Effective marketing is an art where marketers analyze and try different ways to capture the attention and action of their target audience. For newer marketers or those launching a new product, sometimes there is not much information to work with, and it requires a lot of trial and error to see what will work. However, we can always find ourselves ahead of the game when we know in which direction to start.

First, let’s define what creating a content strategy is. Content marketing strategy is creating content to be distributed to grow your audience. This can be accomplished through blogs, website content, social media content creation, video marketing, email newsletters, and more.

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The 5 Key Elements

As marketers, we aim to ensure that whatever resources are applied towards a campaign are well thought out and applied most effectively. This can be done by identifying your target audience through a marketing persona, creating a story throughout your campaign that will resonate with them, identifying the mission of your campaign, determining a business case to justify the content marketing strategies put in place, and streamlining an action plan that is packed with an effective strategy.

1. Creating a Marketing Persona

Designing a marketing persona for a product or service requires knowledge of who would make a purchase or invest in your business, to begin with. This can be done with marketing research and carefully analyzing what kind of people currently use similar products. Marketers tend to use surveys and industry trends and watch who their competition is currently targeting. However, just as it is important to define who you want to target, you must also determine who you do not want to target.

Here is an example:

Suppose you are selling trendy yet racy bikinis for this summer season. You would want to target women aged 18-35, who are likely in shape, enjoy the beach and pool, enjoy boating, and live in specific demographics. It would be a PR nightmare to target children and a waste of time to target someone living in Alaska (you know, because it is cold).

The defined marketing persona will define who you will target upon campaign launch.

2. Storytelling

Storytelling is a powerful tool in content marketing that connects with your audience on a deeper level and can even create a lasting impression. Marketers use a storyline that will encompass all of the mediums used in the campaign that will expand on an initial message. Storytelling is a great way to create trust with your consumers and instill memories that may last years to come. Additionally, using storytelling effectively and creating trust and memory will set a company apart from its competitors. This helps buyers become more brand awareness and positively showcases your brand’s values and personality.

We recently wrote about Storytelling in Content Marketing on our weekly blog. Check it out to learn more.

3. Defining a Campaign’s Mission

A campaign without a mission is like driving aimlessly without a destination. Marketers want to be clear about why they are working towards launching a campaign that should instill trust in the brand and follow the company’s overall branding and personality.

This can be accomplished through what is called a campaign’s mission statement and should be included before one begins planning their campaign’s marketing strategies. Campaign mission statements should include why the company is creating content, for who it is creating the for, and identify what the product or service will do for them.

4. Building an Effective Business Case

There is no point in creating a content marketing strategy if there is if is not bringing value to your audience. Each campaign should be tailored to bring in new clients and increase the chances of returning customers. When a business case is created, it will showcase how the campaign will impact the business, showing its costs, risks, resources, and benefits. When a marketing team is done with their analysis, they can determine a reasonable marketing budget for their campaign.

5. Creating an Action Plan

This is when marketers are ready to pursue the creative outlet of determining the details of their content marketing campaign. Topics, formats, and mediums will be determined for their campaign and included in their content plan. Additionally, it is the time in the content marketing cycle when marketers can set deadlines and launch dates for their efforts. Whether it is SEO keyword research, finalizing marketing personas, determining where content will launch, or the launch dates.

Creating a plan will make confirming the content plan’s performance much easier when the campaign is complete.

Content Marketing Strategies Are a Win When Done Right

When marketing teams successfully plan and launch their content marketing action plans, they set themselves up for success. Even if the numbers are not what they thought they would be, they will gain insight into their customers and shopping habits.

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