Content marketing is crucial for any business, regardless of the industry you operate in. However, marketers can often fail to appreciate its value, especially if they\u2019ve created content that\u2019s failed in the past (and trust me, there are many content marketing mistakes you can make).<\/p>\n
Perhaps what marketers don\u2019t realise, however, is that when great content has been produced, it can help with SEO, digital PR and social media. Essentially, content marketing ties several aspects of digital marketing together; so for your brand to be truly successful, you need content marketing.<\/p>\n
The Content Marketing Institute<\/a> defines content marketing as: \u201ca strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience \u2013 and ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.\u201d\u00a0It can take various forms, including blog articles, white papers, videos, infographics, interactive maps, quizzes, calculators \u2026 the list goes on.\u00a0However, content marketing can only be successful if you\u2019ve created something that\u2019s useful and engaging for your audience.<\/p>\n If you consider content marketing a sales tool, then you\u2019ve set it up for failure. That\u2019s because the immediate aim of content marketing is to build brand awareness, gain links and increase your rankings in the search engine result pages (SERPs). The long-term result of that may well be sales, but it should never be used specifically to generate revenue.<\/p>\n I came across some really useful research conducted by the Content Marketing Institute<\/a> (PDF) in 2018, specific to UK businesses.<\/p>\n I thought the statistics sounded very promising, and then noted at the bottom of the slides that social media posts were considered \u201ccontent marketing\u201d, so it\u2019s worth taking these stats with a pinch of salt. However, they\u2019re interesting insights nonetheless:<\/p>\n From these results, it\u2019s clear to see there\u2019s still work to be done to encourage cynics who aren\u2019t sure of content marketing.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re one of those cynics, then read on to discover how content marketing enhances other aspects of your digital marketing, and why you need to incorporate it into your strategy.<\/p>\n One essential element of SEO is conducting keyword research to identify content gaps and opportunities. Typically, this results in new landing pages or blog articles that answers the questions users are searching for.<\/p>\n This can extend to large content marketing projects too. For example, let\u2019s say that you work for a company that arranges hen parties across the UK, and you\u2019re going to create an interactive map about the best hen party destinations in the UK. That map will focus on several major cities, including a list of the best things to do, and best places to eat and drink.<\/p>\n When you publish the interactive map on your website, you\u2019ll be publishing it as a landing page, so you\u2019ll need some copy to accompany it.<\/p>\n \u201cBest hen party destinations UK\u201d, \u201cbest hen party locations UK\u201d, and \u201chen party getaways UK\u201d all have a good amount of search volume, so it makes sense to optimise your copy for those keywords. After all, your content is in-depth and useful to the reader, who is most likely trying to plan a hen party in the UK.<\/p>\n However, the keyword optimisation doesn\u2019t end there. Think about the power of smaller content pieces \u2013 how many additional pieces of content can you create from your interactive map? At the very least, you can write one blog article<\/a> for each city you\u2019ve covered, covering in further depth the things to do there. \u201cHen parties Manchester\u201d, \u201chen dos Liverpool\u201d, \u201chen party Nottingham\u201d\u2026 there are so many opportunities.<\/p>\n Creating smaller pieces of content from your wider project is great for internal linking: just link your blog articles back to your main landing page (and from your landing page, you can link to your blog articles). This makes it much easier for Google to crawl these new pages, helping your content to rank higher.<\/p>\n Ultimately, when it comes to SEO, a technically sound website is essential. However, once you\u2019ve made all the fixes, the way to steadily increase traffic to your website is through new content; and that\u2019s what makes content marketing crucial for SEO. Plus, the higher you rank on Google, the more authoritative you look to readers.<\/p>\n What\u2019s one of the main reasons why we create large content marketing pieces? To build links, of course! Blog articles, white papers and reports can all be outreached to the media, but let\u2019s think back to our interactive map idea.<\/p>\n So, you have a list of things to do in each city, in addition to a range of recommended restaurants, bars and clubs \u2013 which you\u2019ve linked to. When it comes to outreach, get in touch with everyone you\u2019ve mentioned and ask if they\u2019ll link back to you (and share it on social too!).<\/p>\n The fact that you\u2019ve not only mentioned them, but linked to them too, will probably mean they\u2019re more than happy to link back to you. Let\u2019s say you\u2019ve featured 15 cities, and linked back to 30 different companies in each one \u2013 even if only a quarter of them return your link, that means you\u2019ll have gained an additional 112 links, which is an amazingly high number.<\/p>\n Now, we\u2019re starting to see how content marketing ties other aspects of digital marketing together; as external links are a direct ranking factor for SEO. Why? Well, Google views it like this: if credible (not spammy) sites are linking to you, then that must mean your content is of high quality. High-quality content highlights the fact that you\u2019re an authoritative figure in your industry, with content that will be useful to others, which means you rank higher.<\/p>\n It\u2019s hard getting links, and no one\u2019s denying it. In fact, a study of 912 million blog posts from Backlinko<\/a> found that 94 per cent of all blogs published have no external links pointing to them.<\/p>\n However, bear in mind that on average, their study found that long-form content receives 77.2 per cent more links than short articles, with optimum word count being between 1,000-2,000 words. We’ve written more about the four types of content we recommend for building links<\/a>.<\/p>\n If the content you\u2019re producing isn\u2019t interesting, engaging, valuable and\/or useful, then no one\u2019s going to want to link to it. Considering just how long it can take to create content in the first place, you want to give it the best possible chance of being linked back to by other sites, and ranking in the SERPs.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not the only connection that content marketing has with the rest of the digital marketing mix.<\/p>\n Enter social media: the perfect space to interact and engage with customers and potential customers. Surprisingly, Backlinko\u2019s study found practically no correlation between social shares and backlinks. After all, you\u2019d assume that the more people you put your content in front of, the more links you\u2019d get \u2013 but, in the words of Buzzumo\u2019s Director Steve Rayson<\/a>, \u201cpeople share and link to content for different reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n However, performance on social media is crucial for long term SEO success, and this is where content ties the two together. Posting a mixture of interesting content on social media will encourage engagement between your followers; which in turn, increases brand awareness amongst a wider audience.<\/p>\n Once your brand is in the back of other consumers\u2019 minds, if they are wanting to purchase your products\/services, they may think about you automatically, or if they search for them on Google and see you pop in the SERPs, they may head over to you straight away.<\/p>\n Another tip. According to Backlinko, titles that end with a \u201c?\u201d get 23.3 per cent more shares than those with headlines that don\u2019t feature a question.<\/p>\n If you haven\u2019t yet dipped your toes into the world of content marketing, is it perhaps because you think it\u2019s not relevant for the legal industry? If that\u2019s the case, it couldn\u2019t be further from the truth. Content works for any<\/em> industry. You just need to create content that is useful and engaging for your audience.<\/p>\n Elle Pollicott is an Owned media Consultant at Hallam Internet<\/a>, creating and implementing SEO and content strategies for both B2B and B2C clients. Email elle.pollicott@hallam.co.uk<\/a>. Twitter @elledigital<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\nContent marketing in the UK: stats<\/h3>\n
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Content and SEO<\/h3>\n
Content and digital PR<\/h3>\n
Content and social media<\/h3>\n
Final thoughts<\/h3>\n