First thing you should ask yourself: Is your competition investing the time and energy to implement a content marketing strategy?
Yes? Then you’re a little late to the game, but now is a great time to level the playing field, highlighting to your demographic your expertise in the field, speaking into their lives and providing value relevant to your industry.
No? Then this is a prime opportunity to separate yourself from the pack, reaching out to new potential customers, adding value to their life and gaining loyal customers in the process.
Either way, it’s probably time to proactively establish your brand in the digital marketing realm, taking strategic measures to position your business as the leading option in your industry.
Content marketing shows your audience that you are the brand committed to benefiting their lives, offering advice, humor or inspiration. It’s ok that they might not need your services now, but when they do, you’re the brand that has invested into bettering their lives. And by bettering their lives, you got them to invest time into your brand by engaging with your content.
Can your competition say the same thing?
Not sure what Content Marketing is? That’s ok, many businesses have hazy notions about what it really means. Check out our recent article “Why Do I Need Content Marketing?” outlining not only what it is, but why it is relevant to your business.
GROW YOUR BUSINESS
There is a chronic cycle hindering businesses from working on growing their business, initiating pipelines to funnel new customer streams and establishing themselves as a trusted expert in the community.
And it’s business.
As funny as that sounds, when business is good, all businesses get busy working in their business, addressing customer needs and working on supplying their products, many times neglecting to work on growing and strengthening the business itself. And the first efforts to fall to the wayside – marketing.
And the down cycle will come. Whether it is as predictable as the seasons, fluxes with the state of the economy, say in the form of recessions, or as sporadic as the introduction of new competition to the market, business will ebb and flow. Once the down cycle hits, businesses suddenly realize the need to aggressively market themselves.
While it’s never too late to develop dedicated efforts to market your business, marketing takes time. Launching an aggressive campaign in the throws of the down cycle won’t accomplish the gains you desire in a your ideal timeframe. In order to do that, you need to start before the down cycle.
The times when businesses are caught behind the curve are when their competition gains incredible traction. Plan for these times, not falling behind your competition due to neglected marketing efforts during the good times, by creating a year long strategy to position your business as the leading brand.
POSITION YOURSELF WITH CONTENT MARKETING
Creating and sticking to any long-term marketing plan creates challenges, but also great rewards. And content marketing is no different. But here the benefits not only raise awareness about your brand, but because you develop the scope and direction, you get the unique opportunity to highlight why your business is the best.
What other platform gives you the ability to reach directly into your customer’s life, showing them exactly what separates your business from the competition. With Content Marketing, you control the conversation. And with the goal of working on your business, growing your revenue streams, establishing loyal customers and limiting the effect of down cycles, what cooler tool could you ask for?
If you find yourself too busy with your day-to-day work to invest time in marketing or are looking for help to develop a strategic campaign, consider reaching out to Raindrop to develop and implement tailored campaigns to maximize your brand presence.
EXAMPLES
As an example, for tourism-based businesses in San Diego, winter brings with it a dry season every year. Knowing this, a hotel based on Coronado can plan ahead, focusing an entire campaign on the benefits of traveling to Coronado in the winter months.
By identifying competition in the region, such as LA, you can make a direct play to redirect travelers by highlighting how Coronado is the best vacationing place during the winter months because you enjoy off season rates, the safety of a small town, easy access to the night life of downtown SD and reduced traffic.
Don’t only use content marketing as a tool to plan for down cycles. Use it to position your brand, highlighting your unique value propositions.
Say you want to position your company as the business with a heart. Highlight each of the ways your team members volunteer their time, a company wide service project or the efforts your business supports each year.
Looking to demonstrate your superior knowledge of bikes? Develop a map with the best bike trails in the region, create a list of items every biker needs to have on them in the event of a flat, or run photo lapse videos of you creating the most incredible custom bikes out there.
DIVE IN TODAY
Ready to start? Check out our recent Getting Started article.
No matter if business is booming or you are looking to fuel more pipelines, the ability of Content Marketing to separate you from the competition by controlling the conversation, highlighting your expertise and key value propositions can be an incredible tool.
Remember, the opportunities to position your business through content marketing are only limited by the time and energy you put into building a long-term strategy to highlighting what separates you. Let us help you with this process! Contact Raindrop today and let us show you how affordable a fully developed and implemented content marketing strategy can be.
BENEFITS CONTINUED
Separating yourself from the competition isn’t the only benefit of Content Marketing. Keep an eye out for our next 4 articles will which highlight other key benefits of content marketing.