When developing marketing content – how do you start the conversation and where do you engage with your prospects and clients?

For the consumer, your solution can easily get lost in a sea of SEO keywords, landing pages that all look alike and social channels with sporadic episodes of content. You need to position your solution in the right context for your business. Most companies know the prerequisite marketing for your website, product brief, and contact form-fill pages but not many go beyond that to tailor the bespoke experience for your audience. The extra step of content mapping your collateral can deliver a full-funnel experience for easy access to information and enough due diligence for next steps.

First, for top-of-funnel content, make sure you are building your narrative and positioning your value prop in a clear and concise way. Begin your content by telling the audience what question you’re going to answer, what problem you’re going to solve, and how you’re going to help them achieve a specific goal. This will save time and keep the audience engaged.

For the rollout of content, make sure there is an up-to-date blog post, topical podcast, and or youtube video showcasing your solution for the audience. Awareness content can have a huge impact on the customer who is screening multiple solution providers for base-level domain expertise. If your content is topical, posted on a regular schedule, and provides enough of a comprehensive approach to the subject matter then it is perceived as authoritative and trustworthy. SEO best practices would also entail making sure that backlinks, such as PR/news, are up to date and optimized.

During the middle of the funnel, stakeholders are comparing and shopping solutions. In this phase the highest impact content is video. Explainer videos, customer success story videos, and recorded webinars bring to life the solution, product, or service your organization focuses on. In this phase of the discovery process, the audience wants to see color both literally and metaphorically. The solution benefits and story should be on full display to highlight why your value prop is the leader in your industry. Clear, defined features and success outcomes should put even the most jaded stakeholder at ease with wanting to learn more and or make contact.

For example, if your product or service has made a significant impact on a client – make sure to showcase this by getting customer testimonials, quotes, and perhaps even a video interview from the satisfied customer. There is nothing that compares in the consideration phase more than real examples of your solution shining.

Finally, at the bottom of the funnel, make sure your content is summarizing your solution benefits with actionable next steps. The CTA should feel like the logical continuation of the conversation to move the needle forward. For instance, the next step of contacting your company should be an easy one. Both simple form-fill pages and additional gated content like case studies could serve two objectives. The first, getting the contact information of the now very interested prospect, and secondly, giving one last example of a success story that your solution achieved. Here, contact is not only expected by the prospective customer but welcomed.

At this stage, your solution is probably one of two or three, and FAQs are top of mind. Internally, make sure all your representatives have battle cards and energized talking points to devour the competition with your solution facts! If your solution has a proprietary algorithm and or uses AI to solve complex business challenges – make sure you are speaking to that differentiator.

Likewise, just as it’s important to map the right content according to the buyers’ journey; it’s equally noteworthy to have an overarching multi-touch approach to content distribution. Mapping the right collateral to SEO, the company website, and social channels are commonplace. In fact, an argument can be made that if you are not continuing the conversation on more than one device and channel then you’re leaving an opportunity on the table. My favorite platform for granular targeting in the conversion phase is Linkedin in general. The preferred medium is video.

As your audience finds value in your content, they should be encouraged to be a part of your community. Advocacy and evangelism are sometimes left as an afterthought for content. Instead, plan for community-building opportunities to consistently engage with your loyal audience. Ultimately, it is vital to guide both new and returning leads through the journey while employing the right plan, channel mix, and commitment at every step.