As a business in San Diego, you will create content, all in the hope that it will grow your business online. But a content marketing starter plan removes the word ‘hope’ to drive your business forward. Below are 6 tips to create a content marketing plan for your small business:

Tip 1 – WHY are you creating content?

Most San Diego businesses being asked this question are probably unsure as to the real reason why they are creating content.  There’s no clear direction or strategy and that’s a problem.

Content needs to be of high-quality. It needs to be relevant to your audience. It needs to be informative and not overstuffed with keywords and phrases, and so not created to entice people to buy.

Tip 2 – Setting goals for your content

You will want the content you create to accomplish goals for your business. Here are some common themes to content creation by other San Diego businesses;

• Raising/maintaining brand awareness – a buzz around your business means customers return and new ones find you. It is your chance to show people who and what you are.
• Provide value – some businesses and organizations take the opportunity to add value to their services with quality content. ‘How to’ articles and videos, for example, are useful and valued by customers.
• Earn traffic – links that are genuine and content that answer search questions boost your website rankings.
• Acquire more leads – when people find content, they can be asked to join an e-mailing list and this in itself can swell your customer numbers.
• Build community and connections – the online world doesn’t have to be disconnected and anonymous. Content can build an enthusiastic and thriving fan base.
• Promotion – content promotes your business in many ways but specific content can be created to promote something specific

Tip 3 – Create content for your audience

Many years ago, content wasn’t created for readers or customers but for search engines. Short pieces of content were rammed full of keywords in their extract format. Many articles and blog posts made very little sense in terms of language, grammar or how helpful it was to the customers.

This has changed and yet, so many businesses still don’t create content for their customer demographic.

The next time you load a blog post or spend dollars on creating a video, ask yourself is this what my customer wants?

What is it that your customer wants or needs to know? What is the best format to put this in – is it a blog, a how-to guide, a downloadable set of instructions or a video… or all of these things?

You may also find that what you produce, how and when changes based on the type of business you operate.

Tip 4 – Vary the content

In some ways, these tips are steps to a creating a content marketing strategy and we are now at the stage of deciding what format the information will be delivered.

• TOPICS – topics can be many and varied but providing they have a connection with your business, products or service, they could prove invaluable to your customer. What questions are your customers asking? What are they talking about on social media?
• KEYWORD ANALYSIS – this allows you to see what search terms and questions customers are using to search for products or services like yours. By using this key phrase in your posts, you will push yourself up the rankings.
• COMPETITORS – don’t copy what your competitors are doing but it is worth looking at their blog and so on to see what direction they are taking. But consider what they are missing too? Is there a gap that you could fill?
• FORMAT – what format works best for your customer? There is a growing range of content-vehicles from podcasts, videos, blogs, guest blogging, white papers, newsletters, downloadable guides…

Tip 5 – How will content be distributed?

It’s a sad fact that there is a wealth of amazing content out there that no one has seen, no one has viewed and no one has read.

Why you may ask?

Because most small businesses aren’t taking the right steps to amplify their content.  They need to be commenting on other blogs, posting to social media, and building the right buzz to get people to talk about the amazing content they create.

If you aren’t familiar with the digital marketing strategy of Outreach, we recommend you read about it to see the value it can bring to helping distribute your content.

Tip 6 – How will you measure success?

Are people finding the content? Are they commenting on it? In other words, how will you measure the success of what you are producing?

Think back to Tip 2 when we talked about setting goals. In effect, measuring the success of your content means answering the question of has it boosted brand awareness? Or has it earned more traffic to your site?

But more importantly, if you have a plan and a strategy fueling it, content will create a return on investment for your business.  You just need o track it to make sure it’s successful.

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