Clients today have more choices than ever before when it comes to who they do business with. It’s the upside and the downside of the internet, right? Choices are great, but can also lead to overwhelm and a whole lot of information for your clients to sort through. So in this age of digital marketing, it’s important to establish a personal connection and build a relationship with your potential customer. You can start that process when you create more value in your content marketing.
What Is Content Marketing
What exactly is ‘content marketing’? The Content Marketing Institute gives this formal definition: “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.” [R]
Content marketing serves to inform, educate, and inspire the reader. It’s typically longer and focused on building relationships between the business or business owner and the audience so the reader will want to buy the product in the future. The mantra is to “provide value” when creating content so the reader sees you as trustworthy source and returns to you as a resource.
You may create value in your content marketing in the form of your of your articles, podcasts, videos, and other media. It may be your nurture emails, lead magnets, or resources you’ve created to support your brand. I find one of the easiest ways to think of content is that there typically isn’t an opportunity to buy or sign up directly on the page (unlike a sales page, ad, or launch email).
What Does Value Even Mean for Content?
The first step to creating value-based content is understanding what “value” actually means. In the 2022 B2B Content Marketing Report from the Content Marketing Institute, they cited 74% of respondents felt the success of content marketing was attributed to the value. [R]
Value is anything your audience finds helpful or beneficial. This could be anything from entertainment and education to news and insights.
Sharing a personal post, for example, can have tons of value-added because it’s motivational, inspirational, and helps your audience relate to you. That’s still valuable to them and to you because it builds your authority.
How to Create Value-Based Content
Now that you what it means to create value in your content marketing, it’s time to learn how to do it yourself. Here are a few tips for content creation that your audience will love:
1) Know Your Target Audiences
Early on in your business you should have done the exercises to identify your target audiences. I say more than one because sometimes depending on the offers in your business, you may have more that one ideal customer that you speak to. For example, you may have one avatar who likes to do things themselves or is budget-conscious so they may opt for DIY templates, whereas another avatar in your business may raise their hand for your premium done-for-you services so they can let you and your team set to work while they move on to a more visionary role.
Either way, start by identifying the needs and wants of your audience. This on exactly who you are serving will give you greater insight of their problems – as well as potential solutions.
Knowing your target audiences will also help you identify the content types will want to offer. For example, a busy mom who is juggling young children while trying to manage her home and start a business may be best served by audio content rather than something they have to sit in front of a screen and watch or read like a video or pdf.
Often as content creators, we tend to want to write from our own perspective rather than the point of view of our customers and where they are in the buyer’s journey. This can cause us to miss the mark when we create offers or write sales messaging that is misaligned with what our buyer thinks they need or want.
Understanding the buyer’s journey, or where they are in the process of awareness to purchase. Early on, when your potential client is learning about you and your brand, you are helping and providing valuable content compared to your strategy closer to the sale which is more conversion focused.
Once you are honed in on exactly who you are serving, creating helpful content will be so much easier for you. That’s why market research is an essential part of any content strategy.
2) Always ask, 'Who does this help?'
When you create content, always ask yourself, “who does this help?” If you can answer that question, you know your content adds value.
For example, if you’re writing a blog post about how to start a business, chances are it will help entrepreneurs get started on their journey and learn some helpful tips on getting started.
This measure can be used when creating all types of content types from lead magnets, social posts, or long form content. If you’ve taken the time to do your customer research and know what your target audience is seeking in terms of quality content, it will make your job easier when evaluating what they will find helpful.
3) Think About Relevance When Creating Content
Relevant content is value-based content. When you create relevant content, it shows your audience that you understand where they’re at and what they need.
Not all content will be relevant to everyone. You chose to work with a specific type of client or customer. Maybe you prefer online service providers, coaches, e-comm, or B2C, start-ups, or maybe you help business owners scale from six to seven figures.
When you write specifically to them and addressing the pain points they experience, and the solutions they desire, you’ll build trust between you and them, which can translate into a stronger relationship (and future sales!)
Your social media analytics as well, as the data from your Google Search Console, can give you some insight as to whether or not the content you are sharing is meeting the goals you set when creating your content calendar. If you didn’t hit the metrics you intended, readjust your strategy for the next month. Don’t keep spending your valuable time creating content that isn’t resonating with your intended audience.
4) Don't Be Afraid to Share Your Knowledge
So often I hear from content creators that they are afraid to share what they know because they are worried that people won’t pay to work with them if they do. Instead, they hold back and only share surface content online, reserving “the good stuff” for their paying clients.
This strategy isn’t helping anyone. You need a content marketing strategy that helps you stand out from your competitors. When you potential customers are querying online content for answers to their problem, is your business coming up in the search results because you shared something unique and valuable?
The truth is, most information is available pretty freely online. If you limit what you share, your audience may feel like you don’t have much depth or may not be that helpful; they may wonder if it’s worth the investment.
One of the first pieces of advice I heard when I was taking online business classes as a newbie entrepreneur was, “If you speak to everyone, you speak to no one.” Don’t be afraid to really dial in on speaking directly to your niche and using your brand voice to your advantage. The people whom you are meant to serve will be attracted by your content and will follow you and will pay you to implement the solution to their problems. All because you took the time to provide value.
5) Create a Content Repurposing Strategy
Content production takes valuable time in your business from research to seo efforts, creating your anchor content, writing for social media platforms, and email marketing. One of the best content marketing tips you can implement in your business is to begin repurposing content instead of constantly creating everything from scratch.
Some of your trending content whether videos, blog posts, or social media posts, can be updated and refreshed if they still provide education, tips, strategy, or other value to your target audience.
As you write content for your business, you’ll find you come to a point where you start to have more breath around your topic. Perhaps you’ve become more niched over the years, and your focus has become more narrowed.
These revived posts can begin to bring in more traffic and increase brand awareness helping to generate leads with a new set of potential buyers. Consider asking yourself what’s performing well that you can turn into evergreen content? Or what’s a topic you can use to go more in depth about either by answering additional questions, creating additional media, or adding in infographics to explain your point? Answering these questions can help you to create more value in your content marketing.
6) Create Helpful Resources
The resources you create are also considered valuable content for your targeted audience. This could be any infographics, how-tos, content upgrades, lead magnets, or workshops.
If you are active on social media, looking for some of the questions you are often asked can be great inspiration for content ideas when creating resources.
Some of your resources may be free images included within your social media posts or blog posts, while others may be gated with an opt-in form so you can grow your email list.
As you grow your email list, this is a great opportunity for you to learn more about your audience and their interests. You can can personalize future articles based upon the resources they’ve signed up for, for example, making this a great way to create more value in your content marketing.
Buttoned-Up Thoughts on Ways to Create More Value in Your Content Marketing Strategy
Every piece of content you create has some value. Value doesn’t just mean tips and tricks or tutorials; it could also mean personal content that allows your audience to relate to you or a funny meme post that gets them laughing and thinking.
If you need support in creating a content plan, I provide quarterly plans as part of my VIP day offers. We’ll audit your current content library, determine what serving you, your offers, and your audience, establish where there may be information gaps, and create a content marketing strategy complete with keyword research that can be used by your marketing team to write your anchor posts, email marketing newsletters and social media captions. Contact me to learn more and get started.
As long as you’re create content that helps your audience in some way, then you’re on the right track! Be sure to add value by following these content marketing tips into your process.
