Content is king

Content is king - The reason why a content marketing plan is important

The biggest reason why content marketing wears the crown is that customers love it. According to the Content Marketing Institute , content delivers 3 times as many leads as outbound marketing, brings six times higher conversion rates, and has the potential to increase web traffic 7.8-fold.

Quality content has the power to influence consumers, presents a novel concept they didn’t know they needed, hence, creating value for your business by building a strong brand image.

Make way for the king

Beyond an editorial calendar, a content marketing plan paves the way for a successful overall marketing effort. There are several benefits of devising a road map for your content before sharing it.

To begin with, content marketing is far less expensive than many other forms of marketing, such as paid ads, celebrity endorsements, or promotional campaigns.

At first, you may need to invest in tools or hire professionals to produce high-value content. But once your company has these assets, you can communicate with your customers and develop a relationship without breaking the bank.

As you make progress, you will either work with a freelance writer or consult a full-service agency that offers content assistance, including ideation, content distribution plan, web performance analysis, and other forms of digital marketing.

Once you have your content resources, you need to spread the word, and a website allows you to do it. There are web content writing services where you can hire professional content writers to enrich your website with materials that Google highly values.

Put another way, search engine optimization, a heavy contributor to the visibility of your content, prefers a website bristling with in-depth articles more than the one covered by product listings or pop-up ads.

Publishing consistently with valuable information is a great way to reach new customers and solidify trust with recurring ones. It explains another perk of a comprehensive content creation plan - increasing your credibility.

Start a successful content marketing plan

Lay the groundwork

There are so many things to do at first that you don't know where to begin. To clear things up, start by answering three key questions:

• What is the purpose of your content?
• What types of content do you need?
• How can they help to achieve your goals?

Then, dive deeper into each question to conceptualize your content marketing plan. For example:

Creating a content marketing plan

Contents of marketing plan includes

• Blog post

A blog (short for “weblog”) is a piece of journal live on a website run by individuals within your corporation. It can be composed in a formal or conversational style and include images, audio, and videos for demonstration purposes.

• Ebook

An ebook or electronic book is a nonprint, reflowable book that can be downloaded or read anytime, anywhere on-screen. One distinguishing feature of an ebook is that it should not be editable.

• How-to guide

It is a document that educates readers on a topic with step-by-step guidelines. How-to guides help to improve your reliability by addressing what customers are most concerned about.

• Infographic

Infographics are visual representations of information, making it easier for customers to understand what you are getting at. Infographics prove useful for unraveling complex concepts and can be used in alliance with other types of content, such as blog posts or ebooks.

• Newsletter

As the name suggests, email newsletters are newsletters sent via email. They should include information subscribers want to read, such as the latest industry news, product or service updates, promotional offers, and other relevant information.

• Social media post

Social posts include any content posted on your own or paid social media, such as Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook. A social media presence is mandatory these days if you want to reach new and existing customers where they are.

• Success story

Success stories describe how customers yield the benefits of your product or service. The aim of these stories is to provide a third-party assessment of your company value.

• Syndicated content

Syndicated content is part of omnichannel marketing, in which one material was initially created for one platform and is reused on other platforms. For example, a blog might be published on a website and later shared on social media.

• User generated content

User-generated content (UGC or consumer-generated content) is any branded content originally created by users and spread on digital channels. It can come in many forms, including photos, videos, reviews, and so on.

• Video

In content marketing, videos are created to provide educational content, or promote products or services. Because they are visually appealing and easier to digest, videos are increasingly used in place of written content.

• White paper

White papers are long-form educational reports on the products or services of your company. They are typically found on your website, hidden behind a gated form that generates leads to reinforce your organization's expertise.

7 Key Findings After Analyzing 5514 Content Marketing Jobs by Sk Rafiqul Islam

How to develop a content marketing plan?

At this point, you have grasped the concept of creating a content marketing strategy. It’s time to roll up your sleeves and follow these steps:

• Step 1: Research trending keywords

Since 2010, Google has secretly removed keyword data, causing a tremendous decline in keyword visibility. It is the reason many marketers believe that keywords are dead, but they are not. Hitherto, we are still searching the same way, and Google's interpretation of our content hasn't changed.

Therefore, keywords continue to be vital for content marketing goals. There are long tail and short tail keywords, which are either high competition or low competition and deliver different marketing results.

