A Guide for B2B and B2C Solution Providers
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Step 1: Know Thyself
Step 2: Know Your Customer
Step 3: Determine Your Content Marketing Goals
Step 4: Search Engine Optimization
Step 5: Perform a Content Inventory
Step 6: Content Mapping
Step 7: Creating Content
Step 8: The Right Content in the Right Channel
Step 9: Measuring Your Content Strategy’s Success
Some Final Thoughts
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Introduction
Content without a plan behind it is just a collection of words, which is fine if you’re a part-time food blogger. If you’re a business, with employees relying on you for their jobs and investors who prefer to earn their money back, content without a strategy and a plan behind it is a recipe for trouble. At best it’s a waste of resources. At worst, you risk customers and stakeholders building a view of your culture, products, and services that differs from your own and which will ultimately hurt your business.
For our purposes here, included in our definition of content, is any branding and messaging published by the organization, across any medium, pertaining to the organization and its products and services. This includes printed collateral you take to trade shows, your digital marketing efforts, demand-gen, sales enablement, public relations (PR), investor relations, and industry influencers such as the media and analysts.
Too often, when organizations talk about building a content strategy, their content is focused on their products and services, all but ignoring content about the business, its culture, and why it exists.
But a true content strategy should include both organizational content and product and service-level content because customers don’t just look at your speeds and feeds anymore. They want to know who makes the decisions at the company, and can they trust the company will be around to support its products and services years down the road. Today, they also want to know if your company is sensitive to economic and social issues. For many, who you are as an organization is almost as important as what you do.
With that introduction to why you need a content strategy and what it needs to include, let’s get started.
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