Marketing has moved away from being about the product to being about the audience. No longer is it important to just create messages about how the product works, it needs to be focused on how the product works for YOU- the consumer. This has shifted marketing from having a predominantly selling tone to one that is about relevance, about effectiveness and about content.
Content marketing has been a buzzword since a while. If reports are to be believed, that’s going to be the case for a long time to come. Even if we only look at content marketing in the current sense, chances are you’ve already started doing it. You probably just don’t know it yet.
Social networking pages
It’s hard to come across any business that doesn’t have at least a Facebook account and Twitter page. Social networking has shrunken the world and made cyber existence almost as real as individual identity. This has lead to humanization of brands which makes it imperative for brands to constantly be in conversation with their audience. In their language.
Burger King released its ‘Whopper burger’ with a crazy Facebook contest that invited users to ‘sacrifice friends’ from their Facebook list in exchange for, you guessed it right, a burger!
With over a million followers and tweets on an hourly basis, WaltDisney World weaves a fantasy world in just 140 characters like a pro.
Blog
A well stocked blog is sure tell sign of a company that is interested in keeping its customers informed. Whether you’re a company that caters to offering solutions to end consumers or businesses, blogs are one of the most universal choices for disseminating information. What differentiates a good blog from a great one however is the ability to put out information that the end user would be interested in, without having an obvious ‘selling’ tone.
The GE fan loves technology. This is something that the marketers have kept in mind while creating the GE blog that is rich with relevant news, recent innovations and all things science.
The organic food revolution is here and it’s big. With over 78% of U.S families buying organic food, the Whole Foods Market knew that they had a huge and welcoming audience waiting for them. Their blog is regularly updated with information on their products, recipes and general food facts that the organic food lover will love.
Newsletters/ Bulletins
Sharing information that is important to the stakeholders is imperative in any business. Newsletters have been one of the primary means of doing this, and not just from the marketing point of view. The challenge then lies in making one that doesn’t get the reader to reach for the ‘unsubscribe’ button. 80% of marketers say that personalizing content in emails is key to ensuring high readership.
Whole foods Market figures on this list twice and not without merit. They have an interesting feature that allows newsletters to select the kind of information they would like to receive. Readers can choose between market news, local store news and sales, recipes, coupons and deals or all of them!
White papers/ Case studies
Writing about your experiences in an industry can help in multiple ways. It can help establish credibility in the minds of your stakeholders and along with that it can also act as guiding material for new entrants. White papers help companies to enunciate the expertise that they have in an industry and thus instill further confidence. Case studies on the other hand help in establishing your case further by showing how that expertise has actually helped individuals or organizations in reality.
The DocuSign resource center is a storehouse of information relating to their products, research and customer success stories.
IBM explains the world of big data and analytics through many reports, research papers and presentations that are further divided depending on use cases, industries and nature of analysis.
Videos
There is nothing that has the potential to get a message across as efficiently as a video. While product companies have been using videos to get to their customers since forever, its impact has extended to include all companies that are interested in reaching a wider audience. These videos are no longer about showcasing the features of a product, they are conversations that mirror the qualities that the company stands for and the identity they wish to build.
Brands like Nike constantly create videos that are representative of their audience and not just limited to the product. When Microsoft decided to come out with the new and improved Internet Explorer, they found the best route was an emotional roller coaster ride of the 90’s that would hit the right spot with its audience.
E-books
Ebooks are increasingly becoming more than just a marketing tool. Whether you’re giving them away for free or selling them, they help in advancing your brand like no other. The good thing is that you no longer need to depend on publishing houses anymore. If you have a good idea and are convinced that it will add value to your audience and your business, you can get working on a PDF and be out with it in as little as a few weeks.
Lattice engines uses ebooks to talk about the importance and relevance of big data in a sales context. They have a number of books that help simplify the idea of the use of big data to maximise growth and revenue.
Logicalis uses its position as a technology leader in creating a variety of resources that help the user understand the importance of big data among other relevant data points.
Your website
In more ways than one, your website itself is an important part of your content marketing strategy. By providing information on your products, the company as well as all things that might be of interest to potential stakeholders, your website tops the chart in providing your audience with content that is relevant to them and you.
There is no better example than Coca Cola to understand how you can use your website to talk about the things that your potential customers could be interested in. With a range of topics right from campaigns to social issues that are important to them, their website is a storehouse of content- rather, content that matters.
Red Bull is another brand that believes in extending its philosophy of adventure and living on the edge throughout all aspects of their brand especially their website.
Today marketing is about having a conversation with your audience. Most brands are creating content without even knowing it. The difference then lies not in whether you’re a content marketer or not- it’s how far you’re already in it.
