Or the art of failing successfully
Tell us if this sounds familiar: you want to use content marketing to gather data from potential customers. But to create content that will attract the right prospects, you need to first have data on them. Does not compute? You wouldn’t be the first organization to crash on this modern day paradox.
In this blog we’ll solve this daunting marketing riddle and help you create content for audiences you don’t even know yet. Spoiler alert; get ready for an endless tale of (re)targeting and (re)creating. Let’s dive in!
Use content to get data
Knowing what content works for your audience is always hard. Even when you know your business through and through. But it especially becomes a challenge when you’re starting from scratch.
Do you have a new organization or (sub)brand, do you offer a new product or service? Maybe you want to try your luck with new audiences? Then you probably have to start out with virtually no data on your new target group. Research only brings you so far. The big problem is: the better you know your target group, the more poignant and relevant your content is. So how can you still create content that gets the job done before you have a vast library of data? That depends on your goal.
Content to generate data for leads
Start with what you know. Create personal and insightful content that showcases the knowledge, expertise and skills of your organizations. That way, people who are in need of your services or solutions will naturally gravitate towards your content.
Be generous. The more precise and insightful the knowledge you are presenting, the more data you can ask in return. Your content also becomes an organic method to test if what you’re presenting naturally peaks interest. Use this new well of data to create personalized content and start generating leads quickly.
Content to generate data from a big group
Do you simply want audiences to be aware of your existence? Then a content piece filled with intense knowledge might not be the optimal way to go about it. Create accessible content that has a clear link with your brand, and that might be of interest to a lot of people. Cast a wide net with enough specifics to make it feel like you.
It would be wise to offer up this content, especially when you don’t really share insider knowledge, freely without expecting their intimate data in return. Simply by clicks, the number of unique visits and how quickly they bounce, you can get a lot of data on what content works and will get you the awareness you want.
Use data to create better content
Content always leads to data. Even when it seems like it doesn’t. When a piece of content does not get the results you were hoping for, this offers vital insights. Where did your piece of content go wrong? Why did it not reach your audience? There’s a lot of reasons why content might not lead to the best results. Maybe the input was just not useful to your audience? Or did you simply post it on the wrong channel?
Whether your piece of content worked or flopped, bundle those insights and let them shape your next attempt. The more content you’ll create, the more learnings you’ll have at your disposal to create content that really hits the spot.
Repeat infinitely
The job of a marketer is never done. Even when you feel like you’ve cracked the code for great content and are swimming in data, people quickly get bored. Your content should use the winning data you’ve used in the past but should be ever-evolving and always on the look-out for new ways to scoop up even more data. Find new interesting topics, new ins with other target audiences and keep re-evaluating what works.
Maybe you keep creating content that is loved by many, but it doesn’t generate the leads you want? Or are you only generating leads in the same specific niche, even when you try to reach new audiences? It’s important to know why things fail, but it’s as important to know why they succeed. That way you can keep tinkering with that winning formula.
Feel inspired to start gathering data cleverly through content? Just because we advocate for experimenting, doesn’t mean you cannot build on existing knowledge. We have helped many organizations accumulate data and create killer content. Pick a winner’s strategy.