Please read the Assignment overview.
Assignment Overview: Content Marketing In addition to social media and the textbook chapter, we are exploring the topic of 'content marketing' this week. Before you work on the week's assignment, read the following article. This will provide you with background information and give you context for the assignment. As you work on this assignment, please remember that you are focusing on “content marketing" and not on overall business strategies. Article: What Is Content Marketing (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site. Assignment Instructions: Content SWOT Analysis and Content SWOT Action Plan Let's learn more about what brands are doing online! For the next two weeks, you will work to build a content marketing plan for a brand. Choose one of the brands from the table below (or you may also choose another brand not listed if you are familiar with a brand and it uses social media). Whichever brand you choose, make sure to clearly identify the brand on your content planning document. Step 1: Read pages 1-8 of the Content Marketing Planning Template Guide Step 2: Pick a brand and do some research! Find out how the brand uses social media. Explore the brand’s presence and activity on all of the major social media platforms. Step 3: Using the Content Marketing Planning Template complete: • Tab 1_Content SWOT Analysis • Tab 2_Content SWOT Action Plan Step 4: Submit your spreadsheet here by Sunday at 11:59pm. Note: The Content Marketing Planning Template has 5 sheets. This week you will complete sheets 1 & 2. You will complete sheets 3-5 of the Content Marketing Planning Template in future weeks. Brands to Choose From Adidas Ebay Lululemon Papa Murphy Blendtec Fendi Mastercard Pepsi https://contentmarketinginstitute.com/what-is-content-marketing/ Burberry Ford McDonalds PR Newswire Burger King Forrester Research Microsoft Red Cross Cisco Honda National Geographic Sony Coca-Cola HP The New York Times Southwest Airlines Comcast IBM American Nike Staples Dell Intel Old Spice Starbucks Disney Intuit Oracle Tiffany & Co. Dunkin’ Donuts Jet Blue Oscar de la Renta Toyota CONTENT MARKETING Planning Template 2018 2018 CONTENT MARKETING PLANNING TEMPLATE The popularity of content marketing has soared in recent years. In particular, video content is in high demand with consumers, with 53% of people wanting more through this medium in 2018. This widespread adoption of content marketing is making it more difficult to stand out from the noise. In order to compete with ‘Content Shock’, it is becoming ever more important to question your approach, tweak and optimise your strategy, and grab the attention of your potential customers. Planning strategically for content marketing has a major influence on the effectiveness of your efforts. In a recent study by CMI, they found B2B marketers who had a documented strategy were a lot more effective than those who simply had a verbal one. Of those who had a documented strategy, 60% consider their organisation to be effective at content marketing, compared to only 32% who had a verbal strategy. Why You Need A Content Marketing Plan https://research.hubspot.com/charts/people-want-more-video-content https://research.hubspot.com/charts/people-want-more-video-content http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2014/10/2015-b2b-content-marketing-research/ http://contentmarketinginstitute.com/2014/10/2015-b2b-content-marketing-research/ 2018 CONTENT MARKETING PLANNING TEMPLATE Content planning will undoubtedly have a major impact on the success of both your inbound marketing campaigns and the ef- fectiveness of your content marketing overall. That’s why in this guide we’ve created 4 steps and templates that will help you put together an effective content marketing plan for either your business or those of your clients. The templates will help you to: STEP 1: Complete a SWOT analysis on your content marketing efforts and develop a plan to improve them. STEP 2: Define the right objectives and KPIs for that plan STEP 3: Brainstorm content ideas and map these across your funnel STEP 4: Create a timeline for your content plans How should I use these templates? To make it easier for you to implement these steps, each one has a standard structure explaining how to use it. • The benefit of completing the step • Instructions to complete the step • An example of what a completed template looks like • An empty template for you to fill out Who has created this template? HubSpot has teamed up with digital marketing planning experts Smart Insights who use a similar approach in their member resources for developing and creating digital strategies and managing digital transformation. How to Use the Templates http://www.smartinsights.com/content-management/content-marketing-strategy/?utm_source=hubspot&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=contentplanning http://www.smartinsights.com/solution/online-marketing-strategy/?utm_source=hubspot&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=contentplanning http://www.smartinsights.com/solution/digital-transformation/?utm_source=hubspot&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=contentplanning Template to use SWOT analysis of current content marketing efforts. Why you should do this A SWOT analysis of your current content marketing efforts is an essential part of creating your plan. It allows you to create a plan of action based not on what you’re interested in doing or on your gut-feel, but what you need to do given the situation in the marketplace. It provides a strategic view of the main opportunities and challenges available from content in your market. The outcome of this analysis should be a high-level action plan of the most important tasks that will impact the success of your content marketing. How to use the template To use this template we have broken it down into two really simple steps. 