Top 6 Content Marketing Rules That Newbies Always Forget

Content marketing is quite challenging nowadays. The competition between brands in all industries expands on a daily basis, so the marketing techniques have to evolve. Over 60% of today’s marketers develop at least one piece of content every single day. In the B2B environment, content marketing is leveraged to a whole new level, as a staggering 93% of B2B marketers use content in their marketing strategies.

If you’re a newbie in the field, you’ve probably encountered one of the most annoying problems when you were looking for tips on content marketing : big misinformation and lack of genuine content. How can you learn what you need to learn when everyone’s regurgitating the same content over and over again?

To generate an impressive performance and reach your marketing goals , you need to be well aware of the most important unwritten rules of content marketing. By acknowledging these content marketing rules and by choosing not to neglect them, success will be closer than you expect. Pay attention, take some notes, and make sure to implement all of these rules in the nearest future.

1. Define and Understand Your Target Audience


Every respectable content marketing campaign needs to have a well-definedtarget audience. That’s a general rule that applies not only to content marketing, but to any other marketing strategy that you may develop.

  • Who are you selling to? Is it dog lovers, technology experts, or PC addicts?
  • What are their biggest needs, wants, and craves?
  • What are their biggest issues and challenges?
  • What’s their nationality, age, and gender?
  • When you answer these and many other questions, you’ll understand who you’re promoting the brand to.

    You can further niche your audience by developing a “target persona” – an imaginary person that fits the characteristics of your ideal target customer. When you have this imaginary persona, you can synchronize all your content development strategies with it. This way, your content will become extremely relevant!

    2. Always Start with a Strategy in Place


    Besides knowing who you’re creating your content for, you’ll want to cover the other important aspects of the content, such as why you’re writing it. You’ll need a specific objective for your campaign, and you should choose it in accordance with your greatest business needs:

  • Brand awareness
  • Lead generation
  • Sales generation
  • Building connections/relationships
  • Don’t start writing before defining the end purpose.

    The second most important thing to do is choose the metrics of analysis. How are you going to measure your performance? You can aim to improve the rates of the following stats:

  • Click-through-rate (CTR)
  • The time spent by a visitor on your website/page
  • The bounce rate
  • The retention rate of a video
  • Choose your primary tracking metrics and start measuring their performance as you implement new twists and changes to your content campaign.

    Related: Six Psychological Triggers to Turn Digital Marketing Prospects into Loyal Clients

    3. Develop Different Content for Different Purposes


    Your content will serve different purposes throughout time. In the initial stages of your relationship with a potential customer, you’ll have to win their trust. How do you do that?– Simply by delivering relevant and free information through high-quality articles, videos, podcast, and so on.

    Once you acquire leads, you’ll need to serve them a different type of content. Your objectives change from capturing attention to building relationships and generating sales. Usually, the content you distributevia email is supposed to turn prospects into customers.

    You must align your content’s purposes with your sales funnel. When you have everything written, you may start measuring and optimizing until you’re satisfied with your content’s results.

    4. Have a Professional Website and Blog


    In order to have full control over your content marketing campaign, you must have a well-established website. Many newbies fail to recognize the difference between a website and a blog. To tell you the truth, if you want to excel in today’s competitive marketplace, you’ll need them both.

    By offering your websitevisitors a great user experience and valuable content that can be digested easily and for free, you’ll improve your brand’s reputation.People will keep visiting your platform and blog for new relevant content. Many newbies start writing content before stabilizing their online platform. Don’t make that mistake. The website comes first, and the content comes after.

    5. Leverage the Huge Power of Social Media


    Jane Harvey, Marketing Expert at Assignment Aussie Writings Service , suggests the following:

    “The content you distribute on the web represents your message.Every message needs to be delivered in order to be consumed. In this case, social media is the vehicle of your message. In today’s advertising environment, social media occupies the #1 spot, as it provides unimaginable benefits for the companies that know how to leverage it.”

    You absolutely have to leverage social media channels in order to put your blog’s content in front of many people. Develop a high-quality business page and grow your followers’ database by promotingquality content on a consistent basis. Share other people’s content too, as long as you believe that your subscribers will benefit from it.

    6. Offer a Unique Value Proposition


    How is your content, product, or service different from the rest? Are you standing out, or are you just delivering content because “that’s how it’s done”?

    You see, in order to draw the attention of your potential customers, your content marketing strategy should feature your brand’s “unique value proposition”. It is the element that differentiates your content and sales message from the competition. For example, Uber offers the “fastest and most reliable way to move around”, while Apple promises to “provide a lifestyle with their products”. What are you promising?

    Related: Five Advertising Rules Modern Marketers Need to Remember

    Takeaways


    No matter what your content marketing goals are, make sure to acknowledge the importance of these important content marketing rules. However, you won’t find the key to success in the things you learn and acknowledge. In fact, it’s all about your personal power – the power to act on your current knowledge, the courage to test and discover, and the patience to stand up whenever you fail.