7 Reasons Why Content Marketing is the Future of Your Business
It seems like ads are everywhere these days. Whether they pop up before a YouTube video or disguise themselves as short-form videos with catchy titles, avoiding ads has become quite a challenge. Amid this flood of intrusive advertising, sometimes made worse by meaningless moment marketing ads. However, businesses have a great opportunity to shift their approach from interrupting to assisting their customers. This is where content marketing steps in.
Content marketing is all about boosting sales by giving customers what they’re actively searching for. Quality content is the core of any marketing strategy, whether conventional or digital. In our fast-paced world, grabbing people’s attention is tough, given their shrinking focus and the sheer number of marketing messages they encounter daily. But with proper content planning, you can implement an effective marketing strategy.
Content marketing is one of the most effective and efficient marketing practices. It helps your brand reach and engage quality leads and customers. In this article, you’ll learn about the advantages of content marketing for your company. Without further ado, let’s dive into it!
How Your Business Can Benefit from Consistent and Well-Strategised Content Marketing
1. Helps increase your visibility on the Internet
With over 4.66 billion people online, it’s essential to make your brand visible online. Having an SEO strategy is a must. This starts with building a website, making social media profiles, and a Google Business Profile. These steps ensure that when people search for your business, they can easily find information about it online without any distracting fluff.
Next, content marketing takes it a step further. By creating content that targets keywords related to your business, you can start ranking higher on search engine results pages. For example, if you run a landscaping company, you can target keywords like “lawn care tips” or “best summer flowers.” People searching for these topics may not be looking for your services immediately, but your content will capture their attention.
In this way, content marketing drives more people to your website. Companies that actively create and publish blog posts attract 55% more visitors than those that don’t. When you consistently produce relevant and useful content in your niche, more people are going to discover your website, and they will probably return for future questions or information. This increased website traffic and recurring visitors add to the long-term growth of your net visibility.
2. Targets all stages of the conversion funnel for leads
Content marketing and SEO are unique in their ability to target each of the conversion funnel stages: awareness, consideration, or decision. No matter where your customer is on this funnel or what they’re looking for, well-written content can help both them and you.
For instance, if you’re a clothing brand, a customer in the awareness stage might be exploring the latest fashion trends or seeking advice on a fashion-related issue. Your content can provide the information they need, showcasing your products as examples to guide them further. This converts the customers’ interest in any given topic into awareness of your product.
A customer in the consideration stage has a general idea of what they want, and they’re looking for something that convinces them that YOUR particular product is the best choice for them. Finally, a customer in the decision stage is almost ready to make a purchase, and the content’s job is to convert and finalise that into a sale, providing that final nudge. Well-written content by an expert can do all of these things!
3. It’s the glue that binds different marketing channels together.
Content marketing acts like the glue that holds your different marketing channels together. It helps ensure that all your brand messaging and goals are working together seamlessly.
For example, let’s say you run a catering company and create a useful blog post and checklist on hosting a large event. You can share this content on social media profiles, run ads on platforms like Facebook and search results, or send it to your customers through email. This one piece of content has thus helped your marketing efforts across multiple channels, making your overall strategy more coherent.
This cohesion is invaluable in today’s chaotic marketing landscape, where multiple channels and activities are involved. It acts as the connecting thread that keeps your marketing messages and objectives consistent.
4. Establishes your expertise and authority in your field
To establish your brand authority and prove your credibility as a small business online, your website must be seen as trustworthy and knowledgeable. Content marketing is a powerful way to bolster your authority and demonstrate your business’s credibility.
Research from the Nielsen Group shows that having a good amount of up-to-date content is the top method for a website to establish its trustworthiness. Users appreciate websites with a large amount of relevant content because it signals that the site runner is well-informed and dedicated to assisting its customers. For instance, participants in the Nielsen study noted their positive impressions of moving companies that provided helpful moving tips, such as how to best prepare for a move by packing boxes efficiently.
This approach makes sense because businesses that offer current and pertinent content appear much more trustworthy. Combining trust signals with content marketing can be even more effective. For instance, if a friend recommends a dentist and I visit their website and find useful and relevant content that shows their expertise, I’m more likely to use their services.
5. Educates your customers and creates demand
Content marketing serves as an excellent tool for educating your audience and creating demand for your product. Through mediums like blogs, videos, and listicles, you can provide valuable info not only about your products or services but also about the broader industry/niche you serve.
For instance, look at the case of agricultural equipment giant John Deere, as studied by the Content Marketing Institute. Back in 1985, John Deere created an informative and educational magazine about the farming industry. This approach didn’t involve direct selling, yet it built trust among generations of farmers. By establishing authority in the industry and being seen as a reliable brand, John Deere gained the trust of consumers, a critical factor when they make purchasing decisions. Farmers who weren’t aware of the latest agricultural machinery learned about and bought it.
You can replicate this connection-building online by focusing on providing meaningful and helpful information to your audience without employing aggressive sales tactics.
6. Is Extremely Cost-efficient compared to other methods like Ads
Content marketing has proven to be a vastly more cost-effective and profitable investment compared to traditional marketing methods. Traditional marketing heavily relies on a pay-to-play model, but when you stop paying for ads, your visibility quickly vanishes. In contrast, content marketing only has the initial cost of content creation. Once a piece of content is created, published, and distributed, you don’t have to continually pay for its visibility, especially if you invest in good SEO.
Multiple studies have shown that the return on investment for content marketing is much higher than that of traditional advertising. On average, companies with blogs generate 67% more leads, 97% more inbound links, attract 55% more website visitors, and have 434% more indexed pages on Google compared to companies without blogs.
Content marketing’s success becomes more evident over time because it is sustainable, and the ROI tends to grow as published content gains traction. When done properly, content marketing can generate three times the number of leads and costs 60% less compared to other marketing methods.
Customers Prefer Content to Ads
Today’s consumers have different expectations and behaviours when it comes to making purchasing decisions. They want to research, gather information about the best options, and connect with brands that share their values. Conventional marketing is losing its appeal because nobody likes in-your-face marketing. Consider the last time you even made a purchase based on an intrusive ad that popped up while watching YouTube or using Facebook.
Studies have shown that more than 40% of people use ad blockers, and this figure is only going to increase with time. While advertising is a valuable tool for brands, extravagant spending on it may not yield the best results. By creating a valuable repository of search-optimised content, you can capture the attention of those who are sceptical of ads or actively avoid them.
Content marketing is the way to go because it is what consumers prefer. In fact, consumer preferences are a major force behind the rise of content marketing. The research clearly indicates that many netizens are cautious about ads and tend to prioritise organic search results.
Research shows that 70% of people would much rather read an informative article about a product than view an advertisement. In the B2B world, 62% of buyers read 3-7 pieces of content before they’re willing to engage with a salesperson.
Are You Proud of Your Brand's Content Marketing?
There’s no doubt that content marketing is the future of businesses on the web – especially for small businesses trying to stay relevant. Whether it is a product, service, or platform, any business can benefit from a well-maintained content library to build its brand and improve visibility.
We at Dimensions are proud to have helped several businesses from different sectors thrive and build an online presence. If you, too, are looking for professional help with the entire content pipeline, from planning to generation to maintenance, click here to get started!
