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Putting the ‘Strategic’ Into Strategic Content Marketing

The C o n te n t M a rk e tin g In s titu te ’s (CMI) 2015 reports on B2B and B2C (business-to-consumer) content marketing trends reveal some important disconnects among demand, effectiveness, and satisfaction with results. For instance, while 86% of B2B respondents indicate that they are us­ ing content marketing, only 38% say that their efforts are effective. While 83% say they have a content marketing strategy, only 35% have a documented strategy.

The situation on the B2C side is similar. Here, 77% say they use content marketing; 37% say their efforts are effective. While 77% say they have a content marketing strategy, only 27% have a docum ented strategy. Even among those who claim a docum ented strategy, th ere is a wide range of perspectives about w hat th at strategy actually entails. Truly strategic content m arketing efforts rem ain elusive for many.

Sarah VanHeirseele is VP of digital for Blue Chip. Con­ tent marketing strategy, says VanHeirseele, is “the clearly defined approach that aligns messages, media audiences, and channels in a cohesive w ay.” The strategy, she says, sets the param eters for w hat the brand can say and how

Whole Foods M a rke t uses its website and stra te g ica lly selected— and carefully coordinated— social m e d ia l channels to te ll its s to ry to consumers.

it will say it, as well as w here messages will appear. While content marketing is all the rage these days, VanHeirseele says, “It’s very difficult to find examples of marketers who are nailing the strategy in terms of bringing the tactics back around to business objectives.” The focus tends to be on “going viral” rather than building a sustained effort to create long-term value, she says.

Ed Marsh is a HubSpot VAR (value-added reseller), the export advisor to American Express for its middle m arket program, and the founder of Consilium. Marsh says, “Most companies think that the decision to adopt content marketing is the strategy piece.” Then, he says, they “tackle a checklist of tasks.” Most, Marsh says, will claim they have a strategy and will articulate it similar to this: “G enerate X new leads by reaching XX persons as they consider XXX solutions.” But th at’s not a strategy. T hat’s an objective.

Chris Bilko, a copyw riter based in the U.K., says, “The best w ay to think of strategy—in any context, not just content m arketing—is to see it as how y o u ’re going to achieve your goals.” So if your objective is something similar to the aforem entioned statem ent, y o u r strate­ gies should indicate how you are going to achieve that objective.

“If your goals are w here you want to go, strategy is how y o u ’re going to get there at the very high level,” says Mary Ellen Slayter, CEO and founder of Rep Cap in Baton Rouge, La. “ Divide and conquer is a strategy. W ord-of-mouth is a strategy. Creating and managing a Twitter account is a tactic. Hootsuite is a tool,” she says.

“ Before you hit ‘publish’ on anything, figure out why y o u ’re producing th e content in the first p lace,” sug-

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gests Slayter. “W hat’s the desired outcome? Do you have a tangible goal? Increasing qualified leads or the number of referrals from existing clients are both legit goals for content marketing. So is shortening the length of the sales pipeline. Increasing page views on a website is not.”

Part of the problem, says Marsh, is that content market­ ing is generally driven by the marketing department—so the strategy that has to be driven at a corporate level is never explored. “If the CEO signs off on a new marketing budget but marketing never thinks beyond their silo and never gets [the CEO] involved in how it changes the business, then the content marketing strategy by definition will be a campaign execution strategy rather than a revenue growth strategy. That’s fundamentally limiting,” says Marsh.

But that’s not a strategy. That’s an objective.

Content marketers need to make sure that their efforts are focused on achieving business objectives, as Slayter notes. It’s not about the content—it’s about the business results that the content is able to achieve. “The most lost people are the ones who are quite adamant they have a strategy when all they really have is a monthly editorial calendar in a Google spreadsheet,” says Slayter.

In formulating an effective content marketing strategy, Danielle Hohmeier, a branding, content, and social media strategist at Atomicdust in the St. Louis, Mo., area, recom­ mends the following approach:

• Start with goals. Why are you using content? What do you want your audience to do?

• Define brand voice and personality attributes. This often ties back to the organization’s mission. Not so much what you do, but why you do it. Describe the brand as if it were a person (friendly, knowledgeable, and professional, etc.).

• Create audience profiles. Who is your audience? Do dif­ ferent audiences apply to different channels?

• Identify appropriate channels. If you don’t have customer emails, you can’t rely on an email newsletter. If your cus­ tomers aren’t on Facebook, you don’t need a page there.

news & product briefs

ClearVoice Unveils a Content M arketplace and New Intelligence Tools

ClearVoice, a content marketing platform and service solution, announced a Creators Marketplace and two content intelligence tools— influencer search and IdeaLab— as a part of an end-to-end content solution. ClearVoice says it bridges the gap between brands and content creators, fostering collaboration and enabling scalable content production. Companies can plan, recruit, create, distribute, and measure, all within a single platform.

