Content Marketing World sessions kicked off this morning at Cleveland State University in Ohio, and industry expert David Meerman Scott provided the keynote presentation for the morning session.
Among the key points Scott addressed was the importance of timeliness in the delivery of branded content. For businesses opting to use news content marketing, businesses must find the balance between delivering headlines as soon as possible and maintaining quality and accuracy. With that in mind, hiring professional content writers capable of writing quickly is critical to the eventual success of an initiative. Additionally, social media marketing provides an outlet for businesses to provide real-time updates to fans and followers.
Whether businesses need site or social content, content writers with strong backgrounds in brand journalism will also help success, as Scott emphasized the need for content marketing to tell a story. Any article must be valuable for consumers and provide information that interests them. Ultimately, content marketing is social platform. A reader should feel compelled to share the piece with friends, followers and others on social networks.
As with any marketing initiative, it can be difficult for businesses to measure the ROI of a content marketing program. However, Scott believes CMOs and other decision-makers need to understand that the value of real-time content marketing will manifest itself if given the chance. Based on his own research of major publicly traded companies, Scott found those using content marketing are 5 percent more successful on average.
Ultimately, the success of any content marketing strategy is dependent upon equally reliable social media and SEO campaigns, and businesses should be ready to invest in these areas to remain competitive. Brafton recently reported that social media marketing budgets are expected to increase from 7.1 percent to 10.1 percent of total marketing budgets in the next 12 months.
