Content Marketing: Tell Your Story

Marketing best practices and principles change faster than the Adirondack weather. With the constant advent of new technologies, media channels and communication methods, the landscape constantly evolves and so do the strategies. But one thing is for sure—content marketing is the future of the industry.

Today, practitioners tout the importance of creating optimized content and promoting it through various channels to create a dialogue and engage a specific audience. Some advocate using social media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter or posting regular updates to a company blog. Others champion an integrated marketing strategy that combines a comprehensive mix of traditional and new media.

What should your strategy be? The truth is it depends.

The key to successful content marketing is communicating the right message to an interested audience. Content marketing strategies vary and everyone has an opinion. My advice: forget about the marketing for a moment and instead, focus solely on your message. Evaluate each of your posts, blogs, tweets, emails, video, website and print content and ask yourself, "What is all this publishing worth if the content I'm offering is mediocre at best?"

In her new book, Content Rules, Marketing Prof's Chief Content Officer Ann Handley writes that a fundamental part of marketing today is publishing content that connects with customers and prospects. Whether you market B2C or B2B, Handley states that you need great content to:

• Be discovered
• Educate buyers
• Overcome objections
• Become part of the purchase consideration set
• Build a fan base to help spread your value proposition to additional shoppers

Start by telling your story. And don't oversell it. All companies are different and each has a unique history, personality and point of view. Infuse your content with that authentic character. Be honest and approachable. Try to offer information that has value, is useful and educates your audience.

Once you've figured out who you are, figure out exactly who your audience is. Develop an audience persona and understand what they want from you. What do they value? Respond to? What are they interested in? A good exercise is to assess which of your posts, blogs, tweets, emails, etc. gets the most traffic—at the very least this will provide a topical foundation for future outreach.

Next, develop a comprehensive content strategy with clear and precise objectives including how you are defining success. Determine what you want your content to achieve, along with the style and tone of voice. Do you want to inform or inspire? Are you serious or conversational? Decide how you want to be perceived. Then stick with it.

The final step is to actually write the content. The same principles apply for any client, brand or company: have a story, understand your audience and create a clearly defined strategy. Follow these steps and you'll be well on your way to effective content marketing.

And if you're still struggling, call me. I'll tell your story.