Content marketing is in a good place at present. Reports from the Content Marketing Institute indicate that
After all you are investing your time, money and hard work and it hardly makes a sense to lose it all just because you don’t have a solid content marketing strategy, or worse, have failed to document it properly.
Why is it Necessary to Record Your Content Marketing Strategy
Content is a crucial element of your business; it drives communication between your organization and consumers. It is therefore imperative to develop great content to build an audience and gradually turn them into loyal followers.
If you are still struggling to thrive online, it’s time to analyse your content strategy and documenting the same will make a world of difference here. It will not only help you to pinpoint the problem areas, but also help you identify and fix the mistakes you’re making in order to turn things around.
Here are a few content marketing mistakes that you should avoid at any cost.
Mistake #1: You Don’t Know Your Audience
One of the most common and biggest mistakes many marketers make is failing to know their target audience(s). They don’t take enough time to research and understand their audience and as a result, they are often clueless about topics that can grab their potential readers’ attention.
Developing buyer personas alone won’t help you here. You need to create reader personas in order to learn more about your target audience(s). Based on this you need to create topics that are in sync with your content marketing goals. For example, most marketers use their business blogs as a platform to educate and nurture their existing and potential buyer(s) to push them down the sales funnel. Though there is nothing wrong in it, you need to keep a few things in mind while doing so.
- The age range of your readers
- Their financial status and education level
- Hobbies of your readers
- Their pain points
While your topics must address their pain points, it is also essential to keep the other factors in mind to create relevant and engaging content. Creating reader personas will not only help you create an effective blog but also in building successful email marketing campaigns.
The mistake of not knowing your target audience(s) well enough usually lead to another fatal mistake: “Writing only with your interest in mind”
It is an inevitable mistake to commit when you don’t know your audience or fail to comprehend their interest/pain points. Often marketers think that they know what’s best for their buyers, but they actually focus on topics that only speak volume about their own interests. If you are doing the same, it’s time to re-think your content strategy in order to be successful.
What is the Solution?
A better approach is to create content with your readers in mind. Your content should speak about issues that your potential buyers/readers are facing and not just what you have to offer. Now the question is: how to know what your readers want?
Chances are you already know or at least have enough resource to dig it out. Consumer reviews, forums, question-and-answer sites, and social media comments can help you understand what makes your readers tick. Look out for questions relevant to your particular industry and tailor your content marketing strategy to suit their wants and needs.
Mistake #2: Not Adding a New Perspective
Search “Content Marketing Mistakes” on Google and you will come across hundreds of posts that talk about the ‘Top Content Marketing Mistakes’ you should avoid. At least half of them speak the same thing. Now, we all know that duplicate content is a capital sin from an
Simply rehashing the same information available in other articles won’t attract your readers. Even if they click on your post, your readers are more likely to leave before they finish the introductory paragraph.
That being said, there is nothing wrong in writing about topics that others have already covered. However, the trick is to add a new perspective to make the content unique and interesting. You need to come up with original angles or solutions for a given problem. Original and unique thought leadership content is what you need to establish yourself as an authority in your particular domain.
Alternatively, you can dig deeper into the same topic and add new perspective that both thorough and thought-provoking. Providing real-life examples, case studies, insightful infographs, pictures and videos are great ways to continue the conversation. Remember that it is better to be different than being stereotype when it comes to content marketing.
Mistake #3: Not Proof Reading
This can actually kill all your efforts. There is a difference between “your” and “you’re”. Spelling mistakes and poor grammar are fatal to your credibility and not only make you look dumb but may even cost you millions in lost online sales. A simple proof read and editing can help you avoid serious problems in the long run.
The following are some of the most egregious grammar mistakes that you must avoid:
- It’s vs. Its
- Affect vs. Effect
- There vs. Their
- Who vs. Whom
- Continual and Continuous
- Which vs. That
- Then/Than
- Fewer /less
- Adding words twice
- Improper use of the apostrophe
- The dangling participle
These are just a few common mistakes we see around almost every day and there are more such examples that are one of the biggest pet peeves of all grammar nazi’s out there. It is therefore imperative to proofread your copy before you hit the publish button.
Conclusion
Everyone makes mistakes. Sometimes it is a content-based mistake, a technical or logical mistake while sometimes it is a simple spelling and punctuation error that spoils our efforts. But we are human and we can, at times, fall short of our own expectations. But it is essential to keep our eyes open for these mistakes and beat them out as soon as we find them. With an eye to details and perseverance we can easily avoid these horrible mistakes that can damage our brand reputation beyond repair.
Images: Author’s Own
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