Raven & Macaw

 A Simple Bit about Content Marketing

content marketing

Content marketing is a strategic approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent Content to attract and retain a clearly-defined audience and ultimately drive profitable customer action.  If you are reading this, you are a digital marketer with marketing needs, or maybe you need a re-education on content development and marketing. Uncountable times we hear “content is king” and “content is what makes your business more relevant”.  As cliché as that might sound for those of us already in the e-commerce world, it is essential and crucial to any online business. For example, 59% of marketers say their content marketing ROI is excellent or very good, helping them increase leads, conversions and brand loyalty.  Instead of selling or offering your products or services, your Content is what will define that which you are giving. Content represents what type of business you are into and what kind of products or services you offer customers. Content tells your brand story, and that’s why you must do whatever it takes to make it relevant, valuable and worth selling.  Even Leading Brands Use Content Marketing Don’t think that you must keep trying hard to get there because your business is not on the top list of leading companies. Brands like Microsoft, Cisco Systems, Pepsi, Airtel, Piggy Bank and many other top brands use content marketing to boost their products and services.  Why Use Content Marketing for Your Business Content marketing is cost-saving. It saves you all the extra money and funds you may initially spend on marketing.  It increases sales. Of course, it does! More Content equals more visibility on Search Engine Result Pages and users’ social media pages. More popularity will lead to an increase in the purchase of your goods and loyal customers. The more they like your products, the more they stay loyal and even refer more customers to you. Then the most basic of all primary reasons for marketing is profit. Content is a profit centre. More sales, higher purchases and increased customers all lead to profit.  These are just fundamental reasons to use content marketing.  Types of Content Marketing There are many different types of content marketing, including: Blogging Video Podcasting Infographics Email Visual Content EBooks Lead magnets Whitepapers Slide share presentations Quizzes/tools Checklists Courses Webinars Slide decks Free apps Social media posts And many more to use in marketing your business. What you’re reading right now is content marketing. The key is that the Content provides information or entertainment, usually for free, in support of a business goal.  Yes, we have a goal. Utilizing Different Types of Content Marketing/Platforms Now, let’s talk about why you need to use different types of Content Marketing. The first thing most people would think of when it comes to content marketing is Blogging, which is excellent. But there’s no disagreement that other means of marketing content also work wonderfully. For instance, podcasts have become widely popular, with episodes and listeners growing to millions. Likewise, YouTube has made its mark in the social media world, growing even better with billions of viewers. Writing an excellent piece for your blog is good and will have many reads and views plus likes but add your Content to another platform. Having your Content on multiple platforms builds your big kingdom of audiences, and publishing many different things allows you to be everywhere your audience is present online. For example, someone may not see your article but could be listening to your podcast on his way home. a young lady may find it easier to understand how to create logos by watching a “how to create Logos” video on YouTube than actually reading a 16 pages guideline on how to do that while someone would prefer to read the “details”. Also, some things fit better in specific formats. So, understand the different benefits of the other platforms and learn how to use them. Finally, don’t stick to just one type of content marketing.  Utilizing the many available content marketing types or platforms will also require you to decide on your content type. Then, find the appropriate format for your Content. For instance, you cannot teach pottery on a podcast. It has to be on video. Likewise, you cannot teach mathematics in just theory; there must be examples with workings and solutions. Use platforms that your audience already consumes.  By now, you’re thinking of what kind of Content to create. That is why you need to play around with your strengths! Know what your strengths are, know what you can give your best when developing, give your consumers the best Content they can consume and even come back for more. Then, when you see that what you are doing is going great, you can branch out SLOWLY. Do not make the mistake of venturing to other platforms abruptly because you feel you can do great; instead, slowly, slowlyly, see how it works for you and your audience, check out consumer experiences, analyze and if it works, continue. Finally, don’t forget about consistency! Always start what you can continue. Don’t chicken out or lazy out midway, especially if your Content is selling.  Start Marketing Content or Just Carry On Now that you have read through and understood what Content Marketing is, you can start creating great, irresistible Content and market them to the fantastic world of digital marketing. We would like you to know that marketing your business online doesn’t have to be so difficult becaue tat is what we do. So why don’t you consult with our digital marketing experts at Raven and Macaw for a long term gains without the pains.

