Small Business Research and Enterprise

Author: Gergana Dimitrova

A wise (and very successful) man once told me about the big posters on the London underground: “These spots are reserved for Jack Daniels and Richard Branson (Virgin).” He meant that the rest of us (small and medium businesses), more than ever before, face the nightfall of traditional advertising. While the big and shiny advertising spots remain a priority for the large companies, the way small and medium businesses market their products, is inevitably changing. And the way people and companies research, choose, and buy, has undergone a major shift.

So, if businesses want to keep it strong in a bustling market, a content strategy should form an essential part of their marketing. Simply put, a content strategy is the framework you design to deliver the content to readers.

Below are five reasons why you need a content strategy to make your business thrive.

Building customer loyalty

In the last seven years we saw digital marketing take a turn for the better – a remarkable transition from the reign of the clickable ads, to organic presence and extreme customer centricity. According to the Marketing Insider Group more than half of today’s users don’t click on ads, simply because people are overfed with information, and don’t trust them.

These days people want to read about things which solve their problems or give them value. They ask Google for solutions, and they want these solutions now! Value-creation through high quality and consistent content is therefore considered the Holy Grail of customer engagement.

By reading your blog or website and getting valuable and relevant ideas people begin to trust you and your business. They will stick to you, because with time, they start to believe in you. And building a trusting relationship with your clients brings repeat business – no clickable ad can vouch for that.

Brand awareness

Needless to say, but let me say it one more time: a good content strategy creates brand awareness. It is not a straightforward or easy process, but this is how it works. Engaging with good content, people become familiar with the specifics of your brand, and the different products or services your company offers.

A good blog or web content will make you recognizable, and it will make your business stand from the crowd. It will also help your product or service development strategy flow. Let’s face it: people are more likely to buy if they recognise a brand within a given category.

Lead generation

Because good and consistent content increases your online presence, more leads are drawn to your website with time. In marketing, leads are the prospect customers in your industry – people who may be potentially interested in your services but have not made a purchase…yet. These are individuals who have expressed an interest in your service or product. Content creation and distribution is an affordable and reliable way for small and medium businesses to generate more leads, compared to the old-fashioned ways of direct advertising.

Better revenue prospects

This one is inevitably linked to the previous. The more website visitors you generate through content, the higher the chance you convert. In digital marketing, conversion is turning the visitors to your website to qualified leads, and ultimately – to purchasing customers. At the end of the day it turns out that words do sell. And in a customer-centric world, this is a winning formula.

Better online presence

Finally, good content (with a strategy!), increases your online presence. It is now a known fact that Google likes good, organic and genuine content. Pages which regularly update and produce good text, are likely to rank better in the search engines. This explains why 72 % of marketers rank content creation as the single most effective SEO tactic. For good SEO results, one of the things you need is good content, bound by a long-term content strategy in place. Maybe back in 2008 Seth Godin was correct to say that “Content marketing is the only marketing left”.

So, put simply, in the age of the digital, small and medium businesses, young and old, can all benefit tremendously from a content strategy in place. This is simply because the world has changed, and so has the complex dynamics of the consumer mindset.

About the author
Gergana Dimitrova is the co-founder and managing director of content writing platform Writers Website. She regularly hosts seminars at City Business Library on writing digital content and content strategy. Her next session will be Content strategy and your marketing on 13 June 2019