Top 100 Question on Content Marketing: How do you get buy-in for a content marketing strategy?
Here are 4 ways to get buy-in for a content marketing strategy:
1. Build a big tent to co-create content marketing strategy
To get buy-in for a content marketing strategy,?host a content marketing workshop so people learn side-by-side with the whole team. Build a big tent.
Invite executives, Marketing, subject-matter experts (SMEs), Sales, product management, agencies and freelancers. Get everybody together in one room, face to face.
Bring in an expert who can educate the team on:
Co-create your mission and strategy
By working together in a workshop, your team gains a common language, plus tools and templates they can put to work right away.
In my content marketing?workshops, we co-create a content marketing mission statement (also known as a content marketing editorial mission statement).
Why? Because it gets everyone on the same page. Also because it serves as a litmus test for which content to create.
To get buy-in for a content marketing strategy, use this content mission?template.
A written content marketing mission statement gives you a leg up in developing a content marketing strategy. After the team agrees on the mission, have them co-create a 1-page content marketing strategy.
Co-creation gets people aligned
Your written content marketing strategy aligns content marketing with the needs of the business by spelling out:
The strategy defines who is the target audience, what’s in it for them, and what calls to action will move content users along the path from learning to buying.
To get buy-in for a content marketing strategy, use this 1-page content marketing strategy?template.
Buyers consult lots of content before calling Sales
Buyers have specific information needs, which you can find out through buyer persona research. Buyers look for answers to questions, topics of interest, and social proof.
Advertising isn’t always an effective way to reach buyers. Buyers increasingly skip TV commercials, ignore print ads and direct mail, and block banner ads and pop-ups.
Yet buyers seek out content marketing because it helps them get specific jobs done.
When you offer trustworthy content that meets buyers’ needs, you build a relationship of trust, which will help you when it’s time for the buyer to make a decision.?That’s the magic of content marketing.
3. Advocate for customer-centric content
To get buy-in for a content marketing strategy, teach people with content before you try to create the strategy. Here’s a blog on how to use content to gain buy-in for content marketing.
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Great content marketing is all about the buyer, the customer, and their tribe. It’s not about your company, your brand, or your product.
Great content teaches buyers before it tries to sell them. Teaching creates buyers who become smart enough to buy from you.
Teach first, then sell
Good content leads with information, then bridges to selling.
Don’t try to sell too soon. That approach backfires.
For example, the Michelin Guide?wasn’t about tires. It wasn’t even about cars.
Instead, it was about meeting the information needs of drivers – the tribe served by the Michelin Guide.
Another example is John Deere’s magazine?The Furrow. It isn’t a catalog about tractors and plows. In fact, the brand is rarely mentioned in the editorial pages.
Instead, The Furrow?is a magazine dedicated to helping farmers run their businesses more successfully. Its information serves the tribe of farmers well.
Ask:
The best content marketing teaches before it sells.
When you create great content, you create a single source of truth that helps build relationships across all your key audiences:
4. Do pilot programs to produce proven successes
If you’re just starting out in content marketing, or if you detect hesitation in the team, make content marketing a “pilot program.”
Even in companies that are risk-averse and fearful, people understand a pilot program. It’s a small-scale experiment designed for learning.
Design your pilot project not only to learn about content marketing but also to succeed by bringing in revenue. That’s the best way to gain buy-in for a content marketing strategy.
Give your pilot program long enough to work. Content marketing generally takes 1 or 2 years to prove its full potential.
Better to run a small content pilot program for a year or two than to crash and burn with a big project that lacks enough support to run for a year.
“How do you get buy-in for a content marketing strategy?” is one of marketers’ Top 100 Questions about content marketing. Here are the answers.
Here are related blogs on how to get buy-in for a content marketing strategy from specific people such as subject-matter experts (SMEs) and executives:
Director of Marketing | Experienced in data-driven strategic marketing initiatives, integrated marketing communications, content strategy, organizational alignment, and cross-functional collaboration | HubSpot certified
1 年While the focus of this article is on how to get buy-in for content marketing, George also includes the perfect reminder of what your purpose should always be: “Great content marketing is all about the buyer, the customer, and their tribe. It’s not about your company, your brand, or your product. Great content teaches before it tries to sell.”