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In part 1 of this post, we discussed two of the five most important content marketing tactics to improve your campaign return on investment. The first was to understand your target audience and the second was the selection of the right platforms. If you haven’t read that, we suggest that you read that here first.
In this part, we will discuss the remaining three tactics that you should use to get a higher ROI from your content marketing campaigns.
Ready to learn what they are?
Here you go …
3. Use a good B2B content mix
As mentioned earlier, it is important to use the right type of content to target prospects at different stages of your sales funnel.
Here are some key types of content for B2B marketers, along with tips on how and when to use them. We have already discussed blog posts and guest posts, so these are in addition to those.
Videos
Videos are the most effective at explaining new concepts or teaching people how to use your product. As a B2B marketer, you can use videos for product demos, tutorials, providing tips, and a lot more.
Given that videos are really good at attracting audience attention, these can be used during the initial stages of a buyer’s journey. You can use a video to introduce your brand or product to a wide audience and drive them through the sales funnel.
Explainer videos, however, are also useful in nurturing leads and helping them make a purchase decision once they reach your website. Airtable, for example, uses an explainer video on their product page to make it easier for people to decide whether they want the product or not.
Webinars and online events
Webinars, podcasts, and online events are great both for attracting and nurturing leads. You can win the attention of the right audience and engage your existing one using them.
Trello, for example, has a whole section on their website for on-demand webinars aimed to help their prospective and existing customers. They cover topics ranging from productivity tips to using the various features of the platform.
E-books and guides
Ebooks and detailed guides work brilliantly as gated content to attract new audiences and get their contact details. These are the types of content that are most useful and are desirable enough that people will fill out a form to get them.
You can use these at the beginning of your B2B content marketing funnel to attract users and get their emails to build your email list.
Whitepapers, reports and case studies
Whitepapers and industry reports are very good ways to attract new audiences and bring people to your website. These drive a lot of organic traffic as people look for statistics or other useful data related to an industry or topic.
Case studies, on the other hand, are useful at later stages when a prospect is thinking of making a purchase but needs more convincing. Case studies can provide the required proof to nudge them to make the final purchase decision.
4. Conduct thorough topic and keyword research
Selecting the right topics and keywords is the basis of a successful content marketing plan. Here are some important tips that you can follow for B2B keyword research and topic selection:
- Use an advanced keyword research tool like SEMrush to create a list of all relevant keywords.
- Select metrics like keyword difficulty and search volume to select the right keywords.
- Don’t aim for the most popular keywords, rather, focus on the ones for which you can realistically rank.
- For topic research, see what kind of questions people ask about a topic or keyword and answer those through your content.
- Use a tool like AnswerThePublic to find these.
- Use long, conversational keywords like the ones people would actually use to search for something.
- For example, let’s say you want to target someone looking for an email marketing platform that is not expensive. For that, you might want to use “best budget email marketing platforms” even though the search volume for “email marketing platforms” would be higher.
- This will allow you to reach a more relevant audience
Also, don’t forget to account for and optimize for voice searches. The use of conversational keywords is useful for this as well.
5. Provide social proof across platforms
B2B sales conversions take much longer than B2C ones as business customers are more difficult to convince. Social proof is necessary if you want to drive conversions using content marketing.
In this section, we will discuss various ways you can provide social proof on different platforms, along with examples.
Ready to learn more?
Let’s get started.
Website
Client testimonials, product/software reviews, case studies, etc. are good ways to provide social proof on your website. Most of your sales conversions happen through your website and this is where you should add social proof to convince your potential customers.
For example, Bizzabo has a unique way of showcasing their client testimonials on their website. They use a visual representation to highlight customer testimonials, as shown below.
Social media
Reposting customer reviews/testimonials on social media and using influencers are effective ways of providing social proof. You can share testimonials, feedback, reviews, etc. as social media posts or Stories.
For example, Buffer often posts customer feedback and testimonials on their social media pages.
You can also collaborate with influencers and ask them to write brand or product reviews to improve your credibility and provide social proof to potential customers.
Ready to increase your content marketing ROI?
The best way to increase content marketing ROI is to focus on driving more conversions rather than worrying about the costs. You should invest in creating good-quality, useful, and relevant content targeted at your audience.
Use these five tips to attract, engage, and convert your leads into customers. These tried-and-tested methods will ensure that your B2B content marketing efforts are on point and deliver a high ROI.
Shane Barker is a digital marketing consultant who specializes in influencer marketing, content marketing and SEO. He is the co-founder of Attrock, a digital marketing agency. He has consulted with Fortune 500 companies, influencers with digital products and a number of A-List celebrities. You can find him on Twitter and LinkedIn.