A documented content marketing plan is always better than an ad hoc approach. 41% of the top B2B performers have a documented strategy in place for 2020. From those who have a documented plan, 69% have been the most successful in their efforts and this number has been increasing over the years. When it comes to digital content it’s important to get your basics right—before you start your content creation process, make sure you are following SEO best practices. Search engine algorithms are updated regularly to give people more accurate results and taking care of this overarching aspect of all your content ensures that your content is successful online by design. Your content strategy is going to work well online only after the SEO process is inculcated into every content format you create. Social media algorithms tend to favor visual content, use that to promote your content better. Good strategies have common characteristics like those described below.

Who Are You Talking To?
The first step to formulating a strategy is figuring out who will find your product or service the most useful. It is not as simple as saying that you are targeting a particular industry. A detailed persona needs to be created with a background, likes, interests, life goals, and annual income. Remember that a buyer persona is different from a target audience in that it goes into a detailed profile of the ideal customer from your larger target audience. You can go a step further and split this persona into various buyer types. Just like the B2B buyer journey is not always linear, the B2B customer base is often diverse. From here you can narrow down your persona and identify which one can help your business grow best and target each one sequentially.

Define Your Goals
To create a comprehensive B2B content strategy, you can’t just identify one final goal. Each stage of the buyer journey will have a particular goal that needs to be achieved and stage-specific KPIs. This is especially important when creating content for the intent stage of the buyer journey. When a prospective customer enters a search term into Google, they want a precise answer. Sometimes they are looking for a website, sometimes it’s purely informational, and the intention can also be to purchase something. Instead of trying to figure out the search term they are using, try to understand why finding the answer to it is important to their business. Ensure that there is no speculation involved in this process and sometimes you can understand this by simply asking your audience through a poll or survey. Getting first-hand information from your audience can have a significant impact on creating accurate KPIs. It also helps in developing the apt brand voice that will resonate with your audience and helps you create truly engaging content.

Learn from Your Peers
The content marketing landscape has become such a crowded space that there are more than enough mistakes to learn from if you keep your eyes open. There are also a large number of successful content marketing campaigns that have used unique approaches to reach customers. Watching competitors does not mean that you need to imitate their approach. You can use it as an opportunity to set yourself apart. Assess the maturity level of your content marketing effort—whether it’s in the nascent stages of becoming a process, measuring success metrics is progressively becoming sophisticated, or if it is a full-fledged business strategy that is scalable.

Use Apt Distribution Channels
Ensure that the medium you use to convey your brand’s messaging aligns with your brand image and voice. Marshall McLuhan was a communication theorist who said that the medium is the message and this still holds true today.

The distribution channel you choose to communicate to customers affects how the message is received. Being present on various platforms is a good idea but choose wisely when, where, and how you choose to interact with customers on these platforms. The messaging needs to be consistent so that customers associate a sense of reliability with your brand. This strategy can also have a positive effect on the lifetime value of each customer.

B2B User-generated Content
The current times might be the best time to experiment with user-generated content (UGC) in your business. Most social interaction is happening via technology so the potential is high. There are excellent content marketing examples like how IBM made it work for them so why can’t you?

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