4 Essential Content Pillars For Your Brand's Marketing Strategy
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4 Essential Content Pillars For Enhanced Brand Content
In 2020, it’s not enough for your brand to solely be using your professional website to market and attract new customers. In fact, I’m going to be bold for a second and say that your website is one of the last places people will visit. Why is this? Because marketing has made an aggressive shift away from businesses’ individual platforms to the mass consumption of social media content.
So, whether you’re an established brand in your niche or just starting out - you need to be mindful of where people are looking for services and products, how they are behaving in these spaces and what types of content they engage with the most. Today, I want to solely focus on providing you with a kickstart guide to increase your brand’s marketing strategy by explaining the 4 most important content pillars.
Let’s take a look at what type of content you should be producing and where you need to be sharing it in order to attract new business, build community and grow your brand.
Visual Content
The first content pillar is one that most brand are already using - visual content. Visual content comes in various forms and can include:
Creating original photography to showcase your product/services
Using UGC - user generated content - which is where your customers post pictures of them with your product / using your service and you repost that content to your own platform
Infographics that allow you to express some kind of data or trend
Memes that give your brand the relatability aspect and draw attention by entertaining your audience
Graphic design in the form of typography, objects and elements that match your brand’s creative eye and vision
Visual content is one of the easiest ways to build a content stream. This is because you stockpile visuals and disperse them on your social media profiles over a set period of time. For example, you could hire a photographer for a day and have them create 50 images for your brand. You could post one of these per day paired with another type of visual, as explained above, and have a month’s worth of content.
Additionally, visual content is incredibly important because the majority of our media is influenced by photography. We consume our information either on our phones or computers, which are both highly visual forms of technology. Images are placed all over our advertisements, articles, search results and social media profiles. Therefore, the images your brand shares online will be one of the first pieces of content your customers consume.
Photo by S O C I A L . C U T on Unsplash
So, where are the best places for your brand to share your visual content? Here are the key platforms:
Instagram: This one is an obvious choice as it’s the leader in photography. You should be posting a minimum of 1 image per day, but aim for 2 or even 3 since the recent algorithm changes have made visibility a bit more difficult. Additionally, you should be using stories to their full effect. This means posting and sharing content throughout the day in addition to what you place on your feed.
Pinterest: Another visual application that hinges on great photography and inspiration. You can pin the images you post on Instagram right to a board on Pinterest using the Pinterest Browser Button. You can also upload your own images manually. Just make sure that your caption is descriptive to what your image is about.
Tumblr: If you’re in the fashion, lifestyle or travel space, Tumblr is a great place to post your images as a source of inspiration. Although it may not be as popular as it was 10 years ago, it still serves a platform for discovery. Many images that are reblogged on Tumblr can lead a user to your other social media platforms.
Snapchat: This app is also used often by businesses to keep their content fresh and appealing to their target audience. If your customers are in the demographic of 18-30, Snapchat may be a good place for you to “post in the moment” photographs and videos. Check out Quick Sprout’s guide on How To Use Snapchat For Business.
Video Content
When marketing your brand, you want your audience to feel connected to what your business has to offer. Therefore, utilizing video content allows your consumer to put a face to your business and get an in-depth look at your production, operation, values and culture.
Video content has been slowly taking over the visual market for the last several years. And, in truth it will most likely be the number one form of content sooner rather than later. So, while it’s still important for you to post images on your social media - video is the future.
Photo by Sam McGhee on Unsplash
If you’re going to create video content there should be two forms that you stick to:
Advertising: Any brand or business needs to have advertising to showcase their product or service. This type of video content should be creative, engaging and directed by a professional team. You’ll want to use this across the web in order to attract new customers with an unforgettable video spot.
Youtube: According to Brand Watch, “1 billion hours of Youtube are watched every day.” It’s a platform with almost 2 billion users and boasts an incredible amount of content from creators and businesses around the world. If you’re not already using Youtube as a brand or business, you need to start right now. It’s an immense opportunity to get new eyes on your business and give your brand the wholesome feel it needs.
