Tuesday 02 July 2019, Manchester

Being heard in an ambitious content world

Kate Pickering,  Head of Content at Gyro Manchester, explained that content marketing is a strategic marketing approach, focused on distributing and creating valuable content. Getting it right can help shape business direction and ultimately drive profitable customer action. Content can drive sales, position a brand and change opinion. Content is not just there to transact, it is there to create an emotional connection. Content helps build relationships with customers and can help a brand stand out from the competition. For example:

• American express - No 1 lead generator for new products
• Position a brand - Redbull - fails in every taste test says CEO but content production props them up - create such a buzz around the brand from content to make them no 1.

In a recent survey:

• 58% brand content is not meaningful to customers
• If 77% brands disappeared, nobody would care

Content plays to behaviours and motivations. Different generations display different behaviours:

• Baby boomers - more goal orientated
• Generation x - more focused on data
• Millennials - more values based demand transparency and honest conversation. Don't want to be contacted by phone, prefer email, Visually minded - grown up with mobile video, content needs to be visually engaging
• Centennial - mid 1990’s - flexible schedules, prefer face to face communication

What came first, the behaviour or the technology?

Kate explained both! We’ve seen a seismic shift in behaviour.  90% of all data has been created in the last two years

How do you stand out from the crowd? A fresh tone of voice is vital. Authenticity is key. Golden rule - only create content if you can afford to distribute it. Organic social reach has pretty much died. Impact structure and format of content will change

Agree how you are going to distribute it first as this will impact structure and format of content.

For example there is no point creating a video in landscape if going on Facebook. Twitter still relevant for current affairs.

Data

Using data to target for acquisition. Primary data - data you own, is the most accurate.

Secondary data - create look a like from existing data - performs way more strongly from tertiary data. Do what you can to own your data, don’t rely on third party channels

GDPR

Kate talked about the importance of tailoring content - the audience will only give data to content that resonates with them. GDPR is raising the bar in content creation. Don’t be afraid of collecting first party data. Put more stringent policies around it

 

Audience and channel selection - fish where your fish are!

Talk - do more of it. Engage with audience rather than broadcast

Webinars are re emerging with a tv feel. Technology is being polarised - do we need to find more channels of communication?

Look at the strengths of individual channels. Creating content for that channel and don’t adopt a blanket approach. Look at channels depending on the customer journey. This will help create a more engaged audience

Financial services - either very traditional or embracing it Eg atom bank

Instagram - more aspirational,  great for brand awareness and audience generally more engaged.

YouTube

Has to be tailored for each channel - eg you tube - infotainment - how to guides etc. Youtube - objective should be to  build subscribers not direct traffic elsewhere. It’s the second biggest search engine to google. Embed videos from youtube into your site

Pinterest - if they pin it then there's a conversion intent

Vimeo - great producers of content

Kate Pickering,  Head of Content at Gyro Manchester, is responsible for their growing content team as the agency responds to demand from its existing and new B2B clients. She oversees everything from content strategy through to content development and evaluation for clients.

Written by Katy Turner, Family Business United