In Creators Marketplace, users can conduct a casting call to find and hire the right match for any campaign. They can receive qualified matches, review creators, and choose the best fit. Companies can tag creators or block creators from future casting calls and always set their own price for content. Additionally, all freelancer payments can be handled via the platform.

The influencer search and IdeaLab content intelligence tools work together to produce a content strategy. ClearVoice’s index analyzes billions of data points to identify the most influential content creators and their respective published works. (clearvoice.com)

Time, Inc. Launches Branded Content Wing Time, Inc. has put both feet into the branded content

pool. It opened The Foundry, “ a new content and creative collective that allows clients to tap into the powerful storytelling and immersive consumer experiences of the world’s most iconic media brands,” according to its site.

The Foundry is a bit different than the content studios of other big publications—such as The New York Times or Conde Nast— as it combines content marketing with other projects, such as the digital-only publication The Drive. Announced back in July, The Drive is aimed at the automotive vertical— and joins the beauty brand Mimi and The Snug—and was set to launch in the fall. (foundry, timeinc. com)

Livefyre Partners With Adobe Livefyre (a provider of social curation) announced a

strategic partnership with Adobe (a provider of digital marketing solutions) to give enterprises the ability to create and deliver socially driven content and experiences on owned properties and campaigns. Now, brands can bring together content from Adobe’s Creative Cloud with social content discovered and curated by Livefyre, and then deliver these experiences using Adobe Experience Manager, as a part of Adobe Marketing Cloud.

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( P u tt in g th e S t r a t e g ic ’ In t o S tr a t e g ic C o n te n t M a r k e tin g , fro m pa g e 7)

Choose the channels that will be most effective for you and plan how to assess and build tow ard additional channels in the future.

• Identify topics of content—aside from your company news or product information—that your audience will care about.

• Define measurement. Before you start, choose the m et­ rics y o u ’ll be looking at and the frequency y o u ’ll be looking at them. There is so much data out there; this will bring focus to your efforts.

Then, pull all of the aforementioned together in a state­ m ent that indicates how you intend to meet your desired

business objectives. That will be your content marketing strategy. Whole Foods Market is often pointed to as an ex­ ample of a company that is getting content marketing right. Its strategy might be summed up as, “Use storytelling to convey our commitment to quality, standards and taste, and distinguish ourselves as the leader in the grocery industry,” says Scott Simons, global marketing director for Whole Foods, in an interview that appeared in Direct Marketing News. That’s a strategy. All of the to-do items that will be developed to support that strategy (social media posts on various channels, white papers, and blogs posts, etc.) are tactics. Tactics, without strategy, are chaos—a lot of wasted time and effort that is unlikely to yield meaningful results. If you’re engaged in content marketing—or marketing of any kind—it’s time to get strategic. E

(T he B e s t S tra te g ie s t o M o n e tiz e Your S h o rt-F o rm V ideo, fro m p a g e 9 )

secure paym ent service provider,” recommends Bene- dicte Guichard, senior m arketing director for Cleeng, based in Amsterdam.

• Avoid intrusive monetization schemes. “Your m oneti­ zation approach should be em bedded into the content itself,” says Chad Dunavant, VP of product m anage­ m ent for CSG International. “W ith short-form content, consumers will not stay engaged if they have to enter credit card inform ation.”

• Explore other creative ways to monetize. Perhaps a relevant brand may be willing to sponsor your content, or you can experiment with a freemium model (offering some content gratis, upfront, and then asking viewers to pay for full access to unlimited content).

• Be sure your videos are discoverable by optimizing titles, tags, and descriptions. “The m ore people who are able to find your video, the m ore m oney you’ll be able to m ake,” notes Jefferson.

A dditionally, consider collaborating and develop­ ing profitable partnerships with other video providers as well as affiliate partners. “It’s challenging enough for

one creator to produce enough hours for one subscrip­ tion video channel,” notes Mosam. “W hen creators col­ laborate, more content is produced, larger audiences are reached, and higher levels of income are m ade from a larger p ie.” Partnering with an affiliate can be another great revenue stream. “If you have a big audience and you find someone whose videos would be appealing to th at audience, you can prom ote them and cut yourself into their profit-sharing,” Patel says.

Lastly, ensure quality of service and quality of ex­ perience with your short-form clips. “ One bad experi­ ence with short-form content—including buffering, slow response times, or a slow checkout process—can lose a consum er’s atten tio n ,” D unavant says. In fact, seamless delivery m ay be the m ost im portant aspect th at affects your success as a video content publisher.

“End users will pay for quality, issueless content, and they expect nothing less than th a t,” says Guichard. “To reach that quality level, publishers need to perform seal- ability and perform ance tests prior to distribution and m ake sure all the technical aspects—such as hosting, en­ coding and encryption—are w ell-set-up.”

To help m atters here, “use a top-tier platform or n e t­ work that leverages a world-class content delivery n e t­ work to keep your videos looking great,” adds Mosam. K3

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