Are you having trouble with getting people to read your company’s blog? Are your keyword-driven posts performing below your expectations? – Maybe you should try pivoting your content marketing strategy to focus more on the searcher, instead of the search engine.
Today, for most businesses who operate online, content marketing is on top of their priority list. The only problem is, most companies who invest in this field don’t really know how to make it work for them.
Why? – Because they don’t quite understand it. They think that content marketing is something that can be automated. They think that this is something that can be copied and recycled over and over again, like every other form of marketing.
Why Do People Invest in Content Marketing?
Next to improving your site rankings, content marketing has positioned itself as a great tool for reaching out to potential customers and desired audiences by providing them with the knowledge that helps influence their decisions.
The fact of the matter is that content marketing has become the most efficient and effective way for businesses (big or small) to increase their online presence and position themselves as experts in their field. It has given everyone a fair chance to demonstrate their knowledge to the world and gain customers, and all sorts of different brand ambassadors, solely by what they create and share on the Web.
What makes content marketing so attractive is its power to form strong and loving relationships between businesses and their customers. When such a relationship is created, the likelihood of the customer buying your company’s products and recommending your business to his or her family members, friends, and colleagues increases substantially because these people now trust your brand, which means that they’ll do everything in their power to represent it in the best way possible.
So, Knowing This, Why Do So Many People Fail At Content Marketing?
Even though these benefits are something that almost everyone who has a steady internet connection is familiar with, people still somehow manage to screw up their content. A lot of businesses out there still create sterile and boring blog posts that nobody likes, only because they fail to see content marketing as something more than just blogging for keywords.
When businesses fail to create content that brings in results, even though they have done their keyword research, they usually don’t:
1. Produce content that is clear to its target audience.
2. Have any specific goals preset for it.
3. Provide answers to specific problems / interests / needs.
4. Have anything new to say about a certain subject.
5. Understand that “going viral” is not the only metric for measuring the success of a certain blog post, use case, campaign, etc.
In most cases, these five elements come together in the same package, and they don’t miss out on the opportunity to pound your brand and efforts into the ground. That is why it’s so important that we fully understand how to rise above these silly mistakes.
As a person who has been writing content for all sorts of different clientele for quite some time now, I have noticed that people don’t quite understand for whom they’re creating all of these blog posts, white papers, case studies and use cases.
That’s where all the confusion starts.
Most of my former employers still think that all they need to do here is “reply” to specific long-tail keywords, and people will come to their website and purchase everything they have to offer.
You and me both know that they couldn’t be more wrong.
Looking at the Bigger Picture
Although these keyword-driven post will most certainly bring traffic to your website, they won’t help you make these new visitors fall in love with your brand. Last time I checked, the top goal of almost every content marketing strategy is to create a lasting and loving relationship between your company and your current and potential clientele, and not gather as many random clicks as possible.
If your audience feels you lack clarity, the best you can hope for is that every once in the while you’ll catch a break and create something that your brand followers will find interesting and amusing enough to read and possibly share with their own personal networks.
Although you may have a good day or two bathing in vanity metrics, you’ll still fail to establish the needed frequency to even consider your content marketing successful.
Forget About The Search Engine, Get to Know Your Audience
Yes, keyword selection plays an important part in your content strategy, but you shouldn’t focus all your energy on that. Every content marketing strategy starts and concludes with the goal of keeping users coming back for more. Your goal here is to figure out what your potential customers need and give it to them in a manner they prefer to receive it. Needless to say, your ultimate aim is always to maximize sales; however, the simplest way to achieve that is to attract users by giving them want their hearts desire.
With this in mind, your content ought to be developed around the interests of your audience. In order to create such a thing, you must first get to know to whom you’re speaking to. You must first know who your potential customers are, what they like, what they dislike, where do they hang out online, and what kind of content do they usually follow.
By gathering this info, you’ll have a clearer picture to whom you’re speaking via your content. This will automatically increase your chances of creating something that stimulates user engagement.
The trick here is to single out your user from the crowd and create content like you’re only doing it for him or her. Yes, it’s tempting to address wider audiences and create stuff that you think everyone would like, but the only problem is, when you look at it from a different angle, “everyone” is basically “no one”. “Everyone” has no face, has no specific interests or needs, and thus, he or she is completely useless to you. “Everyone” is an abstraction, a lifeless blob that you cannot win over as your follower.
So, having written that, it’s time to narrow your targeted audience down.
Focus on your desired audiences identity, their job, their behavior patterns, instead of search queries. Then, when you get to know your crowd, think about their problems and try to provide answers to them.
I know this means that you have to do a lot more work, but I promise you, it will pay off.
To make your content marketing really work for you, your main goal here has to be to provide your interest groups with something they would consider as valuable information. Concentrating on your content in such a way will without a doubt attract stronger following as well as drive in more quality leads to your site.
Thank you for reading this blog post. I hope this article provided you with some clarity on why you should focus far more on who you’re targeting, instead of search queries. If you have anything to add on this subject, feel free to submit your thoughts in the comments section below.
Once again, thanks for reading,
See you soon,
Kind regards,
Goran @ AltusHost B.V.
The author is highly qualified and writes blog posts weekly.
