Planning to spread the word about your business? You need to go online. And when you are going for online marketing, there’s no way you can avoid content marketing anymore. That’s because the adage ‘Content is King’ still holds very true in the online world. So, you’ll have to follow
Here’s a quick look at the frequent mistakes that content marketers make.
- Working without a proper documented content strategy
- Functioning without a content calendar
- Not integrating both readers and search engine in the plan
- Omitting a clear call to action
- Ignoring visual content
- Focusing too much only on creating the content
- Not being prudent in content promotion
#1. Not Having a Properly Documented Content Strategy
Every activity that you perform to spread the word about your business needs to be done in a strategic way. And for that, a documented strategy helps significantly.
So, why not go for a proper documentation of your marketing strategy? Write down your plans. It will give you multiple benefits:
- You’ll have a clear idea of the steps that you’ve undertaken during the course of the online marketing process.
- This will help you make necessary changes to the procedure, if required, in future, and yet you’ll have a clear tab of everything.
This is surely going to give you a cutting edge over your competitors.
#2. Not Following a Content Calendar
How important is a content calendar to your content marketing endeavors? A lot of people just ignore this thing. And this surely comes pretty close to the previous one. You must have an editorial calendar to ensure that the contents are created in a planned way.
It is essential to spend a good amount of time in planning the content marketing strategies in a proper manner. You want the content marketing process to be smooth and hassle-free?
A prior planning through the editorial calendar is essential. It will provide you with a number of benefits. You can remain assured that the content marketing procedure will be free from sudden issues. Besides, you’ll also find it easier to incorporate different kinds of ideas in your content marketing endeavor.
#3. Writing Either for the Readers or the Search Engine
For whom are you creating the content? Is it for the readers? Or for the search engines?
- If you are not creating it for the readers, then don’t expect that they’ll read it at all. And if that happens, your website won’t have the amount of traffic that you desire.
- And if you are not writing for the search engines, then you just can expect the site to appear in the front page. So, it will also lead to reduced traffic.
So, what’s the best way out?
You’ll have to master the skill of writing for both the readers as well as the search engine. And that’s when success will follow.
#4. Not Including Any Call to Action
You are creating high-quality content for marketing. That’s surely a great thing. But this is where comes the most pertinent question — what do you want the content to do?
The answer to this question contains one of the basic qualities that your content must have. That’s nothing but a call to action. They are going to give a direction to the reader as to what they should do after going through the content. It can either be a direct sale like, “Buy this” or “Click to Purchase”. Or, it can also be something more subtle. You should always try to use the call to action to get home your marketing ideas.
In many cases, the businesses are found to use content marketing without call to action. That’s surely one of the major mistakes, as the readers are clueless about what to do next if no call to action is included.
#5. Not Using Visual Content
A picture speaks a thousand words: this old adage seems to be ruling the content marketing scenario even to this day. So, are you using only text-based content?
You can do that at your own peril.
So, you should rather focus on different types of image-based contents, such as memes, infographics, and more. Remember, image-based content, especially the infographics, are shared by the readers much more than any other form of content. Hence, they are likely to play an important role in spreading the word about your business. And all of these are linked to the rise of the visual web. Videos are also going to come in handy during online marketing. In short, visual content is sure to rule the roost.
So, not including visual content in your strategy is probably going to be the gravest mistake you can commit while performing content marketing.
#6. Focusing Only on Content Creation
Does this point seem strange? It might. But it’s true. Surely you need high-quality content. Because you are performing content marketing. However, focusing too much only on creating that content is being considered as a mistake.
Why so?
That’s because content marketing consists of two words. And while the content creation part is, of course, important, you can’t do away with the marketing part as well. So, it is essential to spread the word about the content you are creating. You can use various platforms, including blogs, social media and more. The more diverse platforms you choose to spread your content, the more reach it will have, thus informing more people about your business.
#7. Not Promoting the Content Prudently
Taking the cue forward from the earlier point, this one also deals with spreading the word about the content.
If you want people to know about your business, you need to make them come across it across different platforms. For example, you need to use Twitter, Facebook and other social media platforms. But it’s necessary to use them prudently. Know the best times to post on these social media sites and follow those. Remember, posting on these platforms for a single time isn’t enough. For example, tweeting about a new content just once during the day, posting it only a single time on Facebook isn’t going to bring you results.
So, you need to understand the requirements of each platform and promote the content accordingly to get the best results.
Content marketing is something you can’t do without these days, if you want to take your business forward. So, it is essential that you are wary of the common content marketing mistakes, so that you can avoid them to ensure that your endeavors are more effective.
Images: “ Hand writing Content Marketing concept on whiteboard / Shutterstock.com“
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