If I go back 20 years and try to think of brands I often engaged with, all that comes to mind are some local ‘mom & pop’ bagel and coffee shops! When I think of top of mind brands now, I think of Amazon.com and TripAdvisor because they engage with me and my passion areas all the time. Today brands are building continuous relationships with their consumers to stand out as preferred choices and win their loyalty.
Digital media has enabled this change and strengthened brand connections with consumers. It has contributed to building stronger brand perception, helping brands become more competitive. How close can a brand get to its customers, how much valuable information can it provide and how closely can it follow the customer’s purchase journey? Answers to these questions can make a brand memorable or forgettable. So it all comes down to content.
In the past, there was a higher dependency on the linear vendor-led customer journey — with brands as the sole source of sharing the information about its products and services. Today, the customer is actively seeking information and is finding it in diverse ways. As multiple touch-point opportunities become available to customers, new media communication tools are becoming an integral part of the customer’s buying journey. This raises the bar for marketers, making it essential to track and analyse customer behaviour to deliver content that customers really want to read.
Good content marketing is basically marketing that feels like a service and not an interruption. A 2015 poll by CMO.com showed that just around 40% of all Indian content marketers felt that they are effective at content marketing, but were not sure if this content was being read and whether it resonated with the audience.
Here are some of the learnings that marketers can use:
Let your audience guide your content strategy: Content guided by the interests of our consumers moves us to a place where we are trusted and loved. So empower your consumers by giving them the right content, at the right time, through the right channels. Being relevant in your content is not only about being creative in your style of writing. Content that provides information at each stage of the customer’s buying journey, shaped into formats to tell a compelling story and placed on channels customers visit frequently always works. This makes the content purposeful and relevant for customers and helps them find you when they search online.
Customers want credible answers to tough questions: To capture your TG’s attention, the content needs to have a credible voice that addresses what customers want to read and helps them make more informed decisions. Reach out to influencers who share the same values as your brand and leverage them to tell your story. Through these influencers you can amplify your content to reach larger networks, build wider brand awareness and establish the brand’s thought leadership in your industry.
Map data to your customer’s journey: According to IDC, only 34% of APAC organisations integrate, combine and analyse their transactional data. Less than 20% analyse web clicks, social data, customer text or mobile engagement. 80% don’t make an effort to understand each step of the customer’s buying journey. Data can empower marketers to understand customer interests and identify the different types of customer personas they need to target. Personas of prospects can be better understood by continuously investing in primary research, field input and social listening. This intelligence allows them to infuse empathy into campaigns which makes the audience feel understood, supported, celebrated and emotionally connected with your brand.
Keep reinventing your marketing strategy: As per IDC’s APeJ Suite Barometer 2015, 91% of CMOs leverage IT for marketing. Marketers today wear two hats — one as experts in marketing strategy and the other as adopters of technology solutions such as marketing automation, cloud-based solutions and analytics. This allows them to successfully identify the customer’s pain points, mindset and needs at each stage of the buying journey.
Content marketing is a long game and undoubtedly, a brand’s roadmap to success. There is no one-size-fits-all formula. A healthy mix of both science (insights and analytics) and art (messaging, tone and architecture) is required to arm brands with all the elements needed to create an interesting story. Customers want snackable, interactive and easy to share content that can go across platforms. You could also choose to convert data-driven insights into interesting reads, look at new engaging formats and continue to ask yourself if the story you shared today will still be relevant to your customer tomorrow.
The author is director, marketing solutions, LinkedIn India