In the advent of digital marketing and SEO today, a lot of marketers are already aware of how important content marketing is. However, hard as they try, there are still some that just cannot get it. Many marketers still fail at content marketing.
Content marketing might be simple by definition. Literally, it is the creation, publication, and promotion of high-quality content to gain more traffic and brand awareness for your business. However, it gets more complicated as we go deeper into detail. And, this is where many marketers fail. In this article, we will discuss five of the most common reasons why a content marketing strategy is not receiving the expected results.
After reading this article, we hope that you already know how complex content marketing is and that for it to work, you need to be attentive and focused on it. Finally, you should also realize that in succeeding with content marketing, one must be ready to put in time, patience, and effort.
#1 – Freedom on Topic
The first misconception that a lot of marketers have about content marketing is that they think they can just go and write without any topic in mind. They just write whatever they can think of first without considering the interests of their target market. This just does not work. Ultimately, your audience will see your inconsistency and it can cause negative effects.
You need to plan out your topics right. There are generally two ways on how you can find proper content to write about. First, you can try doing the skyscraper technique. The general concept here is that you find existing content that are already performing high with its huge amount of social shares, traffic, and engagements and then repurposing it to create a better version.
Second, you can search for the questions that people ask on the internet. At Quora, you will be surprised at how varied the questions are. This is a great place for you to find a topic to write on. Just browse on and see the most common things that people ask about and then create content that centers on those problems.
#2 – Ignoring SEO
Many experts told you that providing high-quality content is important, right? But, what is the use of creating good articles if no one sees it when they search on Google? This is another mistake that many people make. They think that an online SEO service is not important and that publishing articles is the end game. These results in a sea of good content put to waste because there is no single traffic to all of them.
SEO will always be part of content marketing. Choosing the right keywords to incorporate in your content and putting it in the technical elements of the page is all part of SEO. Never take it for granted. Always consider both your audience and the search engines when you are creating your articles.
#3 – Automatically Going Viral
We could never really understand why some marketers think that when they publish their content, they automatically go viral. Reality check: even the most authoritative websites have content that is not viral. It takes effort if this is your goal.
You will never go viral if your only readers are yourself and your friends and families. You have to reach out. Promote your content as much as you can by joining online communities. You can even start your own community! Utilize social media to spread the awareness of your post. And, if it is not too much, find the people who are sharing related content and tag them.
#4 – Ignoring Measurements
It is also completely illogical to not pay attention to analytics. Analytics is basically what separates digital marketing apart from the traditional marketing. You should be thankful that with online marketing, you are able to see how your advertising efforts are performing.
Moreover, by analyzing your results like traffic and engagements, you will be able to think of a lot of ways on how you can improve your strategies. It is all about finding the right formula and analyzing your metrics is part of it. You will just be wasting your time in doing the same thing over and over again when it really does not perform well.
#5 – Giving up
Did you think that you can perfectly succeed in content marketing on your first try? Then, you have the wrong mindset!
At some point, you will be bound to experience failures. Content marketing is not simple and you need an ample amount of time to figure out a complete strategy that works. This is why you need to dedicate time to it. There will be instances when you need to go over each of the steps and see what works and what does not.
Never give up. There is still so much about content marketing you have not gone through!
Ultimately, content marketing is trial-and-error. We are not saying that by reading this article, you will be able to avoid committing the mistakes above. You will make mistakes before you know it. But, the most important thing is to do it right so you can identify it early and correct it.
