Creating great content is top of mind for an increasing number of companies looking to expand market share, and with that, new content marketing plans are popping up like wildfire. It’s one thing to take great content, design a strategy and build an editorial calendar with countless activities – but quite another to position content that directly influences and may even guarantee a conversion. Because lead generation is a critical activity for all businesses (in fact, their livelihood), and many recent resources have been allocated to content strategy, companies are putting all their lead-gen eggs in the content marketing basket.
There are countless platforms to reach customers. However, the question arises – what works best to get (and resonate with) business-generating leads?
White Papers/Thought Leadership
White papers positioned as premium content often succeed in generating some of the most conversion-prone leads. While it is free, companies that do well with white papers usually sell prospects on the contents of it as if it was a valuable product the chance would typically pay for. These reports are also highly shareable if they contain practical, functional or groundbreaking content. The white paper is not a tool designed to sell prospects but rather inform. Ideally, The reader should walk away thinking they’ve learned something valuable and can use the white paper to make a purchase decision. The key to accomplishing this is the content combined with strong and clear communication.
Personalization
The ideal personalization strategy approach to content can benefit both the user and the brand it supports. Driving higher conversion, the content provided to the user is beneficial and aids in saving the user time in searching for products or information they need. Apps, interactive interfaces, community building and surveys can be built and delivered to users better to understand their tailored likes, needs and preferences.
Webinars
With actual value-added cache and monetization opportunities, webinars can be an ideal lead-gen platform to position a brand as a leader in the market. Webinars have gained significant traction across multiple industries, with professionals seeking to enrich and inform themselves on various topics. Bringing a more personal face to the content is a fantastic tool for marketers. Focusing on a specific topic relative to the target audience is a powerful segmentation tool. If orchestrated well with the right mix of content and presenter, webinars bring an already engaged audience closer to conversion.
It’s important to note that secondary platforms should all support these activities to drive their importance – such as email marketing, social media, sales follow up and customer testimonials/case studies. What will work for one company and target market may not work for another, so taking a trial-and-error approach to these relatively low-cost lead generation implementations is recommended. If not already in place, work with a creative content team to develop a rock-solid content strategy and marketing approach to leverage the brands’ vision and turn content into dollars.