A Content Marketer’s nightmare: The 7 ghastly ghouls that keep haunting you

As we once again welcome the season of ghastly ghouls, ghosts, and all things spooky, now is the perfect time to open the creaking cobwebbed door where your content marketing nightmares await.?

Don't be afraid. It's time to tackle each ghost head-on. This can mean anything from addressing your fear of creating content that nobody reads, struggling to calculate your content ROI correctly, or a fear of looking back at last quarter's performance. ??

Let's go on a content marketing ghost-busting adventure to stop these ghouls from haunting you any further.???

?? The bots terminating your real content analytics

I'll be the first to admit that in the past, I've tracked many content metrics just because others were doing it too. The term 'vanity metrics' comes to mind, or as I like to call it, BS metrics. You know what I'm talking about… website views, new sign-ups, shares, page views, etc.?

Let's examine page views for a second because it's a metric that almost all content folks look at. It's also a metric targeted frequently by emotionless bots that skew your data and pollute your analytics.

Bots are a real threat; paying attention to your analytics is the best way to defeat this ghoul. You can do that by asking yourself the following questions:??

• Has the number of user sessions on your website spiked exponentially??Usually, an abnormally large number of new sessions, alongside a high bounce rate and low session duration, is an indicator of automated traffic activity.
• Is your average bounce rate high??A high bounce rate (on a single page or site-wide) that sits between 95 and 100% suggests that bot traffic is at play.
• Is your average session duration below three seconds??If it recurs below 3 seconds often, this may not be due to the speed of your website but (creepy) crawlers scraping your site for images and content. ??
• Have you seen a sharp increase in direct and referral traffic??These two channels are common sources of bot traffic and where you're likely to see the highest spikes in traffic.

?? The content control zombie

I'm a control freak when it comes to content. So when I had to relinquish that control recently, it made me squirm a little.?

You may find yourself in a position where your company is looking to scale its content efforts, which means you have to enlist the help of other writers, or you may find yourself in a situation where content is being democratized across a team, or in my case — both.?

Breathe. It's a lot to take in. No need to reach for the panic button just yet. ?? If you are in a similar position or are experiencing the same, know that your expertize and skills will get you through these challenging situations. Put your knowledge down on paper, video, or present it in training sessions. Better yet, create an instruction manual, so there's always a mandate to follow when it comes to content creation.?

Your content marketing can still work, even if you don't write it. When you've laid out the ground rules correctly, the result is high-quality content that uses your unique experiences and expertise to provide value to your audience.?

?? The mummified content left in a forgotten tomb of resources?

What’s more horrifying than creating a ton of content that nobody uses because they can't find it? It happens more often than you think.?

Marketing teams create resource libraries, but some employees still struggle to find exactly what they're looking for. And this only becomes more problematic when companies are in full scale-up mode.?

For instance, did you know that 60 to 70% of the content produced by B2B marketers goes unused, according to the Content Marketing Institute (CMI)??

Here's how to de-mummify your content. First, make sure to have all the resources located somewhere centrally. This could be your company intranet, for instance. Make sure to introduce it to all employees and get them to bookmark it as part of the onboarding process. And, of course, it never hurts to promote your resources library on Slack now and again so that you constantly alert it to people's attention.?

?? A content strategy that's as invisible as a ghost

Some content folks talk about it. Others have heard about it. Some say their company has one, but there's no sign of it. No documented proof.?

But the content strategy ghost is real.?

It is estimated that only 35% of businesses have a visible and documented content strategy available to employees, according to CMI.

The benefits of a transparent content strategy are more content for the Sales team to use, greater opportunities to expand brand reach, and a cool opportunity to gather feedback and ideas from others at the company around your content to make it go further.?

There are a number of ways you can share your content strategy with your peers, and that could be in the form of a slide deck, presenting it to the wider company at an All Hands meeting, or you can lay it out in your project management tool which everyone can access and view.?

?? The Frankenstein of your content repurposing project

Frankenstein is a term for all the pieces that don't fit together, and this can be applied to content marketing, especially when it comes to repurposing content.?

Frankenstein content offers no cohesive experience for an audience — the goal many content creators strive for. Knowing which content works harmoniously together is important to avoid creating a monster mess.?

When repurposing, it's vital to ensure consistency. One way to do this is by making sure you revert to your style or brand booklet. This will ensure that your content and brand are distinguishable from your competitors and create familiarity and reliability.?

Don't have a brand guide available? Check out my?article?on how to create one! I also give you a sneak peek into what Foleon's brand guide looks like. ??

?? Too afraid to look back at your content performance

Horror movies have been the source of some truly unforgettable lines, like "don't look back." But what's truly horrific is reaching the end of a quarter not having done a retrospective or knowing how well your content has been performing.?

Look, I know it can be a daunting task to undertake, but it's important to take the learnings from the past and apply them moving forward. I like to think that when you know better, you do better.?

So if you're not making it a priority already, get your content and brand team together and give everyone a chance to share their findings and insights in a safe space. Reserve judgment and hold back strong opinions, and listen to one another to see what's working and what can still be improved.?

?? The ROI vampire preying on those not measuring their content?

The last thing anyone wants is for this vampire to suck its victims dry of their ROI. So it's time to face the most haunting question for content folks, "What's the ROI?"

According to CMI, more than 50% of marketers either have zero clarity or are unsure how effective their content marketing is. To get the full picture, you must go beyond the vanity metrics and track performance on many levels and across multiple channels.?

Of course, this is a big topic to cover. Luckily for you, I've covered a lot of ROI ground?here.?

But in a nutshell, content marketing ROI is a percentage showing how much revenue you gained from content marketing in comparison to what you spent. In other words: (Return - Investment ÷ Investment) x 100 = ROI.

So, now that you're armed with the proper knowledge to vanquish these ghouls, ensure yourself a better night's sleep by tackling them head-on. We promise that by doing so, they won't come back to haunt you.???

Boo-yah!