Why Small Businesses Should Use Content Marketing

Even though by their very definition small businesses have less of a voice, using content marketing can still help them become an authority in their niche and increase revenue. A new infographic from Skilled.co looks at all the data behind content marketing and why businesses big and small should do it. 85% of all marketers already are!

Content Marketing – What Is It?

In short, content marketing is using web content as a way to drive traffic to a business website and build brand awareness and authority. Written forms of content like blog posts and articles help websites rank in Google and other search engines, but video, infographics, memes and other formats are also perfect for sharing on social media. In fact, according to the data video and image based content increase sharing and click-throughs.

Content marketing is a subtle approach with the idea that you inform visitors, instead of pushing your products and services directly. Once trust is built, they will want to buy your products and services regardless.

Why Use It?

Content marketing is one of the most cost-effective marketing methods available, generating an average of $38 for every $1 spent on the campaign and costing 62% less than outbound marketing. It also creates long-term returns for websites, as pages that are ranked well in search engines tend to stay there for extended periods of time, and it creates 3 times the leads as outbound marketing.

It is important to have a content rich site as 70 to 80% of all web users ignore paid search ads altogether. This can be delivered via articles and blog posts that relate to your products and services but don’t plug them directly. Potential customers want to be informed as on average people will consume over 11 pieces of content before deciding to part with their money. If you can’t provide this content, you will miss out on sales.

Tips for Success

Don’t overdo it: Around half of marketers create between two and five pieces of new content for marketing each week.

Engaging Content: Nobody likes walls of text and data proves that articles and blog posts that contain images convert better and are shared more. Video content is even more engaging though the search engine benefits will come from secondary referrers like YouTube where the videos are hosted.

Share It: Leaving your content on your site might eventually get organic results from search engines, but it is important to distribute it by email and social media. 93% of surveyed marketers rank email as the best medium for sharing content, but you should also be using Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram as well.

Use .Com: 84% of top ranking web pages in the search results come from websites on a .com domain.