If the internet were to be guided by its own version of the ten commandments, the first one might read as follows: Content is king. Rightfully so. Without content, there would be no internet in the first place. The .com boom was built on content. The rise of YouTube is for identical reasons. All those social media posts you see on your timeline every day? That is also the content. As you can see from just a couple of very brief examples, the internet runs on content. Seeing as many businesses as possible across the country run solely on the power and connectivity of the internet, it is safe to say there are businesses which rely on content. In fact, nearly all online businesses cannot exist without some form of content.
All this being said, the phrase content is king does not in any way suggest that all online content is high-quality content. In fact, quite the opposite is true. For every instance of the high-quality content, there exists numerous counts of sub-par or worse content. But having been online for more than your fair share of days, you’re aware of this. What you may not be aware of is the way end-users interact with content. The general manager of Brax.io, Kevin Ho, offered perspective here, “No matter what your content is about, if someone clicks through to see your content, they’re looking for an answer to something. Rather than giving them the runaround, give them what they’re looking for. Answer their question simply and clearly and with as little jargon as possible.”
In the vast world of the internet, keeping things simple and clear can often be quite the challenge. Especially when trying to convince customers to engage with your company in some manner. Therefore, companies have begun to create high-quality content meant specifical to bring in new customers. To gain some tips to follow in these footsteps, please keep reading.
Emphasize user-friendliness
Ten years ago you could get away with cutting corners on your website, app, or other technology element. Nowadays, if people cannot quickly and intuitively understand how to operate any piece of technology, they will find something to replace that piece of technology. This extends to advertising content. The most well-created content will be rendered completely useless if the ability to interact with it is subpar.
“For as much time as you spend creating content, you should spend an equal amount of time ensuring that the links and forms associated with said content are functional as well,” said Shaunak Amin, CEO and Co-Founder of SwagMagic. “The worst thing you can do is pair good content with a frustrating online experience.”
The key here is to test each and every element of your digital appeal to customers before it goes live. You don’t want the launch of your next interactive YouTube ad to be spoiled by a website link that does not even direct the user to the right place. Plus, a test along these lines is as simple as it gets. Basically, as long as the person viewing your content can access your products easily, you’ve done a good job.
“To be user-friendly, technologically speaking, is to be at a distinct advantage in the e-commerce sphere,” said Chris Bridges, CEO of VITAL Card. “Your online presence depends on it, so don’t wait on implementing this”
Analyze your own content
Regardless of how you look at it, creating content that converts is a game of numbers. To be considered a winner in said game, your content must be drawing in new and old business on a regular basis. Are you doing all you can to understand the intricacies of this game? Did you know that there are entire software programs dedicated to analyzing how your content is performing? These should be in your arsenal and part of all your content plans moving forward.
“Content analysis is what will take your company to the next level,” said Cody Candee, Founder and CEO of Bounce Luggage Storage. “It can show you what’s working and what’s not. From there, it’s up to your team to keep things headed in the right direction.”
Like it or not, creating content in business is never ending. There will never be a one-size-fits-all piece of advertising content that spans eternity. This is not any fault of you and your content creation. Rather, it is a product of human nature – people always change. Your goal is to meet this change head-on as often as possible. Otherwise, well–designed products and services will not get their due attention.
“Your company needs to get on board with the modern trend of closely-monitoring each and every piece of content they put online,” said Alex Novak, CEO of SLR. “Instead of stabbing in the dark, you can respond appropriately to what customers want because you’re aware of their digital behavior.”
Create for a specific audience
One of the greatest benefits to analyzing the performance of your content is, if done right, it can provide an eye-opening realization – who your customers are. This could be anything from basic human demographics, to geographic location, or even related to entire industries. Whatever the case, this information should be the driving force behind whatever content you choose to create next. For example, if you know that your customers are generally ages 25 to 35 and found through Twitter, then it makes no sense to create content for another crowd on a different platform.
“People will tell you that your business content can be whatever you want it to be,” said Max Ade, CEO of Pickleheads. “However, if you make something that doesn’t connect with your existing customer base, you’re the captain of a sinking ship.”
Of anything presented here, this might be the most tricky aspect of content creation to implement practically. Frankly, it might require a little trial and error on your end. There’s no recipe to success here so if that is what you desire, you will have to figure it out for yourself. That being said, don’t shy away from this – it could end up being the endeavor that brings the most stability to your bottom line.
“Uncovering your business audience is step one in a process that will test you time and time again,” said Alexandre Robicquet, Co-Founder and CEO of Crossing Minds. “After that, you have to do everything in your power to continue to reel these people in with content geared towards them.”
Get creative
It’s in the word, afterall. The explosion of the internet over the last couple of decades has allowed for an extremely wide-variety of content ideas to become reality. Between blogs, different styles of videos, interactive ads, and eye-grabbing emails, there are so many unique avenues you can go down within the world of content generation that it is almost a wonder plagiarism exists in the first place. Especially when you consider how creatively you can use words to get your message across. Though, content that holds the attention of the viewer does not grow on trees.
“Creating content that converts is hard. The sheer number of individual pieces of content available online should be enough to persuade you of this,” said Ryan Rottman, Co-Founder and CEO of OSDB Sports. “The best thing you can do for yourself is to constantly think outside the box in this arena.”
Sometimes, people can confuse creativity with some kind of pie in the sky idea which holds no water in the real world. In content creation, this could not be further from the truth. More often than not, creativity means nothing more than doing things in a noticeable manner rather than cooking up some crazy scheme. Another way of saying this is – you don’t need to land on Mars to interest the general public.
“Think about all the marketing efforts which have gone viral online recently,” said Max Schwartzapfel, CMO of Fighting For You. “Most of them weren’t anything more than people or companies demonstrating originality alongside an excellent product. That should be your focal point.”
Focus on clarity
Speaking of focal points, one of them must be the message of your content. You can design incredibly captivating content all you want, but if the recipients of said content do not understand what it is you’re offering them, it was all for naught. Without a sale or some other interaction, did the piece of content even exist in the first place?
“There are too many instances of companies making great content only to forget what they set out to do in the first place,” said Ubaldo Perez, CEO of Hush Anesthetics. “Your mission is simple – get your message across, whatever it may be, and make it stick, however that needs to happen.”
Maybe the most vital part of content creation is to recognize that you know exactly what your company is and sells. Meanwhile, your potential customers are not nearly as well versed. That is not to say they know nothing, but it does pale in comparison to the people who run and operate the company. This means the responsibility to properly inform them falls to you and your content.
“People should be able to see your content and immediately comprehend what you’re selling,” said Sean Doherty, General Manager of Box Genie.
When thinking about all that goes into generating high-quality content that converts, it might be easy to feel like you’re sitting under a waterfall of information. Thankfully, there are some words of wisdom from author and speaker Robert Rose, “When taking a content-first approach, our job as marketers is not to create more content … it’s to create the minimum amount of content with the maximum amount of results.”