10 Benefits of Content Marketing You Can’t Afford to Miss

Before coming to the Benefits of Content Marketing, let’s first understand what content marketing is what and what exactly is its scope.

What is Content Marketing?

Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.

-Content Marketing Institute

When we create something, we think, ‘Will our customers thank us for this?’ I think it’s important for all of us to be thinking about whatever marketing we’re creating; is it really useful to our customers? Will they thank us for it? I think if you think of things through that lens, it just clarifies what you’re doing in such a simple, elegant way. – Ann Handley

Content marketing helps you to add value to your target audience and get in front of them. It does not ask the audience to buy your products and services. It is a way to create your own media that your audience can consume. If they like it, they will come back for more and eventually buy your products/services.

Here are some of the distinct advantages of content marketing:

Benefits of Content Marketing

Get More Site Traffic

Content Marketing leaders get 7.8X more site traffic than non-leaders. – Kapost

If you can consistently produce quality content that your audience can use, something that can solve their problems, you will start building a loyal audience. This will help you to become a thought leader in your industry. As a thought leader, you will naturally get more people visiting your site to consume your content. 

Generate Leads Cost Effectively

Content Marketing costs 62% less than outbound marketing & generates 3x as many leads. –DemandMetric

Content marketing is the process of producing quality content consistently. It does not require you to invest heavily in advertising. You can give away quality lead magnets like ebooks, reports or conduct free webinars in lieu of email addresses of your target audience. You can also get your blog readers to subscribe to it so you could provide them with useful content on a more regular basis.

You can also create interactive content campaigns like quizzes and polls to get your target audience to share their contact details. 

Take a look at this example from YNAB. The financial software company educates its audience through free workshops. This way they help their audience through useful content while they also collect leads for their business.

You can, of course, promote these pieces of content through low budget paid ads on social media platforms but the overall process is highly cost-effective and can promise you visible results.

Don’t Intrude, Entertain

615 million devices now use Adblock. – PageFair

Consumers of today are smart. They do not wish to be disturbed by ads. If you can give them valuable content, you’ll be able to build a relationship with them. Starbucks recently created a very cute animated web series called ‘1st and Main’. The video series depicts commonly observed conversations of those who visit the Starbucks outlet.

Such content does not just entertain your audience but gets them to talk about your content with their friends. It helps you to create a body of content that your audience loves and shares.

Build Trust Among Your Audience

Creating content that is so valuable that people would pay for it,  yet you give it away for free, is a reliable way to earn the public’s trust. -Don Peppers

When earning audience trust becomes your primary goal then all you to do is help them out. You are not out there creating content to directly sell your products and services. It is a way to build trust and talk about your business. You could then ensure that sales are flowing in automatically. Another way to do this is to create content that acts a social proof of the merit of your offerings.

Client testimonial videos work very well in helping you to convert customers who are on the verge of making the buying decision. Take a look at this example from Tribridge:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGsBYQF4g48

Earn More Search Engine Rankings

Content marketing can help you to rank higher up on search engines and get the desired level of site traffic. Have you ever wondered what Google is looking for when it shows a website on top of the search results?  Simple, Google wants to provide searchers with the best possible experience. If your site has valuable content that satisfies user queries and intent then it can easily get ranked on Google.

Companies that blog have 434% more indexed pages. And companies with more indexed pages get far more leads. – Search Engine Journal

You can research for popular search queries in your industry and create content that answers your audience’s questions. Differentiate your content from your competitors and you’ll surely get higher site rankings.

Build Deeper Customer Relationships

Content marketing gives you the opportunity to help your audience by providing them with answers to their problems. It helps you to connect with them through content that’s impressive and memorable. When they like a piece of content, they share it with their friends and remember it for long. You can make use of Newsletter content to stay in touch with your leads and potential customers. You can nurture them into eventually buying from you by regularly delivering engaging content to their inbox. Take a look at this example of a newsletter from GILT:

Get More Social Media Fans

Quality content can help you to build a community of fans and followers.  Suppose you create a useful blog post or a video that helps your audience overcome a challenge. You can share this on all of your social media pages and get your audience to engage with it. You can also explore interactive content formats like social media contests, polls, and quizzes to get your audience to interact with your brand. The more content you create on these channels the higher will be your following. This way you’ll be able to build a community of those who like communicating with your brand and sharing your content.

Peter England was able to generate more than 256k social impressions with the help of the following content marketing campaign.

They created a character called ‘Peter Caravalho’ who loves travel, food, and sports. They used aesthetically done social media images to tell Peter’s story to the target audience. The brand also got the audience to participate by asking them to guess peter’s next activity or destination.

Create an Online Brand

You can use content marketing to build a memorable online brand. When your content marketing efforts are aligned with your brand values, you end up creating the right perceptions among those who matter. You must also ensure that you are creating content that works for your audience. Businesses are now using technologies like virtual reality to provide superior experiences to their customers.  Take a look at this example from Expedia:

The travel company created breathtaking virtual travel experiences for children suffering from Cancer.

Go Viral and Leap Ahead

Creating some remarkable and thought-provoking content can actually help you to go viral.  Viral content is something that gets shared rapidly by the masses. You need to go out there and create content that’s simply out-of-the-box. Any piece of content – a blog post, a social media image, a video or a campaign has the potential to go viral if it grabs attention and arouses strong emotions. If you go viral you get instant publicity for your brand.

Take a look at this example from the Canadian airline, WestJet.

The airline company runs a content-driven website called Above and Beyond. They put up stories of Canadians who have achieved something extraordinary for the larger good.  One of their videos, of a guy named Josh, actually went viral and got over 6 million views. Take a look:

Stay Competitive, Grow Your Business

Small businesses that blog get 126% more lead growth than small businesses that do not blog. -Impact

If you are consistent at strategically creating and distributing content through the right channels then you’ll surely start getting the desired level of sales for your business.

Content marketing rakes in conversion rates six times higher than other methods. -ABGEssentials

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. – Maya Angelou

Fantastic content makes your business look good and your audiences want to come back to you for more. It helps you to pull your target customers to your website, blog and social media channels. A long-term content marketing strategy of 9-12 months can get you visible and significant business growth.

Conclusion

Content creates a multiplier effect for all your marketing efforts. It helps you to make your brand more trustworthy among your target audience. It helps you to build an audience for your brand – a set of potential customers who love to engage with your brand and share its content.  It can help you to get your site to rank higher in search engines and build thought leadership.

Looking for more on content marketing? Following the latest trends in content marketing is a sure fire way to help your business stay ahead of the pack.

If you are looking to get in-depth knowledge about content marketing, you can enrol for our certified digital marketing course.