Get 5X More Right-Fit Leads with a Clear Content Marketing Strategy

Do you want to generate more traffic, more leads and more sales for your small business?

Sure you do.

What if I told you that content marketing generates 55% more traffic, 5X more leads, and is 13% more likely to generate a return on your investment… all without breaking the bank?*

What’s not to love, right? 

Just this. It takes a lot of content to make an impact, and it’s easy to waste a lot of time without the results you want if you don’t have a clear strategy.

And it’s not just about quantity.To attract your 100% right-fit clients, you have to produce high quality content that they find compelling and valuable.

That can be a tall order for small business owners who have too little time and too many competing priorities. 

But here’s the thing.

Content marketing isn’t a choice, it’s a “must do.” Today’s buyers conduct market research, evaluate their options and make a preliminary decision to buy before they ever contact you.  

This change in buyer behavior requires a new marketing approach, one that keeps you top of mind, provides value, and builds trust at every stage of your sales funnel. 

You do that with content marketing.

For small business owners, the key to making content marketing an effective lead generator is having a cohesive strategy that supports your business goals. 

What is content marketing and why should you care?

Content marketing is an approach to marketing that involves consistently creating and promoting content online that is valuable and relevant to a specific audience. 

It offers a strategic advantage to small businesses owners, because they’re more likely than larger enterprises to know their customers personally. This knowledge enables them to produce content that directly addresses the challenges their prospective customers face on a regular basis. 

A well-executed content marketing strategy contributes to business success by increasing brand awareness, authority positioning (positioning yourself as an expert in your field,) promoting audience engagement, and generating traffic, lead and sales.

A poorly executed content marketing strategy does just the opposite by damaging your reputation and alienating the very customers you’re seeking to attract. 

Not a good thing.

Content marketing is cost-effective but time-intensive. And time can be a rarer commodity than money for small business owners. There are ways, however, to reduce your investment of time by planning ahead and using the right strategies to reach your goals. 

You need a clear content marketing strategy to maximize your results and reduce your investment of time.

To get optimal results, you need a clear strategy for producing and promoting content that supports your business goals. Otherwise you’re going to waste a lot of time creating and distributing content that doesn’t produce the results you need.

A clear strategy helps you:

• Stand out from your competitors by promoting your brand differentiation at every stage of the buyer’s journey.
•  Generate more website traffic. 90% of website and blog traffic is driven by social media with half of it coming from Linkedin.*
• Position yourself as a thought leader in the minds of your target audience by consistently producing quality content that remains true to your core message.

Components of a B2B Content Marketing Strategy

A comprehensive content marketing strategy requires you to get clear on several key components:

• Goals – Your content strategy supports your business goals.
• Niche – Your content will only be valuable if it is relevant to the problems and challenges you ideal clients face. Getting clear on your niche allows you to do that.
• Key performance indicators (KPIs) – Before you distribute content, decide on the analytics you will use to evaluate what forms work best.
• Competitor Analysis – As a small business owner, you don’t have to be better than your competitors - you just have to be different. A successful content strategy promotes that difference to the exact people you want to attract.
• Take the time to research how you’re like your competitors and how you’re different. 
• The New Buyer’s Journey – You have to understand today’s new buyer’s journey in order to develop the appropriate content for each stage in your sales funnel.
• Relationship Building – Content marketing creates opportunities for engagement and building trust over time.

Build a SMART Content Marketing Strategy to promote brand awareness, generate leads and convert viewers to clients.

You’re probably familiar with SMART goals (Goals that are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound), but have you used the SMART format to create your Linkedin marketing strategy? 

According to "Here’s Why Your Content Marketing Strategy is Totally Failing," a recent article by Neil Patel, creating your strategies with the SMART Goals format keeps you focused on the specific content and activities that produce the results you need.

SMART strategies are:

Specific: An effective strategy specifies the types of content you’ll produce for each goal.

• Choose content formats that leverage your strengths. Some of the most popular are: Videos, articles, guides, lists, case studies, infographics, podcasts, and slide decks.
•  Aim for a mixture of formats to appeal to buyers at each stage of your sales funnel. 

Measurable: An effective content strategy identifies the key performance indicators (KPIs) you will use to measure whether or not you’ve successfully reached your goals.      

A partial list of common KPIs includes: Traffic, unique page visits, subscribers, downloads, time spent on page, leads generated, and conversion rates.

Choose the KPIs that are most closely aligned with your business goals and check them often.

Achievable: It doesn’t do any good to set goals if they aren’t achievable. Setting unachievable goals is a sure-fire way to keep you feeling frustrated, guilty and demoralized. For effective goal setting, be sure to -

• Set goals that are a bit of a stretch but not impossible.
• Ask yourself if your goal is realistic given your financial and/or time constraints.

Relevant: The best content is aligned with the needs of your target audience. Try a few of these tactics to learn about their problems and issues: 

• Interview your current and past clients about their most pressing needs and concerns.
• Go online. Check discussion boards, blogs, podcasts and social media.
• Access Quora and/or Answer the Public to the questions on their minds.

