Tag: Content Strategy

When it comes to content marketing, we see many firms make the mistake of over-indexing on a single type of content—often at the Awareness stage—and neglecting the other stages of the buyer journey. This imbalance leaves prospects underserved, resulting in drop-offs during the Consideration and Decision stages.

To ensure your prospects have the information they need at every stage, you need a well-rounded content strategy that maps to their questions and concerns during the Awareness, Consideration, and Decision phases. Let’s explore how to deliver a seamless experience that keeps your prospects moving forward.

What is the Buyer Journey?

The buyer journey is the process your audience goes through when making a purchase decision. In general, it includes three key stages:

1. Awareness: The buyer realizes they have a problem or need.
2. Consideration: The buyer explores potential solutions.
3. Decision: The buyer selects the product or service they believe is the best fit.

Creating content that serves each stage ensures you meet your audience where they are, providing the right information at the right time.

Awareness Stage: Helping Buyers Identify Their Problem

At the Awareness stage, your prospects are just starting to identify their challenges or needs. They’re looking for educational content, not a sales pitch.

Common Pitfall:

Many companies focus heavily on blog posts and social media content at this stage, failing to create deeper, more engaging content that keeps the audience interested.

Content Goal: Build trust and educate your audience.

Content Types That Work:

• Blog Posts: Educational articles that answer common questions. For example, “5 Ways to Improve Your Investment Strategy.”
• Infographics: Visual summaries of data or concepts that make complex ideas easier to digest.
• Videos: Quick, engaging content that highlights key pain points.
• eBooks and Guides: Comprehensive resources that your audience can download in exchange for an email address.

Consideration Stage: Showing Buyers Why Your Solution Stands Out

In the Consideration stage, your audience has identified their problem and is researching potential solutions.

Common Pitfall:

Many companies neglect to create detailed content for this stage, causing prospects to stall or turn to competitors.

Content Goal: Demonstrate expertise and build credibility.

Content Types That Work:

• Case Studies: Real-world examples that showcase how you’ve solved similar problems.
• Webinars: Live or recorded sessions where you share valuable insights and interact with prospects.
• Comparison Guides: Side-by-side breakdowns of how your solution stacks up against competitors.
• Whitepapers: In-depth analysis or research that validates your authority in the industry.

Decision Stage: Giving Buyers the Confidence to Act

By the Decision stage, your audience is evaluating whether to commit. They want assurance that your product or service will deliver on its promises.

Common Pitfall:

Overlooking trust-building content like testimonials, product demos, or risk-free trials can leave buyers feeling uncertain.

Content Goal: Reduce friction and inspire confidence.

Content Types That Work:

• Testimonials and Reviews: Real client stories that highlight your success.
• Product Demos: Interactive or video walkthroughs that show your solution in action.
• Free Trials or Samples: Let prospects experience your offering risk-free.
• FAQs: Address common objections or concerns in a clear, concise way.

Why Many Firms Fail to Serve Every Stage

A common reason for drop-offs in the buyer journey is a lack of balanced content across all stages. For example:

• Focusing solely on Awareness content (e.g., blog posts) without supporting the information with deeper Consideration content (e.g., case studies) means prospects won’t see the value in progressing.
• Providing Decision-stage content too early can overwhelm prospects who aren’t ready to commit.

How to Fix This:

• Conduct a content audit to identify gaps in your buyer journey coverage.
• Map each piece of content to a specific stage of the buyer journey.
• Continuously optimize your content to ensure it aligns with audience needs.

Bonus: Don’t Forget Post-Purchase Content

The buyer journey doesn’t end with a purchase or signed contract. Retention and advocacy are key to long-term growth. Content that supports your clients post-conversion includes:

• Onboarding guides
• Exclusive content for existing clients
• Referral program details

The key to a successful content strategy is balance. By serving the needs of your buyers at every stage of their journey, including after they become clients, you’ll reduce drop-offs, build trust, and ultimately drive conversions.

Are you ready to create a content strategy that delivers results? Let us know where your biggest content gaps are—we’d love to help!

Podcasting is one of the hottest trends in media right now, and it’s become an incredibly powerful tool for businesses and leaders alike who want to reach new audiences and build a strong podcast community. 

Edison Research has been tracking podcasting since 2006, when they added it to their Infinite Dial report. The report tracks consumer media usage and behaviors in America. The study is the longest-running of its kind in the country, and it uses rigorous sampling methods to ensure that its estimates are representative of the entire U.S. population.

