As much as the modern world presents a range of opportunities for smooth business operations and growth, small businesses are finding it extra challenging to exist. In the beginning, many small businesses find it hard to operate and even to obtain visibility. In fact, the U.S. Bureau of Labour Statistics states that 20% of businesses die within the first year of their commencement.
Moreover, those that persist through the dilemma end up bankrupt in the first five years. Generally, there are many complications that small businesses are prone to. Such include financial constraints, publicity, and competition. However, there is good news.
Content marketing is currently one of the most reliable digital marketing techniques that small businesses can consider. Content marketing generally refers to the process of creating, sieving, and publishing relevant content to a target audience via a range of mediums like social media platforms, websites, and influencer sites, among others.
Content marketing is a powerful business growth strategy when performed strategically and intentionally. It can help a small business push through the noise on the world wide web and define its brand identity. And therefore; let’s look at some of the best ways small businesses can leverage content marketing.
5 Ways Small Businesses Can Leverage Content Marketing
Establish Goals
It’s wonderful that you managed to start your business, but this alone isn’t enough for you to survive in the marketplace. You need to define clear goals for your existence. This also requires you to define your mission and vision. Having a well-defined business mission and goals allows a business owner to strategically promote the business.
In this case, you will know what type of content to create in order to promote your business. Commonly, your goals in the initial phase will be enhancing brand awareness, visibility on social media, and growing a customer base. During this phase, you must rely on what makes your business unique. Whether it’s quality products, affordable solutions, or customer service, you can showcase all these traits in your content.
On the other hand, you will have to perform a competitor analysis. A competitor analysis can be considered a SWOT Analysis. It will help you identify the marketing techniques you need to introduce in your business. It will help you see why your competitors stand out and the keywords they use. These will help you create a powerful content marketing strategy.
Define Your Target Audience
It is very important to know your audience in the modern business world. Understanding the type of people you target will help you tailor content and focus on content marketing techniques that matter the most. Besides that, it will reduce marketing costs. Understanding your audience generally requires you to understand its demographics, preferences, interests, and expectations.
If you wish to understand your audience better, try to utilize tools such as SEMrush and Google Analytics. Social media analytics is also another way to attain insights into your target audience. This will help you create appealing and tailored content and one that can help you retain your customers.
Follow Content Marketing Trends
Yes! Following content marketing trends can simplify your content marketing campaigns dimensionally. Besides that, it can optimize your marketing strategies to fetch sizeable goals. Among the best content marketing trends you can rely on include video content marketing, influencer marketing, user-generated content, and AI-powered content creation.
Videos are the most consumed type of content around the world and with that, you can invest more time in creating quality video content. Additionally, partnering with influencers can help you tap into the power of other audiences. You don’t need to partner with expensive influencers, however, you can start with those who require no commission.
Also, you can rely on AI-powered solutions to enhance user experience on your social media platforms and website. In this way, you will attract more and more people to your brand.
Create a Blog
Blogging is a type of content promotion. Blogs generally lay a foundation for partnering with other bloggers and this can positively impact SEO. A blog is a piece of content created and aims to promote a business or talk about its services. Blogs can focus on a range of niches; you only have to identify yours.
A blog is associated with long-term results and even though you may not have the capabilities to start it immediately, it is worth considering. Blogging is currently a content marketing strategy that SEO and marketers rely on. On the other hand, you can also engage in creating blogs and publish them on other platforms in case you don’t have an official website. This will increase your brand popularity and drive customers to your business. All you have to do is conduct a Gap Analysis to understand the topics to focus on in your blogs.
Consider Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing isn’t about to fade away any time soon. In fact, 77% of marketers asserted that social media marketing is an effective business tool. Social media marketing generally requires a business to create and post content on social media. It can be promotional or nonpromotional content.
Over the years, social media marketing has proven to enhance brand awareness, engagement, and ROI. It is a medium of connecting to the target audience and building strong relationships. All that a small business owner needs to do is to invest in quality social media posts whether text, videos, or images. Also, remember to use hashtags and search terms to improve discoverability.
Final Say
Although it may prove to be difficult to grow, content marketing can surely help small businesses. Content marketing requires a business owner or marketer to create any type of content and publish it on a suitable platform. That can be a website or social media. This form of marketing is cheaper when compared to others like PPC and advertising. Therefore, consider the provided content marketing strategies here to grow your business.