Content has been and continues to be a vital pillar of the online marketing world. Online users and consumers interact with content — in one way or another — every day.
Content is everywhere and can benefit online businesses in a variety of ways. The initial cost of starting with content marketing can be a bit steep, but it is almost always worth it in the end.
In this blog post, we are going to shed light on seven big business benefits of content marketing and why you should invest in it.
1. Organic traffic
The biggest benefit of SEO-driven content marketing is free organic traffic. Organic traffic allows you to have a steady stream of free traffic from search engines — and that is just not possible without a well-rounded content marketing strategy.
Publishing high-quality and authoritative content on a consistent basis is one of the core principles by which Google determines search engines rankings and positions.
For many online businesses, organic is often one of the biggest channels for lead generation and revenue. You can create engaging content and optimize it for specific keyword phrases — which can help direct users to where you want them to and convert website visitors into interested leads and paying customers.
2. Search authority and brand awareness
Ranking higher on the search engine results pages (SERPs) for important search queries can have many benefits. Some of those benefits include higher search authority and brand awareness.
If your business appears on top of the SERPs for important search queries frequently, it makes a great impression on online searchers who may or may not be aware of your business.
If Google believes your business is the best of the lot and puts it on the very top of the SERPs, it instills confidence in online searchers, and they believe the same — that your business is the most credible.
In addition, higher search rankings help improve brand awareness. You get more impressions and more clicks, which also usually leads to more leads as well as referrals.
Of course, establishing brand awareness through content and SEO is not easy and takes years of effort and a robust content marketing and SEO strategy, but it is all worth it.
3. Social traction and engagement
Social media is an excellent way of engaging with potential and existing customers. Social media can sometimes be the only medium to reach out to a certain group of audience.
However, managing social media profiles is not an easy task as it requires a constant stream of content.
If you are producing a lot of high-quality content, it allows your business to maintain traction and engagement on social media websites.
Additionally, the content that you create and publish on your website or blog can also be shared on different social media websites. This can bring in new readers and potential leads to your business website. Moreover, the distribution of high-quality content can also help build social and organic signals.
4. Improved targeting during stages of the buyer funnel
Online users often take a complex journey before buying a product or service. This journey is commonly referred to as the buyer’s journey or the buyer’s sales funnel.
This buyer’s journey consists of multiple phases:
- Awareness. In this phase, the user first gets to know about your product, service, or business. On the other hand, they can also become aware of the problem they are facing or of a possible solution that can solve their problem.
- Consideration. In this phase, the user gains a deeper understanding of what your business offers and how it may help them.
- Research. During the research phase, the user evaluates different options on the market with the intent of buying something.
- Conversion. At this point, the user decides to buy your offering, takes action, and completes the transaction.
- Retention. This phase comes after conversion. During this stage, the idea is to offer more value to your customers after the purchase in the form of after-sales support, warranty, help, documentation, newsletters, etc.
At each stage of the sales funnel, users want different types of content. If you approach all of them in the same way, they are less likely to be converted.
One of the biggest benefits of a well-crafted content marketing strategy is that you can craft different types of content for each stage. For instance, for the awareness stage, you can create a very top-of-the-funnel high-level informative blog post. For the research phase, you can create bottom-of-the-funnel comparison articles and customer case studies.
This variety in content allows you to increase conversions and revenue.
5. Increased referral traffic and backlinks
High-quality content is one of the biggest sources of referral traffic. Traffic and customers coming from the referral source is quite crucial for the sustainability of an online business. It is one of those marketing channels that work almost autonomously and without requiring a lot of money.
Secondly, high-quality content attracts more backlinks. These backlinks not only help improve site-wide SEO but also send you more referral traffic. Consequently, you further increase brand awareness and authority by tapping into audience groups that you wouldn’t have otherwise.
6. Leveraging multiple channels
To make sure your marketing department is firing on all cylinders, it is important to tap into all the different channels you have simultaneously, e.g., search engine optimization, social media marketing, referral marketing, paid search engine marketing, influencer marketing, email marketing, programmatic marketing, video marketing, mobile marketing, etc.
And guess what all of those channels need in some way, shape, or form?
Content.
Realistically, it is very tough to create unique content from scratch for all the channels you have. However, the beauty of good content marketing is that you can repurpose your content to be used across multiple channels.
You can create a high-quality blog post and then convert it into an email marketing campaign, a guide, social media posts, infographic, video for video marketing, etc.
With this method, you can increase efficiency across the board, activate multiple marketing channels at the same time, and start generating more leads and revenue.
7. Long-term cost savings and ROI
Last but not least, one of the biggest business benefits of investing in content and content marketing is the potential for long-term cost savings and return on investment (ROI).
When you are just starting, the cost of producing content and optimizing it for SEO can be slightly off-putting. Moreover, you also do not get results right away. On the other hand, many other channels — for example, paid search or paid social — can show almost instant results.
However, investment in content and SEO have more long-term benefits. For instance, as we discussed earlier, you get a constant stream of organic traffic for high-profile keywords.
Moreover, if you start ranking for a certain keyword at the top, you do not have to bid for it anymore — especially if that keyword has a high CPC.
Lastly, high-quality content can generate a bunch of traffic for you — from different sources — which is ideal for A/B testing and optimizing conversions.
Conclusion
As we just learned, there are many benefits of content marketing. Some of those may not be clear right from the start — but if you stick with content marketing long enough, you will be able to reap the rewards later on.
