Go hard or go home. Why all businesses need a content plan
Marketers have fallen head over heels for content marketing. A report by The Content Marketing Institute (CMI), Content Marketing in the UK 2017: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends, shows that 87% of UK marketers are doing content marketing. The 13% non-users are all planning to start in the next 12 months. There has not been a single marketing strategy or plan that we’ve written in recent years that does not mention content as a vital part of the marketing mix.
But how many businesses are doing it right, and gaining maximum impact from their efforts?
The CMI defines content marketing as:
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.
The key word here is ‘strategic’. More and more businesses are producing content, but we’d bet our summer holiday fund that not all are approaching content marketing with a plan, backed up by insight and with measurements in place. The stats back this up, with the same study reporting that a third of content marketers consider themselves as ‘young’ in terms of their content marketing maturity, experiencing challenges in creating a cohesive strategy and plan.
So, what does a content marketing plan look like?
All good plans must allow for adaptation and flexibility; content marketing plans should be agile, allowing for fresh ideas and material – from welcoming a post from an unexpected guest blogger, or responding to time-sensitive industry news or changes.
But well-executed content marketing plans all have these things in common:
- Objectives – the purpose, the aim, the reason for that blog series, case-study or whitepaper. Is it to support sales, new business, loyalty? Brand awareness, social follower acquisition, subscribers? It doesn’t matter what the objective is, but the content must have an identified purpose.
- Balance – like a good restaurant menu, balance is key. A varied range of topics is the obvious approach (think editorially – a magazine doesn’t lead with articles about the same subject two editions running). But balance also applies to format and frequency too. Mixing up different content types, from written blogs, to graphics and film, creates interest and variety for your audience. Feast or famine isn’t the right way to approach things either, consider spacing out your content to ensure a regular stream, rather than leaving your content airwaves quiet for weeks and then hitting your audience with multiple pieces in a short space of time.
- Awareness of timings – when it comes to seasonality, there are the obvious rules to follow (think Christmas), but also some more subtle approaches to ensuring content reaches your audience at a time when it is likely to have the greatest impact. For example, timing a key piece of content around a key industry event is a good way to ensure good exposure, as people are tuned in to and gathering (physically, or online) to hear new ideas, fresh approaches, different voices.
- Authors and subject matter experts locked down – having your content angles and formats lined up isn’t enough. The most impactful content often features expert opinion, influencers, individuals who can engage an audience with their views or expertise. If the content can’t be produced solely by the marketing team and with no input from other areas of the business, you will need to have your contributors pinned down and briefed early. The CMI research shows that the biggest contributing factor to increased content marketing performance was attributed to there being better quality content, produced more efficiently. This is only possible with prior planning and engaging contributors early.
- Audience defined – the more sophisticated plans will contain audience personas. For smaller businesses, being aware of the different audiences is often enough to inform a solid content plan. For example, don’t assume that customers are your only audience – often, businesses have secondary and tertiary audiences, such as referrers or prospective employees, and dedicated content for these groups is therefore something to think about.
- Insight – robust content marketing plans are backed up by data provided by keyword research, website analytics and social media listening tools. Our recent blog on how to approach blogging for beginners detailed this, outlining that data can provide intelligence that can shape the content you produce – helping decisions on topics, formats and frequency. As well as informing the plan itself, data is integral to the measurement of the content generated, demonstrating whether it has met the original objectives.
- SEO focussed – we can’t cover Content Marketing without talking about SEO. Content is key to optimising your website for search engines, in other words gaining invaluable rankings on Google, Bing etc. Keyword research (identifying what people type into Google relating to your product or service offering) is an essential part of content planning and there are specific tools to help with this. Remember, what you think your customers are searching may not be what they are actually typing, so making assumptions is a fast-route to failure – particularly if you are in an industry that is heavy with technical terms but which Joe Public are unlikely to be aware of. Keyword planning can help shine a light on this and ensure your content is of value to your audience, but also ticks the all-important SEO box.
- Measurement – this is essential, and there have never been a greater number of tools to enable us to measure the impact of marketing efforts. The measures put in place need to link to the original objectives – if brand awareness is the overarching objective, can this be seen through increased website traffic, social media follows, mentions? If lead generation is the aim, not only should you monitor the overall result, but overlay this with channel data too. For example, did content placed on one channel (e.g. paid placement) outperform another (e.g. brand-owned newsletter)?
- Budget – depending on how your marketing plan and budget is structured, this might be a time-based resource allocation allowing for team-based resource. Or, it might be more detailed, breaking down the total cost of production. For example, video costs for film content, any purchased imagery, advertising fees for paid promotion, external copywriting assistance etc. Whatever the approach, experience tells us that having an awareness of what the cost is to produce a piece of content creates focus, leading to a better long-term result, as the cost vs benefit equation can be seen more clearly.
- Distribution channels – hosting a piece of content on your website isn’t enough. To ensure the widest possible audience and engagement, multiple channels (selected according to available budget and audience) is the way to go. The CMI stats show that the average number of channels used by UK marketers is three, with social media topping the list (we were surprised to see print in the top three, but that’s for another blog post!). Your content marketing plan should contain details of the planned distribution methods and channels (where it’s going, and when), as well as details on any speculative placements, for example whether the piece can be outreached to any other media owners or influencers. If you are looking to approach an online resource to publish your content, it’s worth noting that the media owners and influencers you approach must be relevant, and be a quality website with good domain authority.
The above list is not exhaustive, and the content of your plan will vary according to the scale of your content marketing approach, as well as the nature of your business. But we do know this – 79% of respondents in the CMI study expressed their intention to make content marketing an ongoing business process, not simply one element of campaign planning. This is good news, with solid content planning becoming business as usual for marketing.
If you would like to implement a content plan for your business, or would like some fresh ideas about how you can produce content that truly engages your customers, get in touch.