Concept Allies

Are you facing difficulties in creating a content strategy plan for your business? Starting with content marketing is difficult as it requires a lot of analysis, patience and planning. To successfully execute a content strategy plan, you need to plan it right. Hire skilled copywriters & be consistent with your efforts. Content marketing takes its time to give ROI. Additionally, it requires you to create the right content that aligns with the journey of your ideal buyer. But these start with a right content strategy plan that is based on your buyer’s journey.

 

But why buyer’s journey?

Your content strategy plan should be based on your buyer’s journey so that you can effectively direct your potential buyers (customers) from one buyer stage to another. Basically, from Awareness to Consideration to Conversion to Advocacy. This all works as a funnel. There will be many potential buyers in the awareness stage, but you will end up with only a handful of loyal customers (advocates). You need to create the right content kind of content and get it in front of your potential buyers and then direct them to take the desired action. This is basically how content marketing works and here we will learn how to plan it just right in 5 simple steps.

 

5 Steps to Create a Content Strategy Plan based on your Buyer’s Journey:

how to create a content strategy plan

 

1. Identify Your Ideal Buyers:

In order to identify your ideal buyer, you need to dive deep into your business. Your ideal customer is one who offers the maximum customer lifetime value (LTV) at minimum acquisition cost (CAC). Once you identify your ideal buyer, you need to research on them thoroughly. While the more you research, the better insights you will have, it is best to start with key identifiers which are their demographics, goals, challenges, job roles, how they research products, etc. Based on the insights you gained, you need to frame content on how your offering will help them achieve their goals, solve their challenges, and perform their job. Once you are through with this, you need to list down your topics to move to the next step.

 

2. Map Your Buyer’s Journey:

The buyer’s journey comprises 4 stages – awareness, consideration, decision and advocacy.

  • Awareness is the stage where a buyer is not aware of your product or service. Here you offer him solutions to their problems and help him identify you as an authority that solves them.
  • Consideration is the stage where the buyer is aware of your offering and is researching for alternatives and competitors. Here you need to come out as an authority and give him actionable insights to come out as a helpful guide.
  • Decision is the stage where the consumer has bought a solution and has completed market research. Now is the time to show that you have the best solution for their problem and how you are better than your competitors and alternatives.
  • Advocacy is when your buyer has purchased your solution and is now a customer. Their experience with your brand will determine what opinion they share with other people about your solution. Here, product onboarding guides and your product/service quality plays its game.

After analyzing your buyer’s journey, you will come up with some more topics that can help your potential buyers. Go through all of them and organize them because of the consumer journey. It is sometimes okay if you think a topic can be grouped in over one category.

Here is a sample consumer journey of an adventure sports company:

  • Awareness – 10 cool places to go this summer
  • Consideration – Best adventure sports to play
  • Decision – Tips to choose a guide for trying adventure sports
  • Advocacy – 7 Ways to share your cool trips with friends

 

3. Look for Keywords & Language:

The language your potential customers use while searching for content online can comprise many industry-specific terms and jargon. If you skip this step, you might create great content but cannot connect with your buyers online. Keyword research is the process in which you research for different terms which your consumers are likely to search online to find your content. You can do that using various keyword research tools like MOZ, SemRush, Google Keyword Planner, etc. The idea is to look for keywords with maximum search volume and minimum competition so that you can easily rank for them and get noticed.

Need assistance with Keyword Research? Feel free to connect.

 

5. Decide the Right Marketing Channels:

Once you are done with the keyword research, your next step is to select the right marketing channels to distribute your content. Your choice of marketing channel should depend upon your budget, type of content and the best way to reach your target customers. Depending upon your target audience, narrow down your focus to key channels and frame content accordingly. Here is an example of choosing the right marketing channels for a company:

  • If the target buyer is a college teen, then primary channels should be social media (Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest), organic search (Google) and AdWords (display advertising).
  • If the target buyer is a working person, then primary channels should be social media (LinkedIn, Twitter), organic search and Google AdWords for search results.

These are just estimates and you can probably refine these options based on data from intense research and analysis. Hence, to wrap it up, you need to figure out where your buyer is most likely to spend their time and focus your efforts in that direction.

Read More: 4 Steps to Choose the Right Marketing Channels for Your Business

 

5. Promote Your Content:

No content strategy plan is complete without a promotional strategy. The mere creation of content won’t lead you anywhere. Figure out ways to get maximum traction to your content. List them down, create a checklist, and make sure you follow it. Marketing automation tools like HubSpot, Marketo etc. can help you automate and streamline this process. If you are not looking for complete automation solutions, then free tools Hootsuite and Buffer can also help. The primary aim is to get your content in front of your target audience using different techniques like social media sharing, search engine optimization, forums, etc. Make sure you spend good enough time in this process.

 

Thus, here we have a 5 step approach to creating a content strategy plan based on your buyer’s journey. In marketing, there is nothing like a one size fits all approach. You need a plan based on individual business and target market. If you use this approach to content planning, then you can easily create a content plan that resounds with your buyer’s journey. This will enable you to attract, direct and convert them with the help of your content. Good luck!

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