Is social media content the manager’s responsibility?

The answer to the rhetorical question above is a resounding ‘yes’. As the company’s manager, you are responsible for all communication, particularly the way in which your company communicates. This article will give you a picture of how Content Marketing should and can permeate this communication. We also consider how social media is controlled by feelings and how Content Marketing can be used in social media.

What is Content Marketing?
Given that the advertising salesperson calls the advert in the morning paper and digital text advertisements ‘Content Marketing’ and the advertising agency claims that the back of the milk carton is the same thing, there is every reason to want to tidy things up a little.

Definition of Content Marketing
Content marketing is a strategy which describes the content that is the target group’s areas of interest and is intended to drive sales by building trust. In order for your communication people to be able to call something ‘Content Marketing’, the content must take suitable channels by storm and be relevant, interesting, valuable and authentic. The content should actually come from you, ideally based on the brand that you are building.

How should you approach content development?
Regardless of whether content is text-based or consists of images, infographics or videos, it must be actively or furtively sought after by the target group. The more you give, the more you get back. It can be a good idea to develop ‘personas’ in order to personalise as precisely as possible. You should also be aware of where the recipient of the information is in their customer or purchase journey; then you will really be able to shoot with live ammunition.

That’s how your people should combine Google and Content Marketing
Content Marketing only takes place on suitable interfaces; the art is to generate traffic to these interfaces. Content Marketing is content which helps the target group to solve a problem by informing. Blog posts are a neoclassical example of Content Marketing, but far too often we see such posts being far too ‘selling’ in nature. This immediately makes the content less interesting for the recipient. Writing a sales text is not Content Marketing. Writing a blog post which actually informs people in an engaging manner is.

One of the reasons why Content Marketing works is that the recipient appreciates the content and searches for it on the web via a search engine. Here, it becomes a little more challenging to define as regards advertising via Google. Google and other search engines can help you to ensure that the content reaches the target group, but the content stays on your web and can therefore still be considered to be Content Marketing. This is true even if the person who is surfing finds the content by googling.

It is also very likely that you will need to expand the distribution of the content through earned or purchased media. It can therefore be a good idea to think SEM (Search Engine Marketing) and SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) right from the start.

This is an example of Content Marketing
What you are reading now is Content Marketing. It is an article which provides you with relevant information, which has a clear sender, which helps you to understand and which reaches you regularly with information which has been produced in order to tempt you into contacting us. Hopefully, you belong to our target group and by continually helping you to overcome challenges or informing you, we will perhaps win your trust and you will be drawn deeper into the sales and marketing funnel.

Content Marketing is a strategic initiative
Content Marketing is a strategic initiative and is best done by engaging internal experts within your company; ask them to share information which is important for the market. Targeted, continuous, structured and needs-based. For you as a manager, this is about establishing a broad understanding of content marketing and social media, and then enabling the market function to spend time on this, have fun and try out new things.

What conclusions are you left with?
We hope we have contributed to a greater understanding of Content Marketing, and how a content strategy should work in social media in order to drive traffic to your website. Developing internal knowledge concerning this can be challenging. Content market will become even more relevant when the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) takes effect. If the recipient does not actually like your content, they will undoubtedly not let you store their contact details, etc. In other words, you will lose the opportunity to communicate with potential customers.

Specific input in order for you
to succeed with Content Marketing as much as possible

Content Marketing meets the harsh reality of social media
When businesses have a presence in social media, their self-image often encounters a harsh reality. In this universe, the general public will neither be aware of nor “like” your company in the same way as those who work for it. The number of interactions and scope will not generally be very impressive. Why? Well, it is here that your content will encounter the harsh reality of the channels and the recipients.

Why make it difficult?
As is usually the case, there are no simple answers to difficult questions. Nevertheless, there are som basic rules and assumptions which can be applied. Businesses are often a little too formal and business-like in what they post. It can also often be embarrassing when unprofessional organisations attempt to be popularist. The best approach is to try and explain complex issues as simply as possible. This is an art in itself.

Why do you use social media as a private individual?
If you ignore the kitten videos, what are you interested in and what do you tend to become engaged in and share? This is a good starting point. You may perhaps be amongst the 90 percent of people on social media who are mostly passive and follow the one percent of those who constantly write posts, or amongst the nine percent who actively interact with what the one percent posts. These are generalised figures, but start by opening some mental doors yourself as regards the dialogue surrounding good content.

Use ‘the kitten principle’
To describe social media and the content that will work, it might be useful to think about kittens. In the past, people used to like pictures of kittens; now, people like videos of them instead. It is about entertaining or surprising the recipient. A press release rarely delivers in this way. Lower the threshold for tonality, be knowledgeable, fun and personal. People want to see a human side. The aim is to drive traffic to your own interfaces; it is there that the recipient will convert, and that is why the content must live on your company’s own interfaces that you own.

Use insight to find out what your customers like
It can often be a good idea to start with oneself, but this can also be a trap, and the insight that one obtains is only assumed. If you go through CRM, the marketing automation system and Google Analytics, and interview customers, you will obtain much more valid insight. The collective gut feeling you had might perhaps have diluted the content you produce, the tonality might be a little defensive and boring. Or perhaps you had missed what the target group is interested in. Find out who is following you; it might not be the same people who are buying your products. It might only be employees and their families who are following you. It might be time to think through new content which both highlights all your employees and builds a wider group of followers.

Do not allow SoMe to become a dumping ground for temporary content
Social media is not a channel where you can cut and paste what you have posted. You must have a strategy in order to succeed. This strategy must enable the inclusion of updates and algorithms from the big SoMe players. Facebook recently decided that they would highlight updates from friends and families to a greater extent in the various feeds, at the expense of content from businesses such as your own.