According to Edison Research, the popularity of podcasts has shown an upward momentum over the past few years. Why? Podcasts are popular because they let us become part of a story and feel like we know the people involved. You hear their voices—even if they aren’t physically present when you listen to them. This makes podcasts so much more than just listening; they turn into an experience that can’t be replicated elsewhere.

Recent statistics from The Infinite Dial 2024 reveal the following insights about podcasting consumption patterns in the U.S.

Podcast listening reach is up overall:  

• Despite changes in how downloads are being delivered and counted, listening levels are up markedly. 
• 47% of the U.S. 12+ population has listened to a podcast in the last month, up 12% year over year
• 34% of the U.S. 12+ population has listened to a podcast in the last week, up 10% year over year.

In the three plus years that I have been podcasting, one fact remains true: it’s exploding popularity. This is partially due to the widespread adoption of smartphones, the advent of smart speakers like Amazon Alexa and Google Home, even smartwatches made by Apple, Samsung, Fossil and Fitbit. All of these devices allow you to listen to a podcast right from your device, so long as you have an Internet connection. Even cars have seen more podcast play with built in software technologies like CarPlay, made by Apple, which enables a car radio to display and mirror your apps screen. Because of CarPlay, my podcast app appears on my vehicle multimedia console. 

Expect Continued Growth 

In analyzing my own behavior and consumption patterns, as both a podcast host and a listener, I’ll make a bold prediction that podcasting will continue its upward trend. This is due to many of my own personal beliefs, biases, and general business intelligence as a marketing agency owner for B2B and B2C firms in the financial services industry, which may apply to other verticals overall:   

1. The ability to multitask while listening to podcasts. What activities are you doing, and not doing, when you listen to your favorite podcast? Is it driving to work? Folding laundry? Exercising and running on a treadmill? For me, the answer is all of the above. I even use my Alexa smartspeaker to stream podcasts in my kitchen while I cook dinner. Few mediums can even come close to the portability of podcast. Once episodes are downloaded from the Internet to a listening device such as a smartphone, tablet, or laptop, you can listen anywhere you go.
   
2. Rise of the creator economy. In recent years, we have seen the rise of the creator, individuals who produce and share content online through social media platforms, blogs, and podcasts. Creators are able to earn a living or supplement their income by selling products directly to their fans, using platforms like Patreon or SubscribeStar. These gigs, sometimes referred to as a side hustle, can even raise money to start or grow a business using crowdfunding sites like Indiegogo and GoFundMe. Having a podcast allows these same creators to reach new and like-minded audiences. According to Meta, the parent company of Facebook, the creator economy is forecasted by some exploratory studies to reach more that $100 billion.
   
3. The growth of niche podcasts. One of the trends I’m witnessing is the growth of niche podcasts, programs that explicitly focus on specialized groups or like-minded audiences who share particular or unique interests by people not already famous for something. For example, The Marketing Book Podcast, hosted by Douglas Burdett, a marketing agency principal, features weekly interviews with authors of new marketing and sales books. Rather than cast a wide net, and appeal to a general audience Burdett’s podcast, now approaching 140 episodes for season 5 at the time of this writing and in the top 3% of podcasts, caters to a smaller, but more engaged community. Furthermore, the more niche, the less competition overall.
   
4. Podcast as a trusted news source. Where are people turning to consume their news? Would you believe podcasts? In fact, some reputable cable or online traditional TV news shows, magazines, and publications now have a podcast news companion. The Reuters Institute identifies three different sub-categories of daily news podcasts:  1.) Micro-bulletins, between 1 and 5 minutes, 2.) News round-ups, 6-15 minutes long, and 3.) Deep-dives like The New York Times The Daily, with a length of 20 minutes or more. At the time of this writing, The New York Times offers 25 various podcast shows including their top show, The Daily, which features “the biggest stories of our time, told by the best journalists in the world,” comes out daily at 6 a.m.
5. Podcast to revolutionize teaching and learning. For teachers, parents, and administrators, podcasting opens a new world of possibilities in all types of educational and academic institutions and environments. As a former adjunct instructor at New York University, supplementing my Integrated Marketing graduate course with pre-recorded podcast episodes on different subjects such as branding, consumer behavior, culture, and leadership reinforced lessons taught in the classroom and increased engagement. Audio learners, students who learn most effectively by listening, benefitted greatly when lesson materials contained a podcast equivalent. This also helped to diversify the subject matter and make it more interesting.

If You Remember Anything…

At the time of writing, there are over 5 million podcasts available worldwide, with 4.3 million of those being active. Similarly, there are an estimated 600 million blogs in existence. However, when you compare the number of podcasts to the 1.98 billion websites currently live, it becomes clear that the podcasting space is still in its early stages of growth.

