How To Increase Content Readership
Marketers are publishers.
We are producers of content strategically created to attract our different buyers and to meet our company goals and objectives.
We’ve started investing in content for our blog, Facebook pages, Twitter accounts and other online entities in order to attract our different buyer personas and get them to take action.
We’ve done our homework and developed plans that will help foster our brand’s. However, even when well-planned and thought-out content is released, marketers need to make sure that the buyers it was created for read it. Here 6 simple pieces of advice to help you increase content readership and drive desired action:
1. Make Everything Shareable
This may seem obvious to most marketers, but it surprises me how so many forget to add some sort of sharing component to their content.
If your buyers feel your content has some value to them and decide it would have the same value to their social graph, why wouldn’t you want to facilitate some sort of simple sharing component right next to your content? This is not only helping you leverage your buyers’ social graph, but also this is good SEO because each share generates a backlink to your content.
2. Talk About The Problems You Solve
I hate to break it to you, but no one cares about your product or service.
Your buyers’ care about themselves and the problems and issues they are currently facing. Now, the question is, how can you help solve their problem and how does your product fit in the solution? Your content should always be geared towards your buyers and what’s important and relevant to them. Let’s face it; people care about themselves, not your brand.
3. Find Your Best Stuff Through Analytics
Run reports on Google Analytics to see which content is being read the most (pageviews), how buyers are reaching your content (traffic sources) and what keywords they are using to discover your content.
Obviously, Google Analytics has a wealth of information, but it’s important that you keep an eye on it to examine what is working and what is not. Also, look at your engagement metrics.
For example, which content was shared the most, on what platform or how many comments did it receive. Analytics is a good indicator of what content did well, but make sure to align these results with the metrics you set out to accomplish before the campaign.
4. You don’t have to spread your content everywhere
Not everyone is going to respond to your content and not every network will be appropriate for your content, so don’t share it everywhere.
Do your homework and figure out where your buyers are hanging out and be part of the conversation. It’s better to spread your content where qualified buyers interact then to spread it everywhere and become a distraction and noise. The latter may even have some negative reaction and backlash and could hurt your brand.
5. Share with your social map
This is another surprise I think some brands simply just forget about. Leverage your brand’s social map to share your content.
Send a tweet, update your Facebook fan page or even add the content to your newsletter. The people that have graciously followed you on Twitter and “Liked” you on Facebook expect some sort of return on their social investment and here is where you can deliver.
You’ve spent time creating this content and engaging online, what’s stopping you from sharing your content?
6. Use the appropriate phrases and keywords
After you’ve done your thorough analysis of your buyers and what keywords and phrases they use, you need to make sure you use those phrases in your content. You need to make sure that the content you create speaks to them in their own words and in a voice they are accustomed to. In addition, your content will be indexed in various search engines relative to the keywords and phrases you utilized.
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Try not to get discouraged if your content doesn’t start out with the most pageviews or leads or whatever metric you are trying to accomplish. Be confident in your plan and strategy.
Increasing content readership takes some work but once you find the right strategies and methods that work for your buyers and your brand, the end result will be worth the wait. I know I’m missing some tips and ideas, so what strategies have you implemented that have increased your content readership?
