A content marketing agency helps you leverage content to achieve your business objectives. One of the agency’s most important objectives is to help you get found on the Internet. In addition a content marketing agency can help you with many types of marketing programs such as newsletters, email campaigns, and social media. Most importantly a content marketing agency writes content that increases leads and sales. This content can be designed for native advertising, embedded marketing, branded content, outbound marketing, inbound marketing and other marketing methods that can build brand awareness and new business opportunity. The best content marketing agency provides focused well-written content for all of these marketing activities.
Content for Native Advertising
The objective of Native Advertising is to drive people to your blog and website through the subtle endorsement of a reputable publication. The content marketing agency places your content in popular publications that have a large audience. The objective is to provide a sponsored post that matches the format and subject matter of the syndicated publication. This is a very effective alternative to the difficult task of reaching the first page of Google search. It allows you to piggyback on the success of other high ranking publication sites.
Even though the primary purpose of native marketing is not to improve your site ranking, it actually does help. Your search ranking is improved when more people click on your native ad and go directly to your website. Google ranks sites by the number of visits, so by increasing the visits, you actually increase your own search ranking.
The challenge for a content marketing agency is to make the article interesting and relevant to the readers of the hosted publication. For example, if you sell door security devices, you could place an article in a security journal such as CSO Online that discusses door access control software with an article titled “Cloud Versus On Site License for Access Control”.
Embedded Content Advertising
The goal of providing embedded advertising is to include content elements within other articles and publications that relate to a product or service. This content blends in with the rest of the article and it is not obvious that a product is being advertised. For example, the article may describe how an IP security camera works, and embedded in the content is a manufacturer’s camera provided as an example. The article may also include highlights of the product’s capability. In this way, embedded content advertising blends into the overall discussion and adds value to the article.
As an example, take a look at the article, “What is the Best Price for Your Camera System”. Embedded in the article are links to product pages that describe a manufacturer’s products.
Branded Content
Branded content is perhaps most similar to native advertising. This type of sponsored post highlights the brand name of an organization or product. It helps to build the organization’s reputation, and helps direct traffic to its website. Branded content is somewhat similar in appearance to native marketing, but branded content goes further to incorporate the branded product or service within the main “story” of the article.
For example, in an article about security cameras you might focus exclusively on a single camera brand. All of the examples and hyperlinks lead readers to the website you are promoting.
Outbound Marketing
Outbound marketing includes newsletters, direct email, and social media. All of these resources are provided by the content marketing agency. Once you have collected email addresses of prospects and customers, you can create various outbound marketing campaigns that help generate new business.
For example, publishing a newsletter reminds people about your brand, products and services. It helps to build recognition and reminds them that you are around to help. When they click on an article, it brings them to your blog site, and increases your web traffic. This helps to increase your search position. A good salesperson can create excitement and interest when they meet a prospect, but after time goes by the prospect may totally forget the conversation. The newsletter is a gentle reminder so that when the timing is right you will be a part of the purchase decision.
Inbound Marketing
Inbound marketing uses many different methods for bringing prospects to your website. Improving your native search position is one of the major goals of inbound marketing. If you can be found on the first search result page for a relevant set of keywords, you have won the marketing challenge. Blogs, whitepapers, referrals from other sites, and newsletters all help you achieve a good native search position.
Content that is written for websites and blogs is the most challenging. The content marketing agency must select keyword phrases correctly to help build your web position. The title of the article, and subtitles on the page all contribute to placing your webpage or blog on the top of a web search. The content must also hold the reader’s attention so that they remain on the site, and finally contact you for more information. The goal of inbound marketing is to improve the leads reaching your web site.
As an example, take a look at this web page that describes Intercoms. The page title, sub-titles, and article text make many references to Intercoms.
Summary
A content marketing agency provides a number of services aimed at increasing your leads and sales. They write content that is targeted at various marketing activities. The agency first asks questions so that it understands your objectives. It then helps you select the best type of Internet marketing for your organization. The results are measured by improved site performance. This includes the number of hits to your page or blog. The most important metric is how your leads and sales increase as a result of this investment.
For more information about content marketing agencies and how our agency can increase your sales, please contact ContentMX.