Although it takes many forms, content creation is carried out with a singular purpose: to work effectively to achieve your marketing goals.
Anyone who has ever been disappointed by a pillow will tell you the same thing: content is everything.
You may be resting your head on something that appears full and with an abundance of filling, but unless that filling is one that is purpose built for heads and designed to promote excellence in sleep, it ends up disappointing and falling flat. It’s the same with marketing content.
The internet is full of stuff to read, watch and listen to. Some of it is useful, some of it not-so-much, and some of it is annoying.
Often, finding what you’re looking for is a time consuming and mind-numbing exercise.
Then there’s the content that delivers.
For the consumer it might be the information they’re looking for, the giggle they hoped for, the resource that’s invaluable.
For the business producing this content, it’s the content that delivers on their marketing goals and increases their brand positioning and recognition, and importantly, bottom line results.
What is content creation?
Content broadly describes every part of your marketing campaign that people consume.
It includes information on your website, blogs, infographics, explainer videos and social media tiles, and can take the form of words, videos, images, audio recordings and infographics.
Although it takes many forms, content creation is carried out with a singular purpose: to work effectively to achieve your marketing goals.
The desired outcome of your content strategy might be to increase sales, sell tickets, increase your profile or relevance, or to educate consumers about a particular issue.
Content creation is a key element of a marketing strategy, and sits alongside other marketing activities, such as branding, promotions, audience targeting and in-person promotions.
What’s involved in the content creation process?
Before a single word is written or podcast dropped, there’s a whole lot of planning that takes place.
Detailed planning helps content creators identify goals, target audiences, the type of content to create, best platforms to target particular cohorts, and the scheduling and publication of the content.
As well as creating a content strategy that will deliver the best results, content creation also takes into account how highly an article or other piece of content will rank in search and show up in front of people who are looking for exactly what you have to offer. Regular article posting is one way to achieve this.
Content creation must also be designed to be seen, liked, and shared on social media.
How does content creation support digital?
Content creation supports digital marketing in that it creates a deeper and more intimate relationship with the consumer than achieved with more traditional forms of advertising.
Most notably, content gives something of value to the potential customer.
An explainer video showing how to edit audio for a podcast, for example, is a great resource for anyone looking to dip their toes into podcasting; an infographic explaining how a vaccine works might answer some niggling questions; an article that explains how to care for a puppy would also be of benefit for those who have just become a pooch’s forever family.
In this way, content is a two-way relationship: businesses provide customers with something of benefit, and the customer responds with their business. It creates brand recognition and, importantly, trust.
Essential to digital marketing, content creation creates a way in for businesses.
People may be less inclined to read an article about how awesome your cakes are but will watch a video about baking hacks; they probably won’t download a video telling the story of your great hardware store, but they will check out an infographic about how to prune trees.
Content creation provides access to every digital platform, including your website and social media.
Regular posting is the first step to driving customers into the buying cycle. They come for information, advice or entertainment, and, supported by a strong digital marketing strategy, are massaged down to consideration and sales.
How does content creation fit into marketing?
Of course, a great video, an informative suite of blogs posts, or engaging social media tiles by themselves is not a marketing strategy and is unlikely to achieve maximum bottom-line results themselves.
Content creation works hand in glove with the entire marketing ecosystem used to drive a marketing strategy.
Your email campaign, for example, will drive visitors to your digital content assets; television and radio advertising will whet their appetite and the content on your website will deliver the information they come looking for. Your social media strategy will increase your number of followers, and the content you post will move them further towards the sale.
It’s this holistic approach to content creation that will one of the biggest assets in your marketing mix.
Call in the content creation experts
Assemblo is a full-service marketing agency based in Melbourne, that produces results-driven content strategies to support the marketing mix of every marketing campaign and deliver tangible bottom-line results.
To find out how we can help your business, give us a call on (03) 9079 2555 or send us a note via the contact form below.