It is widely known that content marketing is one of the most powerful, yet cost-effective means of generating B2B leads. About 88% of B2B marketers rely on content marketing to generate quality leads because their consumers are highly influenced by brands that educate them and are thought leaders in their domains. According to research by Conductor, consumers are 131% more likely to buy from a brand immediately after they consume educational content from it.
So, if you are a B2B marketer looking to develop an effective lead generation strategy, you have come to the right place. Before dwelling into specifics of content marketing, let’s look at what content marketing is and why it is central to a B2B lead generation funnel.
Content marketing is an approach whereby businesses use content such as blogs, eBooks, case studies, market research, videos, podcasts and so on to attract, engage and convert website visitors. The effectiveness of content marketing stems from the fact that consumers, especially those of B2B companies, have matured and now turn to search engines before anything else to fulfill their needs. Additionally, they are much more receptive to brands who prove their knowledge through their communications, rather than brands who simply push out advertisements.
Now that the benefits of content marketing are clear, let’s take a look at what goes into crafting an effective B2B lead generation strategy driven by content marketing.
Who should you create content for?
While it is fairly commonsensical, in theory, to begin your content marketing strategy by gaining clarity on who your content will be directed towards, in practice, most marketers abandon this step either completely or too quickly.
It is critical to ensure that you understand your customers in detail. And, a great way to do this is by laying out your customer’s persona. A customer persona seeks to personify your ideal buyer by chalking out details like demographics, psychographics, values, strengths, and weaknesses. Did you know that by undertaking this essential step, you could get a 2x jump in email open rates and a 5x hike in click-through rates?
Here’s what a typical customer persona looks like:
(Source: https://bit.ly/2XW5At3)
What should your content consist of?
Create a list of topics around the following objectives:
- Creating awareness
- Generating interest
- Stimulating desire
- Facilitating action
Then, before settling on any topic, ask yourself if your ideal buyer will be interested in it. If not, you should consider skipping it. You can also supplement this technique by finding out whether or not people are searching for things around your topic by taking the help of keyword research tools.
Besides themes and topics, you must also look at the forms of content you should invest in. Unlike a B2C customer that is interested in listicles, editorials, and entertainment-led content, B2B consumers value inspirational or educational content like:
- How-to-guides
- Tutorials
- White papers
- Case Studies
- Industry trends and opportunities
How to engage consumers with your content?
Email: If done correctly, email marketing can effectively support your lead generation efforts. Hubspot says that 93% of B2B marketers use email to distribute content, and 40% say email newsletters are critical to their content marketing success. Here’s what you should keep in mind before generating content for your next email campaign:
- Use subject lines that are eye-catching
- Keep emails concise and easy-to-read
- Address your customer’s pain point and offer a solution
- Add images or videos
- Include social sharing buttons
- Make sure there’s a call-to-action (CTA) linked to a relevant asset
- Test out different types of emails to establish what resonates with your audience
- Make sure that you have established a way to measure important metrics
Lead Magnets: People are reluctant to share their contact information unless you provide them with value in return. Lead magnets help you take care of just that. They are key to the success of your B2B lead generation strategy because they provide incentives to potential leads for leaving behind their contact details.
Types of content that can serve as lead magnets include:
- Ebooks
- Reports
- Webinars
- Quizzes
- Courses
- Videos
Search Engine Optimization: Publishing your content collaterals on your website and then enhancing its discoverability on search engines through SEO is a great way to ensure that your blogs are read by relevant people. To promote your content on Google, one of the most widely used search engines, you must ensure that the selected topics are validated through keyword research. Further, you should also try to incorporate relevant keywords within your blog. This will help you rank high when a relevant person searches on Google with those keywords. To step your SEO activities up a notch, get other reputed websites to provide backlinks to your blog.
As for your content, follow the ‘EAT guidelines’ to get search engines like google to favor you.
Taking care of the above-mentioned pointers will not only make your blog content more visible but will also improve your website ranking when a customer searches for services related to your website on search engines.
Social Media: A lot of people with high business decision making power are very active on Twitter and LinkedIn. Did you know that on LinkedIn, 4 out of 5 members drive business decisions?
Needless to say, promoting high-quality content on such platforms will go a long way in establishing you as a thought leader, driving more traffic to your website and ultimately generating relevant leads.
Conclusion
Content marketing is highly effective when it comes to generating B2B leads. It has the power to make or break your business.
To do content marketing right, you must start by drawing-up a customer persona. Then, you must select topics that are relevant to your customer persona and validate them through keyword research. Don’t forget to segregate your topics based on themes aimed at creating awareness, generating interest, stimulating desire and facilitating action. Additionally, you should try and opt for content forms valued by a B2B audience such as case studies, white papers, and tutorials.
After you have generated engaging content, you will be all set to promote it through email marketing campaigns, lead magnets, SEO and social media.
If you are interested in creating noise-cutting content marketing campaigns for your brand, contact us at Envigo, a B2B digital marketing agency, which specializes in content marketing services. Our experts will be glad to help you!