogs and tweets. Some creative examples. The Guinness Book of World Records, I’m sure you know this but it’s a content marketing piece from Guinness Beer. Before the days of the internet, drunk’n banter would happen inside of pubs – one way to call people on their BS was a book of world records to debate the strongest man, longest throw, etc. People debated about pointless stuff and drank more beer, Guinness Beer as a result. Content marketing with conversion. Michelin Star restaurants. My wife and I are total foodies, we’ve traveled around the country and world picking our vacation spots based on restaurants. Just last weekend we went to southern California to eat at one of Richard Blazes restaurants – in case anyone else follows celebrity chefs. So I was familiar with Michelin star restaurants and even have eaten at a handful, but I never knew where it came from. You guessed it, the Michelin Tire Company. They used their endorsement of high end establishments to encourage Parisians to drive long distances to restaurants outside of Paris to what… Put more miles on their care and burnout tires faster. That’s content marketing with conversion in mind! The national anthem at sporting events, why? Yup, it’s sponsored by the U.S. Armed Forces recruiting offices. And now, it’s much more than the song. It’s flags that cover the entire filed and blue angels flying over the stadium. Another creative form of content! Another blog – comedy content, how comedy writers create some of the most memorable content. Check it out!
- Literally anything Red Bull does. Saint Paul knows this from the crashed ice and viral snow mobile video from last year. But these guys do creative stuff really well. I’m a Cubs fan and every year I go to opening day at Wrigley. This year as part of the opening day festivities, NL MVP Kris Bryant took batting practice in downtown Chicago where he hit baseballs into the skyline and Chicago river. Cool content, right. Some cool video examples: the Squatty Potty and Dollar Shave Club. If you haven’t seen those, check’em out for some inspiration.
- And that’s all I have for today. I realize I crammed a lot of items into a short presentation. Hopefully it wasn’t too much jumping around. I recognize for most it’s a lot to swallow at once, so my recommendation is start slow and begin thinking about these four areas with all of the content you created. So with that, your adventure begins!