Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

C5: NewsCred tackles the meta-task of marketing to marketers. What’s the biggest challenge you face in communicating with that audience?

AB: Most marketers today know that content is the key to truly connecting with their audience. However, it’s sometimes difficult to justify why brands should allocate more of their budget to content marketing, especially when this budget is being borrowed from elsewhere.Content marketing is not a short-term game – it’s a long-term strategy with long-term results. Investing in content requires an entirely different mindset than what traditional marketers are used to. It requires CMOs to move away from the crutch of traditional digital advertising, and instead move toward a more customer-centric, value-led approach to marketing.

For us, that means constantly proving the business case of content marketing. In 2013, banner ads were clicked a mere 0.1%, and that was before the abundance of ad-blocking technology. Today’s consumers are far too smart to click on a banner ad or watch a pre-roll advertisement. They know what to ignore, and it’s our job to help our customers cut through the noise and deliver actionable information that their audiences want.

The good news is that there is a compounding effect of content marketing, and we frequently use our own data to prove this. For example, at NewsCred the marketing team drives 40% of our revenue on a first-touch basis, and influences 100% of deals. And the best news is that content marketing is our most cost-efficient channel! For every $1 we put in, we get $14 out....

Did you know that 59% of B2C marketers and 55% of B2B marketers are planning to increase their content marketing spend this year? Content marketing has become an extremely competitive arena now.

For this, you need to understand the buyer’s journey. It’s interesting to note that 70% of the buyer’s journey gets complete before they even reach out to a sales rep.

So focusing just on sales would make you miss out on a major part of the buyer’s journey.

With marketing automation tools, you can influence this journey at different stages:

-. Awareness: This is the start of the buyer’s journey, where your buyer is probably unaware of your business and that they have a need. At this stage, you should focus on creating awareness for your business and offerings so that your buyers start to understand what you do, and how you can help them address their needs/overcome their pain points.

-. Consideration: Buyers now have already shortlisted a few companies and start to do deeper research to arrive at a decision. You should use your marketing automation tools to keep track of their growing interest and adjust your content so that they see what can influence their decision in your favor.

-. Decision: Buyers are ready to make a purchase and start thinking and comparing about implementation, costs, customer support etc, which will decide the company they’ll finally buy from.

This is the time to get brand-specific with your content. You can use customer testimonials and case studies to brag about how others have had a positive experience with your offerings.

Let’s have a look at some tools that will help you experience content marketing success, and nurture buyer’s all the way along this journey....