For example, let’s say you’re a sneaker company. How would you use Youtube to build your brand and gain an audience of sneaker-heads? Create workout videos that people can do for free with the instructor wearing your gear and plugging it several times in the video. Or, create style videos that showcase how you can put together an outfit with your sneakers. The opportunities are endless and by creating videos on YouTube you can gain a whole new audience of customers, showcase your products/services and build a down to earth brand identity.
Written Content
While some may argue that blogging is dead, I can say that I highly disagree. Blogging and posting articles to your brand’s website is one of the most effective ways to bring in new traffic that compounds over time.
Blogging is directly related to how our search engines work and operate. In short, if you post highly informative, searchable articles to your website - people will land on your content due solely to the fact that they were browsing the Internet. Here’s a few examples of how blogging can be used to grow your website’s traffic and increase customer acquisition.
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If you’re a fashion brand, you can use your blog to post fashion tips and styles. Discuss the latest fashion trends and then plug in your latest products for the reader to shop from.
As a skincare brand, you could post articles that relate to taking care of your skin, what foods help maintain proper skin nutrition and formulas that are guaranteed to give you that young, youthful look.
If you’re a CBD brand, write about how your products help with mood, better sleep and lowering your stress levels.
Or, as a home improvement service you could post articles that show people how to DIY projects, fix a leak or what tools are best to buy for their next home fixer upper while plugging in your service or adding product links and generating affiliate income when a reader makes a purchase.
There are many ways for your brand to effectively utilize the world of blogging and wield the power of the search engine, Google. There’s more to learn on this subject, such as how to determine which articles you should write or how to use SEO (search engine optimization) to find keywords that apply to your business and will increase your visibility.
I’ll create another post on this in the future, but for now - you can check out Open Vine’s article on 6 Ways To Optimize Your Blog Posts Using SEO.
Audio Content
The final content pillar your brand should be utilizing is audio. Auditory experiences are another effective way to reach your audience through the use of advertisements and original content.
Photo by Kate Oseen on Unsplash
As we know, many of your customers are discovering new businesses, shopping and making decisions via their cell phone. Therefore, integrating audio content into your marketing strategy will allow you to reach consumers where they are the most active. Here are some ways you can use audio to market your brand.
Advertising: One area where audio advertising thrives is on music apps, such as Spotify, and on podcasts. Despite having a premium feature without advertising, many users still use Spotify for free which places advertisements between songs every 30 minutes. While this space may be more expensive, it’s worth creating an auditory advertisement for a specific launch or initiative.
Additionally, you can also place your advertisements within various podcasts. Start by looking for podcasts that relate to your niche. Inquire about their advertising, whether the host promotes the product/service themselves or if they allow original ads to be placed within the time slot of their show. Depending on the audience size, your brand could gain a solid amount of new business by utilizing this method.
Create Your Own Podcast: Going back to podcasts, if you want to build brand recognition and image - you’re better off with creating your own unique and original podcast. To do so, you’d need to create a show that focuses on the singular topic of what you offer as a business. Here are some examples:
If you’re a food company you could create auditory episodes relating to anything about food, cooking and the kitchen. Walk your listeners through how to cook a specific recipe, give them a breakdown of the best places to visit in their city or have special guest speakers come on the podcast to discuss their experiences and insight.
As a homeware company, you could discuss everything that has to do with the home. The latest trends in interior design, how to spruce up your house on a budget, perfecting your dining table or how to match your walls and floor.
If you choose to go the podcast route, think of this type of content as indirect marketing. You’re not going to spend every episode plugging your brand and boasting about how great you are - no offense, but who would want to listen to that?
Instead, think of your auditory content as providing value to your listeners. Give them content they look forward to and return to weekly. With the subtle advertising elements you throw in for your own brand, you’re guaranteed to bring in new customers all while building authority in your niche.
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And, that’s it! 4 content pillars for enhanced brand content and a solid marketing strategy. Utilizing these methods in unison are guaranteed to expand the influencer of your brand across every relevant platform.
Did you find the breakdown of these 4 content pillars to be helpful? Which ones are you currently using for your brand’s strategy? Drop me a comment below with your thoughts.
If you need help determining what content pillar your brand should tackle next, you can reach out to me at james@thehhub.com