Content Marketing A to Z Guide for 2020 – Part 1

Content is King or Content is Kingdom?

It can be a sweet debate, but at the end of the day, both show the importance of content.

Before moving forward, let me share a few statistics related to content marketing –

1. 81% of B2B companies use blogs as a content marketing tactic. (Content Marketing Institute, 2016)
2. 55% of marketers say blog content creation is their top inbound marketing priority. (HubSpot, 2018)
3. Content marketing gets three times more leads than paid search advertising. (Content Marketing Institute, 2017)
4. LinkedIn is the most effective social media platform for delivering content and securing audience engagement. (LinkedIn, 2017)
5. 47% of buyers viewed 3-5 pieces of content before engaging with a sales rep. (Demand Gen Report, 2016)

 These are a clear indication that content is important, maybe it is the kingdom, or it is the king.

Now let’s ask a very basic question, what is Content?

According to Wikipedia, “content is the information and experiences that are directed toward an end-user or audience.[1] Content is “something that is to be expressed through some medium, as speech, writing or any of various arts.”[2] Content can be delivered via many different media including the Internet, cinema, television, radio, smartphones, audio CDs, books, e-books, magazines, and live events, such as speeches, conferences, and stage performances.”

So, the content can be in different forms, in different channels for different audiences. Some niche is suitable for videos, some are for images, and some are for text content. Some are good for long length educated content; some work better with thin content. 

Types of Content

Content can be divided into many types based on many purposes. If I make it very simple, then it will be – 

• Videos (Short and Long)
• Text Content (Blog Post, Email, etc.)
• Images (Infographic, small images, etc.).
• Audio

It can be a further breakdown for different channels and purposes, such as content for social media, content for email channel, for messenger bots, for SMS, for own media.

A specific type of content may have more variety; for example, video content can be an interview, 2D/3D animation, short film, documentary, etc.

How can I Prepare Content for Different Channels?

Each channel has a different type of audience with a different psychology. Or even, the same audience has a different liking and thought process while visiting different kinds of social channels. If I give you an example with video content, Instagram gets maximum engagements when the video length is around 30 seconds. While YouTube gets more engagements when the video length is 2 minutes or more.

According to HubSpot research, duration of the most engaging content on the following platforms are- 

• Instagram: 30 Second
• Twitter: 45 Seconds
• Facebook: 1 Minute
• YouTube: 2 Minutes and longer

So, it’s a clear indication, before you start preparing content for any specific channel, you need to do some research to get more ideas about those platforms. How their algorithm works, for who are you creating content for. To make it easy, I am giving you a quick checklist. 

1. Identify the channel algorithm
2. Types of Content which are getting more engagements
3. Popular hashtags
4. Audience Age, gender and geography
5. Discover the common psychology of that specific audience
6. Frequency and visit time for that social channel. For example, people visit Instagram more often, but each visit doesn’t last long compare to YouTube.

Read – Complete Guide to Performing Content Audit for SEO 

Powerful Social Channels you can focus in 2020?

I know you will find the answer to the above question, but I am trying to make it even easier for you. HubSpot did some research, and survey to help us plan better for 2020. According to them, you can find the popular platforms marketers are being targeted to produce content for their audience.

Now you know the importance, types, and way to prepare for your content marketing journey. Now let’s talk about how we can make our content more engaging.

Content Headline

What is the first thing which grabs your attention while you are browsing on the internet? It is the Content Headline. When we are browsing on the internet, we are surrounded by lots of content. If I talk about social media like Facebook, we surrounded by our friend’s update, various page updates, Facebook ads, and a few more things. The more we scroll the more we get, but we don’t give attention to each and everything. What gets our attention? A powerful headline.

But making a compelling headline is not an easy thing. It needs research, practice, and experience.

But it’s always comparatively easy when we know the formula which has been discovered by others, and it worked again and again. I am going to give you 10 key proven methods that have worked all the time.

1. Use of numbers: 5 Ways to Get More Traffic to Your Website
2. Use of Power/Emotional words: 5 Proven Ways to Get More Traffic to Your Website.
3. Adding something Curious: Are You Giving Enough Focus in Your Traffic Generating Methods?
4. Creating Urgency: Marketing Mistakes: Prepare for Growth Before It’s Too Late
5. Adding some reference: If I were Steve Jobs, I Might Do These 10 Things to Build a Better Business
6. Adding some value: Make Your Traffic Generating Funnel Powerful with These 10 Tips
7. Adding something emotional: Don’t be Ignorant, Build Your Marketing Funnel Now.
8. Announcing something: I am Sharing these 10 Traffic Generating Methods Only for You.
9. The question in the headline: Do you want to get more traffic? Learn it How.
10. Tell your audience what to do: Build These 10 Habits Right Now to be More Productive.

Note: This is a short list; lots more can be discussed in my upcoming posts.

You can Also Use Blog Title Generator

Sometimes a title generator can help you find useful titles and inspirations. One of the best tools I have ever used is Portent Content Idea Generator.

Its an easy tool. You just need to add your content topic/keywords and click submit, you are done. It will show you powerful title idea; if you are not happy with it, click the retry button, and it will come up with a new idea.

Note: You will need to tune the suggested idea slightly to make it exactly relevant and meaning full.

How to Start the Content?

So, people came to your content by seeing an attention-grabbing headline. Now it’s time to prove to them that they are going to get the same things what have they expected for. And you need to give them that feeling from the very start. You should have a powerful first line followed by the entire para.

To have a powerful start, here are a few things you can try – 

1. Start in storytelling the way
2. Start with a powerful quote
3. Start with a question
4. Start with a humor
5. Start with a direct answer
6. Start with something surprising
7. Start with an offer/value they are going to get if they continue the entire content.

79% of Web Users Don’t Read the Entire Content; they Scan it:

Yes, the heading is right, 79% of the web users don’t read the entire content, they scan it. So, as a content producer, you need to make it scan-able. How can you do it? 

1. Adding Heading and Subheading
2. Adding Bullets
3. Highlighting Powerful Lines/Words (Can do it by giving different colors/making it bold).
4. Using Images
5. Adding Quotes

By adding all these parts, we are making it easy for both types of audience, who love to read the entire content, and also the audience who love to scan.

To be continued…….