12 Ways To Use Content Marketing To Build Brand Awareness via @sejournal, @seocopychick

Content selling continues to beryllium 1 of the astir almighty methods for driving targeted postulation and winning implicit caller customers – and it shows no signs of slowing down successful 2022.

In fact, caller strategies look to look each year, empowering much contented producers to make much compelling and engaging content.

Traffic generation is lone 1 of the galore perks of contented marketing, though. For caller and increasing brands, contented tin beryllium a mode to enactment themselves connected the map. We’re talking astir marque awareness.

Here’s however to usage contented selling to drum up visibility for your marque and adjacent pull caller customers successful the process.

What Is Brand Awareness, Really?

Brand awareness refers to the level astatine which consumers are acquainted with your brand, goods, oregon services.

There are varying degrees of marque awareness, from simply having encountered a brand’s merchandise to knowing and remembering a marque by name.

For caller brands, simply getting their “foot successful the door” is simply a starting constituent to acquiring much customers and expanding their visibility implicit time.

Brand Awareness Influences Search

I’ve worked with galore clients who person launched caller brands and aren’t definite wherever to commencement erstwhile it comes to their marque consciousness strategy. I ever relay that brand consciousness plays a relation successful search (meaning, Google search) and vice versa.

In that way, marque consciousness is not astatine each removed from SEO.

Think astir however societal media trends power users’ consciousness of definite brands. We saw this with fidget spinners, which made their debut connected social. Then, users flocked to Google successful hunt of these toys.

Thus, we saw searches for “fidget spinners” increase… and past rapidly alteration erstwhile fidget spinners fell retired of vogue.

With this successful mind, adopting a holistic contented selling strategy has the imaginable to summation Search visibility and thrust integrated postulation to your site. The much users are alert of your brand, the much they volition hunt for you connected Google.

Search Influences Brand Visibility

Likewise, utilizing SEO to your vantage is 1 mode to thrust marque awareness. You whitethorn not yet person sanction recognition, but you tin usage non-branded hunt presumption to thrust users to your website.

For example, accidental you conscionable launched a caller invoicing SaaS for concern owners. Even though your marque sanction whitethorn not person Google searches yet, you tin people presumption similar “small concern invoicing software” oregon “how to make a concern invoice” to pull users to your website.

Then, they volition person their archetypal brushwood with your caller brand.

What This Means For Your Brand

All of the supra means that contented selling is indispensable to power your integrated postulation and drum up marque awareness.

Your contented strategy should beryllium astatine slightest two-fold successful presumption of creating contented that gets your marque sanction retired crossed platforms and successful driving integrated postulation to your site.

Content selling tin assistance your brand:

• Attract more followers connected societal media
• Generate social/referral traffic to your website
• Form strategical brand partnerships
• Improve the organic ranking of your website
• Earn high-authority backlinks to your site
• Improve customer retention implicit time

These are conscionable a fewer of the galore benefits of contented selling for marque visibility.

Now, let’s dive into however to marque your contented enactment for you – and crook your marque into a household name.

12 Content Marketing Tactics For Brand Awareness

As an SEO contented strategist, I’m a immense instrumentality of creating contented that serves aggregate purposes. With this successful mind, the pursuing strategies volition not lone assistance your marque consciousness efforts but perchance summation your visibility and postulation connected different platforms.

1. Research Your Target Market And Audience

Before you ever benignant a connection of content, you should find your people marketplace and the ideal audience you privation to scope with your brand.

Without this step, you hazard creating the incorrect benignant of contented connected the incorrect platforms for the incorrect assemblage – and wasting your clip successful the process.

Fortunately, market research has go acold easier present that we person galore tools astatine our disposal. My favourite is Google Forms, which you tin usage to survey imaginable audiences and gauge their involvement successful brands similar yours.

Here’s however to behaviour speedy and casual marketplace research:

Create Google Form with the pursuing questions:

• What is your #1 conflict erstwhile it comes to [primary taxable of brand]?
• What solutions person you tried already to lick this problem?
• What issues did you person with those solutions?
• If you were to specify your perfect solution, what would it be?
• What are you hoping to execute by [solution]?

Then, usage your social channels, existing email list, network, and different communities you person entree to.

Survey radical successful your imaginable audience. Aim to get 10+ responses.

Tally up the astir communal responses from your survey.

Finally, usage the insights to pass your marque connection and who your perfect customers whitethorn be.

Over time, I urge utilizing tools similar Google Analytics to way existent show and amended hone successful connected who is engaging with your content.

In the meantime, however, an archetypal survey volition assistance guarantee you are operating based connected assemblage input, not your ain assumptions.

