"Customers are not interested in your product, They are interested in solving a problem."
Admit it - you're probably guilty of starting all these social media accounts, posting random content you came up with, and then questioning why it doesn't work. If you're optimistic, you'd think that all you need is more tests and learning. The fact is you're only running yourself in circles, wasting time, money, and effort.
In today's crowded market, customers are bombarded with countless products and services. To stand out, businesses need to focus on the problem they are solving, not just the features of their product or service.
What is creating quality content?
Fast Fact
Key takeaway
Whether your content ends up being social media posts, blogs, articles, or a tweet, it must connect with people. Creating content and distributing content is all strategy. What most brands and companies have gotten wrong is that they think their target audience is interested in their product. That is absolutely not the case!
"Posting a photo or video online and waiting for the business offers to start rolling in is not a strategy. Neither is hinging your visual content success on creating the next viral phenomenon. Like any content marketing format, you need a compelling rationale for visual storytelling and a clear plan for turning views into meaningful marketing results."
- Sally Ofuonyebi, Content Marketing Institute
To make people pay attention to you, you need to help them first. And to find out what people need help on, here are the things you need to assess before creating any sort of content.
Recommended Tools List:
 Audience Intelligence Platform - Audiense | |
 Content Management System - Story Chief | |
 Reach your buyers - Apollo |
How can you create content that offers value?
1. Learn about your target audiences’ preference
First, use different content marketing tools to research and learn about your target audiences' favorite types of content.
Do they prefer video, text, or static visuals?
Are they readers or do they prefer snippets?
How do they like to be spoken to?
The number one thing many companies forget is to establish the correct tone and manner. You want to strike the perfect voice so you don't sound too corporate, nor too casual to be trusted.
2. Identify your target audiences' questions
In short, what are your target audiences' pain points? You can simply find out by seeing what questions they ask online. Go through forums, post threads, and content marketing tools like answerthepublic.com.
From your findings, you should be able to pick out some repeated ideas to craft into hooks for your content. Not only does this help attract your target audiences, but it also showcases your authority (as you provide the answer to their question in your content), and increases relevancy which is likelier to drive engagement and following.
3. Spot your own top performing content
Though competitor research and global best practices are helpful, nothing beats your own data. Go back to your content management tool or social media platform backends and spot your best performing content based on its set objective. By spotting the pattern between your best performing content and understanding what makes some of your content successful, and others, not so much, you can start to scale effective content by building them into series, further adapt them into longer format, or breaking them down into shorter snippets.
However, if you have been simply creating content just for the sake of it, or you have been publishing posts without consistency, learnings, POV; there's no way you can spot your top performing content. It is very likely you are not helping your target audiences solve their problem or capturing their attention to tell them about your product at all. In short, the content you have been producing are just a bunch of stuff that is a waste of your time and money.
Need a hand with selecting the right tools to help with your content creation process? I have a full list for you here.
By shifting the focus from the product to the problem it solves, businesses can create content that truly resonates with their target audience. By creating quality content that addresses their audience's needs and interests, businesses can build lasting relationships with their customers and drive success in today's competitive market.
How can I create quality content?
The answer is content marketing.
By having a content marketing strategy, you know what content to create and what each piece of content is set out to do. You start to offer value, which in turn, earns you traction and trust. Not to mention, consistently creating valuable content allows you to stand out from competition, making it easier for you to reach your target audience and for your target audience to have you top-of-mind.
To learn more about creating, evaluating, and improving your content marketing, here are some free resources for you to access and download:
Content Marketing has been around for over a century, but it has only regained mainstream traction in the last decade. While all brands are talking about "storytelling" and "authenticity"; how many of them truly know what content marketing is?
Access my free report which reveals surprisingly simple ways to start your own business and acquire your first client with content marketing – even if you have no content ideas and don't know where to start. Finally find out what’s stopping you from doing content marketing right so you can eliminate it and live your dreams!
This is one of the most prominent reasons why people know content marketing works but they forfeit it anyways and end up going for traditional, outbound marketing techniques - they think they aren’t getting any result. The fact is they are achieving something else which is just as, if not more, worthwhile for the long-term success of the business.
If you have other hot burning questions, you can also directly ask me here and have all your content marketing inquiries answered on the spot. I hope this helps you on your content marketing journey, so you can create and execute effective content marketing, driving in potential leads and increase brand awareness on your own!