Winning with Content Marketing in 2014: A Roadmap for Success

www.redbamboomarketing.com
DEFINING CONTENT
Content is all the ways we share and communicate
ideas.
Content Marketing is sharing ideas about your
products/services with customers to educate,
persuade and influence their decisions.

WHY CONTENT?
Content marketing became important when the
balance of power shifted from brands to consumers.
In the past, we relied heavily on advertisements, sales
reps, packaging, and other brand-supplied messaging
to make purchase decisions.
Advertising was king of the kill.

WHY CONTENT?
Today, consumers have the power to fact-check,
research, and explore competing brands.
The old barriers have been broken down. Brands must
now appeal to this new information-hungry customer.
And we must feed them content.

TELL ‘EM, DON’T SELL ‘EM!
Content marketing caters to the new customer by
supplying them with all the information they need to
make an informed decision.
It helps us align with our customers wants, needs and
desires, and makes us stand out from our competitors.

ARE YOU B2B OR B2C?
B2B brands must focus on leveraging their expertise to
convince and convert buyers.
» AMEX Open Forum for SMBs
» HubSpot Inbound Marketing Library
B2C brands must focus on connecting with the interests of
their customers by entertaining and inspiring them.
» Red Bulletin – Sports, Culture & Lifestyle
» The Lego Movie

LET’S GET THIS PARTY STARTED
Finally…

“Strategy without tactics is
the slowest route to victory.
Tactics without strategy is
the noise before defeat.”
Sun Tzu, The Art of War

CREATING A CONTENT MARKETING PLAN
The reason most content marketing initiatives fail is
lack of planning. We won’t make that same mistake!
Step 1: Resources
• People
• Budget
• Tools
• Limitations
Step 2: Roadmap
• Goals
• Audience
• Strategy
• Tactics
Step 3: Running It
• Launch plan
• Execution
• Testing
• Analysis

RESOURCES: PEOPLE
Content creation is impossible without people. A few of
the people that may be involved are:
Marketing Manager // Writer // Web Developer //
Graphic Designer // Data Analyst // Social Coordinator
Figure out what you can do in-house, then decide if you
can bring in an outsider like a freelancer or an agency.
(Ahem.)

RESOURCES: BUDGET
Everything has a budget. Whether it is a hard cost (like
paying for ads) or a soft cost (like the time of your
staff), you need to decide how much $$ you’re willing
to spend to make your campaigns a success.
Decide before you begin to avoid headaches and
missed targets.

RESOURCES: TOOLS
The right tools can help you save time, money and
labor. Some invaluable tools of the trade are:
Marketing Automation: HubSpot, Marketo, Pardot
CMS: WordPress, Joomla, Drupal
Analytics: Google Analytics, MozPro, Optimizely
Social: Hootsuite, Buffer

RESOURCES: LIMITATIONS
Some industries have legal restrictions or compliance
limitations to keep in mind.
Industries like Real Estate, Finance, Healthcare and
others must first understand what they can and cannot
say before acting on a content marketing plan.

ROADMAP: GOALS & TARGETS
Once your resources are mapped out, its time to
answer the big question:
What are we trying to accomplish with our marketing?

Common goals might include:
» Increase sales/revenue
» Reduce customer churn
» Increase repeat purchases
» Recruit new talent
» Grow subscriber list

Having goals isn’t everything – they need to be realistic and
attainable. That’s where we set targets.
Every goal should have a target to help you determine if
your marketing was successful.
Examples:
» Increase subscribers by 50 each month
» Increase customer retention from 80% to 85% over 6
months

ROADMAP: AUDIENCE
In order to hit your goals, you will have to focus your
content marketing plan on specific audience(s).
A great way to define your audience is by creating
Buyer Personas.
Buyer Personas are semi-fictional representations of
your ideal customers. They help you craft content that
will resonate with your target audience.

ROADMAP: AUDIENCE
Ollie is a small business owner that
knows he needs marketing, but doesn’t
have the time or experience to get it
done himself.
He is interested in the bottom line and
doesn’t speak marketing talk. Ollie
wants someone to “get things done”
and wants a partner who can show him
results at the end of each month.
Oscar the Owner
• 1-20 employees
• Smaller Budget
• Ideal for
Monthly Full
Service
Marketing Pack

ROADMAP: AUDIENCE
Mary is the Marketing Manager at a
growing software firm. Tasked with
managing a small team of marketers, it is
up to Mary to supply sales with a constant
flow of new leads.
Mary talks the talk and has a firm
understanding of her strategy, but lacks
the resources to execute effectively. She
consistently has new initiatives launching
and needs more strategic insight into her
marketing programs.
Molly the Marketer
• 50-200
employees
• Medium Budget
• Ideal for Projects
& Consulting

ROADMAP: STRATEGY & TACTICS
Strategy is the big-picture way to achieve your goals.
Tactics are the means to get the strategy done.
The two work together to fill out your content
marketing plan.

ROADMAP: STRATEGY
Your strategy should align directly with the goals you
set out earlier.
Your strategy can include:
- Who to target (buyer personas)
- Internal positioning (what makes you different?)
- External messaging (what will convey this
difference?)

ROADMAP: STRATEGY
Online Software Company
Goal: Increase customer retention after month 3.
Strategy: Feed new customers a series of ongoing
product education content to keep them engaged and
using the product often.

