Content marketing is the strategy aimed at creating and publishing valuable information for your target audience, in order to attract potential customers. naturally and non-intrusively. These contents are distributed in different digital media, such as web pages or platforms such as YouTube. The main characteristic that these should have is that they have to be necessarily relevant for the intended audience. In this way, you create value in them and get them to project a positive vision about your company. The direct result is lead growth. But, let's go little by little, what is a lead?
The importance of leads in content marketing
Everything you do as a company is aimed at growing customers. Both the design of the products you offer, as well as the characteristics of the services you provide or the price you set for any of them. In order to do all this, you will have to know their interests, budgets, ideas and needs. Only in this way, you will be able to attract new leads.
A lead is a potential customer who shows interest in consuming one of your products or services. In this way, if your ideal customer leaves their details to subscribe to your program or receive a discount coupon, they will directly become a lead. To get a lead, first of all, you will have to attract your target audience. So, a strange will be attracted to your company, which will end up on your page, becoming a visitor. If your business attracts his attention enough, he will leave his data and you will have a lead. In the same way, if you create effective sales strategies, the lead will become customer. Interesting, right?
Now you will wonder what you can do to get leads, although you will already guess the answer: use content marketing. Although, this is too generic, so let's start with the basics: funnel top.
The funnel stop
He conversion funnel It has different parts, called: TOFU, MOFU and BOFU. Although they may seem like the names of three children's cartoon characters, they are three concepts that you must burn with fire because of their importance in content marketing.
- TOFUThese are the acronyms for Top of the funnel, which comes to refer to the highest part of the funnel. In this phase, you will need to create a lot of content to attract the largest possible audience. It is at this stage when the first contact is made between your company and users. That is, they stop being strangers and become visitors. The main objective to pursue at this time is the creation of previously unknown needs by the user. Needs that, obviously, your products or services will know how to calm. In summary, you will educate your potential customers, telling them what they want and desire. Therefore, the content at this stage will have to solve your questions. Don't mention your company, don't offer your services, just be helpful and customer focused. Before you speak, you must listen.
- MOFU: In the Middle of the funnel, users already know what they need, since you've let them know. In this way, they slide through the funnel without any impediment. This is the part that interests you the most, since you will have to be able to teach users that you are the answer to their questions. As you may be imagining, it is at this precise moment when visitors become leads. Here the content should not be as easily accessible as in the first phase, but something deeper. Among the formats that you can offer at this stage are the templates, tools or whitepapers. That is, practical content that helps your visitor. To acquire them, they must enter their data, so you will have managed to create leads.
- BOFU: the older brother is the most selective. Is the narrowest part of the funnel. Along the way, future customers who abandoned the process as visitors or leads have been left behind. However, the few that arrive here will be your potential customers, as long as you know how to close the sales cycle. At this time, the content you offer must finish convincing them, so you will have to create personalized content, such as downloadable pdf, success stories or free courses.
Now the concepts of lead and conversion funnel have become clear to you. You know the importance of each one and how this directly affects the growth of your company. However, you may still not be able to understand how to go through the whole process successfully and how to create a good content marketing strategy.
The key elements of a content marketing strategy
There are multiple content marketing strategies. However, to be successful they must be based on some fundamental elements.
Brand identity
Defining your brand identity is the first step you must take to create a good strategy. This element sustains the rest, so must be stable. When creating the image that you will project to your audience, you will have to establish a series of elements.
First of all, you will have to create some visual characteristics that define you and that the public associates with your signature. Among these are the colors, the logo, the typography and the style. All this must keep a concordance that lasts throughout the process. You will have to dedicate some time to each of these parts, do not take it lightly. They all convey an image about your business, so if you don't want to appear to be something you're not, take this point seriously.
Second, you must tell your story. This is very important when looking for a emotional feedback by your audience. Tell what made you get here, the path you had to travel and what you want to offer. It is in this part that you should create a value proposal.
business status
Think about it At what point are you and where do you want to go?. If you are not clear about your objective, it will be difficult for you to reach it. In order to achieve your goals, you must know where they are. From there, you can create a path that leads you to them. Within the definition of this path, you must specify what resources will you need. No mountaineer goes on an adventure without preparing a good backpack to help him reach the top.
Develop content goals
Once you're clear about who you are and where you're headed, it's time to set the content goals that will drive you forward. develop Smart content marketing goals. That is, do not set yourself an immense and unattainable goal. Start one step at a time, challenging yourself, but without flying too high. These objectives must be in line with your marketing strategy and have a specific duration. By doing it this way, you can measure your results and change certain details that you set at the beginning, but that are not helping you in your content marketing strategy.
