Why Content Marketing Is Important for Your Business

When Bill Gates famously coined the phrase “Content is King” in 1996, he already envisioned how the new world would be shaped by content. 

Why? Competition is stiff amongst businesses today. It is commonplace for business owners to invest in different strategic campaigns to engage both their old and new customers, boost leads, and generate revenues to get a competitive advantage.

While some of these investments yield massive results, others don’t work in terms of achieving long-term business objectives. One of the significant aspects that business owners and execs easily disregard is content marketing.

What Is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is the simple process of curating and publishing high-quality content to grow your customer base and achieve your brand objectives. Most people associate this with social media and digital marketing, but its reach goes far beyond. 

Content marketing is a top-to-bottom, holistic approach towards shaping how your audience, investors, and even competitors perceive your business.

Some of common examples of this form of marketing include releasing infographics, podcasts, blogs, videos, billboards, magazines, videos, and so much more. Content marketing is a proven growth method for both B2B and B2C businesses.

Why Content Marketing?

In a sea of competition, your business must deploy a strategic campaign to earn dominance. And… Content marketing is just what you need to get there. 

Do you know that you can boost the traffic to your website by 402% by simply updating old blog posts on your website?

According to another study, 93% of North American marketers in the B2B industry use content marketing to promote businesses and boost their bottom line. Your business shouldn’t be left out.

Benefits of Content Marketing for Businesses

Content marketing is loaded with many benefits for businesses. If you’re still skeptical about the whole prospect, read on: 

Content Marketing Promotes Your Brand Awareness

One of the unique benefits of content marketing is increasing your brand awareness for new and existing customers. Potential customers need to know what your business is about; content marketing can help you achieve that. 

For instance, you run a cake shop and put up an informational guide on “Best cakes for weddings” that will rank higher on search results. If 15,000 people search for the exact keywords on their search engines monthly, your bakery will have the attention of over 180,000 potential customers who will read and see the call-to-action. That’s without mentioning the number of people who might read your blog and share it with their friends and family. 

With the proper content marketing, you can take advantage of trends and position your business for awareness. And if people know about and are talking about your business, that’s usually a good sign. 

Content Marketing Increases Your Web/SEO Traffic

Another unique benefit of content marketing is that it helps you boost your website and SEO traffic. In a world where everything is digitized, ranking higher in organic search results is more about proper content marketing. 

The usual argument about this is that technical SEO strategies help with positioning your business’ website in organic search results. However, most of these campaigns do not go beyond optimizing your homepage and alt text descriptions. More so, they do not allow more relevant keywords for your business to be used. 

When an average internet user stumbles on your website, is impressed with the homepage copy, and finds nothing relevant to keep them on the page, they will leave, and that’s another lost prospect. 

Content marketing keeps your target audience impressed by creating and curating high-quality content. Most search engines have no idea what a website is about until some specific keywords are used in the pages. 

If you invest in publishing instructional guides, tutorials, blogs, and video content, you will have the opportunity to introduce relevant keywords across different web pages to create a wholesome customer experience when a visitor lands on those pages. 

For example, let’s say you own a showroom for indoor and outdoor furniture. Instead of stuffing your homepage with décor-related keywords, you can optimize your website by creating different articles and spreading out the keywords across them. By doing so, your website will rank higher from organic searches. 

According to a comprehensive study, websites that rank higher on search results have valuable content. Keep your articles short and to the point to keep your audience engaged. However, if you can engage your audience with lengthy content, then go for it. 

Content Marketing Encourages Brand Loyalty

How do you feel when searching for something on the internet and finding it within seconds? Elated, right? That’s what the right content marketing does for your business; giving your customers what they need before what you think they need.

When people land on your website or go to your offices and get precisely what they need, it sends a confident message that your business is trustworthy. Naturally, trust breeds loyalty, which business owner wants to see.

Whether you have a product or service, content marketing will inspire your audience to always rely on your business. And when people are happy about a product or service, they’re bound to talk about it with their friends. 

Content Marketing Increases Engagement on Social Media

It is almost a heinous offense for your business not to have a social media presence. When people visit your social media pages to find engaging content, they often subscribe to your newsletter or follow your pages. 

Your audience on social media has a significant role in promoting your business. As followers of your pages, they share your posts, refer to your services, and buy your products. All of this will not happen if you don’t have excellent content marketing in place on your website and social media pages. 

Establishing a dedicated following on social media is directly correlated to how you connect with your audience. With high-quality content displayed on your website and social media pages, you will soon become an authority in that niche. You may even get noticed by other websites that reference and share your content to their followers. 

Content Marketing Makes Customer Support Easier

Customer support/service is one of the most hardworking departments in any business. Your agents constantly deal with questions, complaints, and inquiries. With content marketing, your business can make your agents’ tasks easier. 

How? 

You can inform them to curate all the common questions and complaints they tend to. Work with an in-house or professional content writer to create relevant instructional guides that seamlessly answer their requests. You can then publish them in several blog posts and on your social media accounts. 

