It will take some disciple to determine your content problem, the ‘beast’, which will lead to your plan of attack, utilizing a new content management framework for success. It probably has been an easy task to figure out where you want to go in your marketing strategy, including content marketing. However, to really map to your planned ‘end in mind’ there has to be a step of discovery that includes a deep analysis of your failure. There is a bit of psychology involved here that works with all things – you don’t know where you’re going until you have figured out where you’ve been as a leader of your marketing or the company as a whole. A simple way to do this quickly and effectively is to ask yourself the 2 questions below and then take a look at the 3 quick fix categories. Then, review, discuss and analyze the failures without pointing at external factors as the only reason for failure.
Question #1: Did you have a strategy?
If you did, what were the metrics of success and did you achieve them. No marketer should be afraid of failure and you won’t achieve success unless you are fearless and not afraid to fail. So, dig into your strategy and figure out where the gaps were and now that you have taken this step to analyze your failure – map it back to your strategy or lack thereof and document how you would do it differently.
Question #2: Was your content crap?
This may sound harsh but the question needs to be asked of you and your team when in the step of analyzing your failure. Your audience is not engaging because it seems like the same thing that is out there and it’s getting lost in all the buzz words and the strength of your competition will drown your message. It doesn’t mean that what you were publishing isn’t important but it hasn’t stood out in the massive amount of noise in the marketplace that is social media and content marketing. Ardath Albee has written a great book on content marketing called, “Digital Relevance, Developing Content Marketing and Strategies that Drive Results.”
Author Albee explains, “Publishing content without a strategy isn’t moving the needle. Time, effort, and money are flushed away without a quantifiable impact on business performance.” This is a serious problem for marketers. Their companies expect results. Their jobs are on the line. If not now, then soon.A I agree and this should always be the 1st part of your publishing strategy. You can explore common and important topics and subject matters; however, it has to be engaging and stand out. If you feel you need to improve, don’t worry there are a few quick ways to fix this:
Be customer-focused in all topics! Don’t publish items that just interest you or your staff but items that engage your readers, prospects and customers.
- Provide insights that create value -Enough said!
- Don’t focus on how your customer can do business with you or buy your product. This should be the last thing on your mind when you are blogging or creating content for your readers. Your prospects do not want a sales pitch!
I will go into a great deal of detail and provide exercises in future chapters that you can use for yourself or for your team in later chapters to create these fixes and make sure it becomes part of the new paradigm for you content the business of content marketing on your website, blog or integration into your marketing strategies and tactics for the future.
Chapter 2: Create the new Customer-Value Paradigm: Providing innovation and quality content for and not ‘to’ your customers.
What do you think? – I would love to hear your thoughts. Please feel free to comment or reach out to me. Part 2 is coming Soon: “Innovating Your Content Marketing System” @neilkeene.