Content: The Lifeblood of Your Marketing Strategy

Content is no longer just a king in the realm of marketing; it’s the very air that your business breathes. It permeates every aspect of your marketing efforts and your business operations.

Today’s consumers expect to find answers to their questions, solutions to their problems, and details about products or services with a simple Google search. If your business isn’t showing up in those search results, you risk losing potential customers, even if they’ve been referred to you. Why? Because trust is paramount, and visibility fosters trust.

In my view, content is the cornerstone of a sustainable, long-term marketing strategy. But it’s not enough to churn out content for its own sake. Your content should serve as the strategic voice of your business, educating your audience and building trust, all while aligning with your core business objectives and messaging.

To do this effectively, you need a plan. Spontaneously deciding what to blog about each day isn’t a sustainable approach. That’s where the Total Content System comes into play.

This system, which I developed, enables you to plan, delegate, curate, create, collaborate, repurpose, and maximize every piece of content you produce.

Start by developing a list of core content topics, assigning one to each month for the next year. Each theme should be a substantial topic related to your business or industry and represent an important keyword search term. You can also target terms that you’d like to rank higher for but currently lack content.

Think of it like a book, with each month representing a chapter in what will ultimately become a significant body of work by year’s end. The key is to develop multiple subtopics around each theme and then create a core “guide” for each theme by linking the various subjects together.

Once you have your themes, you can organize your Content Delivery Platform. Here are a few examples of content that I use and how I use them:

Blog posts: I write a weekly blog post that contributes to a monthly guide with other content of the same theme.

Podcasts: I publish a podcast episode twice a week, aiming to have at least one of them be a solo show that discusses an aspect of my theme for the month.

Webinars: We host monthly online seminars to deliver the content in a new form.

Content packages: The final step is to take all of this content from each month and create a package that allows people interested in the monthly topic to access the entire package in one tidy resource.

Once the first two steps are complete, you must map your content plan to your core business objectives. This step allows you to better understand how to get a return on your content investment and how much you should actually invest in creating a certain form or package of content.

One of the most important aspects of a Total Content System plan is that it changes the lens you use to view all the information that comes at you all day long.

When you know what your monthly themes are, all of a sudden tools, articles, and conversations take on new meaning and seem to somehow organize themselves for the benefit of your ongoing, long-term approach.

Now, in order for all of this to be truly effective, I want to reiterate that the content must build trust and must educate your audience.

Blogs are a great way to build trust. They provide a platform for you to share your expertise, offer insights, and engage with your audience. But remember, the key to building trust is consistency, quality, and relevance. Your blog should be a reflection of your commitment to these principles.

If you found this article helpful then check out: Leverage Existing Audiences to Expand Your Own