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Content
marketing

Content marketing is a marketing technique that involves creating and publishing high-value content to attract visitors to a website, spark their interest, and convert them into customers.

Why Has Content Marketing Become Indispensable?

Content marketing is a key driver of what is known as theinbound marketing, or inbound marketing. This strategy involves attracting consumers to a brand through a carefully planned journey designed in advance. Potential customers remain free to make their own choices at all times; the inbound approach simply offers options rather than imposing them.

Conversely, theoutbound marketing, or outbound marketing, reaches consumers by sending them advertising and promotional messages. In the field of digital marketing, this includes social media ads, sponsored links, email campaigns—in short, everything that pops up in an internet user’s daily life.

Although these two approaches are complementary, inbound marketing—of which content marketing is one aspect—has now become indispensable. Consumers are increasingly wary of advertising encroaching on their privacy.

Here are a few figures to better illustrate this trend:

  • 84 %
    People aged 25–34 do not visit a website because the ads are too intrusive.
  • 77 %
    Many online customers prefer to receive emails for which they have given their consent.
  • 90 %
    Consumers research products online before making a purchase.
  • 80 %
    Some internet users are completely unaware of sponsored links such as AdWords.
  • 36 %
    Some French people use an ad blocker online.
  • 70 %
    Some consumers prefer to discover a brand through original and creative content.

What Are the Benefits of Content Marketing?

A well-executed content strategy offers numerous benefits.

Content marketing makes it possible, in particular, to:

Increase Your Traffic

Relevant content optimized for SEO provides greater visibility.

Position Yourself as an Expert in Your Industry

High-quality blog posts build your credibility and increase your prospects' trust in you.

Generate leads

You reach a new audience while building your database of prospects—for example, by offering e-books for download in exchange for an email address or by having people sign up for a newsletter.

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To work on your branding

The tone you use and the originality of your content help define your identity and set you apart from your competitors, while building and retaining a community. As a result, your customers become your brand ambassadors and take it upon themselves to promote your business.

Web Writing and Different Types of Content

E-books and white papers

Longer, more in-depth, and more detailed than blog posts, e-books and white papers are types of content that allow you to both showcase your expertise to your readers and grow your email list by collecting email addresses in exchange for downloads.

This is typically the second step in an inbound marketing process, with your visitors downloading the ebook after reading one or more articles on your blog.

Infographics

They help summarize information that can sometimes be complex and are highly valued by internet users.

Placed in the middle of a blog post, they lighten up the overall content and hold your visitors' attention longer.

Videos

They help increase your traffic and keep visitors on your site longer. They’re also easy to share on social media and can quickly go viral.

Podcasts

This type of content is constantly growing in popularity and is also highly valued, helping to build user loyalty.

Define Your Editorial Line

Content marketing isn't about rushing headlong into producing a flood of content that isn't well-suited to your target audience. You need to know who you're talking to, why, and how.

The goal, therefore, is to determine—based on the data you have gathered through audience analysis or from your first customers—:

  • What are the needs of these buyer personas,
  • What are their consumption habits,
  • What are their expectations,
  • What are their interests,
  • What are their values? What can you—and you alone—offer them?
  • that they won't find with your competitors.

Content marketing isn't about rushing headlong into producing a flood of content that isn't well-suited to your target audience. You need to know who you're talking to, why, and how.

Become a trusted source of information

One of the goals of a content marketing strategy is to position yourself as an expert in your field. The more informative your content is and the better it answers your buyer personas’ questions, the more it will be shared and become a go-to resource. Content shared on social media will bring you new leads. The more you earn your leads’ trust, the more likely they’ll be to become your customers.

Set a publication schedule

To ensure consistency in your posts, it’s essential to create an editorial calendar. If posting a blog article every week isn’t feasible for you, plan to post one every two weeks, but be sure to stick to that schedule. This is the best way to build reader loyalty and optimize your SEO.

8:45p 5 méthodes efficaces pour évi… 8:30p 5 méthodes efficaces pour évi… 15 8:30p Comment se lancer dans l’aventure z… 8:45p Comment se lancer dans l’aventure z… 8:30p Comment se lancer dans l’aventure z… 14 Avril

Optimize Your Various Types of Content

Content Length

For a blog post, aim for between 600 and 1,000 words.

The Relevance of Keywords

It is sometimes more beneficial to target a so-called “long-tail” search query—one containing 4- to 5-word key phrases—rather than a single, highly competitive keyword. Furthermore, voice search—which is rapidly growing—favors this type of query: when speaking, users formulate their questions using natural language rather than a string of keywords.

Their strategic placement in the tags and the body of the text

Google prefers clear, well-structured content. You should therefore make sure to strategically place your keywords in the title tags and Hn tags, while taking care to avoid keyword stuffing—that is, over-optimization—which is now penalized by Google.

The semantic field

This type of content is constantly growing in popularity and is also highly valued, helping to build user loyalty.

Internal linking and external links to reliable sources

Internal linking helps keep visitors on your site longer—a factor that Google takes into account and that can influence your ranking in search results. Links to external, trustworthy sites are also valued, as they confirm that you provide information and additional details that are relevant to users.

The originality and relevance of the content

Make sure your content answers the question your visitors are asking. If it doesn’t, you’ll have a high bounce rate and will quickly lose traffic. Your content must also be original and not duplicated to avoid being penalized by Google.

Use social media to promote your content

Sharing your content on social media is now an essential step in growing your popularity. You also have the opportunity to see your readers’ reactions firsthand and interact with them. To grow, your brand needs to build a community that will advocate for your products or services and help you expand your customer base without having to rely on advertising.

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How Do You Measure the ROI of Content Marketing?

To measure the ROI—or return on investment—of your content marketing strategy, you need to establish key performance indicators, or KPIs. These include, for example:

  • the number of visits to your website
  • the number of pages viewed
  • the amount of time your visitors spend on your site
  • your traffic sources
  • social media engagement rate
  • your ranking for a particular keyword in the SERPs