July 22, 2016
It isn’t exactly new news that content is king. Particularly on social where you have a noisy opportunity to connect with millions of people and conversations. The keywords there were ‘noisy opportunity’. If you do what the rest of your category or industry are doing, then your content isn’t going to stand out. Even if it’s boosted with plentiful Paid Media budget. You’ll be caught in the noise. Stand-out with great content and you’ll hook your opportunities to influence the buying-journey.
Social success comes from creating thumb-stopping content; irrespective if it’s organic or sponsored content, there has to be an eye-catching element. Landing content that truly connects brand to customer and doing so in volume, it is what we at IF call ‘relevancy at scale’.
But how do we approach this? Where do we start?
Well, you need to set your content strategy. To do that you’ll need to understand:
- Demographics of current customers
- Demographics of potential customers in industry
Listening tools, data sources such as GWI or TGI and smart analytical minds will be able to help you establish this key information. You need to understand your current buying personas versus your potential customers. Understanding their behaviours and interests is critical to unlocking social success.
Next you need to set your Content Tilt. Your Content Tilt is what sets you aside from the competition. Unique content being served into your specific market, with your brands personal slant. The ‘tilt’ or personalisation element is key. There must be a uniqueness to your brand position and its published content. If your content looks, feels and sounds similar to what your ‘nearest and dearest’ are publishing, then you’ve not tilted your content enough. Try again. Be bolder. This is about the brands who you remember and whom have great content. There’s a uniqueness to it. They’ve ‘tilted’ their content.
Next you need to determine your content goals. The obvious one being increasing brand awareness and driving incremental traffic. Ok, but if we’ve just ‘tilted’ our content that means what we’ve previously published won’t be right. This is true.
At this point you need to look at the customer journey. Like many ad agencies, we use the McKinsey Loop. It has been around since forever. It works. Use it.
The key points to look at (having just tilted your content) are 1 and 2.
- The consumer considers an initial set of brands, based on brand perceptions and exposure to recent touch points
- Consumers add or subtract brands as they evaluate what they want
Even if you’re a B2B brand, use this approach. See beyond the consumer reference and think about what the two points mean.
You need tilted content that truly lives your brand’s values and unique position within your industry niche. Ideally, customer touch-points should be with unique, stand-out and memorable content. Then, as customers move through the loop, and beyond point 2 – evaluation, there is greater potential for your brand to be added by the buyer. Of course this means at the moment of purchase, your brand is front-of-mind and in line for a product or service purchase.
Too many brands do what they’ve always done. They do what the industry is doing. What they should be doing, is looking for the unique content tilt and the right content goals. If you do that, then your content will be regal.