The one marketing activity you should invest in this year

There is one marketing activity that is becoming the primary focus for businesses and marketers alike. It’s been around for a long time, but it gained new importance for a number of reasons. The first was the changes that Facebook and Google have made in regard to their advertising and privacy laws. The consequence of which is that you cannot target and remarket to audiences in the way we could 5 years ago.
The second reason is the current political and economic environment. The increased cost of living and inflation means that customers are researching and spending more time than ever choosing which companies and products they will spend their money with. Increasing environmental awareness is also playing into this and our understanding of companies who greenwash (the process of conveying a false impression or misleading information about how a company's products are environmentally sound).

The result is that customers now demand to have information about a company, product and service, so they can make an educated buying decision. What does that mean for your business?

It means the one marketing activity you need to invest in this year is content marketing. A once nice to have, it is now a critical part of any successful marketing strategy.

Content marketing is a strategy that involves creating and amplifying (we’ll come back to this later) content online. It can take a variety of forms including blogs, emails, social media, videos, podcasts etc).

It’s overtaking more traditional forms of marketing as it offers a new and exciting way of connecting with potential customers without coming across as being overly self-promotional. The primary goal is to attract, engage and retain your audience by providing valuable, educational and relevant content designed to address pain points, entertain and educate your audience.

The benefit of content marketing is that it builds trust and a relationship with your audience. Rather than selling at them, you engage them, and they want to buy from you. It also makes for loyal customers.

In this series, I’ll be sharing all you need to know about how to create a content marketing strategy for your business in 2023.