Time-bound: Every goal needs a due date to keep you focused and moving forward. This includes content marketing goals

A word of warning: You may be tempted to skip creating a strategic plan for your content marketing. That would be a mistake. The only way to ensure that you meet your goals is by identifying and documenting

the strategies you’ll use to achieve them.

Stay on Brand With Content Mapping

Now that you’ve identified your SMART goals and strategies, you’re ready to focus on your core message, this is the message that communicates your brand story and the main benefit you provide to your clients.

Your core message is based on your mission statement and answers the WIIFM question. (What’s In It For Me?). Here's an example.

Mission Statement: To help B2B small business owners grow and flourish by building and promoting their unique promise of value to their 100% right-fit clients. 

Core message: Promoting your personal brand on Linkedin is your key to attracting more leads, more clients and more revenue, day in and day out …and still have time for a life.

3 – 5 messages that support your core message.

• Linkedin can be overwhelming to the uninitiated, but it’s not rocket science. You just need someone to show you the ropes and help you build the right strategies and systems to succeed.
• By mastering the B2B social selling process on Linkedin, you’ll increase your visibility, establish your expertise, and build trust and relationships with your ideal clients. 
• Content marketing can be tough for a small business owner, but with the right strategies, systems and actions you can become known as the go-to person in your industry.

Building your message map provides focus for your content and ensures that you’re always on message. That’s consistency, and consistency builds credibility. 

The 5-3-2 Rule of Social Sharing

For Not So Big Biz Owners?, the rule of thumb for posting content to Linkedin is 5 posts a week. I know that seems like a lot, but if you follow the 5-3-2 rule of social sharing, you’ll save time and build your reputation as the “go to person” for answers at the same time.

Here’s how it goes.

Only 50% of your content should originate with you in order to establish your expertise on Linkedin. 

According to "The 5:3:2 Rule of Social Sharing," by Della Cornish, out of every 10 pieces of content you post:

• 5 should be other people's content that is relevant to your audience. 
• 3 should be content from you that is not “salesy.”
• 2 should be nonwork-related content that tells people a little more about you and reinforces your brand.

It seems counter-intuitive, but it does make sense. In order to be seen as an expert in your field, you have to provide the best information available that relates to the needs of your ideal clients and customers. 

By balancing your own material with that of established and up-and-coming thought leaders in your field, you grow your own reputation as a “person in the know.” (Don’t forget to cite your sources!)

The key here, is to add your own point of view to what you post and make your opinion something more than “Great article.” 

So, what kinds of comments can you make? Explain why you’re sharing the information, agree or disagree with the writer’s premise, or add your own insights. There are lots of options, just be sure to express your point of view and customize your comments with your target audience in mind.

To express your point of view, you have to stick your neck out a bit, and that can feel uncomfortable. Just remember this. Whether people agree with you or not, you’ll be more memorable if you express your opinion.

Remember, Linkedin is all about building relationships. Pushy sales techniques don’t work. Make 80% of your posts curated content that is cutting edge, informative, actionable and valuable to your target audience. 

Use the other 20% of your content to build brand awareness with highly valuable content including a persuasive Call to Action (CTA) that moves your viewers to take the next step in your sales funnel.

Build a Content Repurposing Plan

Content repurposing is the practice of taking your best content and repurposing in different formats. For example I could take this article and break it into several articles, each going deeper into my main points.  Or I could make it into a slide presentation, a video, an infographic, or top ten list …there are many different options.

Repurposed content brings new perspectives, improves search engine optimization, reaches more prospects, builds brand awareness, and increases customer retention.

Final Thoughts:

Content marketing is a key component of social selling and is essential for building credibility and staying top-of-mind with your ideal clients and customers.

It appeals to small business owners because it’s cost-efficient, but it’s also time-intensive. Make it work for you by creating a cohesive content marketing strategy that supports your business goals and guides you in produceing quality content on a consistent and constant basis.

Are you the owner of a Not So Big Biz and interested in generating more traffic, more leads and more revenue on Linkedin? I'd love to hear from you. Send me an invitation to connect and mention this article, I'll send you my new "Social Savvy Entrepreneur Content Planner" to make planning and scheduling your content a breeze.

*References

"The Ultimate Guide to Content Marketing Strategy in 2019," by Alina, Petrova.

"8 Ways To Get More Traffic From LinkedIn," Jimmy Daly.

"48 Eye-Opening LinkedIn Statistics For B2B Marketers In 2019," by Josh Gallant. 

Dumont Owen, Ph.D. builds personal brands that help small business owners generate 100% right-fit leads, clients, and opportunities. A storyteller at heart, she puts her unique stamp on the process of personal branding and social media marketing. A certified Master Personal Brand Strategist and Social Media (Linkedin) Analyst, she helps her clients build and promote irresistible brands on Linkedin without feeling forced, contrived, or phony.

*References

The Ultimate Guide to Content Marketing Strategy in 2019, by Alina, Petrova.

8 Ways To Get More Traffic From LinkedIn, Jimmy Daly.

48 Eye-Opening LinkedIn Statistics For B2B Marketers In 2019, by Josh Gallant. 

Contact her at [email protected].