Feeding the Dragon: Where to Start with Content Marketing

So you set up your Twitter account, you have pages on Facebook and Google+, and suddenly they are looking empty and you need to stoke them with more content to keep your readers interested.

People are using online more than ever, either on the PC or mobile devices, for research, for recommendations, for information and for price.

You can increase awareness and demand by the careful use of quality content that will demonstrate your specialist knowledge, encourage people to share, and ultimately encourage people to buy.

Relevant, well-written content offers proof of your abilities, and it allows you to showcase your knowledge and expertise without (directly) selling.

You need to be able to create something good enough that people would pay for it, then you need to give it away for free as part of your lead generation programme.

Good content marketing skills you will need include:

• the ability to monitor and analyse your social media streams
• an understanding of your current content metrics – what has worked well for you before and how you can develop that further
• and an ability to use SEO in order to identify the right keywords so that you show up in your readers’ searches

Content can be offered in lots of different formats, from articles to videos to case studies to powerpoint slides and so on, and while good content is the underpinning of content marketing, the real key to success is in its effective promotion, ensuring it is shared extensively wherever the opportunity arises.

Content marketing is becoming a hungrier monster, but with a sound content calendar of valuable planned and created content you should be able to start generating interest from your readers that will lead to recommendations, respect, and conversion.

What content do you find the most valuable? Are there any topics you would like to see me cover here that would be helpful to you? Let me know in the comments below.