We often hear about the importance of content marketing and are so caught up in implementing it to our marketing. However, it’s important that you plan ahead because content marketing might NOT be right for you. Just like any other type of marketing, you have to make sure you plan ahead and understand how content marketing will help your business. Only then you’ll find out if it is right for you or NOT. I must admit implementing content marketing to your strategy can be very tough because of the following reasons which I’ll be discussing below. With that said,
Let’s look at some reasons why you’ll avoid content marketing.
Lack of Automation
Some people are NOT built for a systematic approach and rely way too much on automation. Content marketing is a strategy which requires very little automation and a lot of skill. If you are a blogger which can’t handle manual work then your going to have a hard time implementing content marketing. For example, content marketing requires:
- Testing
- Tweaking
- Research
- Writing
- Knowledge of products and services
With all this said it’s important you are ready to put in hard work and rely very little on automation.
Research
I mentioned research above and it’s true…you have to be able to put a lot of work into research. Almost everything you do will be based around research so it’s important you have the skills to know your audience and what they like. Research in content marketing involves testing the waters and using tools you have NOT used in the past. You have to take the time to learn these tools and dig out important information about trending topics and your audience. For example, here are a few things you have to always know about:
- Your audience
- Trending topics
- How to skim forums
- Blogging communities
- The right people to network with
Once you have the patience to research your niche only then will you be able to excel at content marketing.
Networking
It’s no secret that networking is a valuable tool in building brand awareness and exposure. However, not everyone is great at building relationships and this will be a definite roadblock in content marketing. Once of the best ways to get your content in front of people is through authority bloggers which you have networked with. They mention your content or even accept a guest post which can drive enormous traffic to your blog. However, if you are NOT good at building relationships then your going to have a serious problem. Here are some things you should keep in mind when reaching out to authority bloggers:
- Make sure you build a mutually beneficial relationships because it’s tough when one person benefits.
- Be genuine
- Be humble
- Appreciate their experience and credibility
- Always keep in touch
- Pitch the right ideas which add value
Explore Different Channels
Many bloggers simply don’t have the patience to explore different channels. For example, I’ve notice content marketing has a lot to do with value, but also visibility so you have to use different marketing channels. You have platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Google+ all ready to help promote your content, but you need to know how to use them.
I know many people simply don’t take the time to learn them so often have a problem with the whole concept of content marketing. If you don’t want to explore different marketing channels then content marketing is NOT right for you. It’s that simple!
Final Thoughts…
Content marketing is huge and will continue to grow over the years. I encourage everyone to implement it into their blogging. However, I know many of you simply don’t have the skills or patience to go through what I’ve discussed above. You might think you should avoid content marketing which is an option at this point however you are way better off learning and implementing then not using it at all.