Focus on Your Services
When developing a content strategy for your brand, you want to think about what it is that you’re selling and how you want to get that message across through your content. You want to remain consistent, keeping an even voice across all of your content. For example, if you’re a law firm, you’d only want to post content that is related to the types of cases you handle. If you’re a restaurant, you would post about food or food-related topics. Basically, you never want to post something that is out of place or off brand. Make sure that everything you talk about can be, in some way, related back to the service that you provide.
Prioritize Highest-Value Services
You want to make sure that your highest-value services or your most popular services are the ones that you spend the most time and effort on. For example, with most law firms, most of the cases they take on are car accident and motorcycle accident lawsuits. Because of this, it makes the most sense to post the most content about those topics. Other content is still posted about other practice areas. But the main focus should be on your most popular service or the one of the highest value that you’re trying to promote. The core services of your business are what your content strategy should be built around.
Know Your Audience
Before you post anything, you should think about who you’re trying to reach. Your audience is incredibly important, as they’re the ones who will potentially buy your service. You want to create content with them in mind. For law firms, the audience is victims of accidents. Therefore, their content strategy should appeal to and be informational for people who have been in accidents. If you sell shoes, you would want to research the demographic for the type of shoes you’re selling and work from there. There are many tools that you can use to learn about your audience, such as Google Analytics.
What content formats will you use?
Not only do you need to think about what you want your content to be about, but you need to think about what the best format for your content is. Your content strategy will vary based on the medium you use for your content.
Blogs
Blog content is good for SEO, driving potential customers directly to your website, and establishing a name for yourself when it comes to reliability. You want to post information that’s both informative and interesting while remaining on topic. The more that a person visits your website for information, the more likely they are to buy your service when they’re looking to make the purchase. They’re also more likely to recommend you to a friend. Making consistent blogs makes your name show up more, sticking in people’s heads.
Video
Not everyone wants to sit down and read a blog post. You have to think about the different types of people out there, and how they learn. Some people learn a lot better by watching something rather than reading something. You can convey the same information in a video and a blog post. Videos can also be long or short, depending on what platform they’re posted on.
Podcast
Podcasts have grown dramatically in popularity over recent years, and there are many people who listen to them to learn information about different brands. However, podcasts are finicky. They have to be interesting and informative enough to keep one’s attention, but not too boring that people click away after it’s over. If you have something interesting to talk about that you think your audience would like, a podcast could definitely work in your favor.
What platforms will you publish to?
As much as the type of content matters, where you post it matters as well. Not every platform is suited for each type of content. Some content will thrive on different websites, as your audience may be different on each platform.
Website
Your website should be kept simple, posting mainly blog posts and videos when you see fit. Make sure to keep the information current, interesting, and relatable. You don’t want to post too much on your website that people are overwhelmed, but you don’t want to post too little that it hurts your website’s SEO.
Social Media
Social media has become incredibly popular in the last decade, to the point where almost everyone has at least one form of social media. However, they’re all different and have their own different pros and cons.
Facebook is best used for all-around information. You can post links to blogs, links to videos on YouTube, and even status updates about your company. Facebook is a great tool, but it’s dying off in popularity, as not as many people use it anymore. Depending on your audience, Facebook might not be an effective tool.
Instagram is used for pictures, stories, and short videos. You can post pictures of things you have for sale, updates in the “stories” section, and even short videos. A new feature allows you to even sell things from your profile if you’re a verified store. Instagram does not lend itself well to links, so save your blog posts for Facebook and LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is great for networking and reaching other people in the same field as you. You can learn from them, look at what they’re doing and build it into your own strategy. You can also share articles and pictures here, however, LinkedIn is much more popular for business use than it is for personal use.
Twitter is a great place to share links, post updates, and interact with your followers. It’s generally used the same way that Facebook is, but you should still use both to increase your reach.
Managing a Creation and Publication Process
If you want to have a successful content strategy, you need to have a calendar for posting to ensure that you stay consistent.
Create a schedule for content creation
Make a calendar for when you’re going to write or shoot your content and make sure you (or your writers) are sticking to it. It’s easy to fall behind and get overwhelmed with content that needs to be done, so do your best to stay on track. Make a schedule that works best for you, and don’t overwhelm yourself with too much too fast—start small.
Create a schedule for publishing
You should also have a schedule for when your content will be published. In most content management systems, you can schedule posts out on your website. There are also many applications you can use that will allow you to schedule social media posts as well. Remaining consistent will help your brand grow.
Why Hire a Content Marketing Firm for Your Website
Hiring a content marketing firm means that we’ll take care of everything listed above. We can help you build your content strategy and maintain your website. We’ll take the stress of marketing off your shoulders while you worry about perfecting your products and services and serving your customers. For more information, please contact us online or by calling us at 407-712-0494.