I often remind our clients of this key point: “If you were starting a business today, would you avoid creating a website simply because there are nearly 2 billion websites already? Of course not—that would be absurd!” So why would you talk yourself out of launching a podcast or even a blog just because many already exist? There is still plenty of room to make your mark and connect with an audience.

Ready to stop standing on the sidelines? Your audience is waiting — and I’m here to help you take the mic. Whether it’s a podcast or blog, let’s amplify your voice. Connect with me today, and let’s make sure you’re heard where it matters most!

Working on your 2023 content strategy? Start – and finish – by thinking about your audience.

Follow these five customer-first tips for nailing the what, how, why and where of content creation and distribution. 

Put your content where your audience wants it. Start thinking about your website as an In-N-Out rather than a Target. Your audience isn’t there to browse aimlessly or discover some unexpected treasure in the home goods aisle; they want transactional information quickly. How much does this cost? What does it do? How does it work? Can you serve a business of my size? How do I get in touch with someone?

On social media and other content-specific platforms, like YouTube and Spotify, you have the opportunity to grab their attention unexpectedly with content that speaks to a problem they’re facing, a challenge they can’t figure out, the impact of news or market trends, or a new way to think about how they do their jobs. 

“But SEO” – Okay, publish the educational blog post on your website. But then do more than just link to it on social media. Pull the most important concepts into a text post, a slideshow, a short video, an audiogram or an infographic that they can view right in the feed itself without leaving the platform. 

Thinking this way frees you from the traditional whitepaper and blog shackles and creates new avenues for communicating your message that don’t necessarily translate to your website, including podcasts and videos. 

It also enhances shareability. Your reach on social media, for example, gets exponentially greater when your audience interacts with your content, making it visible to their connections as well, which is impossible to achieve on your website. 

Focus on what you want them to know, not what you want them to do. Shift your top priority from getting your audience to click, like, register, sign up, subscribe, download, or buy, to helping them understand something they didn’t know before. 

Making your message the main attraction and treating the CTA like a nice-to-have changes the kind of content you create to be more about what they need and less about the numbers you need to hit. 

Even if a potential buyer never clicks on your link, if they’re continuously consuming valuable, educational information from your brand, your content is doing its job (and it’s 2023. When they want more information, they know how and where to find you.)

Use your customers’ words. Not just in testimonials and case studies (although you should be doing that too). Use your customers’ words everywhere: In your messaging, in your ads, in your videos and articles, in all the ways you speak about your brand, your product or service and your value. 

They know best how to talk about the work they do, their challenges, and how they use your solution (or a competitor’s solution). 

First and foremost, talk with your customers – regularly – not just about your company, but also about what their days look like outside of what you offer. 

Read your reviews and your competitors’ reviews, not just to inform your product roadmap or upcoming enhancements, but to understand how your audience talks about what you do, and how it helps (or doesn’t help) them.

Spend time where they do. This could be in online communities, at trade shows or virtual events, at seminars, the list goes on. What questions are they asking each other, and how are they phrasing them? Keep a running list or document that you can reference easily.

The words they use should inform the words you use so that when they consume your content, making a connection becomes effortless.

Figure out why your content matters to them. This isn’t the well-worn features vs. benefits argument (both are important, by the way). It’s a question to keep front of mind every time you create a new piece of content: Why does this matter to my audience? If it doesn’t, how can I change that?

Press releases, for example, tend to be largely self-promotional. But you can take a press release, strip it of its traditional jargon, and promote the news yourself (in your audience’s language) in a way that speaks to the impact it will have on them.

Client case studies, too, tend to focus more on the product or solution and less on the actual experience of the client. Shift the frame to make your client the story’s hero so the rest of your audience can more easily see themselves in the outcome. 

Make it actionable. Whether it’s a new way to think about a problem or a practical takeaway they can execute on their own, the majority of your content should enable your audience to learn or do something.

When they put what you’ve taught them into action and it works, you build trust and brand affinity while encouraging word-of-mouth referrals from people who aren’t even your customers yet. 

TL;DR? In 2023, we are: 

• Thinking strategically about what channels to use for content based on what our audience needs and where they want to be.
• Prioritizing content consumption over clicks.
• Eliminating friction in both logistics and language. 
• Putting the audience first.
• Making content that matters.

We see it all the time: Businesses using their social media accounts as their personal billboards (for the purposes of this article, we’ll focus on LinkedIn, but the same ideas apply to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok). And the truth is, it’s easy to default to using LinkedIn strictly as a promotional platform for sharing your press releases, your product features, your benefits, your awards. 

