Content Marketing Tips and Tricks

What is Content Marketing?

Content Marketing is a system of content for your business that nurtures, supports and engages your users.

This does not mean that you consistently and constantly barrage your users with product or service information. This tactic will not be engaging, informative or entertaining and won’t turn your users into customers. You must strive to post a variety of content, some helpful, some informative, some just for fun!

What information you use for your content will vary, depending on your business needs. For example what is posted on a government site will be quite different from what is posted on a social media site for a product that you may be selling.

Neil Patel is a social media and website building guru. He offers an incredible amount of free information to increase engagement and website traffic. Check out this blog post where he talks about how important the user experience is for building your business.

In his post he discusses a variety of amazing tips to improve your social media game. I am going to focus on consistency, scheduling and content and why you should start out by focusing on one platform before moving on to another.

Consistency

In my first post, Choosing the Right Social Media Platform I discussed that I have recently started a Virtual Assistant business. I have spent time posting nothing, posting consistently and then being sporadic. What I can tell you is that posting consistent, engaging content is a huge part of maintaining a presence with your audience.

This is easier said than done, at least for me it is.

Scheduling Platforms

There are a variety of social sharing platforms that will enable you to create a variety of content that can be scheduled out when your users are active on your various social media sites. Sites like CoSchedule, Hootsuite and PromoRepublic offer paid and free versions. Depending on your needs and budget each one offers slightly different options. One is not necessarily preferred over the other, it solely depends on personal preference.

Which Site to Choose and What to Post?

When it comes to developing a social media strategy as outlined as advised by Hubspot I would suggest focusing on one platform to start. We read this week to choose a platform you love and rock it!!

I believe this is the most effective approach as I have been trying to build an audience on four sites at the same time and am failing horribly. I found that Facebook is the social media site I am most familiar with and use the most, and should therefore focus on creating great content that includes a mix of information.

This plan is the most effective as it can be hard to develop SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely) goals for more than one site when you are just starting out and this will affect the quality of what you are posting and ultimately cause your users to scroll elsewhere.

This is a snapshot of my stats for post reach, how much of my audience has seen what I have been posting. I have neglected to post consistently over the past two weeks and I am personally noticing a decline in my engagement.

You can find a ton of resources for free online regarding content; what, where and when to post or you can pay for them, it depends again on your wants, needs and means. I try to post a variety of content including informational posts/articles, quotes, vulnerability posts and more recently posts that include not only stock photographs, but personal pictures of myself. I had read that they get the most engagement and when looking at my Facebook insights, this would seem to be true!

I could not say whether or not posting a variety of content was preferred to posting similar content as I have not been at it long enough, but from personal experience, this is what I enjoy when reading other people’s content on social media.

Conclusion

My final thoughts on content marketing is to make a plan that you can stick with, whether that is once a day, twice a day or weekly. I would not have a longer gap then that as the attention span of your user may not keep them engaged when you do not post often. Also, keep an eye on your analytics (almost another job in itself, if only to learn what it all means!). Find that social media site that you love and use it! Your enthusiasm will shine through your content and keep your users engaged, informed and coming back for more!

These are some of the ways to create meaningful connections with your social media users and building connections is the key to online business success.