Marketing strategy is a long-term, forward-looking approach to planning with the fundamental goal of achieving a sustainable competitive advantage.
Before you begin, you must understand who your audience is.
Who are you marketing to? What are the goals you want to accomplish with your strategy?
Do this before any keyword research. Second, look at your competition and see where they are weak and where they are strong.
One of the first steps to achieve a successful marketing strategy is to decide what type of content will be produced, and which is the most effective medium to promote it.
Is it a video, white paper, blog, podcasting, case study, web content, social media or an email campaign? It's a good idea to distribute content on multiple platforms. Know that all audiences are not the same. Content should be revised to fit the style for each platform to attract market share effectively.
With social media, your target audience may differ on LinkedIn and Facebook. Research buyer persona's on each platform and recognize the differences of each audience. Once you key in on your audience you can begin your keyword research for each platform.
Content Audits are a Key Metric For Future Success
Continually run content audits and compare the metrics going back as far as a year. You'll be able to see what worked and which content did not meet your goals and expectations. Set plans for a fresh approach to accomplish higher goals.
Make The Best of Planning Your Budget
Keep in mind what your budget will be for advertising your content and keyword optimization. You can analyze the costs of keywords with Google Adwords to see what the best keywords are profitable within your budget.
Your Reputation Matters
To further your content strategy, create a positive influence for your reputation by asking customers to leave reviews to enhance your online image. If you are a B2C or B2B company, place a Yelp listing taking advantage of the sites high rankings in Google Search.
Build a Google My Business Profile to help with search rankings.
Prepare press releases and landing pages to increase your online presence. Landing pages should be specific to a unique audience.
Take part in social media projects that allows customers to see your "brand advantage."
Don't ever stop tracking projects so you can better analyze what's working and where improvements need to be made.
Do you need help with implementing the perfect content so your customers choose you over the competition? Click here to see how we can work together.
Author: Leslie Cohen is an experienced content writer. Formerly a published contributor for CBS News Local Los Angeles and currently Managing Partner for CWEB.com and Robinhoodnews.com . She currently works with companies producing content and advising them with full-scale content management goals for website content, blogs, white papers and guides, creatives, news releases, blogs, product descriptions, and direct response marketing.