What is content marketing?

Content marketing is a marketing tool used to create and distribute valuable, relevant and consistent content to attract and acquire a clearly defined audience – with the aim being profitable customer action. The key to this type of marketing are the words valuable and relevant, without them it becomes normal informational garbage. If an individual gets to the end of a marketing piece and feels like they had to finish it that is bad content marketing, it should be stimulating and an easy read causing the individual to want to read it.

During the stages of buying a potential customer needs to realise they have an awareness of a need and research to learn what exactly it is they require. Content marketing is key to these stages as it raises awareness of solutions and educates consumers about a product they may have never considered before. To put this concept into practice content marketing can be seen in many forms. Infographics these are generally long, vertical graphics that include statistics, charts, graphs, and other information that increases the users knowledge. If you have a timeless infographic it can be passed around on social media for years.

Podcasts an interesting podcast can be heard by thousands and spread a message that without the web would have been heard by few. Videos, creating interesting stimulating videos is a great way to content market. Many think podcasts and videos cost a lot of money to look professional but with the improvement of technology and the decreasing of price these methods are becoming cheaper than ever.

Content marketing has 3 main benefits, it causes an increase in sales, it saves costs as it is cheaper to put out an interesting article or video then a whole advertising campaign, and it causes customers to be loyal. Context marketing is therefore a key and easy marketing tool for marketers to employ on the web, as long as the content produced is relevant and valuable to the customer.