The Year of Content Marketing

Content is King

Is this statement, made by Bill Gates back in 1996, still valid a quarter of a century later? The short answer: absolutely! However, since we are dealing with content marketing here, let’s elaborate a bit further.

The pandemic allowed us to rethink our ways of going about our daily routines. Along with the adjustment to telework, growing interest in buying local, and the awareness of the environmental impacts, the coronavirus has also propelled certain social changes. What about marketing? What will we learn from this crisis? Two essential points are to be distinguished in this singular context, words have taken on a sometimes forgotten meaning and the construction of a content architecture becomes a major element if we want to succeed.

Making sense of words

In a fraction of a second, our vocabulary mutated into words less commonly used or combined to form expressions, "social distancing", "collective immunity", "hydroxychloroquine" even “COVID party”. There were many questions regarding this new lexicon that generated an increase of web searches during the first few months of the pandemic, which have now become common “COVID” lingo.

While this growing interest in linguistics may seem rather comical, it does not lessen the transfer of a specialized vocabulary to a public previously unfamiliar with these terms. Hence it is important to weigh one's words, especially in times of crisis, as statements can quickly become ambiguous or leave room for interpretation. In other words, a poorly thought-out speech can seriously affect an organization's credibility, to the point of damaging its overall operations. A transparent, unambiguous content strategy focused on creating a sense of community is no longer an option, but a necessity.

Think before you put words in print

This is especially true in this social media era, where the trend has often wavered between convergence and divergence. While these platforms can be powerful tools to spread your messages and promote your brand, there are certain pitfalls to avoid, such as duplicating the same content everywhere or, on the contrary, publishing significantly different content on each network. In fact, although an online presence is essential to the notoriety of your brand, your audience expects adapted content, yet homogeneous, across all channels.

Content framework to elevate your words

The strength of corporate communication comes from the strength of their editorial architecture. They think it through, reflect on it, draw on the brand's DNA and values to create well-anchored content that gives them significant legitimacy and credibility. In fact, it is this foundation that allows them to set the course for their communications, often based on an inbound marketing strategy. These organizations gradually moved away from traditional media to become their own content aggregators, which was greatly accelerated by the pandemic. In fact, in a context such as the one we are currently experiencing, where consumers are spending more and more time online and are inundated with information, focusing on useful, distinctive and quality content becomes essential to attract attention, spark an interest, provoke desire and, eventually, generate action.

What's more, for a content strategy to maintain this position of strength, understanding the importance of combining creativity and agility has become fundamental. Creating simple content is no longer sufficient. You must know how to adapt and segment it, according to the subjects to be addressed, the targets to be reached and the means to be used. This is when messages converge into a single purpose: the brand sends a message to convert and retain its customers who will hear it. Nevertheless, to reach these objectives, listening is imperative.

SEO is no longer. Long live semantic SEO!

As the foundation of any good digital strategy, SEO continues to occupy a fundamental place in web writing practices. By responding to the challenges of your audience and the requirements of search engines, optimized and well-referenced content generates invaluable business opportunities. The days when algorithms only calculated the number of occurrences of a keyword to rank Web pages are now over. Make way for semantic SEO!

The way we search for information has greatly changed in the last few years, Google and company, now take into consideration the intent and context of a search, among other things, thanks to keywords. The objective is to respond, as precisely as possible, to the Internet users' queries. It is therefore essential that content creators and SEO specialists work together to identify your brand's semantic universe and appear in the first search engine results.

All in all, communication is not a race but a rigorous and long-term process. In order to position companies and ensure that they are established in consumers' daily lives, collaboration is also essential. Managers, content creators, specialists and other employees must work closely together in order to stand out from the crowd and reach the top of their industry.