Content Publishing

Are you setting goals for your content marketing campaigns?

Without goals we have no direction and this can be applied to content marketing too. When you set up goals — whether big or small — you have a direction and when you have a direction you know exactly what you have to do and what you should avoid doing.

How does setting goals make your content marketing more effective? Let us suppose in the next four months you want to increase your search engine traffic and you don’t just want any traffic you want traffic that converts, that generates business, revenue for you. Once you have decided that, you figure out what sort of traffic from search engines would have a better conversion rate? Obviously the sort of traffic that is looking for what you have to offer. So write down somewhere what exactly you offer.

In my case I offer online copywriting and content writing services. Very good! Incidentally there are thousands of online copywriters and content writers on the Internet and there might be 10-20 content writers and online copywriters whose links appear before my link on the search engine result pages for appropriate keywords and search terms. In such a case scenario I can do three things (through by content publishing efforts)

Beat my competitors in the search optimization game and make my rankings better than theirs
Target those keywords that are less competitive but that can get me a fair amount of business
Generate content that significantly improves my conversion rate

The first option is obviously good but it may take a very long time and I don’t want to spend lots of money. The second option on the other hand is quite achievable. It won’t take much time and it will give me enough breathing space: I can get business and along with that I can also keep improving my website content for more competitive keywords and search terms.

Having a good conversion rate would also be very important for me because as much traffic as I get I would like to generate enough business from it. Since right now I won’t be able to attract thousands of visitors everyday to my website I would prefer that my content has a higher conversion rate. For me this would be my goal and I would generate all my content keeping this fact in my mind.

You may have another goal. Your goal may be getting lots of exposure on social media and networking websites and you may generate content accordingly. For this you will need to know what sort of content creates buzz and goes viral on social media and networking circles. This way you have a direction.

Simply dumping content on your website or blog doesn’t help you much. You must set clearly-defined goals for your content marketing strategy.

Why cheap content mostly harms your business

Just stumbled upon this blog post titled “pay peanuts, get monkeys” that basically means if you publish cheap content on your business website your conversion rate falls down drastically.

I would like to state at the outset that I offer very low-cost content from my website sometimes and I outsource this work to writers who can produce lots of “passable” content at extremely low rates. I would also like to tell you that I started providing low-cost content after having provided content writing services at normal international rates for more than 4 years (I still do) primarily because of 2 reasons:

There is high demand for cheap content
Writers are actually willing to provide such content

So I thought if there is a demand and if there is a supply and if I can earn money out of it then why not? I started offering a “package” and I also got some clients and some steady work for my writers. I mostly provide this content for SEO boost — it helps my clients increase their keyword density. But it stops there.

The problem comes when some of the clients want very cheap content and then want to use this content as their primary content and when the quality doesn’t meet their expectations they complain. It’s like, desiring to drive a car while paying for a cheap bicycle. This is exactly where the expression “pay peanuts, get monkeys” applies.

Cheap content isn’t always bad and surprisingly there are a few writers who really write well without charging much. How do they do that? When I asked around for most of them writing is just a side activity carried out either during office hours or after office hours. They have the skill but they don’t have the expertise and providing professional content writing and online copywriting service is not their primary activity. This means they neither invest in resources nor in improving their skills. They are simply comfortable with the language, they can quickly search on the Internet and find the relevant information and then rewrite it very fast. Nothing is unique and individual voice is always lacking. This is where the clients pay the casualty.

Whereas cheap content written around your keywords can certainly give you an SEO boost it doesn’t help you when it actually comes to selling. You may increase your search engine traffic but it will just remain traffic; you’re going to generate very little revenue. This is because you are inferior content is never going to convince them into doing business with you. Your content needs to inculcate a sense of trust and authority. If you sound like a teenager it isn’t going to do you much good if your target market mostly consists of grown-ups who are very conscious about making purchase-decisions.

Content writing is like any other service: it takes effort and experience to give you content that gets you business. There is a reason why bigger businesses eagerly pay hundreds and even thousands of dollars to experienced copywriters and content writers; they perfectly know what harm cheap content can cause.

But I hear some of you saying, “What makes you think that people who charge less cannot provide quality content?”

I have a Chinese Blackberry phone that almost looks like the real thing. So if you can purchase really cheap versions of a Blackberry or an iPhone, why do you spend so much money on the real devices? Well, this may seem rhetorical so let us see the practical aspect.

Let us say a content writer agrees to charge you just $5 for a business webpage — a professional content writer may charge you anywhere between $40-$100 for the same webpage, and I’m not talking about a well-known and reputed content writer or copywriter. How much time do you want your content writer to spend on your particular webpage? One hour? Two hours? Keep in mind that your business depends on this page and that is why you are getting it written. When people read it they will make their purchase decision. So you would like your content writer to spend ample amount of time while preparing your page. You would want him or her to properly understand your business and your market and you would also want him or her to visit your competitors’ websites to check out how they express themselves. To sound convincing you would want your content writer to properly understand your concept and its impact on the target audience. After all this you would want him or her to come up with convincing copy.

Do you actually want someone working on your business page who is desperate enough to provide a skill for just $5 per hour or worse $2.5 per hour? How much time can that person actually devote to your content? He or she will certainly devise ways to make up for the meager payment.

On the other hand if you pay standard rates (rates that enable your content writer to make contemporary income per hour) then you make sure that your content writer eagerly spends sufficient time on your project without having to worry about how to make up. He or she doesn’t have to come up with “n” number of words in the given time. He or she can actually focus on the quality of your content.