It’s more difficult, but way more effective for building a loyal audience that actually wants to read your posts, to focus outward and use social media as a valuable, educational resource center – most of the time.

Because a percentage of your posts should be about you and what you do. LinkedIn isn’t a sales tool, it’s an engagement platform, which means it can be used in many different ways, a big one of them being for its original intention – job hunting and recruiting. Potential candidates will certainly be interested in what your culture is like, who your recent hires are, and what you bring to the market.  

But LinkedIn has evolved well beyond its roots as a career network. Across industries, people spend time on LinkedIn connecting with their peers and learning how to do their jobs better. Importantly, that does not mean they log onto LinkedIn to request a demo of your software or read about why your latest feature is such a game changer.

Flip the script. What can you offer your target audience on LinkedIn that has nothing to do with them buying anything from you? You know them – their goals, challenges, benchmarks, struggles, uncertainties – so use that information as your foundation for LinkedIn content.

When you’re putting together your social media calendar, the key is to ensure your Them: Us ratio skews in favor of them – your audience – and doesn’t lean too heavily on self-promotion as a strategy.

So who’s doing this well? 

Sales and marketing software big guns Gong and Metadata, with recent posts that include:

• Demand gen campaign dos and don’ts
• Tips for balancing demand generation with ABM 
• The impact of marketing and sales alignment on sales rep retention
• A common sales team hiring mistake, and how to fix it
• How to maximize your demand gen budget while your competition is cutting theirs

In the fintech space, Helios offers up their quant-driven research twice a week with market commentary and their Most Important Thing blog feature, both aimed at helping advisors communicate more effectively with their clients about what’s going on in the market.

Individuals have mastered this, too – just take a look at Dr. Daniel Crosby’s page for a compelling combination of behavioral finance insights, psychology lightbulbs and the occasional welcome dose of humor.

And perhaps no one offers more value-at-no-cost sales content than Josh Braun, who regularly gives away cold email templates, frameworks for improving sales calls, and real-life examples of applying psychology to sales.

Evolving Your LinkedIn Presence

Not sure where you or your company fit in?

Follow this simple framework for taking the ‘me’ out of your firm’s social media:

First, start with an audit. Look back through your last ten LinkedIn posts. Count how many are focused on you – what you sell, what you’ve won, why you’re great – and how many focus on what your audience wants to know.

If the ratio is seriously skewed in favor of posts about you, consider these tips for evolving your social media presence to be more audience-centric:

• Ask your sales team the top three questions they hear on prospect calls. Create posts that answer them.
• Go back to existing case studies. What problems were your clients facing before they found your solution? Build content around those challenges.
• Talk to your clients. What are they dealing with right now that may or may not have anything to do with your business? Encourage thoughtful discussions about those topics on your platform.

Once a month, go back and review your posts. Over time, that ratio should shift in your audience’s favor. The benefits of this are clear for them: Free, valuable content they can take and use to improve performance, profitability, engagement, etc.

But there are distinct, powerful advantages for your business, too – three in particular:

Shareability: When’s the last time you shared the news about some other company’s funding round or industry award with your team? Probably never. But a concrete list of five tips for improving client outreach, or a thorough breakdown of a new industry rule? Those posts are shareable because they help your audience either a) learn something new or b) do their jobs better.

And what gets shared may not get measured – there’s no way to track social media posts sent through Slack, for example – but it does get amplified. Shareable information drives your message outside of your immediate followers to a wider audience, reaching potential prospects who may not be following you on social media yet.

Brand affinity: People like people who help them. It sounds simple, and it is, but it’s also a powerful tool for business growth, especially if you’re in a commoditized space with a number of competitors. 

Word of mouth: Not everyone who benefits from your content will be able to buy from you – immediately or ever. But the somewhat ironic thing about creating content without the intent to sell is that it often ends up helping you sell after all – due in large part to grateful followers telling others about you.

We mentioned above that it’s difficult to track whether your educational posts are being shared through private channels like Slack, Teams, email or DMs. But there are ways to determine if changing your social media strategy from you-centric to audience-centric is having a positive impact on growth and revenue:

• Track number of followers on LinkedIn. Is it growing? More importantly, is the number of followers in your target audience growing?
• Look for qualitative indicators, like engagement in the comments from followers that match your ideal client profile.
• Pay attention to number of website visitors, especially via direct traffic or branded searches. These should increase as you ramp up your valuable, educational posts.
• Add an open text, ‘How did you hear about us?’ field to your demo or contact us form. People will report whatever their most memorable interaction was with you and your content.

As with any change you make in marketing, don’t expect to see results overnight. Give your audience-focused social media strategy at least six months to start making a difference.