Addvocate + Trapit = A Recipe for Content Marketing Success [Infographic]
Content marketing is a lot like cooking. With the right ingredients, the right measurements, and the right recipes, you’ll be able to serve up scrumptious morsels of content to your audience.
This week, Addvocate and Trapit merged. Together, the combined company provides you with the ingredients, utensils, and appliances you need to become a maître cuisinier of content.
In the graphic below, you’ll see how you can take our technologies’ ingredients and meld them with the tastes of your company. That way, you can deliver piping hot content to your hungry audience at the right time and in the right places.
Let’s take a look at the infographic closer. First up, the ingredients…
Ingredients
1. A hearty content strategy
Your content strategy is like salt. From salty pretzels to savory treats like chocolate chip cookies, every recipe needs salt. Similarly, every content team needs a strategy.
Unfortunately, only 35% of content marketers have a documented content marketing strategy. Which means that a lot of people are committing random acts of content.
To help you develop a strategy and tactics, we created an interactive content curation workbook, which you can download and fill out.
2. A heaping spoonful of content sources
Created content is important for any business. You need your e-books, customer testimonials, and case studies. But most marketers are not able to create enough content. The Aberdeen Group has found that 68% of marketers are unable to create enough content to satiate their audience.
So, what do companies do? They rely on content from other sources. Heck, even those marketers who can create enough content could benefit from some third-party content.
Why? Sharing only branded content is like eating only Snickers bars for the rest of your life. At first, gobbling up nougat, caramel, peanuts, and chocolate for every meal might sound appetizing. But after a few days, you will have quite the tummy ache.
The same is true of sharing only branded content. Your followers will get sick of reading branded post after branded post, and they will begin to file those posts away as corporate spam. To break up the monotony, it’s wise for marketers to share third-party content. In fact, the Aberdeen Group has done a study on this subject. They found that best-in-class sellers rely heavily on content, especially third-party content, to close deals.
With Addvocate-Trapit’s library of over 100,000 sources, you can find the third-party content that you need, and you can co-mingle it with your created content.
3. An assortment of publishing channels
This goes back to your content strategy. Where are you going to serve up your piping hot content?
To give you a few ideas, you can create e-mail newsletters. You can share content on your social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, and LinkedIn. You can share content internally to educate your team.
Those are just a few examples. The most creative people will find new ways and innovative techniques.
4. Your executive curatorial chefs
Someone needs to oversee the cooks in the kitchen. Many times, the best content marketing team will have a few people overseeing their recipes so that you have different opinions and perspectives. Does this taste too salty? Is this too sweet? Is this too hot?
But remember: Nothing gets done if you have too many cooks in the kitchen.
5. A handful of helpers
In order to get your message out there, you need a human face. You need helpers who will promote your brand’s messages and represent your brand well.
Did you know that 90% of people trust recommendations from people they actually know? So, why not have your employees support your marketing efforts by sharing your messages with their peers?
Directions
1. Plan it.
Your content strategy needs some planning. Think of it like creating a menu. You need to think about the flavors and foods your customers will want? In the case of content, what themes and types of content will your audience want?
To help you formulate your content menu, here’s a page from our content curation workbook.
Download the rest of the workbook here
2. Discover it.
There are 1,600 varieties of bananas alone, and scientists continually make new varieties. In a similar fashion, people keep making more and more content.
Every minute:
- Facebook users share nearly 2.5 million pieces of content.
- Twitter users tweet nearly 300,000 times.
- Instagram users post nearly 220,000 new photos.
- YouTube users upload 72 hours of new video content.
- Apple users download nearly 50,000 apps.
- Email users send over 200 million messages.
That’s quite the smorgasbord of content. In order to sift through the content and find the tastiest items on the internet, you’re going to need some help. Through our product’s machine learning and artificial intelligence, our platform shrinks the internet, and it learns your tastes, making it easier to find what you and your buyers want, when you want it.
3. Curate it.
Most chocolate chip cookies are good, but there’s nothing quite like your grandmother’s special recipe. Bakers and chefs have to leave their mark on their food. And the same is true of your content. You have to add something memorable – a spicy point of view, a sweet certain tone of voice, or a salty remark.
In short, don’t be bland.
4. Share it.
Don’t hoard all the good stuff for yourself. When you create or discover a real treat, share it with others. The channels that you use will depend largely on your company’s goals and profile. You may want to tap into Facebook’s 1 billion users who are looking to be entertained. Or maybe LinkedIn’s more “serious” platform is for you.
Remember: You shouldn’t serve soup on a plate, nor should you serve the same content across all social channels.
For instance, your LinkedIn followers may want to read industry news and how-to posts, but your Pinterest audience is going to want infographics and photos.
5. Amplify it.
Expedite your created and curated content to your waiters and helpers, and let them pass it along to their followers. Let them be the “front of the house” for you.
Trust me, you’re going to need their help.
Right now, the reach of brands is plummeting. But individual users still can reach their audiences. In fact, they can reach an audience that is 10 times larger than what your brand is reaching through its social channels. That’s a lot of reach. Why not use them?
6. Analyze it.
Some recipes are great and are worth repeating without making any changes. Others need small adjustments. And let’s face it, there are some recipes that are total duds you simply have to ditch.
When creating and curating content, you have to figure out what works. With the analytics and reporting capabilities of Addvocate-Trapit, you can determine what success looks like for your content strategies.
Ready to start cooking the perfect content meal?
You can read more about how Trapit works and how Addvocate works. If you’re interested in either product, feel free to contact us to request more information.
We look forward to hearing from you soon!
-Mark