6 STEPS FOR BUILDING A KILLER Content Marketing Program in 2017
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88% of B2B marketers surveyed in the 2016 B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and
Trends - North America Report are currently using content marketing in their arsenal,
88% of B2B marketers surveyed in the 2016 B2B Content Marketing Benchmarks, Budgets, and
Trends - North America Report are currently using content marketing in their arsenal,
although they’re not all entirely sure what they’re doing…
Less than a third said they had a documented content marketing strategy.
32% | Yes and it is documented
Yes but it is not documented | 48%
No | 16%
4% | Unsure
[1] Data from: 2016 B2B Content Marketing Trends—North America: Content Marketing Institute/MarketingProfs
What’s going wrong here? and how can you best use your budget in 2017 to build out a kick-ass plan that’ll help you drive leads, conversions, and industry recognition...
What’s going wrong here? and how can you best use your budget in 2017 to build out a kick-ass plan that’ll help you drive leads, conversions, and industry recognition...
Instead of blowing your budget on mediocre content that sits there gathering mothballs and spam comments?
What’s going wrong here? and how can you best use your budget in 2017 to build out a kick-ass plan that’ll help you drive leads, conversions, and industry recognition...
Instead of blowing your budget on mediocre content that sits there gathering mothballs and spam comments?
Here are 6 key steps:
Who is running your content program?
• If you hire someone new to the field without a defined roadmap to work from, you might stay within budget, but what is the program really going to deliver if you don’t have clear goals or metrics to track against?
Step 1Seek expert
guidance.
Who is running your content program?
• If you hire someone new to the field without a defined roadmap to work from, you might stay within budget, but what is the program really going to deliver if you don’t have clear goals or metrics to track against?
• Spring instead for an expert, senior level content marketing director to develop and manage your program off the bat, or contract with an agency partner to help you formulate an initial strategy, which can later be handled by more junior employees.
Step 1Seek expert
guidance.
What is the aim of content marketing?
Step 2Make sure
your senior leadership is
all on the same page.
What is the aim of content marketing?First and foremost, content marketing is about building trust through developing genuinely useful and educational content aimed at a target audience.
Step 2Make sure
your senior leadership is
all on the same page.
What is the aim of content marketing?First and foremost, content marketing is about building trust through developing genuinely useful and educational content aimed at a target audience.
It’s not about selling a product or promoting your company.
Step 2Make sure
your senior leadership is
all on the same page.
What is the aim of content marketing?First and foremost, content marketing is about building trust through developing genuinely useful and educational content aimed at a target audience.
It’s not about selling a product or promoting your company.
Make this clear when discussing your program, and ensure that your leadership team understands and buys into the goals, or your program is destined to fail.
Step 2Make sure
your senior leadership is
all on the same page.
Step 3Line up your
internal subject matter experts.
How much access does your content team have to the company’s SMEs?
Step 3Line up your
internal subject matter experts.
How much access does your content team have to the company’s SMEs?Whoever is managing your content program needs to have access to the wealth of knowledge that lies within the brains of your team, so they can:
Step 3Line up your
internal subject matter experts.
How much access does your content team have to the company’s SMEs?Whoever is managing your content program needs to have access to the wealth of knowledge that lies within the brains of your team, so they can:
• Identify key executives who can share their valuable experiences and insights
Step 3Line up your
internal subject matter experts.
How much access does your content team have to the company’s SMEs?Whoever is managing your content program needs to have access to the wealth of knowledge that lies within the brains of your team, so they can:
• Identify key executives who can share their valuable experiences and insights
• Commit them to a regular cadence of interviews
Step 3Line up your
internal subject matter experts.
How much access does your content team have to the company’s SMEs?Whoever is managing your content program needs to have access to the wealth of knowledge that lies within the brains of your team, so they can:
• Identify key executives who can share their valuable experiences and insights
• Commit them to a regular cadence of interviews
• Ask them to review articles for accuracy; they may even wish to byline them
Step 4Build a staged
approach to your content
strategy.
What does that mean?Don’t put the cart before the horse.
Step 4Build a staged
approach to your content
strategy.
What does that mean?Don’t put the cart before the horse.
Give your content marketing director or agency strategist time to understand your brand and your customer personas before asking her—or her team—to produce any content.
Step 4Build a staged
approach to your content
strategy.They need to:
• Engage with internal stakeholders to review and refine key messaging and goals for your content strategy
Step 4Build a staged
approach to your content
strategy.They need to:
• Engage with internal stakeholders to review and refine key messaging and goals for your content strategy
• Build an editorial calendar template
Step 4Build a staged
approach to your content
strategy.They need to:
• Engage with internal stakeholders to review and refine key messaging and goals for your content strategy
• Build an editorial calendar template
• Focus on a distribution plan for the content, whether managing it independently or in tandem with demand generation or social media marketers
Start small.Evaluate and optimize your results as you go.
While you’re identifying best practices for your specific industry, roll out content more slowly and do a “soft launch” of your program while regrouping with internal stakeholders on what’s working and what’s not. Then, your content marketing director or partner can refine the strategy to enhance results.
Step 5Run a pilot
program.
Now you have a strategy that’s been tested and refined.
It’s finally time to grow your program and build upon your results.
Step 6Scale up
your team.
Step 6Scale up
your team.If you’re working with an agency:
• Use this time to either commit more resources to content development and outreach or begin working on internal recruiting and creating a transition plan to build a team, starting with a content marketing director.
Step 6Scale up
your team.If you’re working with an agency:
• Use this time to either commit more resources to content development and outreach or begin working on internal recruiting and creating a transition plan to build a team, starting with a content marketing director.
If you already have a content marketing director:
Step 6Scale up
your team.If you’re working with an agency:
• Use this time to either commit more resources to content development and outreach or begin working on internal recruiting and creating a transition plan to build a team, starting with a content marketing director.
If you already have a content marketing director:
• Give her the green light to begin building her own in-house team.
Content marketing requires a thoughtful, deliberate approach, and the results may not be immediate.
Content marketing requires a thoughtful, deliberate approach, and the results may not be immediate. But by beginning with a sound strategy, and building that into an optimized program that’s integrated with your organization as a whole, you’ll be able to create a strong content marketing effort that will spotlight your organization as a market leader in your industry.
Content marketing requires a thoughtful, deliberate approach, and the results may not be immediate. But by beginning with a sound strategy, and building that into an optimized program that’s integrated with your organization as a whole, you’ll be able to create a strong content marketing effort that will spotlight your organization as a market leader in your industry.
Contact us for a free consultation on building your content strategy.
Eucalypt is a small agency that specializes in developing, executing, and optimizing successful content marketing strategies for clients including LinkedIn, Intel, Cray, and many other B2B technology companies. Our writing team has extensive journalism experience, bringing clients the same in-depth, engaging, and accurate reporting that we bring to national publications.
We take a personal and agile approach to each client engagement, partnering to understand their brands and to collaborate with internal teams to help scale their businesses sustainably.
eucalypt.co
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