Your content is more than just blinking words on a screen. It forms the narrative of who you are as a brand. Your content is the difference between you and every other business in your niche.
What sets you apart? Your story. Who you are. What you bring to the table.
Content marketing can potentially put your brand on the map in an instantly identifiable and unforgettable way. Even better, it drives revenue and business growth quickly—exactly what a startup needs to get on its feet and thrive.
The dual benefit of content marketing for startups
The benefits of content marketing for startups are twofold. First, you build your brand, and second, you expand your reach. Both will help you reach your business goals and build a customer base.
Telling your story
Telling your brand story has several benefits:
- It makes it easy to stay cohesive in your messaging across marketing channels
- It gives you a foundation to build your content strategy on
- It humanizes your brand, making you more relatable
- It differentiates you from your competitors
- It gives you brand recognition
Amplifying your reach
Expanding your organic traffic and reach with compelling content will result in:
- Increased engagement rate
- Sustainable growth
- Customer loyalty
- Brand authority
- Conversions
- Social proof
How to harness the power of content marketing for your startup
Content marketing is an extremely popular marketing channel for companies of all sizes, and it’s easy to understand why.
Content marketing is significantly more cost-effective, with a 62 percent lower cost compared to other marketing channels and a six times higher conversion rate.
Here’s how to harness some of that power to grow your startup:
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Figure out your target audience
You should identify your target audience before creating a single piece of content.
The slickest, most clever pieces of marketing content won’t be effective if it’s in front of entirely the wrong audience.
If you’ve already created some content marketing assets (blog posts, website pages, social media posts), you should have some data to work with.
Examine this data through analytics platforms like Google Analytics or your social media dashboards to see who responds and engages most with your content.
From there, determine your target audience persona based on your data, product, and past and current sales trends.
This buyer persona will give you a blueprint for your content marketing efforts.
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Establish yourself as a thought leader in your industry
“Thought leadership” refers to sharing knowledge and expertise in a certain field. Content marketing for startups should spend time focusing on thought leadership.
Your expertise is what attracts people’s attention. It demonstrates that you know what you’re doing and have developed a product that solves problems.
Good thought leadership content should have a point of view, be written from experience, and offer solutions.
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Educate, problem-solve, and entertain
The content you create for your startup should fall into one of these three buckets.
Educational content doesn’t have to be dry and technical. In fact, if it is, you should make it more accessible with TL;DR recaps, scannable bullet points, and infographics.
You want to inspire and entertain as well as solve problems and educate.
A funny meme on your social media channels may lead potential customers to your website, but once there, they will want to know who you are and what you’re about.
Your educational and problem-solving types of content could include:
- Answers to common concerns
- Interviews from experts
- Troubleshooting fixes
- Product comparisons
- Product reviews
- Statistic reports
- How-to guides
- Video tutorials
- Resource lists
- White papers
- Case studies
Entertaining content could include:
- Playful “roasts” of your own brand or others
- Behind-the-scenes posts and videos
- Clever quips about your industry
- Live-stream or virtual tours
- Giveaways and quizzes
- Narrative storytelling
- Animated shorts
- Memes and gifs
Start with what you already have
Chances are, you already have some content to work with.
If you’ve already developed a blog, newsletter, or good social media posts, you can build on them without reinventing the wheel.
Use your analytics tools to see what resonates most and build on those themes.
For blogs, update and refresh existing blog posts, especially those doing well.
You can do this by researching currently ranking keywords, deleting old or irrelevant information, and re-writing sections with fresh keywords and perspectives. You’ll retain the SEO juice of the former article while getting all the advantages of a new one.
Lastly, content distribution channels are your friend. Re-use a piece of content as many times as you can.
For instance, the tour company Beaches of Normandy created a newsletter archive on their website to help promote their Band of Brothers Tours and other offerings.
This allows them to get more marketing mileage from every email newsletter they create, amplifying their reach and building an audience in email marketing and their website.
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Build a solid sales funnel
Every part of the sales funnel is considered part of a successful content marketing strategy.
Your sales funnel should include Top of Funnel (ToFu) content, Middle of Funnel Content (MoFu), and Bottom of Funnel (BoFu) content.
Your ToFu content is meant to create awareness of you and your brand. Your target audience knows they have a need or a problem to solve. Your job at this stage is to make them aware that you a) exist and b) have a solution (read: offer valuable content).
Most content that’s created is awareness-stage content. It comprises many content formats: blog posts, ebooks, short-form videos, infographics, and similar content.
The middle of the funnel is where your target audience considers their options. This is where you want to have valuable, educational content.
Middle-funnel content can include webinars, free trials, comparison guides, targeted email campaigns, and videos.
Wiz, a cloud security company, is an excellent example of using animated videos as MoFU content.
They offer information on a range of topics, from Cloud Native Application Protection Platforms (CNAPP) to cloud security assessments, making it easier for potential customers to grasp the full spectrum of their services and the value they provide.
Alternatively, Dyte, a leading video conferencing SDK provider, adeptly uses MoFU content to compare its offerings directly against industry giants.
Through articles such as “Twilio vs. Agora” and “Zoom vs. Twilio,” Dyte showcases its unique value proposition and strategically targets keywords associated with its competitors.
Finally, once your target audience is nearing the end of the funnel, they may need one last concern answered before they decide to buy.
Your BoFU content should include reviews, testimonials, pricing pages, and frequently asked questions to address these roadblocks.
It’s easy to focus all your content marketing efforts on one area, but you want to have content for every stage to help move potential customers through the sales funnel.
How to tell your brand story
Done well, all your content should echo who you are as a brand. However, there are a handful of marketing assets and channels that give you the best opportunity to tell your brand story and showcase who you are.
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Your “About Us” page
Don’t throw away your “About Us” page. This is your introduction to potential customers, a chance for you to demonstrate what it’d be like to work with you. What you value, why you do what you do, and the ethics you stand on can all be showcased here.
A good “About Us” page is an excellent piece of PR for your company and should be written with sincerity. You want to be genuine, friendly, and approachable in your tone without being phony or canned.
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Your social media presence
Your social media presence—especially on platforms that allow for more personal branding platforms like LinkedIn— is an excellent platform for you to extend your “About Us” storytelling.
Your posts should have a point of view that demonstrates who you are and what you value.
According to SproutSocial, 89 percent of B2B marketers use inbound marketing on LinkedIn for lead generation, and 62 percent are successful in landing leads.
And the even better news is it costs you nothing but some thought and time, so a tight budget won’t hinder you.
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Your mission statement
A mission statement defines your company’s purpose and objectives.
A good mission statement will include three parts:
- What you do
- What you hope to achieve
- Your values
Use this opportunity to express in your own words what your company brings to the table. Your mission statement can be a part of your “About Us” page or in a separate section.
Wherever it lives digitally, its ethos should be a part of all the content you create in your marketing strategy.
Wrap up
Regardless of where you’re starting in your inbound marketing journey, focusing on content marketing is a smart move.
Use data to define your audience persona and use it as a blueprint to establish yourself as a thought leader in your industry. Create high-quality content by solving problems and educating your readership.
Lastly, utilize the forms of content you already have, ensure you’ve created content hubs for every step of the sales funnel, and fill your content calendar.
Use your “About Us” and mission statement pages, as well as your social media posts, to tell your story and generate positive PR, and your startup will enjoy content marketing success.
