For example, a company getting started with content marketing might invest in a team that can get the organization to the mature phase in a short period. Whatever the case, before making efforts to achieve more from your content marketing, consider your organization’s commitment to the approach. As you can see in the comparison chart, those in the sophisticated/mature phase are 5.6 times more likely than those in the young/first steps phase to say their organization is extremely/very committed to content marketing (13% vs. 73%). Develop a written strategy Observation: Compared with 33% of the sophisticated/matures, only 10% of those in the young/first steps phase have a documented content marketing strategy (32% have a verbal strategy and 47% plan to have a strategy within 12 months; 11% have no plans to develop a strategy within 12 months). Action item: CMI research has consistently shown that a documented content marketing strategy is one of the most important keys to content marketing success. Action item: Develop an editorial calendar as soon as feasible, and make it a priority. “If you’re just getting started, focus on one type of content, on one platform, and deliver that consistently over a long time,” says Michele Linn, CMI’s editorial strategy advisor. Action item: If your organization doesn’t value creativity and craft in areas like writing, design, video production, etc., ask yourself why. Be cognizant of the buyer’s journey Observation: Twenty-one percent of manufacturing marketers in the young/first steps phase always or frequently create content for specific points of the buyer’s journey compared with 48% of those in the sophisticated/mature phase and 41% of all manufacturing respondents. Even if buyers don’t travel through their journey in a linear way, you’ll have answered their questions no matter where they are in their process.” For more insights Looking for more manufacturing content marketing insights?
With each passing year, there are more examples of manufacturers doing impressive things with content marketing. Though manufacturers have been slower than those in other industries to adopt the practice of content marketing, CMI’s annual survey a year ago indicated a breakthrough: 59% said their organization’s overall approach to content marketing was more successful compared with one year before, and most (82%) attributed that success mainly to doing a better job with content creation.
Even so, many manufacturing companies are in the young/first steps phases of content marketing maturity, as reported in today’s release of Manufacturing Content Marketing 2018: Benchmarks, Budgets, and Trends—North America sponsored by IEEE GlobalSpec Media Solutions.
What can manufacturers in the young/first steps phase do to take their content marketing to the next level? To get deeper insight, we looked at how their responses compared with those in the sophisticated/mature phase.
As a marketer, you may think there isn’t much you can do to change your program’s content marketing maturity – that it simply takes time. However, content marketing maturity doesn’t necessarily depend on how long a company has had a content marketing approach.
For example, a company getting started with content marketing might invest in a team that can get the organization to the mature phase in a short period. Conversely, a company that launched a content marketing effort many years ago still can be in the young phase of maturity. This could be due to many possible reasons (e.g., staff turnover, budget cuts, a change in leadership).
Whatever the case, before making efforts to achieve more from your content marketing, consider your organization’s commitment to the approach. As you can see in the comparison chart, those in the sophisticated/mature phase are 5.6 times more likely than those in the young/first steps phase to say their organization is extremely/very committed to content marketing (13% vs. 73%).
While it’s true that commitment can strengthen based on results over time, how can you move forward if your organization isn’t strongly committed in the first place?
Thus, assuming your organization has made a meaningful commitment to content marketing, we offer six ways to grow in your content marketing maturity.
1. Develop a written strategy
Observation: Compared with 33% of the sophisticated/matures, only 10% of those in the young/first steps phase have a documented content marketing strategy (32% have a verbal strategy and 47% plan to have a strategy within 12 months; 11% have no plans to develop a strategy within 12 months).
Action item: CMI research has consistently shown that a documented content marketing strategy is one of the most important keys to content marketing success. Even if you’re just starting, formulate a content marketing strategy and write it down. (You can use this one-page plan.) It can (and will) change over time. The important thing is to document a starting point.
2. Deliver content consistently
Observation: Three-fourths of sophisticated/mature manufacturing marketers always or frequently deliver content consistently (i.e., on a defined, regularly scheduled basis) vs. 29% of those in the young/first steps phase.
Action item: Develop an editorial calendar as soon as feasible, and make it a priority. Decide which types of content you’ll deliver when. If it’s a monthly e-newsletter, get it scheduled. If it’s a blog post every other Wednesday, write the due date and commit to it. If it’s one webinar per quarter, put it on the calendar.
“If you’re just getting started, focus on one type…
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