How Do You Score Your Content Marketing Strategies

How do you score your content?

In the long term, social media marketing and SEO-optimized content outweigh paid advertisements, video marketing, and traditional marketing in a way that Frank from finance wins every time.

So why is Content Marketing important? Because it’s an effective way to reach your target market where they are online – namely social media platforms and search engines. It’s very cost-effective compared to other types of marketing practices such as paid advertisements, video marketing, and traditional marketing. In the long term, when compared to both social media platforms and SEO optimization for increased visibility on search engines, content is the undisputed champion with Frank from finance dancing gleefully behind closed doors.

Content strategy delivers returns on investment (ROI) because it’s a long-term investment instead of a short-term fix.

As we’ve seen in HubSpot’s 10th annual State of Inbound report, quality content and social media marketing are the most effective strategies for generating leads and making sales for your business.

Quality, relevant content attracts visitors to your website, where they’ll convert at higher rates than anonymous website visitors. Plus, because search engines like Google give preference to sites that publish high-quality original content rather than low-quality spammy links, you’ll rank higher in SERPs (search engine results pages). And because great content is often shared on social media platforms by readers eager to share why the article is trending or why it’s important, you can expect increased traffic referrals.

HubSpot’s research found that the highest-performing content marketing strategies are all about creating consistent value for your audience. It’s why HubSpot predicts “that ‘less is more’ will be the new mantra of effective, efficient content marketers.””

HubSpot recommends offering fewer posts with higher quality to increase conversions and engagement rates while increasing social sharing across various platforms. Get started on your content strategy by building an editorial plan – a spreadsheet that outlines topics you’ll cover in blog posts throughout the year along with what you’re promising to provide readers. It’s also why they recommend developing buyer personas to help you understand which topics are most relevant to your audience – based on their demographics, needs, challenges, and struggles – so you can produce content that matters to them.

HubSpot’s research shows why content marketing is important in making more money for your business by increasing leads and sales. By offering fewer posts of higher quality, you increase engagement rates while boosting social sharing across platforms, which leads to increased traffic referrals. It’s why they recommend developing buyer personas so you can create relevant content that matters most to your audience based on demographics, needs, challenges, and struggles. Then use an editorial plan – a spreadsheet outlining topics you’ll cover in blog posts throughout the year along with what you’re promising to deliver – to get started with developing your content strategy. With all this combined under one roof (along with other strategies like email marketing), it’s why HubSpot predicts “that ‘less is more’ will be the new mantra of effective, efficient marketers.”

Frank from finance agrees. After all… why is content marketing important? Because it’s an effective way to reach your target market where they are online – namely social media platforms and search engines. It’s very cost-effective compared to other types of marketing practices such as paid advertisements, video marketing, and traditional marketing. In the long term, when compared to both social media platforms and SEO optimization for increased visibility on search engines, content is the undisputed champion with Frank from finance dancing gleefully behind closed doors.

With that said… why is Content Marketing important? Let us count some ways why! To read HubSpot’s full-on why Content Marketing strategies are key

Here’s how to score your content:

