Content marketing lets you get your business name and brand out in front of your target audience. Effective content speaks to your customers’ pain points, offering solutions and guiding them on their customer journey.

Content increases your visibility online, casting your business as the authority in the industry and driving traffic to your website. Among small businesses, 99% report that they see positive results from their content marketing efforts.

However, the key lies in learning how to employ content marketing effectively. If you run a small business and want to build revenue for your brand, here is what you need to know.

Why small businesses need content marketing

Content marketing generates three times as many leads as other strategies, commonly called traditional outbound marketing. With content marketing, your goal is to create material that addresses the issues that matter the most to your customers.

For example, if you have a plumbing business, you might create material that explains how homeowners can protect their pipes in the winter. If you run an IT firm, you might create content outlining basic cybersecurity practices all businesses should have in place. This material helps customers see you as the trusted authority. Then, when they have problems with their pipes in the future, or they realize keeping up with all the cybersecurity practices has become too much for them, they turn to your businesses for help.

The internet has become a critical component of people’s daily lives. Eighty-one percent of retail shoppers say that they will make online searches before they make a purchase. Similarly, 90% of B2B buyers will start their shopping journey with an online search. You want to make sure you have produced quality content that your target customer discovers as they make these online searches. Content marketing is your cornerstone.

The benefits of content marketing for small businesses

Content marketing offers several benefits for small businesses that you will want to seize. Here are some of the most common advantages we see:

• You increase the visibility of your site. When you have content that regularly answers customers’ needs, your site will become more visible to customers as they search online.
• You will drive more traffic to your site. Increased visibility means more visitors and more people can enter your sales funnel.
• You increase your brand reputation. Quality content associates your brand with expertise.
• Your content marketing can serve you for years to come. Unlike an ad that disappears after it runs, the content lives on your site as long as you maintain it. That article you wrote can still attract customers months or years later.

How to get started with content marketing for small businesses

Now that you have begun to see some of the benefits of incorporating content marketing into your brand strategy let’s explore how you can get started with content marketing. Done right, content becomes the voice of your strategy. And that means you

Step 1. Know who you want to target. You need to identify precisely who your target clients are. Consider factors like their income, background knowledge, budget, and who else has to sign off on their purchase decisions.

Step 2. Identify what matters to these target customers. Know what your customers are concerned about and what questions they have. Look at competitor sites, research keywords related to your industry, ask your sales team what customers ask, and ask your existing customers what they want to learn more about.

Step 3. Create a content calendar. A calendar helps you keep your content focused and on track. For example, if you want to produce a blog post every Friday, you might create a three-month calendar outlining your topic for each week so that all you have to do is sit down and write.

Step 4: Promote your content. Remember to call people’s attention to your new content through platforms like social media. Let people know when you put out a new piece of content to start bringing in traffic.

Creating a content marketing strategy for small businesses

Eighty percent of those who excel with content marketing have a documented strategy. To create this strategy, you want to identify your goals with content marketing. For example,

• Do you want to increase traffic?
• Do you want to increase sales?
• Do you want to increase your market share?
• Do you want to raise your website on the search engine results page (SERP)?

Once you know how you want to succeed, you can then identify the indicators you will use to measure your success. Knowing what you want to achieve with your content will also help you choose your content topics and target your audience effectively.

Therefore, create a basic content strategy that outlines:

• What you want to achieve
• Who you are targeting
• The topic you want to cover
• How you will measure your results.

Measuring the success of your content marketing efforts

Finally, as you put your strategy into action, make sure you carefully measure your success. Use the metrics you defined earlier to monitor your success as you develop your content. Note which content is more or less popular and how customers interact with your content before buying. These insights will help you refine your strategy moving forward.

Build your small business with content marketing

Content marketing for small businesses can help power visibility and success. If your company has not yet implemented a content marketing strategy, consider how you can use this information to raise your visibility and bring customers to your door.

If you’d like more insights on how content marketing can help your business scale, book a free consultation and let’s talk.