If you run a small business it’s likely that you have been searching for a number of marketing tools that you could use for improving customer acquisition. Growing your business with a customer centric approach has become one of the most popular ways that businesses are able to retain new and loyal customers. Quite unfortunately, paid advertising does not work well for customer acquisition in today’s modern marketing campaigns.
Paid advertising has been far less effective since the year 2015 when ad block was introduced for the first time. Today there’s hundreds of millions of devices that have ad block software installed on them and this is part of the reason why small businesses struggle to reach new users when they use paid marketing campaigns.
A content marketing strategy has become one of the most popular methods for acquiring brand-new customers because it completely goes around any type of ad block technology. Content marketing is more than just blogging today too. A content marketing plan can be a long-term strategy that uses formats like social media or even shared photo content.
Having on-site content can be vital to nudge is getting around ad blockers but also for improving search engine results for any page as well. With around 80% of consumers using an online search before they work with a new business, having some type of content that is ranking over social media will help any business to succeed.
Almost any small business can see a positive return on investment for adding a content marketing strategy to their current marketing campaigns. There’s no need to have access to a massive budget in order to generate results either. A small business owner can make a small investment in a content strategy, manage the resources to connect with their audience and then see some very loyal new customers as a result of their content marketing efforts.
Here are some of the top reasons why any small business should be using content marketing this year:
It is very inexpensive:
You can start content marketing by producing your very own content and managing pages with the help of your current employees. This can be an ultra-low-cost solution for your marketing campaign. What makes the process even easier is when you start to call upon a sizable group of followers to produce user generated content. This can be a great way to bolster your content marketing efforts without having to invest any employee time. Even if you decided to outsource your content marketing and go with a professional writer or content producer, you can see a huge cost difference between outbound marketing through content over inbound content marketing strategies.
It doesn’t mean selling out:
Content marketing is very different from the paid search advertisement. You aren’t paying to have your content simply displayed in front of your users instead the goal is to produce valuable content that will actually help your users and get them interested in subscribing to you. Nobody wants to hear straight promotions 24 hours a day seven days a week. With a content marketing strategy that builds quality content, you can have a product that your customers and prospects will regularly check out which are also related to your product or niche. By taking a journalistic approach to your content or sharing updates about your brand that people may be interested in, you can indirectly build loyalty without bombarding people with advertisements.
Building a larger audience:
Content marketing over social media is an excellent way that you can build up a massive audience of followers. As you continue to build valuable content across multiple platforms, the content that shared amongst Internet users will only help you to grow your platform. Continuing to build high-quality content while to make sure that your audience can grow and the number of customers that may support your business will grow as well.
Building trust with your audience:
Content marketing can also help you share great details about your brand and the products that you carry. By producing great content you can nurture any of the leads that might be interested in your brand or your products. Showcasing the real value that’s associated with the items you are selling can be a great way to build up trust for the future. Generating leads for brand-new customers tends to cost at least 50% more than holding onto loyal customers. Loyal customers often tend to spend more within your company as well. A customer that well informed with content marketing will be far more likely to make a purchase or to even upgrade to one of the luxury items you may have. With more content available across multiple platforms, your prospects can be more informed and your current customers can stay updated about your latest product releases.
Organic search visibility on the rise:
As you continue to create content for your page in an effort to grow your audience, you will only continue to boost the search visibility of your brand. More mentions of your brand over social media and valuable, trending articles will always work at generating high search engine rankings. If you continue to produce excellent content that nobody sees, it can be far less than valuable. Producing content that is ranked highly on search engines will only help you to succeed because it is widely viewed within your niche. The only way to achieve top organic search visibility is with regular work and content production.
Finally defining your brand identity:
Content marketing can really help you to have a brand that is well thought out and represented online. As well as producing a better visibility for your page, quality content will help you to make sure that your brand can be well-defined to your audience. Mapping a content strategy and having a tone or voice to your content will help to make sure that people can quickly recognize content that’s yours and learn what you are all about.
Keep some of these top ideas in mind about adopting a content marketing strategy for your small business. If you aren’t currently content marketing in 2019, it could be an excellent time for you to start building your business using quality content.