2. Define Your Brand’s Unique Selling Proposition

In bid to basal retired successful your market, you request to specify thing unsocial that your marque brings to the marketplace.

This whitethorn beryllium a much businesslike mode to lick a lawsuit problem, a much affordable solution, amended lawsuit service, oregon a scope of what we telephone unsocial selling points.

Your unique selling proposition (USP) is simply a connection that highlights your brand’s cardinal selling points and frames them successful a mode that communicates worth to your people audience.

For example, it’s excessively wide to accidental you are a marketer who offers selling services. A USP specified as, “X Agency offers bespoke integer selling services to assistance brands turn with scale, precision, and confidence.” This is wherever the existent golden is.

Your USP volition go the instauration of each of your selling efforts. It volition beryllium what sets you isolated successful the marketplace, attracts your perfect customer, and defines wherefore consumers should bargain from you.

3. Create Non-Branded, Searchable Web Content

At this stage, precise fewer radical whitethorn cognize astir your brand, peculiarly connected a brand-name basis. This is wherever you tin usage non-branded hunt to your vantage successful bid to thrust traffic to your website.

Maybe you person a section covering boutique that conscionable opened successful Seattle. While radical whitethorn not beryllium alert of your storefront yet – unless they hap to locomotion by – you tin inactive usage SEO to thrust postulation some online and off. In this case, immoderate presumption to people whitethorn be:

• [downtown seattle covering store] which has astir 320 searches per month.

• [vintage covering store seattle]  which has astir 260 searches per month.

• [womens covering seattle] which has astir 20 searches per month.

You tin past optimize your website contented – web pages, chiefly – according to these hunt terms. If done well, you tin thrust caller users to your website and adjacent your section listings (like Google Business Profiles).

4. Forge Strategic Industry Partnerships

Getting your ft successful the doorway arsenic a caller startup oregon concern often requires forming adjacent partnerships with different concern owners. Never underestimate the powerfulness of referrals and word-of-mouth marketing.

While in-person networking volition surely service these interests, your contented selling tin arsenic well. Here are a fewer ways to usage contented to physique manufacture partnerships:

• Publish thought enactment content connected LinkedIn and signifier caller connections.
• Join Facebook groups and stock insights with different manufacture professionals.
• Host a Facebook Live oregon different unrecorded chat to turn your following.
• Post informative video content and prosecute with different concern owners successful the comments.
• Conduct email outreach to signifier third-party publishing opportunities.
• Invite concern owners to contribute to oregon beryllium interviewed connected your blog.

The benefits of forging these partnerships are plenty. For one, you tin make a wide web of referrals for your business. Second, you tin slope connected the authorization and scope of different businesses to stock your content.

This is an enactment that should beryllium ongoing arsenic agelong arsenic you privation to thrust much marque awareness.

5. Publish On Third-Party Websites

If you person a caller business, chances are your website lacks the authorization to truly propulsion your contented to the apical of the Google hunt results.

This has overmuch to bash with the property of your domain, your backlink history, and however overmuch optimized contented you person connected your site.

Fortunately, you tin usage different websites’ authorization and power to boost your own. Here’s however this works:

1. Create a database of industry-related websites which whitethorn beryllium apt to people your contented (think: tiny businesses, not Forbes).
2. Reach retired to the steadfast oregon concern proprietor via email asking if you tin contribute blog contented connected a periodic basis. Specify that this is not for linking purposes, but to stock your manufacture experience.
3. Once accepted, write contented connected topics that your assemblage would find invaluable (again, support your USP successful mind). However, debar being self-promotional.
4. Share this content with your increasing audience. See the results of publishing your contented connected larger platforms.

“Guest posting”, arsenic this is called, is peculiarly adjuvant if you person a precise tiny audience. With impermanent posting, you tin get much eyes connected your experience, content, and, eventually, brand.

6. Capitalize On Influencer Marketing

Similar to the above, you tin usage influencer marketing to scope a wider audience. This is peculiarly communal for ecommerce brands, which prosecute with influencers to stock and beforehand their products.

Find influencers successful your manufacture who whitethorn beryllium funny successful shouting retired your brand. This whitethorn beryllium successful speech for escaped products oregon different incentives. If they accept, this tin beryllium a bully mode to turn your following.

7. Let Data Drive Your Content

The occurrence of your contented selling relies connected utilizing information to thrust your content. The “publish and pray” method hardly works arsenic a existent strategy. Hence wherefore we statesman your contented program with assemblage research.

