Is your content marketing working? Are you getting the results you want?
If not, then you may be committing one (or more) of the 7 biggest content marketing mistakes.
Mistake #1: Not understanding your market
When it comes to marketing your material, you must know who your intended audience is. This will be a determining factor in the success of your material.
Once you know your market you can begin creating content that they want. Of course, you may know that they need one thing, but they may not know that. Meet them where they are and create content that helps them solve the problems they believe they have – then, only then, can you give them what they need.
Understanding your market also allows you to post your content in locations that are visible to them. This means that your content will be extremely focused and drive the most engaged potential customers to your site or product.
Once you have a good understanding of your market and their needs and desires, you’ll find it easier to come up with a constant stream of content ideas that will genuinely help your market.
Mistake #2: Creating content with no real plan in place
Creating content is great, but do you know what you want each specific piece of content to do or what action you want your customers or clients to take? Many business owners know that they need content, so they begin creating content and posting it.
Unfortunately, there is much more to creating content. When you create content with a purpose, your company will receive more benefits from it. It is important for your business – and your sanity – to create content with a plan.
Having a plan allows you to know what type of information to include – or not include – in your content. An article created for your website that is intended to direct your clients to a download or sales page is going to be much different than an article created to help walk them step-by-step through a process.
Mistake #3: Not being yourself
Another of the most common content marketing mistakes is simply not being yourself.
You need to be yourself – it’s that simple. How many times have you thought the person you were working with was one way and later discovered what you though you knew wasn’t true at all?
You do not want to leave your customers and clients in this situation. People trust those who are trustworthy and honest. One way to show this is to be yourself. If you are a jokester, it is okay to add some humour. Let your quirkiness shine and set you apart from everyone else.
The best part about this is you can stop trying to be perfect.
🙂
Nobody is perfect and by accepting that and being yourself, you’ll usually find the “right” customers are more likely to be attracted to your business. Those who don’t connect with your personality will probably go elsewhere and that’s quite okay. You most likely weren’t a good match for each other.
Mistake #4: Doing what everyone else is doing
There are so many techniques for the perfect marketing strategy. Everywhere you look, you see and hear something that “you must” do to improve your marketing and grow your business.
Most small business owners do not have the funds or time to do everything. Therefore, it is important that you find what works best for you and do that. It may be a combination of what others are doing, or a strategy all your own.
Doing what everyone else is doing, is not always the best strategy. One of the quickest ways to get into the front of your niche is to do something different.
Mistake #5: Creating wishy-washy, boring content
The internet has made it possible for anyone to post anything. How much of that content is high-quality content? Not very much.
It is important that you create high-quality content that gives value to your customers. Filling your blogs, videos, and tweets with “filler” content is not going to give you the results you desire. People will look for people they can trust to give them content that has value to them.
Remember that value doesn’t have to be boring. You need to keep your potential clients interested while giving them information they can use.
Mistake #6: Not promoting content
Writing and publishing great content are only two of the steps in your content marketing pan. Many small business owners believe their content fails because it lacks quality – this isn’t necessarily true. Most of them time it is because they forget to promote it.
Promoting your content can seem scary when you only think of it as selling. Promoting your content simply means that you’re sharing it with your potential clients on purpose.
It is important that you use all your resources to promote your content. You can use social media platforms, blogs (yours and other bloggers), website owners, paid ads and other business owners to help promote your content.
Mistake #7: Not tracking the results
A successful content marketing strategy can lead to strong relationships and a sense of community with your customers and clients. It allows you to become an authority and thought leader within your industry.
A strategic step in content marketing is tracking your results. You need to track your content from creation to distribution to ensure you have the correct plan in place. Tracking your results enables you to see where you are succeeding and where you may need to make a few changes.
If you’re making any of these 7 content marketing mistakes, make a commitment to change that … beginning from right now. You’ll soon start to see a great improvement in your content’s engagement and the results its getting, among other things, and the extra effort to get this process right will soon be well worth it.
