Nov 7, 2022
Is Your Content Marketing Stuck?
If so, you are not alone.
Fact: Most companies distributing content still need a content marketing strategy that works.
As a content strategist and writer, I see this more often than you might think. Companies of all sizes are putting out content that underperforms due to a lack of strategy.
So I got curious and did a little digging.
I found a 2022 Semrush survey asking 1,500+ businesses about content marketing strategy. Here is what they found:
- 97% of companies said content marketing is a “part of their marketing strategy.”
- But only 57% have a “documented” strategy.
Since “documented” is usually a requirement to call something a strategy, can we agree that, in reality, only 57% of companies have a solid strategy for content marketing?
The lack of a documented approach may have something to do with this, too:
- Only 19% think their content marketing strategy is “very successful.”
If content marketing feels like playing a game of whack-a-mole, I understand how you feel. News travels fast, and trends change in nanoseconds. Audiences are more connected to information and each other than ever before.
On top of that, social media platforms hold your audience hostage, charging you to reach the very people that your content attracts to their platforms in the first place.
Houston, we have a problem.
Lucky for you, I grew up in Houston. I’ve got some tips to help you improve the trajectory of your content marketing without recreating the entire moon shot.
When someone hires me and my team to rewrite a website or create sales copy or blog posts, often the first thing we have to figure out is a basic content strategy.
A simplified approach
To save clients time and money and keep the project moving, I developed a streamlined approach. It’s called The Customer For Life (CFL) Trust Content Marketing strategy.
The CFL strategy is based on many findings of industry leaders, including:
- All leads are not created equal — Attracting and retaining customers with the highest potential customer lifetime value (CLV) is key.
- McKinsey’s research for technology and software companies shows that companies focusing on retaining customers grow faster and are more profitable.
- The latest research from Edelman, a leading global communications firm founded in 1952, gives us a clear answer as to how to attract and retain customers for life. Spoiler alert: TRUST
The CFL framework helps you:
- Stop the exhausting “run-and-gun-and-cross-our-fingers” content spray.
- Create an efficient and effective strategy you can implement within a few hours or days.
- Create a starting place to build out a more detailed model over time.
This method assumes you have the marketing basics in place:
- What problem do you solve?
- Target audience
- Ideal customer personas and the customer journey
If you don’t, it may be because you have felt overwhelmed. That’s understandable. Feel free to reach out if you need help.
To learn more about the Customer for Life framework, check out this post that explains 3 reasons why the traditional content marketing funnel is broken.
Thanks for reading!
This is an excerpt from my complete Customer for Life (CFL) Trust Content Marketing Report. If you would like to access a copy of the whole report, which cites additional resources and tips, you can do so here.