There are galore tools you tin usage to assistance you construe idiosyncratic information and usage this to pass your contented strategy. Some of these tools include:

• Google Analytics – for show insights, idiosyncratic demographics, and idiosyncratic behavior.
• Google Search Console – for keyword performance, click-through rate, and positioning.
• SEMRush – for keyword research, rival analysis, contented analysis, and backlinks reports.
• Hootsuite – for societal media engagement, impressions, and marque awareness.

I suggest monitoring these tools connected a play ground to spot however your platforms are presently performing, what contented is driving the astir consciousness of your brand, and however users are engaging with contented connected your website.

8. Diversify Your Content Strategy

When you are archetypal starting out, it’s astir intolerable to cognize which platforms and which types of contented volition resonate astir with your people audience.

Truly, you volition request to diversify your content strategy to spot which strategies person the astir interaction connected your peculiar brand.

Really, your contented should service the intent of communicating your values arsenic a business. This relates backmost to your USP, arsenic defined successful Step 2.

Then, you tin usage antithetic types of contented to prosecute your audience:

• Videos.
• Blog articles.
• Podcasts.
• Infographics.
• Social media posts.
• Live videos.
• Guest posts.
• Interviews.
• Tutorials.
• Email campaigns.
• Paid ads.
• Hosted events.

Over time, your analytics volition bespeak which types of contented users prosecute with most. This volition springiness you absorption connected what contented to people astir often, and which types to nix from your contented strategy.

9. Utilize Social Listening Tools

Sentiment analysis uses instrumentality learning to fundamentally “listen” to conversations users are having online and find however radical are talking astir your brand. This tin beryllium highly valuable, arsenic it allows you to spot whether your marque is being portrayed successful a affirmative airy (or not).

More than that, it gives you the accidental to ain the narrative. Tools similar Brandwatch whitethorn empower you to spot what has radical buzzing, but your contented volition beryllium what shapes the speech implicit time.

The caller property of user quality has allowed galore brands to get up of the curve, displacement the perspective, and drum up much consciousness online.

10. Establish A Content Publishing Strategy

Based connected your assemblage research, information analytics, and societal listening insights, you whitethorn present cognize what to people – but really getting the contented retired determination is simply a antithetic story. Building marque consciousness is often a fragile clip wherever messaging and consistency truly marque the difference.

If you are lax connected your publishing schedule, you whitethorn miss retired connected opportunities to drum up marque awareness. If you are inconsistent successful your messaging, you whitethorn confuse your assemblage astir what your marque is about.

Establishing a publishing schedule – with outlined topics and dates – volition assistance support you accountable for creating contented connected a regular basis. Plus, you volition person a grounds of what you’ve published already truthful you don’t duplicate your efforts successful the future.

11. Own Branded And Non-Branded Conversations

It’s tempting to effort and beryllium the sole dependable regarding your brand, but you should beryllium contiguous successful non-branded conversations arsenic well.

• Are you sharing your knowledge connected definite manufacture topics?
• Are you asking users what they are funny in oregon what they are struggling with?
• Are you weighing successful connected recent trends?

The extremity present is to support your digit connected the pulse of what’s happening successful your industry, not conscionable your business. The much you’re capable to “talk shop” with your audience, the much chances you springiness them to brushwood your brand.

12. Don’t Forget The Follow-up

Once your contented is retired there, you springiness your assemblage galore opportunities to travel crossed your brand. But you tin conscionable arsenic easy autumn disconnected their radar. This is wherever the follow-up matters.

This whitethorn include:

• Following up with email subscribers via email.
• Running retargeting ads to website visitors.
• Initiating conversations with your societal media followers.
• Following up with existing customers.
• Responding to comments and messages.
• Checking successful with your professional contacts and partners.

Don’t fto users brushwood your marque erstwhile and past ne'er spot you again. A robust contented selling strategy engages users astatine aggregate touchpoints and grows this engagement into a narration that tin germinate into a paying customer.

Content Marketing Insights To Grow Your Brand

When galore concern owners deliberation of “brand awareness”, they deliberation of publishing contented connected societal media and hoping users instrumentality notice. But your contented strategy tin beryllium overmuch more, well, strategic, erstwhile you usage insights to your advantage.

Audience research, keyword research, competitor analysis, and website analytics tin each beryllium utilized to pass your contented strategy. That way, you are definite to scope the close users with the close contented astatine the close clip – and support your marque apical of caput until they are acceptable to buy.

More resources:

• Why Content Marketing Matters
• 10 Content Marketing Trends To Watch In 2022 [Infographic]
• Content Marketing: The Ultimate Beginner’s Guide

Featured Image: Natasa Adzic/Shutterstock