For instance, while a head term like "content marketing plan" caters to a broad spectrum of people, a long-tail variation like "how to develop a content marketing plan" will target a more specific audience, which works wonders for attracting and converting qualified leads.

• Step 2: Find related keywords

Choosing a focused keyword is crucial, but you don’t want to rely on a single keyword. For Google to understand your writing better, you should add related keywords to your content.

Google has to inspect a massive amount of information. Many keywords have dual meanings, so using a list of seed keywords enables Google to determine what type of search intent to target.

• Step 3: Design a content template

Make a master spreadsheet that serves as a template so you can duplicate it for any next piece of content you create.

The spreadsheet should include the key and related keywords and relevant information required for your content creation plan.

Thanks to it, you can share your ideas with your team members, get feedback, and schedule content publication. Don’t miss this step unless you do not want your content strategy plan to be well-organized.

• Step 4: Make an outline

An outline helps to structure your article for maximum impact and prevents you from forgetting what you want to cover.

If possible, you should integrate the outline into your spreadsheet, label each topic with the appropriate heading tag to make the best use of it.

• Step 5: Write your first draft

Write down anything, even if it does not make sense. A lot of quality articles start with a terrible draft. You can use WordPress, Google Docs, or any other program you are familiar with.

After finishing your draft, abandon it for a day or two before you come back to revise. For a better result, you should work with an editor who can point out logical leaps or other writing errors.

• Step 6: Create a schedule for publication and promotion

Consistency is the key, so you should devise your content calendar weeks or months in advance.

For example, if you upload every Thursday, your readers will know when to check and won’t miss your content. You might want to publish three times a day, every day, or once per weekday.

Besides, you should promote your content across owned channels. Re-sharing your latest content on social media and emailing people mentioned in each article can significantly increase your reach.

• Step 7: Conduct affiliate marketing

When you have someone in your content, get in touch with them and ask them to share it. Some will not revert to you, but it’s a numbers game. The more people you reach out to, the more impressions you’ll get.

Influencers can help your brand go viral, so if you are proud of your content, there’s nothing wrong with asking for a share. After that, nurture your relationship with those people and help them in return.

• Step 8: Apply internal linking

Internal links help your content rank higher in search results and keep visitors staying longer. You don't want visitors to leave after reading your article. Instead, you want them to explore more of your website.

If you're creating a content marketing strategy from scratch, you do not have existing content. On adding new content, go back to older articles and add relevant links to your recent pieces.

Remember to optimize your anchor text! (the words that get linked). Instead of using a cliché like "click here", use relevant keywords to incorporate internal links to make them sound more natural.

Content marketing plan examples

“I pap YOU” CAMPAIGN by papmall®

• Context: We are all aware that any company needs strong financial capabilities to remain competitive. Besides, the thing that makes our business thrive is to have a significant position in the market; we tend to build a place that focuses on ‘human’ connection within a community. And that is how “I pap YOU” came.

• Content marketing goals: To motivate our clients to share and connect tighter, want to build a strong community for papmall®. We expect that every time they mention our ‘pap’, papmall®, they know exactly what we do and what messages we are trying to spread within the community.

• Content strategy plan:

Week 1:

Content marketing plan examples

Introduce how we define "pap" in three different ways: as a noun, an adjective, and a verb. We combine and integrate “I pap YOU” under a form: hashtag, to be able to spread it more intimately.

Week 2:

A content creation plan

What is ‘pap’?

OH MY pap !

A noun: we form that “pap” here as an exclamatory sentence. Cannot deny that we operate the platform to do business and want our clients to remember our brand name in ways.

#ohmypap Yes, “pap” will be popping in everywhere. Let’s spread “pap”.

Week 3:

HE/SHE/IT is so pap.

An adjective: to describe the feelings inside of every individual, to present a character of each one that is complicated to talk about somehow.

#heissopap

#sheisverypap

#itspap

But hey, at papmall®, everything is driven in positive ways.

Week 4:

I pap YOU !

A verb: to confess a secret feeling that is hard to say out loud, to connect people, to motivate each other, to share, learn and help.

#ipapyou

#youmakemepap

You make me wanna pap, I pap YOU.

Let’s connect through “pap” . Draw “pap” in your own imagination.

The latest content campaign plan by papmall^®

Conclusion

As you can see, developing a content marketing plan is a long, if not daunting journey. You will learn more about your customers and the content that works along the way, and you might need to adjust your plan frequently. That said, we believe this article is a helpful guide for you to start creating a content marketing strategy of your own!