Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

This is not another article about content marketing. It’s not intended to convince readers that content marketing can help differentiate them from their competitors, showcase thought leadership, drive traffic, or engage their customers. A quick Google search of the phrase “content marketing for small businesses” yields more than 200 million search results, meaning that there are already plenty of people out there talking about these things (and probably trying to sell small businesses something in the process).

So who is this article for? Anyone who’s convinced, but not sure how they can make it work for their business. It’s for anyone who’s ever wondered whether it’s possible to have a content marketing strategy without creating any content.

While the short answer to this is no, there is good news. The first is that the investment of time and money it takes to create great content doesn’t have to be a barrier to entry. Almost any small business that really wants to get into the game can do so by being smart about how they’re allocating their resources and maximizing the content they do have.

The second piece of good news is that the sheer amount of free content online makes activities like curation arguably more important than content creation itself.

That said, content creation still needs to play a role in your strategy. Original content--whether it’s in the form of a blog, case studies, videos, infographics, etc.-- will help you define the point of view you want to convey and should help set the tone for all of your content marketing efforts. The key is to maximize the ways in which you distribute and supplement it with other, lower touch tactics. Read on for five of the best....