Hello there!
How important is content marketing? It’s a question we debate regularly, both within close circles and on social media. You can probably guess where we stand…
As B2B buyers increasingly prefer end-to-end digital processes over dealing with salespeople in the traditional in-person way, companies must engage and build relationships with them online. Otherwise, they won’t be in the running for their business. For this reason alone, content marketing has become a mission-critical activity for most B2B businesses.
This brings us to the subject of this week’s post on The Framework blog, which asks whether a B2B CEO should actively champion the company’s content marketing efforts. Once again, it’s hardly a spoiler to reveal that we believe the answer is yes—the CEO must champion content marketing in equal measure to other critical initiatives at the company. Read the blog for supporting evidence.
Scouring the web for articles of interest, we came across pieces on email campaigns that deliver superior ROI, hiring a “brand journalist”, the emerging opportunity to host events in the Metaverse, and writing effective calls to action (CTA). Scroll down to What We’ve Been Reading for the links and a brief explanation of why we think you should read them.
To cap things off, this week’s One Step actionable tip concerns keeping up with the personas. They’re our version of the Joneses, and we follow their every move.
Thanks for being part of our community. Slowly but surely we’re growing a following that understands the importance of content marketing and wants to keep up with developments.
Please help us grow that network by forwarding this link (https://messageup.substack.com) to 2-3 people in your network who will find our insights valuable. We are most grateful in advance.
~ Team MessageUp
Our Latest Posts on The Framework Blog
Aug 10, 2022 - Should a B2B CEO Champion Content Marketing?
Aug 3, 2022 - 8 Reasons Why a Ghostwriter Can Outperform an In-House Blogger
What We’ve Been Reading
Here are some articles we’ve been reading this week that you might enjoy and find helpful:
10 Types of Email Campaigns You Need to Be Sending Today [and Why]
With companies reporting highly favorable return on time and money invested in email marketing, Momina Asif at DirectLync digs into what those emails should contain, identifying 10 different types of email that your company should be sending.
Why Marketing Teams Should Outsource to Brand Journalists
The term "brand journalist" might be new to you, but the concept is simple: employ someone with journalistic skills to write blog posts that are more relevant and compelling to your audience than bland or salesy alternatives. This concise piece by the team at PowerPublish summarizes the key benefits.
The B2B Marketer’s Guide To Events In The Metaverse
Mainstream adoption of the metaverse as a B2B marketing channel is still a long way off but, as Kelly Lindenau writes for Demand Gen Report, it's clearly an opportunity in the making and something B2B marketers need to keep an eye on.
How To Write CTAs For B2B: A Call-To-Action Guide For Businesses [With 10 Examples]
They might seem like an afterthought compared to the heavy lifting of writing engaging copy and pairing it with appealing design, but getting the CTA (call to action) right on each piece of content can dramatically improve its overall effectiveness. This excellent summary by Alexander Kesler at the Search Engine Journal even comes with 10 helpfully explained examples.
One Step…
Content marketing should always be customer-centric. It is designed to provide relevant, helpful information to your prospects and customers at each stage in their buyer’s journey, from initial awareness to loyal advocate.
To understand your buyers in sufficient depth and detail, we recommend clearly defining your ideal customer and its buying committee—the humans that will collectively make the decision to purchase your solution. We call the members of that committee buyer personas—semi-fictional representations of the characters you typically encounter during the sales process—and we use buyer’s journey mapping to understand their needs, wants, beliefs, and emotions.
If you haven’t yet developed an ideal customer profile and created journey maps for your target buyer personas, we strongly recommend doing so as soon as you can. Click here if you need help. Without that level of analysis, effective content marketing is nigh-on impossible to achieve.
For those who have completed their buyer homework, this week’s actionable step involves keeping those analyses up to date.
How frequently do you review and update your buyer’s journey maps? We recommend doing so quarterly or more frequently if significant new information is obtained that challenges or alters any of your assumptions. Pick one persona today and read through the corresponding BJM. Is it still an accurate and complete capture of your understanding? If not, schedule time with your team to complete an update.
This is a key step in Parts C and E of the MessageUp content marketing framework, Customer Focus and Content, and Evaluation and Evolution. Capturing your customer understanding in a usable format and keeping it up to date are critical to publishing content that your target audience will find relevant and helpful.
Until Next Time
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