• Establish a scoring framework. Just like any other practice, measuring the success of your content marketing efforts begins with establishing what you’re going to use as a benchmark. That means defining what success looks like for your business by determining why you want to do content marketing in the first place. Are you trying to achieve more leads? More social shares and backlinks? Just be sure that whatever goal(s) you set aligns with why you think content marketing is important in the first place – it’s the only way to know if your efforts are producing results.
• Implement a strategy. This is why Content Marketing strategies are key. HubSpot suggests “creating a process from start to finish” when trying to determine why Content Marketing is important. To make your content – whether it’s a blog post, video, or podcast – more effective, they believe it should be “built on the why.” For example, why did you choose that topic? Why is it of value? Once you establish that foundation of why along with establishing what success looks like for your business by determining why you want to do content marketing in the first place, that’s when you can turn to your why(s) and create a strategy.
• Build a strong content scoring system to establish a baseline constructed on engagement metrics has the most powerful effect to your content. Sort it by votes and social shares. Once you’ve found what works for you, all other engagement metrics should be based on this metric. For example: if you discovered that polls generate the most comments and likes, why not just create a poll at the end of your content? This tactic will strengthen both your content marketing and SEO.
• Use the right analytics tool. It’s why HubSpot recommends using a content scoring system that can filter by traffic source to help you understand why some of your posts are doing better than others. A solid Google Analytics Content Optimization report is one way to see which posts are getting organic traffic and referrals from social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc., why they’re seeing success with certain topics (keywords), and if any external (or internal) factors may have played a role in their visibility.
• Optimize your content for search engines – which is why you’ll want to use keyword research tools like Keyword Explorer to determine what phrases people are using to search for your blog content so you can include them in your posts. That way, they’ll show up high on the SERPs (search engine results pages) with more visibility – why is Content Marketing important? It means more eyes on your content!
• Invest in creating valuable, educational content that people want to engage with (in other words create a lot of content). The why of Content Marketing is important – high-quality content, that is! Once you have your campaign crafted and ready to go, start making more of it. Why the emphasis on quality?
  • There are two main reasons:
    • 1) Google’s Panda update came out in 2011 to target low-quality content across the web, which means they rank sites with unique, trustworthy copy higher.
    • 2) After all is said and done, you need content to power your campaigns (never forget Google’s Panda update cannot read it’s based on math).
• Create compelling content that’s easy to share on social media. Remember Panda? There are two main reasons your unique, quality content should be shared on social media: 1) it helps you rank higher in search engines (because let’s not forget the second part of Google’s Panda update), and 2) people like sharing things they find interesting with their friends – why is content marketing important? It gets the word out about your brand!
• Observe and monitor the performance of your content. You can do so by analyzing the data. Which topics and keywords are performing well? What time of day generates more traffic? How many page views does each post get? Identifying these patterns in your analytics is just another way you’re measuring success across all your content marketing efforts, which brings us to our next point: Monitoring what’s working and what isn’t as important to understanding whether or not your content marketing strategy is effective – which then helps you refine it. If done correctly, Content Marketing should drive traffic back to your site over time, but if that’s the only metric you’re tracking – do this for one month maximum – you’ll miss out on a lot of opportunities for growth
• Evaluate what works. If you find that a content piece isn’t performing as well as the others, why not look into why? Maybe it’s time to revisit your keyword strategy or social media distribution. Taking all this data doesn’t help if you’re not analyzing it, which is why understanding what makes a campaign successful begins with carefully weighing your metrics and determining why they matter most. Only then can you refine or even start new campaigns based on these insights – why is Content Marketing important for businesses? It helps them grow!
• Implement to Rinse and repeat technique. Once you have a system that is generating results, why not scale your efforts? A process is only as good as its ability to be repeated. Repeat this process on a larger scale month after month, to drive more traffic to your site.

This can be a long process, and it’s only the beginning of a true content scoring system, but it’s a necessary process to implement if you want to improve your content marketing strategy.

If you have the time, why not try Auditing your company’s existing content marketing strategy? It will help surface any content flaws and highlight areas for improvement.

Every business must engage in some form of content marketing or risk being forgotten about by potential customers. However, there are still many companies that struggle with their overall content strategy; whether it be creating enough original, engaging content or simply reaching an untargeted audience. As a result, these companies see an increase in cost-per-acquisition (CPA) since they’re using a less-targeted, shotgun approach. It’s a vicious cycle that can only be broken with a well-rounded content marketing strategy.

I recommend leveraging an automated tool like Atomic AI to help you score your content at a more detailed level. This helps you understand what’s working and what isn’t, and how to better fine-tune your content marketing strategy.

For more information on content marketing and content strategies to transform your content development approach fill out the form to the right to meet with one of our team members. 

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