Every day, we create and consume different types of content. We scroll through social media feeds, newsletters, Youtube videos, eCommerce platforms, news outlets, and all sorts of websites. Therefore, there’s a tremendous amount of content surrounding us, and there’s even bigger demand. Today we’ll talk about content marketing.
Content marketing trends change and evolve each year. They drive brand awareness and revenue. Content is king, but content marketing is queen.
So, here are our reflections on content marketing in 2022, from Google ranking algorithms to consumers’ behaviours and informational requirements.
Content Marketing Integrated with Everything You Do
Every brand should have a unified voice that stands out from the digital noise.
To create this voice, you need a clever content marketing strategy that integrates everything, from the mission, and company values to the homepage, product descriptions, blogs, Social Media texts, even Google Ads.
This helps because you can get all sorts of interesting organic opportunities to boost sales and increase conversion rates. For example, you can use your highest-performing blogs as lead-generating assets. You can incorporate smart time-sensitive coupons as Easter Eggs in specific blog articles.
There are so many things you can do if you have a solid content marketing strategy and enough SEO knowledge to push it through.
So, integrate your content marketing strategy with everything you do.
Relevant, honest and high-quality
This is how the content provided by your company should always be. Google’s latest updates continue to fight against spam and fluff and towards relevance and significance.
E-A-T is Google’s favourite catchphrase when it comes to content. “Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness” are the foundation, as per Google’s Guidelines.
So, everything we write, we write with this mantra in mind. It should be relevant; it should be honest and empathic, high-quality and informative.Just recently, Google issued an update regarding product reviews. They advise you to keep your reviews as authentic as possible by providing multiple links to different sellers and several types of evidence showing you have experience with the products, including visuals, audio or other links.
Content marketing should follow customer intent
Marketers, content writers and SEO professionals roll up their sleeves and start writing with a high focus on keywords. However, keywords are not everything.
There’s a softer side to content marketing and content creation, and that’s understanding what people want and search for in their daily activities.
Therefore, search insights, a deep understanding of your customer journey opportunities and topic research are crucial to a high-performance content marketing strategy.
This is a differentiating point between content that just fills a page and content that communicates exactly what audiences are interested in, leveraging content gaps and opportunities in the customer journey.
The customer should “stand” in the centre of your content marketing strategies.
The empathic marketing trend speaks of brand humanisation – becoming part of your audience, seeing the world through your customers’ eyes. Empathy is indeed an essential asset for a content marketing manager.
Video marketing has become king
Video marketing is the king of user experience content. Words speak volumes, pictures are worth a thousand words, but videos can make the world go round.
Moving images get people hooked and excited. Therefore, they are easier to digest and have an intrinsic viral value. It is a very effective content format that can yield excellent ROI value.
Video content marketing is the cherry on top of any content marketing strategy. Luckily, it’s becoming increasingly accessible to create. There are plenty of video production tools and editors online that can help you create a video in minutes.
However, what do you put into that video? This is the question. Pretty much like every piece of content, video content should be relevant, honest, high-quality, and follow the customer’s intent.
So, it’s back to base 1, writing and scripting. Then, it’s about the format. You’ve got an arsenal at your disposal: short-form video, interactive videos with 3D imagery or AR, authentic interviews for B2B, how-tos, guides. There are plenty of options to choose from one. Some are cheaper than others, so it’s also a matter of budgeting.
Topic research and authority
How well do you know your topics? How deep is your expertise, and how useful is the information you display on your website or blog?
Topical authority is a significant factor when it comes to building website authority. Building backlinks is the technical side. Topic research is about the level of expertise.
So, as we were saying earlier, Google is going in the direction of determining how authoritative and qualitative information really is.
Therefore, long-form, informative content becomes crucial for any online platform.
Nevertheless, you don’t go write and publish everything you can think of. You build content pillars that represent the foundation for specific topics. Then you expand on these pillars with different content pieces and create a beautiful educational story around your brand.
Storytelling is both art and science
Every piece of long-form content has a structure, a format and a purpose. That’s the “science” of it.
However, every piece of content should also create a human connection with the reader. That’s the “art” of content.
We can use the power of AI and other tools to tap into the most relevant keywords and topics. We can even use automation technologies to generate sentences. However, content writing turns into art when it comes to generating empathic stories around genuine insights.
This is just the tip of the iceberg of content marketing. If you want to get more in-depth, get in touch.
