Cutting through a Saturated Market
Cutting through the chaos and noise in a Saturated Market is tricky.
By now, you’ve likely heard a bit about “content marketing”, an effective way to use your experience and authority to provide useful information to your audience.
In practice, content marketing is not so simple. It takes a lot of effort to build and maintain the right sort of audience. The general wisdom holds that the average person is so constantly bombarded by information that they are increasingly reluctant to devote their scarce mental resources to (underline) really hearing any message you might want to convey. With the right strategy, however, you can cut through this content saturation.
Here are five tips to getting your message to penetrate the noise of people’s everyday lives:
1. Know Your Audience
For such a simple concept, this fundamental step is often overlooked. Put yourself in your audience shoes and frame of mind. Is this useful to them? Does the topic catch their eye, and provide them with relevant tips or information? Make sure you can easily answer these questions with a resounding YES before producing and distributing the content.
2. Stick to a Schedule
You can’t just post a great article then let yourself off the hook for a while. The key to establishing an engaged audience and a base of future customers is to keep them coming back to you for new material. Knowing that you’re going to be producing, say, two articles every week will foster a readership that consistently engages with your brand, and helps build rapport with your audience.
3. Dare to be Different
If you work in a unique or narrow niche industry, there’s only going to be so much insight you can provide that hasn’t already been picked over by yourself or your competitors. To avoid being repetitive, you need to establish a unique voice or perspective with humor, wit, or a deeper insight. Cut through the noise in your industry with your distinct voice, and your readers will look forward to a different feel to possibly similar information.
4. Call on Experts
Give yourself a day off every now and then and reach out to an industry expert for some guest-created content. They will likely have a unique perspective that adds some appealing variety to your regular repertoire, and can add flavor to the scope of your blog or production.
5. Pull in the Eye
In the age of Twitter, it’s important to recognize that people’s attention spans have shrunk dramatically. They are more inclined to absorb short, punchy messages than to read anything in great detail. Remember to include some video every now and then. Eye catching, bright, and unique images or infographics help the reading digest and assimilate the information, as opposed to a drawn out, monotone diatribe.
In the new era of content marketing the marketplace of ideas can be terribly unforgiving. Make sure you give your readers something useful, in a unique voice, on a regular basis, and the brand engagement will follow.
The bottom line: if you remember to speak to your audience in a unique, fun, and helpful fashion, you’ll be on the right path. Don’t be afraid to get creative- if you’re standing out, you’re winning the marketing battle!
A big thanks to Hugh Moore at Emerging Insider Communications for these valuable points on effective marketing! See the original article on Entrepreneur.