How to Use Your Content Effectively

Here at Do What Works, we are big believers in only creating content that has value.

This might sound like a given - of course you only want to spend time creating content that is valuable! If you look a little deeper, however, you will often find that the content people THINK they need to produce and the content they will actually USE are two different things.

Time and resources are valuable; wasting them on creating commodity content that cannot be used to solve your customers’ problems and help your sales and marketing efforts will never be something we recommend. Instead, let's look at how to create and use content effectively.

Using Content Effectively Starts with Creating the Right Content

With so many options available today, potential customers will almost always research before they even speak to you.

If they cannot find information that leads them to believe you can guide them to the answer to their problem, they will move on quickly.

To create effective content that will speak to these customers, you must first understand what they are looking for. What problem do they have? What frustrates them? Why are they seeking answers?

Notice that none of these questions are “Why are you, X Company, the answer to my problem?”

At the risk of sounding harsh, they don’t care about why you are the answer to their problem - they care about their problem.

Instead of creating content that answers why you, X Company, are the best possible solution out there, I recommend a mindset shift.

If you can prove that you understand them, their problem, their frustrations, and the consequences of not solving this problem, they will be much more likely to look to you for answers as to how to solve the problem.

Once you understand this, you can then begin to create the RIGHT content - content that can be used effectively across your organization to guide potential customers to a solution to their problem.

How to Figure Out the Right Content to Write

Your potential customers are looking for a guide to help solve their problem and you have the expertise and experience to be able to help. However, coming up with specific topics to write about can often be easier said than done. 

We find that the best way to create a list of content topics is to use your potential customers themselves as inspiration.

Whether you are a sales team of one or a team of many, you will have been asked questions by potential customers during their journey through your sales pipeline. These questions could be broad and general or targeted and specific - either way, they are valuable.

I recommend jotting down questions that you are asked during the sales process; this can be done by one person or by the entire team.

These questions can be used to help create content that answers your potential customers’ questions and helps establish you as an expert guide to help solve their problems.

Instead of creating a list of topics that will produce commodity content, you have now created a list of topics that will produce sales enabled content that is valuable to both your company and your current and prospective customers.

I Created the Right Content - Now What?

You have taken the time to produce sales enabled specific content - now you have to put it into use.

The best part about sales enabled content is that it is not generated for one-time use. If done correctly, this content will accomplish a variety of the following tasks, including but not limited to the following:

• Improved SEO: Content that is written with sales enablement in mind should show your expertise on a particular topic. Google and other search engines will crawl your content and recognize this, so when someone searches for something on that topic, your content will show up as valuable.
  
  
• Lead Nurturing for Sales: This content can also be used by your sales team. If you have identified topics that often come up in your sales process, you can then use the content created around this topic as a way to show your expertise, either in conversation or as an email follow up after a phone call or in-person meeting.
  
  
• Lead Generation for Marketing: Sales enabled content is not only for your sales team; your marketing team can also utilize this content in drip campaigns. For example, if you are showcasing a particular product or service at a trade show and you have sales enabled content created around that product or service, a drip campaign with that content can be sent out to visitors post-show.

To us, a valuable piece of content is one that is sales enabled and has the ability to be used in a variety of ways across your organization. However, you have to remember that content is only considered valuable if it is valuable to your current and prospective customers.

Content can only be used effectively if it helps your customers and guides them towards the solution to their problems. Once you begin to create content with this in mind, you will have valuable sales enabled content that is multi-use and effective in helping your customers and your business grow.

Learn more about creating sales enabled content and reach out to us with any questions.