You may have heard the terms content marketing and content strategy, in fact, you probably have. You may even use them, however, are you aware they are not the same thing?
So if they are different, how do they differ?
Are both content marketing and content strategy as important as each other?
Is it a good idea to implement both into your advertising?
Well good news, I am here to answer the above questions.
Content Marketing
Content marketing is the use of great content to pique interest and make you want to click to find out more, it wants to lead you to a sale rather than shout out to ‘buy here.’ Because it is more of a tease, people will pay more attention to it.
If you watch a Youtube video there’s a high chance you will have to watch a video beforehand and during. I don’t know about you but I for one always skip these ads where possible. People are not interested in ads. Content marketing though entices you in and makes you click on a link or have a closer look.
Content marketing has an almost organic feel, it offers value to the customer and builds trust. You help them realise they need your product instead of telling them so.
Content Strategy
Content strategy, as the name may suggest, is the stagey for using your content. It is the plan master plan, the blueprints for the content as it were. It is used to build content marketing and ensure it works.
There are 3 main areas when it comes to Marketing Stagey:
- Why you are publishing the content.
- Who you are reaching with your content.
- What kind of content are you publishing?
Why? You shouldn’t be posting any content just for the sake of posting. You shouldn’t think ‘Oh, I haven’t posted anything for a while, maybe I will today.’ That isn’t going to help anyone. You need to have a clear idea of what you are hoping to ascertain from posting.
Perhaps you want to share your own insight into your industry to gain respect and renown. Or maybe you are looking to gain more followers who you can turn into potential customers. You may want to target a new audience.
Having a goal in mind can help you produce the best bit of content possible.
Who? This is pretty self-explanatory really. Who are you writing your content for? Who do you want to see it? Who needs to see it?
If you know who is reading your content, you know how to identify pain points, why they are reading your content and you know how you can help them with your product and/or service. If you were to write an article about the housing market of 2021and your target audiences were students and people new to the world of work, then most of them probably won’t care too much about what you have to say as it won’t affect the vast majority of them. If that article, however, was on the best locations for renting in their city, they would be far more likely to read it.
When you know who is reading your content you can spark interest all the more easily.
What? When I say this, I don’t mean what kind of content in terms of the subject as much as format. As I mentioned above you need to have the right topic for the right audience, and formatting comes into play a little here too. However, it is also personal preference.
There are many different ways you can post content, blogs, ebooks, videos, podcasts anything and everything can be turned into content. Not only are there all these options, but multiple platforms to put them. Your own website, Youtube, LinkedIn, Facebook, every other social media platform. It may be you have the opportunity to write for Forbes, there are many avenues to explore when to comes to sharing your content.
Work out what works for you, find out how much your viewers want to read, and look out for where you get your most views.
So, without content marketing, the content strategy couldn’t exist, and whilst the marketing side could exist without the strategy it would struggle to prove at all effective. By devising the right strategy for you you can ensure your content thrives and increases sales, without shouting about your product and being too ‘in your face.’
