Did you know that more than 2.5 quintillions (2.5 million trillions or 2.5 billion) of data is being created and shared daily? This says a lot about why you should take your content strategy seriously. Especially when it comes to choosing the right content channels.
Here are three rules for a successful content marketing strategy:
Rule #1: Your content strategy should by dynamic enough to leverage different content forms. These include written content (text), visual content (images, videos), or a mixture of both (infographics).
Rule #2: A well-planned content strategy backed by a content calendar saves you from creating random (and mostly useless) content. So, you need to dig deeper and find out what your target audience is interested to learn about.
Rule #3: When we say that you should create content regularly, sharing it on the right content channels inevitably comes to mind. That’s because:
- Every content marketing or distribution channel offers a specific audience.
- Not all content channels go hand-in-hand with your products or services.
Most of the time, businesses get stuck with the third rule. In this post, we shall discuss what exactly needs to be done to fill loopholes.
Need Help to Market Your Business? Get the Right Consulting
If you’re constantly failing to get your content noticed, it’s high time you should consult a professional content marketing agency. The right content marketing consulting can help you:
- Build a solid strategy from scratch, or
- Tweak your existing content strategy to start paying dividends
But sometimes, there’s a missing link, and you can find the correct answer by simply refreshing your memory. For example, a quick look into finding and picking the best content channels might just be what you need right now.
So, without further ado, let’s get started.
Content Channels Serve Different Purposes
Suppose you want to start and promote your life coaching expertise. What would you do?
A straightforward answer would be to find and invest in the best content distribution channels. But where should you start? Which track would make the lasting impact?
Vlogs, blogs, guest posts, and newsletters are excellent content distribution channels to make people aware of your products and services. But they have different purposes.
Let’s find out which content marketing channels serve what purposes.
Gaining Authority
An eBook is an ideal channel that blends perfectly with content marketing for startups. This channel offers you an opportunity to showcase your experience and expertise. You have a chance to make an impression and mark your authority.
Remember that 88% of customers prefer to buy from authentic brands. So, it would be ideal for writing informative eBooks on life coaching and getting more customers.
Building Relationship
Social media is the perfect content channel that allows you to build customer relationships. It is a great way to interact with your target audience and learn about their requirements one-on-one.
Such are Facebook groups, especially those with thousands of followers. Because they can help you make an immediate impression and even find a new customer base. In addition, you can share your content directly in these groups and bring more attention to your brand.
Educate and Inform
Another significant purpose of content channels is to educate and inform the audience. Therefore, you can conveniently share relevant content with your audience on different media platforms.
But you can’t mindlessly share content and hope to make an impact. People look for information that can add value to their lives. To generate content tat is useful and productive for your target market. You will see how more people engage with you when you do.
5 Steps to Choosing the Best Content Channels to Market Your Business
Now, let’s find out how you can choose the best content channel for your business.
1. Focus On Your Goals
The marketing channel you’re going to opt for should meet your objectives. Therefore, be sure about what you want to achieve out of your marketing efforts.
Throughout their lifecycle, businesses make strategies to accomplish different goals. For example:
- Generating leads
- Penetrating the market
- Educating people about their brand (or raising awareness)
- Increasing sales revenue
- Expanding reach, and others
These goals set the foundation of your marketing strategy. When you have a clear picture, you can find the proper content marketing channels and set up your content strategy accordingly.
You must know that every marketing channel has a different working format. While some provide you satisfactory performance, others may be better at achieving specific goals.
You can take social media as an example. It is a great way to strengthen your relationship with your existing customer base while expanding your horizons. But a billboard will only raise awareness about your brand among the target market without having any human connection.
You must know your goals to choose your marketing channels to achieve the most out of them.
2. Know Which Platforms Your Target Market Uses
You should not only know about the demographics of your target market but also about their interests.
- What do they do on the weekends?
- What sort of media do they consume daily?
- What apps and websites are more common among them?
- What keywords are they using on search engines?
An average internet consumer is bombarded with media clutter all day long. So, to ensure your marketing strategy is effective, you must know precisely when to communicate with them.
So, instead of trying to reach them at a more convenient platform, get them where they are already available. For instance, if you’d like to communicate with Millennials, launch your campaign on LinkedIn, Instagram, or even Reddit.
If you’re trying to reach Gen Z, YouTube, Instagram, or TikTok will work. The point is, you should know where you will be able to get your target market and then use that platform to grow your business.
3. Stay In Touch with Your Consumers
One mistake most business owners make is communicating with their target market only at the beginning of the journey. They don’t stick around till the end, and that is what, in turn, makes them lose their audience.
It makes sense, though. Talking to your consumers initially, addressing their complaints, and always being available kick-starts a business. But not nurturing these relationships once the conversion increases also slows down the growth.
Let’s take another example here; you go on a date, but once the date is over, the person you went with doesn’t call you back. Won’t that make you feel forgotten and deflated? The same goes for a business-customer relationship.
We are not saying that you should be available 24/7 to address your target market. But you can generate auto-messages, so that when someone reaches out, they feel heard. As a result, you can encourage a more meaningful relationship and ensure brand loyalty.
You can look at available channels to help you stay connected with your audience before, during, and post-purchase. This will maximize the success of your marketing campaign while keeping you connected to your audience throughout their journey.
4. Draw Out Competition
Are you having trouble finding the right direction? First, identify which ones are your most successful competitors and observe which marketing channels they are using. This should give you solid insight into the path you should be heading.
You will know which channel will be more effective for running all your marketing efforts. You can always have a digital presence on all content media to market your business to millions of people online.
5. Create a Solid Strategy and Analyze the Results
We hope by now you have achieved the following things:
- Determined your goals
- Have taken inspiration from your competitors
- Discovered platforms that your target market is most frequent at
Where do you head next? The whole point of us writing this down was to give you an idea about which marketing channels are the most fruitful for your business. But your marketing efforts don’t stop here.
A marketing campaign isn’t something you can design and then forget about. Instead, you need to constantly test the waters, optimize your approach and stay updated on the platforms to ensure relevance.
Only this can help you achieve optimal results. Moreover, with the growing demand for high-tech platforms, you can now check insights and analytics on the given media. So, keep observing your insights to ensure the success of your marketing campaigns.
Any time you feel you’re not getting the results you anticipated, change your tactics and start again.
Find the Right Content Channels
Content marketing is one of the factors that keep businesses afloat. But the entire content strategy falls apart if you overlook the importance of choosing the right content channels.
Content marketing and distribution channels let you send your message across to the right audience. You can utilize these channels to gain traction in the market, educate the masses, build and strengthen relationships, and expand your reach to new markets.
We hope the steps mentioned above will help you find the best content channels to boost your marketing efforts. But if you still struggle to execute your content strategy properly, you should consider content marketing consulting.
A professional assessment and recommendation may just be what you need to kickstart your journey to success.
Good luck!
Article guest written by Daniel Martin. Dan has hands-on experience in digital marketing as far back as 2007. He has been building teams and coaching others to foster innovation and solve real-time problems. Dan also enjoys photography and traveling.
Last updated March 16, 2023
