All marketing strategies boil down to content creation. Over 45% of marketing experts report that their content marketing efforts struggle to find the right target audience. This is why it's essential to have a content creation strategy.

Content strategy can change the results of your marketing efforts. It starts from finding the right keywords to outlining a content calendar. 

In this guide, we'll share 9 easy steps that will help you take your marketing efforts to the next level. 

What is a Content Strategy?

Content strategy is the process of planning, creating, and distributing content. The aim of the content strategy is to meet pre-defined marketing goals. Content strategy may cover short-term goals, such as an ad campaign or long-lasting objectives. 

Importance of Content Strategy

Creating and promoting content isn't cheap. So, marketers need to build a content strategy that delivers the maximum ROI. Content strategy is basically building a strategy around their content marketing efforts to meet the pre-defined goals for the company. 

Whether the end goal is to generate leads, increase sales, or boost brand awareness, a well-defined content strategy can help you achieve the goal. The right content creation strategy can help you get the most out of your content. 

What is a Good Content Strategy?

The thought of building a content strategy can be overwhelming. But, with the right steps, you can get over the challenge and exceed expectations. 

To begin, a good content strategy considers a KPI and then builds a plan to achieve the said KPI. It's an outline that maps out all essential steps to reach the end goal. 

Sometimes, even if you do everything perfectly, you may end up missing the mark. Which is fine. No need to be disappointed. A good content strategy should always include room for measurement, analysis, and optimization for future goals.

What Should Your Content Creation Strategy Include?

There are a number of elements that make up a content strategy. All of these elements are equally important to make your content strategy exceptional. Let's go over all the elements:

• Detailed goals and KPIs: How would you have a plan if there's no goal to achieve. Defining the goal as precisely as possible should be a core part of your content strategy. 
• In-depth content calendar: There are a number of things that need to be completed on time. So, it's important to have a content calendar that maps out all the content creation and publication schedules. 
• Variety of content types: The best content strategies use a combination of content types to capture the ideal audience from multiple angles.
• Several content promotion channels: It's vital to work with multiple content channels at the same time. This allows you to maximize the exposure to your target audience. 
• Creative writers and designers: What's the core of your content strategy? Great quality content! Without a team of great writers, your content creation strategy is worthless. Provide that content to graphic artists and video editors to create something visually appealing that attracts audiences. 
• Necessary budget: Content creation is expensive. Without the right budget in hand, you're always going to fall short of one or the other thing. Assigning a proper budget allows the necessary space to bring out the potential of a content strategy. 

9 Steps to Build a Content Strategy Framework

If you're new to the content creation game, don't worry; we've broken down the content strategy into 9 steps. By following these 9 steps, you'll be able to create an effective and engaging content strategy.

#1. Define your business

Starting off a content strategy is always the hard part. To build a content strategy, start by asking necessary questions about your business. Some important questions include:

• Who are we?
• What do we do?
• What customer pain points are we trying to solve?
• What our product/service can do best?
• What makes us unique?
• What are our short-term and long-term goals?
• What do we expect from content marketing?

Once you have a clear answer to all these questions, a basic framework will start taking shape. 

#2. Learn as much as you can about your audience

Your target audience is constantly going to be consuming the content you put out. But what if you're feeding your content to the wrong target audience? Before creating content, you should have a clear idea of who your audience is. 

To identify your target audience, ask these questions:

• What are your audience's interests?
• What common problems do they face?
• Which channels do they use the most?

The best way to know your target audience is to generalize and create a customer profile for every type of customer you're trying to target. 

#3. Create a brand voice

If you're going to be generic, you'll only generate generic results. Especially if you're in a market that's very cluttered. There's endless content online, and there are similar businesses to yours, so how do you set yourself apart?

You can try to create a unique brand voice. Showcase your target audience the authenticity of your brand, and share your unique knowledge, ideas, and point of views. 

If you're authentic online, you're 91% more likely to generate a loyal community around your brand. Customers love buying from businesses that are authentic and showcase themselves truly.

#4. Build a written roadmap

A content strategy won't go too far if it's all in your mind. According to a study conducted in 2017 by the Content Marketing Institute and Intelligent Content Conference, 44% of all marketers don't have a written content strategy. 

If you've been working on a strategy that's not defined on paper, it's time to change that. It will help you and your team make sense of the end goal and the steps needed to achieve that goal. 

Also, having a written strategy makes it easy to adjust and refine it whenever needed. 

#5. Find best promotional channels

Multichannel marketing has become the norm in the marketing space. This means promoting content across all possible channels. You should promote content on social media, email marketing, native content recommendations, personal blogs, display ads, and other channels. 

The trick is to figure out which channels are where your target audiences are most active. A B2B content strategy will have different channels compared to a kid's toy company. 

#6. Measure your content strategy whenever possible

For a content strategy to work, it must be measurable. Content marketing metrics should be divided into 4 categories: consumption, sharing, lead generation, and sales. 

You should define your KPIs, and you'll have a clear map of your content goals. With a range of analytics tools and software, you can track how your content is performing. You can use the metrics to modify your strategy and reach your goals. 

#7. Test your content and campaigns

Your content strategy doesn't end when you publish the content. So many variables affect content performance. The only way to know how your content is performing is by testing it out. 

One of the most common ways to test digital campaigns is by doing A/B testing. Run two versions of an ad or content concurrently, with only one element different in headlines, images, colors of CTA buttons, content, and more.

Track the performance of each version to see which version of the content is performing better. 

#8. Optimize content regularly

Once you've tracked, measured, and tested the content, you know which content needs improvement. 

Optimization of content can mean rewriting an article with relevant keywords, trying out new headings, and improving layout and designs. Optimization of content has to be an ongoing process in the content strategy. 

#9. Repurpose content

Let's say a particular content is doing well; why shouldn't you use it somewhere else? You can extend the life of your content by repurposing content wherever possible. 

Content repurposing is when content is updated, reworked, refreshed, or adapted for some other use. It's kind of like recycling your content. You can recycle the content to get more clicks, impressions, engagement, and leads. 

If one of your blogs is doing incredibly well, you can use it as a base to create a longer eBook promoted via native ads or on social media.