How to Develop a Content Marketing Strategy

Saphyte Team

3 min read

Updated: July 11th, 2023

To achieve business goals, marketers need to develop a content marketing strategy that is designed for their organization’s needs, as well as their audiences’. Read on to find out how to start making yours.

Many businesses plan to write blogs, post on social media, and send bulk emails to their target audience. But many also don’t know where to begin.

It’s understandable. According to a report, 74% of companies observed that content marketing increased their lead generation results. Those with a content strategy also achieved 27.1% higher win rates and 18.1% higher quota attainment.

That’s why 90% of marketers continue investing in the channels they focus on using a content marketing plan.

In this post, we’ll talk about what content strategy is, why it’s important, and how you can develop your own content strategy that is designed for your unique business needs and your target audience. Let’s get started.

What is a Content Marketing Strategy?

A content marketing strategy is a plan of action or policy that uses content (blogs, articles, videos, among others) designed to help organizations achieve their business goals.

Most business organizations use the content for the following:

• To increase brand awareness in the market
• To attract and generate more leads
• To engage leads, nurture them, and convert them into customers
• To remind customers of the brand and make a repeat purchase
• To retain customers and reduce customer churn

A successful content marketing strategy will help businesses achieve their targets and goals, like those mentioned above.

Why is it important?

A content marketing strategy is important because it ensures that the content that you’re sending out is doing work.

Remember, it’s not free to produce content. It requires time, energy, and company resources to write articles or publish videos. That’s why a strategy is important to make sure that they work.

It’s also important to note that your competition is sending out content too. Your strategy should take this into account because the first content the customer receives may lead that customer to ignore all other options and make their first purchase.

7 Essential Parts of a Content Marketing Strategy

What should your content marketing strategy be made of? Here are seven essential elements to take note of:

1.   Your target audience

The most important element of your content marketing strategy is understanding your target audience. Who are they? How do they behave? Getting the right idea about your target customers lets you decide what to do in the next steps so you can get your message across effectively.

2.   Their needs and preference

Of course, each customer has a need that they have to address. Understanding each customer’s needs and preferences lets you provide an offer that is relevant and responsive to their unique situation.

3.   Your competitive edge

You need to know how to market your unique selling proposition (USP). What makes you different from the rest? Why should the customer choose you among the competition?

Knowing your competitive edge allows you to drive your message home— telling the customer to ignore all other options and just focus on your brand.

4.   Your content format

Not all customers respond positively to blogs and articles, some prefer the video format. Choosing the right content format for the right customer is critical to getting them to consume your content.

5.   The channels to focus on

This is extremely important especially when you market on social media. Understanding which platforms your target customers is likely to use lets you optimize your content performance, especially when you choose to run paid ads.

6.   Your team

The success of your content marketing strategy depends on the team executing it. Choosing the right people to implement tasks and run workflows is an important part of the strategy.

7.   The evaluation

Last but not least, evaluating your performance lets you spot what needs to be corrected in your strategy and what needs to be retained. Use the right tools and metrics. Learn from industry peers and be ready to adapt.

5 Steps to Develop a Content Strategy

Now that you know what elements to focus on when developing your content strategy, it’s time to make one! Let’s dive in.

1.   Set a goal

Goals are what would determine what your plan is going to look like and how it’s going to be implemented.

There are many goals to choose from. When planning their content marketing strategy, many businesses aim to:

• Generate more leads
• Establish brand awareness
• Drive sales
• Retain more customers

2.   Know more about your customers

Clearly defining your content’s target audience also allows you to be more specific about your content marketing strategy.

It lets you produce more relevant and valuable content that they’ll want to consume and which will, later on, push them to become customers.

Customer profiling helps you know more about your customers:

3.   Choose your tools

It’s going to be hard to run a content marketing strategy, especially if it’s your first time. Choosing the right tool makes the job easy and also helps you become more efficient in your tasks.

Tools like Saphyte’s Drip Marketing lets you send emails automatically on schedule to your target customers.

4.   Determine your content

There are several content formats to choose from and your content will largely depend on your target audience. Among them are:

• Blogs.
• Videos
• Podcasts
• Infographics
• Emails
• Case Studies
• Ebooks
• Lead magnets

5.   Explore and experiment

The success of many content marketing strategies today can be attributed to their willingness to explore and experiment. Evaluate what’s working and what isn’t. Try something new and see how far it goes. The sky’s the limit.

Want to know more about content marketing tools?

See how Saphyte’s tools can reinvent the way you engage with your leads and customers. Talk to us and get started here.