Let’s start with a basic assertion; content marketing has become every brands’ secret weapon in the B2B space.
After all, not only does content marketing generate three-times as many leads as traditional outbound techniques, but it also costs more than 60% less on average. This makes a compelling proposition for B2B firms, who are becoming increasingly reliant on the quality and insightfulness of their content to effectively engage clients.
With these points in mind, it is crucial that you invest in the cultivation of well-written copy if your B2B venture is to succeed. Here are five essential tips to keep in mind:
-
Understand Your Audience and Underlying Business Model
If there is one word to bear in mind when creating content, it is relevance. There are many different facets to this, however, from the topical relevance of the copy that you write to the way in which it relates to your core service.
The latter is particularly important, so it is imperative that your work is underpinned by an in-depth knowledge of your business model and its core value proposition. This should frame the structure and the nature of your content, so that it reflects your brand ethos regardless of whether you are providing insight, challenging perspectives or answering client queries.
Similarly, you also need to have an innate understanding of your audience, as the content that you produce must appeal to your core audience and target market. More specifically, it needs to add value to a potential audience, so that they are compelled to interact with your brand and engaged with its core message.
-
Embrace the Importance of Language and Tone-of-Voice
When you are writing content for various platforms, it is easy to develop a disjointed approach that creates an inconsistent brand message. This is where language and tone-of-voice (TOV) come into play, as these elements help to ensure that you communicate consistently with clients and in way that remains true to your core brand values.
With this in mind, it is imperative that you create a TOV that shapes every publication and every conversation that involves your brand. The best way to achieve this is to translate down your brand values into specific emotions, before determining they best way to convey these through words.
The precise language that you use should influence the technical application of your TOV, as your communications should include the jargon and conventions that are inherent to your industry. The relevant use of such terminology tends to build credibility in the eyes of clients, helping you to establish yourself as a thought leader.
-
Invest in Competitive Research
The B2B space is particularly competitive, particularly given the service-driven nature of the marketplace. It is therefore important that you are able to compete aggressively with your rivals, and invest in the creation of content that performs well in relation to keywords, engagement and social signals.
Fortunately, there are a myriad to tools available to help brands research their competitors and identify any ways in which they can improve their own efforts.
One of the best on the market is buzzsumo.com, which provides in-depth analysis of what content performs best in relation to specific topics and competing brands.
Similarly, Impactana.com measures your competitors content and its performance against two core metrics. The first of these is social signals, which offers an insight into which types of content generate the most shares across individual platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Pinterest.
The second metric is user engagement, which analyses how content is shared across social media and the effectiveness of specific posts. This includes the analysis of comments, downloads and click-throughs, as you look to determine how clients interact with your competitors’ content.
This insight can be used to optimise the impact of future content, while encouraging copywriters to tailor their work according to individual platforms.
-
Re-optimise Existing Content
While creating and editing content is a priority for B2B marketers, you can also improve your online presence by re-optimising existing copy. This process starts by performing a full audit of your content to identify which posts do not attract social shares or traffic, before you look to make definitive changes that make your copy more technically proficient and engaging.
You should definitely appraise your content and check it for relevant keywords, which must be included in the main title, at least one sub-title and within the first 100 words of the copy.
When it comes to the main body of your content, however, it is important not to get too bogged down with keyword density. While it is suggested that copy should have a keyword density of between 3% and 5%, Google’s latest algorithm updates have placed a far greater focus on the quality and relevance of your content.
This means that producing a relevant and insightful article with naturally incorporated keywords should be your primary objective, so it makes sense to work on tailoring your content to ensure that it offers clearly-defined value to the reader.
-
Implement a Good and Clear Call to Action
On a final note, creating concise and relevant calls-to-action (CTAs) should be one of your main goals when writing copy for a B2B audience.
After all, this market is extremely value-conscious, so regardless of whether you are marketing a product or service it is imperative that you are able to clearly present your value proposition and compel clients to take further action.
Given that you are also likely to be selling to experts within your marketplace, it is wise to avoid producing overly promotional CTAs that lack substance. Instead, focusing on using concise and actionable messaging, which has been framed by surrounding content that boasts topical and industry relevance. So, if you were looking to promote content marketing services to potential clients, you would be best served by penning an insightful, long-form piece on a relevant subject while incorporating a clear CTA such as ‘book your free content audit here’.
If you want to enhance the quality of your CTAs further, make sure that they written above the fold and include some form of actionable icon or clickable link, as this makes it easier for clients to engage and interact with your brand.