14 Nov 5 Content Strategies That Will Boost Your Sales

One of the best ways to boost sales is with a knockout content marketing strategy.

Written by Daniela Cavalletti

6 min read

We all do only business with people whom we know, like and trust. That’s equally true for your potential customers. So in order to connect with new customers, who will generate sales for you and your business, you need to give prospects a chance to get to know you. To like you. And ultimately to trust that you are the best person (or business) to solve their problems and address their needs.

A well thought through content marketing strategy is key to making this vital connection.

Content Marketing Strategies – The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Do you ever feel like you are beating your head against a brick wall when it comes to your content marketing strategy? Where to start? What to talk about, what to leave out? And what actually makes a good plan?

You’re not alone – it’s super tough out there in content marketing strategy land.

You may think you are ticking all the right boxes by writing regular blogs, dutifully tweeting and updating your website but quite frankly not much is happening. Customer queries are sporadic and lead conversions sparse. It sometimes can seem like you’re bobbing along solo in a content bubble; with not much converting to leads or sales.

If some of that resonates with you, it’s time to revisit your content marketing strategy.

Five Effective Content Marketing Strategy Steps to Increase Sales and Customers

At its heart, content marketing is about building an audience to achieve increased sales and more loyal customers. The problem is that everyone else wants that too and cutting through to your time-poor potential customers is becoming difficult … but not impossible.

Try the following tips to boost your sales and customer numbers – by improving the content marketing for your business.

#1. Someone Has a Bad Case of the Me, Me, Mes

Everything you do with your content marketing strategy, should speak to your audience, i.e. who they are; why they need help and what you as a business can do to make their lives easier. Content marketing is never about a hard-core sales pitch. It’s not about talking yourself up or impressing your peers. When it comes to your content marketing strategy, the focus should be on your customer; not about how much information you can sneak in about your products and services (no matter how good they are). Remember that, yes, they need to get to know you, but more importantly the need to like and trust you. Understanding and listening –  not boasting – will generate trust.

So you need to know your audience – inside, outside and backwards. What they like, their needs, wants, which social media they prefer and what makes them happy or annoyed. Knowing whom you are trying to convert will make formulating your content a whole lot easier. You can find out more about your ideal customer by doing the following:

• Undergo some formal market research – research companies can set up client panels or send out surveys that deliver a wealth of information.
• Send out a survey to your existing database.
• Search under your keywords in Quora, Yahoo Answers and on social media.
• Read blogs and publications relevant to your industry and business.
• Go to a conference or relevant event and meet your potential clients in person.
• Chat to some of your most loyal customers.

• Interview your sales team/customer service about them.
• Trawl your in-house database to identify characteristics of best and worst customers.
• Evaluate your web analytics reports.

#2. Choose Your Words Wisely

Now that you are intimate with your audience, create content that will be interesting, entertaining and informative to them. If it helps them in some way, they will be more engaged and more likely to trust you. Try to to write about more specific topics rather than general content that is thrown out there with little thought. Engagement leads to conversions so make sure you offer a good mix of the following in the content you produce for your customers:

• Solve a problem
• Give useful and practical advice
• Fill in an information gap
• Address concerns
• Educate them
• Offer an informed opinion.

Writing authoritative content that is well researched with informed opinions will more likely position you as an industry leader and gain your business blog and other marketing content more of a loyal following.

Original, fresh content is also viewed favourably by Google’s search engine ranking algorithms so write quality (absolutely no crap content!), write more than 500 words (over 1,000 would be a bonus) and write at least once a week.

Also remember to ditch the jargon and write in easy-to-understand language that a newcomer to the subject would understand.

#3. Keep your eye on the prize

Make sure you know what you want to achieve with a content marketing strategy. This is driven by your business plan, advertising strategy and wider marketing aim. Have some big bold main goals, but also keep an eye on any obstacles or opportunities you may encounter along the way.

What ideas and messages do you want to communicate and what’s your unique selling point? All this needs to be creatively incorporated into what your audience wants and needs – and is interested in reading.

Remain flexible – leave some room for topical news or developments in your industry that you are bursting to comment on. Part of the prize is that you gain trust; and that can only be achieved if you remain authentic and personable.

#4. Give Them Some Sugar

Once you have an audience that is actually engaging with you, make sure you take the time to stay connected with them. In your content marketing strategy, ensure you account for follow-up time and communication. If your readers – aka potential new clients – comment on your blog or social media, comment back. If you can, keep rewarding your engaged audience in some way, whether it be with discounts, competitions or content freebies.

Mix up the formats to make it interesting for your followers to be part of your audience: by using a variety of media, such as images, videos, infographics, e-books, checklists and podcasts. Remember to use different presentation of materials, e.g. Q&As, ‘Behind the scenes’, interviews, and customer profiles will all help keeping your readers engaged and feeling part of your tribe.

#5.Work it Baby

You’ve built a following, now you have to make their engagement work for you – and them. Trust has sprouted via your online communications, but your content marketing strategy has to keep nurturing this still fragile belief in you.

Your next content marketing strategy step towards a one-on-one conversation with your readers could be sign-up calls-to-action that capture their details by offering a tip-sheet, free e-book or another freebie in exchange.

Of course, once you’ve ‘hooked’ them, you want to convert your connections into sales leads. But whatever next steps you choose, choose wisely: keep your promises, follow up. Too many content marketing strategies (and sales lead conversions) come to nothing because of a lack of timely, friendly and appropriate follow-up.

Create appropriate drip campaigns that address the needs of each of your customer sectors – and keep the promises you’ve made to them in each communication piece of your content marketing plan.

And finally, you regularly should measure how well your content performs, analyse its progress and adjust your content marketing strategy accordingly.

For your benefit, yes – but also for your audience. Because without them, there will be no customers. And no sales.

Listen and they will come 

So there you have it. The marks of a successful content marketing strategy that will convert your readers into customers, and leads to sales:

Understand your audience, attract their attention with relevant messages, build and nurture their trust – and only then make your offer.

Cavalletti Communications can make developing and instigating a content marketing strategy easy-peasy lemon-squeezy. Get in touch with us now to find out how we can help make your life easier by writing all those pesky but oh so important blogs, social media messages and other important elements.