How to Make Waves With Effective Marketing Content

As more and more businesses grow savvy to the benefits of content marketing, the pressure for companies to compete on this bustling stage and make some noise is ever increasing. 
Over half of UK businesses claim to have a content marketing strategy in place.  And while companies are getting hot under the collar when it comes to developing strategy, and worrying about measuring ROI (surprisingly, only 28% of companies track this), there’s a tendency to bypass one essential point. The content itself needs to be informative and high quality.
Although good copywriters are best placed to write effective content, there is a difference between copywriting and content marketing. Essentially, copy is there to persuade, sell and promote. Whereas content has one major purpose. To engage and entertain. 
So on a mission to put the focus back onto the content of content marketing with a big “C”, I’ve whizzed up a few top tips. 

1. Make it valuable
The key to successful content marketing, is to create value for the reader. 
Expert insights into your industry are the quickest way to build interest. Whether that’s through engaging thought pieces, influential articles, insightful blogs, or enlightening whitepapers. Regardless of the type of content, the idea is to create something useful, readable, edifying, and sharable. 

2. Be the expert
You wouldn’t expect to see a blog post about crocheting on a lawyer’s website. There’s a good reason for that.  It’s not relevant to their business.
Each carefully constructed and considered piece should be about what you know, as the expert in your field. Shout out about this knowledge, and brand yourself as a specialist in your industry.  

3. Get it on social media
Shrinking violets don’t get ahead in this crowded landscape. Without aiming to sound like a broken record, social media is a powerful way of drawing traffic to your site. 
Twitter comes top of the pack when it comes to content marketing distribution, earning a sturdy 75% effectiveness rating according to UK marketers surveyed by the Content Marketing Institute. But whatever media channel you choose, and there’s no limit on spreading the word across many, make sure you do it right. Write a punchy headline, think about timings for release, and hashtag wisely.  

4. Create evergreen content
Piggybacking off current trends is one approach. It does have its place, and can be fun. But beware of creating content that dates quickly. 
Writing about a subject that will stand the test of time by remaining educational and relevant is always a solid way of drawing attention. It can add real value to your efforts through continuing to attract new visitors for years to come. 

5. Always aim to entertain
It’s been said before, but I’ll say it again. The most important thing is to create something interesting. Boring your audience isn’t an option. In fact, you probably won’t even have time for that. They simply won’t engage in the first place.
Make your content stand out. Target the right people. Use the right promotional channels to drive traffic. But most importantly, always aim to produce quality content that entertains. Without that key piece of the puzzle, you’ll be floundering in the content marketing wilderness.