ROADMAP: STRATEGY
Fitness Center
Goal: Increase sales of personal training packages.
Strategy: Upsell existing customers by showing them
the benefits of personal training vs. standard gym
memberships alone.

ROADMAP: TACTICS
With our strategy in place, we now get to the fun part:
tactics.
Tactics are the “how the hell are we gonna do this”
part of the plan, and the piece most marketers are
familiar with.

ROADMAP: TACTICS
Tactics will pull from all parts of the plan so far.
- Strategy determines all the ways we can achieve our
goals
- Audience shows us which tactics will work best in
each campaign
- Resources show us how much we are capable of
doing, and where we need help

ROADMAP: TACTICS
Attract Traffic
- Blogging
- Web Content
- Press Release
Engagement
- Email Marketing
- Video Marketing
Convert Leads
- Landing Pages
- How-to Guides
- Quizzes/Tests
Close Deals
- Brochures
- Case Studies
- Webinars

ROADMAP: TACTICS
Online Software Company
Goal: Increase customer retention after month 3.
Strategy: Feed new customers a series of ongoing product
education content to keep them engaged and using the
product often.
Tactics: Write a series of educational emails and deliver
them via an automated email drip program on a weekly
basis. Add how-to videos on landing pages to increase
engagement.

ROADMAP: TACTICS
Fitness Center
Goal: Increase sales of personal training packages.
Strategy: Upsell existing customers by showing them the
benefits of personal training vs. standard gym memberships
alone.
Tactics: Give gym members a blank personalized fitness and
nutrition template to fill out, and offer a 1 hour session with a
trainer. After this, send a series of case studies via email
showing before & after results and testimonials from happy
personal training customers.

RUNNING IT: LAUNCH PLAN
Finally, the time has come to launch our amazing
content marketing plan. Here is where we list out
everything we need to create, who is involved, and how
its delivered.
Let’s try a new example to see how it all works.

Joe’s Mortgage Company
Goal: Attract 15 new inbound leads a month from my
website.
Audience: First time homebuyers (Newlywed Nick &
Jan buyer persona).

Strategy: Provide educational & insightful content
about the process of buying your first house, and
position ourselves as the go-to experts for new
homebuyers.
Our message to customers is that we make it easy for
you to buy your first home by taking care of all the
details. Every piece of content will make it clear that
we’re here to help make your journey easier.

Tactics:
- Write a weekly blog post focused on popular first-time
homebuyer questions in our area to attract new visitors to our
website.
- Create an all-in-one excel spreadsheet that will calculate all
your expenses and help you budget for your home. Make this
download only behind a form. All content points here.
- After conversion, create a series of emails that automatically
send to the prospect and help further qualify them.
- Follow up with customer testimonials, and ask for a formal
appointment.

People Needed:
- Marketing Manager
- Writer
- Graphic Artist
- Web Developer
Technology Needed:
- CMS or Website
- Marketing Automation or Email Software
- Spreadsheet Software

Content Needed:
- 4 blogs per month (List topics) - Writer
- 1 spreadsheet template - Marketer
- 1 landing page & form – Marketer + Writer + Web
- 1 graphic Call to Action - Artist
- 3 email templates – Artist + Writer
- 2 customer testimonials - Marketer

RUNNING IT: CREATING CONTENT
Writing great content is key to making your plan work.
The key is hitting the “sweet spot”:
What your
customers
care about
What you’re
really good at
$WEET $POT

When writing your content, always ask yourself from
your customer’s perspective:
“What’s in it for me?”
Doing this will help you create meaningful, engaging
content that your customers will love.

A few tips to help you make your content sing:
1. Reuse content whenever you can.
2. Personalize!
3. Create processes & templates.

RUNNING IT: TESTING
A/B testing is an excellent way to improve campaigns
as they are running.
It allows you to remove personal biases from your
team and focus on content that works.

RUNNING IT: TESTING
If you’re new to testing, the key is to keep it simple.
Test only a single element at a time to control for outside
factors.
Test A: Green Button
Test B: Blue Button
Getting into a habit of testing will make your content
marketing more effective over time.

RUNNING IT: TESTING
Email
- Subject line
- Text vs. HTML
- CTA
Website
- Button Color
- Video Marketing
- Pictures
Landing Pages
- Size of forms
- Headline
- Left vs. Right

RUNNING IT: ANALYSIS
Testing and performance analysis will give you deeper
insight into your content to understand what worked,
what didn’t and help you identify unforeseen
opportunities.

Identifying KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) linked
to your goals will help you measure overall
performance of your campaigns.
Goal: Increase sales of Product A
KPIs: Total Sales, ROI (Revenue-Cost/Revenue)
Goal: Increase awareness
KPIs: Branded website visitors, Video views

Creating a reporting dashboard for yourself in Google
Analytics can save you valuable time each month and
give you a real-time view of your performance.

PUTTING IT ALL TOGETHER
Content marketing success stems from two branches:
creating memorable, valuable content and having a
well thought out plan.

LET’S GIVE IT A TRY

THANK YOU!
You can contact me at:
smurphy@redbamboomarketing.com
www.linkedin.com/in/sbcmurphy
Direct: 732-977-2429

Winning with Content Marketing in 2014: A Roadmap for Success

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Winning with Content Marketing in 2014: A Roadmap for Success