So what is the solution if you don’t have a big budget? Quality always works better than quantity. Well-written 10 articles are far better than poorly-written 100 articles. The same goes for your Web pages. If you don’t have budget for 20 pages just stick to 10 pages but get some writer who can really write them well.

And what if you also need SEO content? Then you need to strike up a balance. You can publish low-quality content in as much quantity as possible but also make provisions for well-written content that actually does business for you. You need to balance between content that generates you search engine traffic and content that converts that traffic into paying customers and clients.

Incorporating content marketing in the earlier stage helps

One of my clients recently asked, “Would it have been better if I had incorporated my content marketing strategy while I was planning my business website?”

Of course, was my reply. And this is not just about content marketing or content writing; every good strategy has an advantage if it is implemented or incorporated from the beginning. There can be some pitfalls if a particular methodology or strategy hasn’t been tested well and in such a case it is better to wait rather than take a big risk.

But everybody knows what an important role your content plays towards promoting your website and generating targeted search engine traffic. This has been known for more than 15 years (at the time of writing this it is 2010). When you implement content marketing strategy earlier you get an edge; you save lots of time and effort when you decide to aggressively promote your website through your content.

Although most of my clients come to me when they have already had their websites for a long time there are some clients who come while they are launching their new websites. They are lucky as they already comprehend the overwhelming importance of targeted content and related marketing from search engines and social media and networking websites. Publishing content regularly on your new website immediately gets attention from the search engines. This is one of the greatest advantages of publishing clearly defined content either on the main website or on the blog. If you create a blog under your main website and start publishing at least two posts everyday your links can start appearing on search engine result pages within two weeks and this has been proven with multiple websites and blogs.

Early adoption to content marketing is more beneficial these days when you can attract lots of traffic from social media and networking websites since people love to post interesting links they come across while browsing the Web. Your targeted content can get you much needed attention at a very low cost.

But it doesn’t mean it is a hopeless case for older websites. You just need to be more aggressive. One pain points can be the quantity of your content. If you already have hundreds of pages indexed for wrongly targeted content you might have a problem refocusing the search engine results. This can be achieved, though, by streamlining the existing content and at the same time adding fresh content.

Content marketing defined

Content marketing is different from conventional marketing; you can call it as pull marketing in which you make so much content available all over the place (the Internet) that it becomes very easy to find you. It is about building long-term relationships with your visitors and followers, on your website/blog, or on social media and networking websites. Through your content you are constantly seeding new conversations. You not only educate people about your products and services you also provide them solutions through your experience and expertise.

So where does the marketing fit in?

It’s not like the conventional marketing. Instead of promoting your products and services you promote your content, and it doesn’t always have to be about your business. There can be lots of information that is, although not about your business, but is useful, and is indirectly related to your business. Your information should solve people’s problem instead of pushing your marketing message. Does this mean you totally ignore your business and simply focus on solving people’s problems? No, it doesn’t mean that.

When you are providing your content, make it amply clear what business you are. Create contexts in which you can talk about your business. While trying to explain something, take live examples from your business. For instance, on this website I provide content writing, marketing and strategy services. For me it’s easier to refer to my services because they are closely related, but most of the content on the website is educational and informative.

Content marketing involves:

Constantly generating and publishing highly useful content
Making it easier for people to find your content through search engines and social media and networking websites
Engaging people in conversations regarding your content
Providing people a platform for exchanging ideas vis-a-vis your content
Reaching out to people in other forums and social media and networking websites

Content marketing is an inexpensive, highly effective method of establishing and promoting your brand. It’s also a double-edged sword. Since your content marketing effort is closely attached to your brand identity, you have to be very careful about what sort of content you publish and promote.

So do you have a content marketing plan? If yes, please share your experience and wisdom. If no, why do you think it’s not an important part of your marketing strategy?

Does your content engage your readers?

The most important job of your content strategy is to engage your readers in a continuous manner. This is how they remember you. This is how they become familiar with you, and what you can offer them.

In order to engage your readers, you need to talk and listen and respond, instead of just talking at them from your lonely, isolated part of the universe. Ask them questions, and give them answers, or even probable answers, when they ask questions. Don’t just focus on establishing your authority — although that is important if you want people to listen to you — but along with that also talk in their language and be approachable.

In order to engage your readers in conversations,

Encourage them to interact on the comment section of your blog

The best way of letting people interact on your comment section is to let them share their thoughts. If you have, say, 10 points to discuss on a particular topic, publish just 7 and let the remaining 3 come from your readers. Does this leave your post unfinished? Wait for a couple of weeks, and if nobody talks about the points that can make your post complete, you can always update it.

Publish sometimes things that are relevant to your users even if they’re not directly related to your product or service

Is there some public debate going on on your part of the world and you would like to know what your readers think about it and how it impacts them? Take for instance global warming and rapidly melting polar ice caps. It may not help you sell more network security devices or get you more web hosting customers immediately but it will certainly provide you with an opportunity to reach out to your readers and convey to them that you are not merely interested in promoting your business. Varied topics also encourages those people to come forward and express themselves that are though interested in your field but have got nothing much to say.

Highlight suggestions made by your readers

Sometimes readers/visitors raise very important issues and they need to be highlighted. Talk about them by updating your existing blog post or writing a new one. Give full credit to the reader who gave you the idea and if he or she has a website, link to it. This will give an incentive to your other readers too.

Make good use of social media

Some of your readers may be active social media users. They may like to share their thoughts on Twitter and FaceBook rather than posting them on your blog. If you find it difficult to express what you have to say in the limited number of characters, write a small post on your blog and then just mention the link on your stream.

What more can you suggest?