The next time your customer support team faces such questions, they can redirect customers to read the articles and resolve their concerns. The fascinating thing about content marketing is that your customers may even find these guides through organic search without having to call or message customer support!

Content Marketing is 10x Better Than “Normal” Marketing

No one wants to be ambushed on their way to work on a busy morning by a marketer looking to sell a product that they don’t need. It’s the same thing with when people are surfing on the internet. 

A record 1 in 4 internet users has installed ad-blockers on their smartphones, tablets, and PCs to prevent offensive ads from tampering with their internet experience. If you’re planning to invest in pop-up ads, you might not be pleased with the results. 

Content marketing is all about providing relevant content to your audience when they want it. And when that is achieved, you can introduce your related products or services you think they’ll need.

Content Marketing Boosts Your Products Visibility

Content marketing also reigns supreme in promoting awareness for your products and services. This can happen in two different ways. 

• Direct visibility. Writing a ‘how-to’ article about your specific products will inspire your audience to check out the products themselves. Remember to provide links to your product pages if you talk about them in your blog! 
• Indirect visibility. If your blog or article is informative enough, other websites will link back to it. Search engines like Google see backlinks to mean that your webpage is informative and relevant. More so, the links to your product pages are also seen as a valuable internet resource. The more other websites link to your web pages, the higher they are ranked on search engine result pages (SERPs). 

Building your links and ranking higher on organic search results is one of the most challenging parts of digital marketing. However, if your content is valuable, other websites are more likely to talk about it and share it to their audience. 

Content Marketing Builds Engagement via Multiple Formats

Different generations come with different needs. That’s why it is not smart to implement an umbrella campaign for your audience across different generations. For instance, most Gen-Z are usually found on video-sharing platforms like TikTok and Instagram. Focusing all your marketing campaigns on those platforms will alienate other demographics such as Baby Boomers and Millennials. 

The fascinating aspect of content marketing is that you can use different platforms and formats to amplify your brand while securing your target audience. Some of these formats include: 

• Newsletters
• Blog posts
• Instructional guides
• Photobooks
• Webinars (on and off social media platforms)
• Podcasts
• Virtual interviews
• Videos and many more

You’ve got a truckload of formats you can use to your advantage while capturing your audience. 

Content Marketing Is A Virtual Sales Team Member

As much as content marketing makes your customer support team’s life easier, it also acts as an extended member of your sales team. Think about it; if your website, social media pages, and even your physical documents are filled with the right content, your sales team does not have to say much. 

To create this sales-focused content, ask your sales department to write out the top 10 challenges or objections encountered during their sales meetings and create relevant articles to address each one. 

Content Marketing Promotes Your Brand Voice

When you see or hear the words ‘Just Do It’, the first thing you think about is Nike. That’s the relevance of content marketing. 

Your branding goes beyond designing a logo or improving the color scheme of your website. It is more about tapping into your core objectives and curating content that communicates what your business is all about and what you stand for. 

You don’t need to overstuff your pages with fancy words. Make it objective and let it speak to your customers in the best way possible. 

Content Marketing Converts Passive Email Subscribers to Web Visitors

Another importance to content marketing is that it can convert your passive email subscribers to generate leads for your website. Convincing your email subscribers to click on a link that’d take them to your website isn’t an easy process. 

That’s why your email content has to be authentic, informal, and filled with promotions and discounts to lure them into visiting your website to buy a product or service. 

Content Marketing Allows You to Control the Conversation

Content marketing, in application, also allows you to remain in the driver’s seat of your digital campaign. From content creation, lead generation to sales completion, content marketing puts your business ahead.

A potential customer will stall ordering a product if the content on the product description page is shabbily written. With a properly structured product page, the customer will read up on the product to see its specs and how it benefits them. It will instinctively push them to order the product. 

How to Implement Content Marketing for Your Business

Ready to put these strategies into practice? Follow these simple steps: 

1. Understand Your Audience 

First things first: you need to understand who your audience is by answering the following questions: 

• Who is my target audience?
• Where are they usually located?
• How can I best reach out to them?
• What information are they searching for online?

2. Create Content for Your Audience

After understanding your target audience, you need to create content for them. The best way to achieve this is to pay attention to their questions and plug your products into your guides. Your in-house copywriters or hired freelancers can get the job done. 

3. Repurpose Your Content

Have you got an old article that is still relevant even now? You can repurpose it by updating the content with emerging trends. You can also republish it in a video, podcast, infographics, and many more formats. 

4. Experiment With Different Formats

The beauty of content marketing is publishing your content through different formats. You can spread your creativity through them to pass your unique message across. 

5. Encourage Your Followers to Share Their Experiences

Your customers play a significant role in your marketing campaign. Satisfied customers are naturally inclined to leave positive feedback for others. Why not encourage them to share their experience? 

You can publish their testimonials on your website, social media pages, and your physical brochures.