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As a content marketer who works for a venture capital firm, one of the most interesting aspects of my job is helping our more than 20 portfolio companies develop and refine their content strategies and build their own in-house content factories. What I’ve learned from that experience and the more than 10 years that I’ve been in the business of creating and distributing content, is that content marketing is not only the best way to go to market, it’s also something that you can generally be successful at if you follow some basic guidelines.
In fact, I’d argue that there are 11 keys to being successful at content marketing that will help ensure that any content marketer is well prepared, in a position to execute effectively, and able to continuously improve. Here’s what they are:
- Get sharply focused. Establish a content strategy by zeroing in on just one customer segment to start and doing everything you can to understand your target buyers in that segment and the buyer journey they are on. Doing so will give you a framework for designing the content your buyers need to help them through their journey.
- Hire a managing editor. Every content factory needs its own CEO, and that role is typically filled by a managing editor with the skills and experience necessary to develop your strategy and manage your content creation and delivery processes. Content marketing cannot be an add-on responsibility to someone’s existing role, it requires at least one (if not several) dedicated resources.
- Build a content creation community. Your content factory should extend far beyond the marketing team. Create a real-life community of freelancers, industry influencers, and co-workers to support your efforts, and a virtual community of fans, followers, and subscribers, all of whom can be utilized to help your content factory succeed.
- Create high-impact content. Every piece of content you create presents an opportunity to make meaningful contact with your target buyers and to get them to move through their buying journey. Take full advantage of that opportunity by creating high-impact content that is optimized for search, reflects a deep understanding of your buyers, demonstrates your brand aspirations, drives conversions, and promotes engagement and virality.
- Repurpose, repackage, and recycle. Find ways to re-use every piece of content you create so that you are maximizing your return on investment. Make sure that smaller pieces of content (e.g., blog posts, podcasts, and articles) get recycled into larger assets (e.g., eBooks, webinars, and reports) and conversely that any large assets are broken down into smaller content.
- Focus on conversions. Make sure that every piece of content you create has a clear call to action that directs your target audience to take an action designed to help move them through the sales funnel. Remember that every sale will be the result of many much smaller conversions throughout the buying process.
- Amplify your content through multiple points of contact. Create a plan for delivering your content to your buyers through all of the best distribution channels available for reaching them. This includes your website and other sites that you can control, social media, direct marketing, influencer marketing, campaigns, and more.
- Establish a content rhythm. Get into the regular and consistent content publication schedule that’s necessary to create momentum, build a community, and ensure that your content factory drives real business results.
- Institutionalize your content factory. Experiment to find the best processes for creating and delivering your content, refining them over time. Document best practices so that they can easily be replicated and transferred to others, and to help ensure consistency.
- Measure what you do. The only way to understand what’s working and what’s not is to track and analyze key metrics. If your content factory isn’t underpinned by a robust analytics dashboard, it will be impossible to glean the insights you need to make improvements.
- Hold frequent retrospectives. Your content team needs to meet on a daily, weekly, quarterly, and annual basis to set strategic goals and priorities, assess the progress you are making toward meeting those goals, and to analyze your results and adjust your strategy as needed for every piece of content you create.
While there’s no magic formula for success when it comes to content marketing, following the guidelines above will help ensure that you build a focused program that yields meaningful results.
Kevin Cain is the Director of Content Strategy at OpenView Venture Partners. Check out his blog or follow him at @kevinrcain.
Read the latest issue of our newsletter, PRognosis, for more about content marketing.
