A truly effective content marketing campaign involves copywriting, creative design, digital promotion and sometimes other outbound elements like email marketing. But as you develop a strategy that makes use of all these components, you need to decide what content offers will guide leads through the stages of their Buyer’s Journey. Below are some quick tips to help you produce content offers that generate marketing- and sales-qualified leads (MQLs and SQLs) and still delight current customers.
-
Focus on a Specific Buyer Persona
If you have multiple buyer personas for your product or service offering, such as IT professionals and c-level executives, it’s important to identify which persona you’d like to target with each piece of content before you get started. We recommend designing a campaign around one buyer persona at a time so that all elements work to entice a single target audience.
-
Select a Stage and Answer Questions
Gear your content toward a specific stage of the Buyer’s Journey: Awareness, Consideration or Decision. Then conduct research to find out what information your buyers are seeking about your type of product or service at each stage. Craft your content around their questions to show how your product or service can fulfill their needs.
-
Pick the Right Format
Effective content comes in many forms, from eBooks, tip sheets and whitepapers to cheat sheets, checklists and demos. Some formats work well at certain Buyer’s Journey stages; eBooks and whitepapers are great when you want to fully inform an audience about an industry issue or a budding trend, and checklists and tip sheets are helpful ways to inform buyers about solutions and next steps.
-
Discuss a Relevant Topic
If you lack ideas for content offer topics, consider again the general needs of your buyer persona at each stage. Scan industry headlines or brainstorm timely topics that might interest your audience and answer their questions. Your offer might give an overview of a popular or little-known topic, provide an educational crash course or serve as a point of reference for a confusing topic.
-
Include Appealing Visuals
Images and creative design should always play a big part in how your content offers are presented to target audiences. Although these offers will be placed behind a landing page form, you still want the content itself to look appealing and professional and captivate readers for a longer period of time. Strong visuals also increase the shareability of a piece, encouraging interested readers to pass it along to other prospective customers.
-
Identify Repurposing Opportunities
Once you’ve put forth the effort to design well-crafted offers, determine each piece’s repurposing potential. Break up longer offers into bite-sized teasers, flesh out shorter offers by expanding on topics, or combine offers into a comprehensive guide for future use. Repurposed work can reinforce your message, help your SEO efforts and increase your authority.
To ensure a smooth first content marketing campaign, make use of our helpful checklist: Content Marketing Campaign Planning & Execution.
Are you interested in B2B content marketing services? Contact Sagefrog Marketing Group today.
