5 reasons to give content a leading role in your ‘new normal’ communications strategy

Bill Gates first gave regal titling to content way back in 1996 and the internet has proven to be the perfect vehicle for it ever since. And there you have it, the crux of why it’s so crucial to your success – the digitisation of commerce. Online or offline, content is integral to every every element of the marketing mix, including:

• Website & SEO, emails, social media, PPC
• Branding, public relations, marketing campaigns, influencer activities
• Events, print collateral, affiliate marketing

What prominence do you give content in your organisation?

Another way to ask this question would be to consider how much storytelling you do as a business? Or how often do you communicate with your audiences and via which channels?

Content sits at the heart of how a business communicates and what it says about itself and to its customers, suppliers, shareholders and staff.

What marketers refer to as ‘owned content’ is content that you create and host on your site or use in your marketing materials. This is your opportunity tell the story of your business, how it came about, what you’re experts at, how you deliver that expertise in order to help others – what challenges you help overcome.

Here are five reasons to give content the most prominent role in your communications strategy to help you through the rest of this calendar year:

1. Be present
Visible or audible businesses helping their audiences navigating the changing landscape, will be those most remembered for their assistance, knowledge, expertise and generosity of information and time. Communicate now to stay front of mind.

2. Be relevant
With relevance comes resonance. If your communications can reflect on the current, changing and yet to appear ways of living and working post Covid-19, you’ll strike a far more pertinent chord with your readers or listeners. They’ll be far more likely to pay attention as a result.

3. Be expert
You don’t have to be an expert in pandemics or crisis comms to be a useful expert. Remind yourself of the value of your expertise to your audience and shape it to fit their current challenges via website content, nurture emails and social media campaigns. Genuine expertise is invaluable, especially in times of uncertainty.

4. Be credible
Unless you tell your audience about your expertise and put it into context for them, why would they think of your business when they next need someone like you to help them? Content that incorporates findings from your own sector or surveys, data on product usage, commentary from industry experts, and/or endorsement from existing customers all aid great storytelling while reinforcing your credibility.

5. Be analytical
Learn what’s working for your audience by analysing what they’re choosing to read: email open rates and click-through rates are invaluable, social media engagement figures and conversion stats too, website traffic sources and most read content are vital as well.

You won’t always have to create new content to stay relevant, credible and present. Businesses that regularly create content for their website, whether that be a blog or FAQs, might find that long ago written content needs just some small tweaks to become hyper-relevant now.

Making your content work for you

All too often content can fall to the bottom of the to-do list, but with a clear focus on who you’re creating it for and what value you’re adding, the plan will come together more easily and dedicating time to its creation can be more easily prioritised.

The rewards will be quick to see too thanks to the ease of measuring how owned content is performing. What’s more, you’ll have a continuous flow of newly generated or refreshed content to fulfil email and social campaigns as well as myriad other marketing activities.

Make content the king of your communications strategy and you won’t look back.

kate@coconutpr.com