Content is king – what?

What the heck does content have to do with kings? You may be wondering the same thing. Or maybe not, in which case you can skip reading this post.

Content is king simply means that content is the best way to extend your reach over the Internet. Gone are the days of “push” marketing, where companies broadcast their brand messages. The new and much more effective way to market is using content to educate, empower and entertain prospects and customers.

Sounds like a lot of work, doesn’t it? Well, the good news is that companies don’t have to all the creating. User-generated content is very effective.

What’s user-generated content? Anything from product reviews, to message boards, to testimonials, to what’s being said on social media.

There are also many different types of content. Content can be:

* written – blogs, testimonials, product reviews, questions & answers
* pictures – how about some of your customers using your products
* videos – same as for pictures
* audio – webinars or podcasts.

Here are some quick tips to get you started:

* determine goals for your content marketing
* use different types of content
* make it educational NOT promotional. People want you to solve a problem for them.
* make it interesting!
* be consistent
* measure results against your goals so you can know what’s working and what isn’t.

Technology makes it easy for anyone to put up content on the Internet. That’s both good news and bad news. Just because you can do something quickly, doesn’t mean you should do so without thinking about it.

In the next few posts, I’ll be talking about some mistakes in content marketing and how to fix them.

Photo courtesy of Giopuo at flickr.com under Creative Commons Licensing.