1. Complete a Content SWOT analysis. Instructions to complete the SWOT analysis: First, select 3-4 major internal strategic strengths and weaknesses in your current content marketing efforts. In these two boxes you want to identify what’s working well and what weaknesses you have. If you have yet to begin content marketing for your company, you can still complete this. For example, one of your strengths may be expertise in a topic your target audience is extremely interested in, and a weakness could be a lack of a dedicated resource to begin producing that content for you. Step 1. Review current use of content marketing Next, you identify both the opportunities and threats that can apply to anyone working within your market. Example In our example, the addition of paid social media distribution is an opportunity. It can be used to further promote our content plus it’s less competitive (and costly) than Adwords. On the other end of the spectrum there is a potential threat to our successful whitepaper strategy. Competitors can easily replicate this, as its success is heavily reliant on well-optimised Adwords campaigns. 2018 CONTENT MARKETING PLANNING TEMPLATE Content Marketing SWOT Action Plan (Example) Content Marketing SWOT Action Plan (Example) Now you’ve completed the SWOT analysis of your current content marketing efforts it’s time to use that information to create an actionable plan. This actionable plan should be based upon the strengths and weaknesses you’ve identified from your current efforts, it should take advantage of opportunities in the market and also account for potential threats to your current strategy. Example Below, you’ll see a Content Marketing SWOT Action Plan example. Make whitepapers more valuable for social promotion by developing an influencer program and adding expert commentary to maintain our thought leadership. Leverage technology to improve personalization for returning leads to further improve our lead to customer conversion rate. 2018 CONTENT MARKETING PLANNING TEMPLATE 0 Template to use: SMART goal setting and strategy alignment templates Why you should do this: Many businesses don’t have a strategic approach to content marketing. This results in a lack of clarity around both the goals and KPIs that the plan is trying to achieve. If you’re unsure of either of these elements, it’s impossible to know if your content marketing plan is on track or not. This template helps to solve that. They will allow you to plan specific objectives and KPIs structured around the customer lifecycle. This template makes objectives actionable by defining strategies to help you reach these objectives. In the example below we are using a customer lifecycle based on the Smart Insights RACE Planning model. This stands for: REACH: This stage is focused on the top of your funnel. Its aim is to increase brand awareness and visits to the company websites, apps and social network sites. ACT: This stage is focused on increasing the number of visitors who interact with your content and who then convert into leads. CONVERT: This stage focuses on increasing conversion rates from leads to sales. ENGAGE: This stage is focused on increasing long-term customer engagement and loyalty leading to repeat sales and advocacy. You can modify the template to suit your funnel. For example, the Hubspot inbound marketing funnel is broken out into attract, convert, close and delight. Read more about the inbound marketing funnel here. How to use the template: Work through each row for the different parts of the customer lifecycle – Reach, Act, Convert, Engage. For each row, define SMART objectives and detailed KPIs that will show how effective your strategies are. This template builds on what we completed in step 1. You will see in the example below the action plan we devised from our SWOT analysis is included in the third column. Don’t worry if your initiatives don’t map across all stages of the customer lifecycle. It’s ok to focus your efforts on a particular part of the funnel. Step 2. Define content marketing objectives and KPIs http://www.smartinsights.com/digital-marketing-strategy-guide/?utm_source=hubspot&utm_medium=pdf&utm_campaign=contentplanning http://www.hubspot.com/inbound-marketing Example In the following example you will see a one-page summary of your content marketing strategy linking SMART objectives in the left column to how they’re achieved, as well as detailed KPIs to review if you’re on track. You can use the SMART template we provided as part of this download to create your own goals for this template. Customer lifecycle stage and aims SMART objectives Strategies to achieve goals Key performance indicators Reach Increase brand awareness and visits to company websites, apps and social network sites. Increase new monthly visits to the website by +25% in 12 months With help of partners, create a resource center filled with free long form content on topics relevant to our audience New organic visits to site % Act Increase audience interac- tions with content on compa- ny-owned media platforms to generate leads. Reduce our average cost per lead by 5% in the next 9 months by increasing the amount of traffic we get from organic and reducing traffic from paid Generate 10% more leads from each whitepaper created Make