Do you know that 70% of a buyer’s journey is completed before even talking to a sales rep? Yes, and I’m sure it’s a horrifying thing to know if you don’t have your buyer’s journey mapped out yet. In fact, a Moz report shows that 88% of customers use online search to find out more about a company or brand.
So, if you’re not saying anything about yourself online, whatever they find or don’t find influences their buy or don’t buy decision.
You can’t leave this up to chance, and in case you’re still wondering why you need to tighten up your content marketing game, here are 5 WHYS it affects and makes sales;
- CONTENT ESTABLISHES YOU AS A THOUGHT LEADER: Either as a product brand or a service brand or even a personal brand, content is how you establish yourself as a thought leader in your sector. Right from the fashion brand to the beauty brand or accounting service to a marketing agency, content is what makes you the leader. The more valuable your audience finds your content, the more integrity you have with them, this leads to higher trust which often will lead to higher sales.
- CONTENT EDUCATES YOUR AUDIENCE: Have you ever bought/seen a product and just couldn’t figure out how to use it or what to do with it? What do you do? Google it, right?
Exactly, and when you google it, I bet you’ll prefer to make buying decisions with the site that gives you the most valuable information about what you searched for. So, why do you think your customer will do differently than you do? Create content that educates your customers on the need for your products and what they’re missing out on without them.
- CONTENT CREATES BRAND AWARENESS: before people can buy from you, they need to know you. Your customers wouldn’t buy from a stranger, so create awareness about your brand, solutions, and establish yourself as a credible source using content.
- CONTENT CREATES AND DEVELOPS RELATIONSHIP: Consistently creating great content will help you, not only to draw awareness and traffic to your brand but also help you develop that awareness into fruitful relationships. Content is where you really show up for your audience, with tricks, tips, guides, freebies, etc. that makes them aware you aren’t just about the sale. Nobody likes a sales machine, but everyone cheers on the friend they like.
- CONTENT DRIVES ORGANIC LEADS: When you drive traffic to your website, and people see and read your amazing content, what do you think happens? They come back right? Take that up a notch by offering them more value in their emails and then follow up with more valuable content and proposition for them. This works like magic, the SECRET is in delivering value, every single time an audience comes in contact with your content.
In conclusion, you can’t afford to relegate or ignore content marketing for your brand, doing so might very well be you lighting a match under your business to watch it burn. And, it’s not only because it helps you educate your audience, develop a relationship with them, build integrity with the said audience or establish you as a thought leader, but also because you generate massive organic leads that can help grow your sales.
Do you have a current content marketing strategy for your brand?