Doing More With Less: Content Marketing
Traveling around to various industry events and talking to marketers over the past year, one comment kept coming up time and again: “We’re trying to do more with less.”
That sentiment came in a couple of different contexts. Companies trying to get more out of their technologies and tools. Leaders looking to better optimize and personalize their customer engagements. And marketers wanting to get more out of their content.
For this discussion, I want to stick to the content aspect of this focus. Because the number of channels and methods of content are rapidly expanding faster than teams and budgets are growing. Expectations to reach customers wherever they are have risen dramatically, leaving so many companies unsure of where to start.
So that’s what we’re going to do here. Although here’s the thing: doing more with less isn’t really the goal here. That concept is a bit off. It’s about doing better with what you have, increasing your efficiency and success rate. It’s not necessarily more work. Just smarter work.
Here are a handful of high level tips and strategies to get you on the right path to more engaging content, without a massive investment.
The 75/25 Rule
There are several uses of the 75/25 ratio in marketing. The more popular deal with the balance of SEO vs other content or value vs sales. But my use of the 75/25 rule is in the form of how you approach your content: 75% proactive and 25% reactive.
Plan out 75% of your content and leave 25% of the content as flexibility. As you start the new year, you’re ideally building out a plan with your major pieces of content and focal points for the year. But it’s impossible to predict what’s going to happen or what could change in six months. Balance is a necessity.
Too many companies go chasing after trends or scrambling for content around the next shiny object as they pivot their priorities and focuses. It’s a lot of wasted time with no clear direction. If you have a sound, thought-out content plan that you execute well that accounts for the majority of your content (75%) then you’re going to have time to still go after important reactionary themes when they arise.
Write Once, Publish Twice (and More)
You know the carpenters’ adage “measure twice, cut once”? The inverse should be your matra for content marketing. Don’t spend all your time coming up with 50 different topics that go out into the world once before you’re on to the next one.
As you are creating the content plan mentioned above, you should have a handful of pillar/anchor/whatever name you want to give pieces. These can be ebooks, webinars, events, or other pieces of thought leadership. Maybe you have one per quarter or one per month. The point is that you’re using every part of it across your channels.
Think of early Americans who used every bit of the land and their resources for all of their needs. An animal could be food, clothing, tools, etc. The same is true for your content. Let’s say you’re publishing a holiday readiness guide. Don’t just launch the piece and leave. There should be enough content goodness in there to be repurposed across channels. One ebook or report should get you multiple blog posts, infographics, social posts, ads, and fodder for email campaigns.
It’s so much easier to create six pieces from one topic than it is to come up with six different topics that are only pushed out once.
What Happens Next?
So you have a content calendar and know what you want to push across social, email, your site, etc. Similar to the write once, publish many times advice above, one of the biggest pitfalls you can run into is seeing and treating your content as a singular touchpoint.
Always ask yourself: “What does the audience do next?” If you’re creating an email campaign, what do you want the reader to do and where do they go next? What’s the next action? Don’t create a social post without knowing where they’re being driven and what they should do next. Or a website page without knowing how it ties in and what their journey should be after it.
Let’s go back to the holiday readiness guide example. What does that journey look like? You share it on social with a link to your site. On the site, there’s a form for them to download. Filling out the form triggers an auto-response email with the PDF. Now they’re in your system, so how do you nurture them? Don’t move onto the next content topic until you have thought through and planned for the entire journey of your first content piece.
Ask For Help
If you don’t have the time, resources, or ability to take this on yourself, find a partner that can help steer you in the right direction. Your business does what it does every day and knows your field better than anyone. So make sure your content is in the hands of someone who also does it every day and knows it better than anyone.