The first half of the year is almost over and most of us are still figuring out the most practical approaches to generating leads and converting them with the right content marketing techniques. Over the years, the tactics used by brands and businesses to gain the attention of their customers and target audiences have evolved and gotten fine tuned. Today, our audiences have become smarter and can find out any difference in our approach in taking our products or services to them, no matter how minute.
We need to constantly modify our content marketing strategies and the way we perceive our messaging, content and our potential readers to keep them hooked to our business. There are tons of factors that go into this and this article specifically points out a few content marketing trends that are influencing the year 2018. If you haven’t incorporated them in your strategies, it’s time you did.
Changing Content Consumption Techniques
Moving away from just web content and blog articles, we are now going towards newer dimensions in content consumption. If you pay attention to your social network handles today, you would come across diverse ways of publishing one simple idea. Today, content has taken new forms like videos, podcasts, infographics, animated clips, sponsored posts, thought leadership articles, reviews and lots more. The takeaway is that each of the type brings in distinct sets of values to customers and readers.
That is why you need to pause your content marketing strategies and think of other engaging ways you can present the information or insight you have in mind apart from long-form articles or posts. We recommend exploring multiple avenues and channels to expand your wings in.
Transparency
The consumers of content today expect one thing – transparency. All of us have evolved as consumers and we don’t like to be deceived or fooled. To give a simple example, we hate videos on YouTube that are plain clickbait. We expect a certain level of honesty from marketers and it is okay if they could be upfront about their presentation technique. So work on those aspects and be transparent to your readers.
If it’s a sponsored post you are doing, be honest about it so you still have the interest of your readers rather than keeping them deceived until the last few lines of your post. When taking a transparent approach, also ensure to modify the tone, approach and messaging accordingly.
Newer Angles to Existing Content
With the content writing realm becoming too cluttered, it’s tough to get the attention of our audiences. More so, it is difficult to keep them reading our content because what we have said has already been said somewhere else by more credible personalities. That’s where uniqueness or the writer’s persona comes into picture. You can save your articles from becoming redundant or lost in the clutter by bringing in new perspectives to it. You can target a particular set of target audience to come up with tailored content.
For instance, if you’re writing a review about a new smartphone in the market, you can either write what has already been written or take the perspective of a photographer or an entrepreneur and review it from his or her expectations.
It all boils down to creativity and how interestingly you tend to take your messaging to your audience. With readers ready to pay attention, the expertise lies in how successful you are in retaining their attention.
What do you think?