Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.
The Content Marketing Institute defines content marketing as:
A strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience. The goal is to create content that is useful, interesting, and engaging for your target audience, and that will help you achieve your business objectives.
Content marketing is not about blasting out self-promotional content in the hopes that someone will bite. It’s about creating content that is genuinely useful and interesting to your target audience, and that will help you achieve your business objectives.
There are three key elements to a successful content marketing strategy:
1. Define your target audience
Before you can create content that is useful and interesting to your target audience, you need to know who that audience is. Define your target market, including their demographics (age, gender, location, etc.), interests, and needs.
2. Create valuable content
Once you know who your target audience is, you need to create content that is valuable and relevant to them. This content can take many different forms, such as blog posts, articles, infographics, videos, etc. It should be useful, interesting, and engaging, and it should help you achieve your business objectives.
3. Distribute your content
Once you’ve created valuable content, you need to distribute it in a way that will reach your target audience. This includes publishing it on your website, sharing it on social media, and promoting it through email marketing and other channels.
A successful content marketing strategy requires a lot of hard work and dedication, but it can be a very effective way to attract and retain customers, and to achieve your business objectives.
