This Business Thrived When It Made Blog Content a Cornerstone of Its Marketing Strategy Start simple, then hone in on your audience and ask for their feedback.
By Will Caldwell Edited by Dan Bova
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Today, popular media content is fairly homogeneous, and if you're not posting a selfie or blogging about your latest food experience, you're outdated, right? Wrong. Growing your company's online following can seem like a complicated task -- especially if your content isn't related to a "hot topic" -- but this doesn't have to be the case.
It is a larger undertaking to build an online audience from content that's traditionally touted as boring, but it's absolutely an achievable goal. Moreover, it's a worthwhile pursuit that can pay off.
Related: 4 Simple Steps to Creating an Effective Content Marketing Strategy
Crafting killer copy out of less than gripping information didn't scare off Capital Alliance, a company that saw positive returns nearly instantaneously after posting their first blog. In a world where small business financing isn't the most thrilling topic, they needed to find angles that were unique and compelling to their audience. Traditional approaches wouldn't work, so they decided to be story driven to tie in emotion.
Capital Alliance created their online presence quickly and painlessly, and they now have a large following because of it. To find this success, they abide by the following principles:
Creative content conceptualization.
Creating content can sometimes require a lot of behind the scenes work. This convention leads many to conduct expensive market research before they begin posting, but this isn't a necessity -- at least not at first.
The more insight you have the better, but in the beginning, it's enough to keep it simple. For example, instead of investing the time and money into personalized research, companies can take advantage of resources like Google Suggest.
Here's an example. If you own a reverse mortgage company, and you want to grow its online presence, you can turn to Google for content ideas. Simply typing in a keyword set, like "reverse mortgage," brings up frequently searched terms and phrases that can be used as topics -- like "reverse mortgage calculator" and "how to get a reverse mortgage."
Individuals are already searching for these topics, so companies can offer useful information -- without paying large sums of money for it -- by simply answering these inquiries.
Related: This is How Top Bloggers Get 90% of Their Traffic
Hone in.
As you're creating your first piece of internet content, you might be confused about who to target, especially if your audience is multifaceted. Although there are several strategies for this, one that's shown a lot of success is catering content to specific groups. The internet is already big enough, and it's all too easy to get lost in its noise. In order to offer helpful and interesting information, connect with readers on a personalized level.
For example, instead of creating general blogs about financing, Capital Alliance writes pieces like "Small-Business Loan Options for Manufacturing Businesses" and "4 Unconventional Uses for Restaurant Loans."
Although these pieces are specific, they can also speak to wider audiences because they are all helpful and interesting. If a manufacturing business owner reads and enjoys their industry-specific article first, they'll likely be motivated to read more content -- regardless of what industry it addresses.
Also, Capital Alliance does a great job of creating an interesting topic out of something that could have been lackluster. Individuals who aren't in the restaurant industry will likely still read the restaurant article because the title piques their interest.
Feedback is key.
Google Suggest and similar tools are great resources if you're starting from scratch, but they shouldn't be relied upon forever. At some point, you should ask your customers what they would like to see. After you've created content, engage with your customers. Ask them why they are reading, what they'd like to see in the future, etc. This customer feedback can then influence future online post ideas.
Related: Synthesizing Startup Feedback: What to Use, What to Ignore
If you don't have the time to promote your blog through collecting more formal customer feedback -- and trust us, you should make time -- you can allow comments on your contemporary blogs. It will take time to go through the comments and respond to them, but a well-maintained comments section can serve as another way to gain feedback from customers.
Focusing on a new strategy can be terrifying, but this shouldn't stop you from getting involved. With the right content, techniques and opportunity to improve through customer feedback, any company can increase their brand awareness and support their bottom line.