Generating Traffic With A Successful SEM Campaign

  Is your business page not driving enough traffic as it should?  Here is a read on using Search Engines to market your products or services to increase your visibility on Search Engine Result Pages and SERPs. Search Engine Marketing, SEM, is a marketing strategy to improve a website’s online visibility in SERPs. Like Search Engine Optimization, SEM can include techniques like rewriting a website’s content to achieve higher rankings. However, SEM refers to paid search or PPC.  While there are many ways to attract new visitors to your website, Search Engine Marketing differs and may be the best for a business. A business can advertise on a search engine page when specific keywords are used in an online inquiry. Advertisers commonly bid on industry-specific phrases and word sets or highly relevant to a particular product or service. In that way, businesses have their ads placed in front of users alongside searches for queries.   Businesses should focus on selecting a proper keyword strategy. You may think Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing are the same, but they differ. Using SEM gives you more control over your digital marketing efforts. SEO is suitable for a highly targeted optimization effort. SEM focuses on a larger tray of keywords while ensuring similar visibility is a success.  A strength of SEM is that it gives you the opportunity as an advertiser to put your ads in front of motivated customers at the right time they want to make a purchase. It is a guarantee that SEM is a powerful way to drive traffic to your website, especially for a starting business. In addition, SEM tends to draw many first-time visitors to your pages. There is no other way to do this than Search Engine Marketing, which makes SEM a very effective way to promote your business. You pay a search engine to advertise for you. Very easy. The Groundwork of Search Engine Marketing     Know Your Target Audience The first key to success is knowing the people you are targeting. Understanding your audience can produce more effective ads for the right people. The easiest way to do that? Well, your current potential customers can always be your starting point. But, first, create a survey or questionnaire to know what they like and dislike about the products, habits and even locations. It will be hard to know everything about them, but understanding a little about them through those survey sheets will give you more understanding of the people to target and how to launch a successful set of ads. Keywords! Keywords form the basis of search Engine Marketing, which should not be much of a surprise. First, you must conduct comprehensive keyword searches as the number one keyword management strategy. Then, identify keywords relevant to your business and likely to be used by customers when searching for products or services. A thorough keyword search will help you discover your business’s right keywords and identify negative ones. Negative terms aren’t harmful, but they are irrelevant to whatever you are offering.  For example, if you sell ‘clay pots’, you might want to use keywords like; “Ways to use a clay pot”; avoid keywords like “the best type of clay for a DIY vase” unless you’re also selling ‘clay’. You definitely won’t drive customers with the latter keyword term. Comprehensive keywords will make your ad appear on people’s screens. Go for less but specific keywords for your products. This will give you the best traffic. Uncommon keywords are superlative in maximizing the value of every click. Ad Auctions To grow your business, be ready to invest in SEM, and once you are prepared, you will need to participate in ad auctions. We will look at ad auctions in Google Ads. Every paid ad on Google’s SERPs had to go through an auction. To enter an ad auction, you must identify the keywords you want to bid on and clarify how much you are willing to spend per click of each keyword because, of course, you’re dealing with a pay-per-click system. Google then determines if your keywords are obtainable or within a user’s search query, and then you are entered into the ad auction. However, not every ad will appear on every search related to that keyword. Some keywords don’t have much or no commercial intent to allow them to include ads on the page. For instance, typing ‘Content Creation’ into Google will not show any ads on your screen. Even if your keyword is a good fit for an ad, it may not necessarily mean you will win the bidding. This is because the ad auction considers two main factors to determine if your ad is worthy of being on the SERP – your maximum bid and your ad quality score. Remember, the more relevant your ad is to a user and how likely will a user click on your ad and enjoy it all add to your Quality Score. Once you’re set to use SEM, research relevant and commercial intent keywords, enter Ad Auctions and pay for your ads to appear on the SERPs. All these and adopting an SEM strategy that requires you to optimize paid search ads with a specific goal in mind. You must understand how paid ad platforms work and effectively manage variables that affect performances, such as keywords, budget and copy. Maximize the Strategy for CPC Targets Cost Per Click is the actual price you are prepared to pay for every click. You may need to consider a few things before deciding on a deserved CPC. Think about the proposed bid, the role of digital in your general ads budget, the campaign aim and how competitive it is. Cost Per Click is significant because it is the number that will determine how financially successful your paid search campaigns are and how much Google Ads will cost for you. Customize Your Landing Pages Landing pages are essential to the success of SEM. It is where every individual would be directed