I have been talking about content lately and for good reason. Whether you are doing search marketing, social media, blogging or updating / maintaining your web site the key component to all of it is content. Good, high quality content.
Does good content without the right intent really do anything? Maybe yes, but not as effectively as it should. Your online content should be created to fulfill one or several of the following criteria. If it doesn’t it will be less effective and may even be wasted.
Does your content:
- Inform – Content designed to inform customers or update clients about what you and your company is doing. Don’t assume that your customers are “up to speed” with all of the goings-on at your company. They are busy too and need to be reminded that you are you there to help them.
- Educate – If your customers look to you to help them learn something about a subject matter area that is important to their business make sure you tell them that you are educating them. How To’s and Lists can help educate. Note: Educating is about subject matter while informing is about events or details. They are different.
- Entertain – Business can be dry. Presenting your content in an entertaining fashion can serve to get more people to virally share it and even get business value from it. Not everyone likes the “technical writer” approach to business so entertaining them is OK.
- Validate – Are you looking to be viewed as an expert? Is your company the best at what it does in the industry? Sometimes you need to create content with the intention of building, fostering and validating your position in the marketplace. Talk about an area of your expertise with authority and you will be viewed AS an authority. It will be up to your customer to determine if you actually are one or not.
- Re-create – Oftentimes a company needs to reposition or re-create themselves. Maybe their image has gone stale. Well, the best way to show that change is taking place is to re-create oneself is through the content they generate. If you are struggling you can’t let your clients or prospects see it. Get out there and put your best foot forward with good solid content that tells your new story.
- Populate – I would say this is a popular one but one that needs to be used less often. This is the idea of creating content for contents’ sake. It is creating information to feed search engine bots. It is not as well thought out and less intentional than the other options. Try to avoid this kind of content creation mindset. Often this approach will result in “crap-tent” and that doesn’t do any good for anyone.
So are you creating content with intent today?
Are you creating content at all? If not you need to get moving fast because your competitors will be.
