Content Marketing Northern Ireland

Content Marketing NI

In Northern Ireland, marketing with content is essential. The ways in which consumers choose to browse, buy and engage with their chosen brands have transformed: where customers were previously targeted on the high street with billboards and advertisements; content marketing today targets those audiences in the world of digital. For marketers, the world of digital takes many forms; from web pages and blog posts to social media and email.

What is Content?

In Northern Ireland, digital content is all around us – a trend which continues to gather pace with the rise of metadata and smartphone technology. But what do we mean by ‘content’? In a nutshell, the digital marketing and content creation industry maintain that digital content is anything that can be published, including text and audio files; graphics, animations, videos and images. In many cases, it can safely be said that whatever you are doing online, you are engaging with a piece of content.

How do We Define Content Marketing?

Digital content marketing has emerged as one of the most important forms of marketing in Northern Ireland. A content marketing definition by the Content Marketing Institute describes the term as “a strategic marketing approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience — and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.” For Northern Irish businesses, the figures speak for themselves: research recently published by Technavio suggests that the content marketing industry will grow by $217.3 billion to reach a value of $412.88bn by the year 2021. But why is this the case?

Why Content Marketing is Important in Northern Ireland

Why content marketing is so important can be explained in how marketing methods and everyday technologies have transformed over the past decade. The smartphone revolution has played a considerable role in this transformation, with recent findings by Statista demonstrating that 2.71 billion people currently use the devices – a whopping 35.13% of the world’s population. This means that over a third of the global population engage with digital content on their devices. Indeed, traditional advertising techniques including television and radio advertising are gradually losing ground to online content marketing, meaning that businesses in Northern Ireland must adapt to remain competitive.

The average content marketer in Northern Ireland cites three key benefits of content marketing and growth drivers of the industry:

1. Build an audience

Content marketing and branding go hand-in-hand. Nowadays, companies with good marketing strategies tend to build their brands online; from their initial website launch strategy right through to the content of blogs, videos and product descriptions. When it comes to building brands, allocating your resources to the world of digital can guarantee increased recognition of your brand.

2. Reduced costs compared to traditional marketing methods

Activities involved in marketing can often be financially draining. However, some of the most effective content marketing tactics can be exercised at a fraction of the cost of traditional marketing techniques. Cost-effectiveness is crucial, and content marketing can deliver your branded message on a budget.

3. Improved sales conversion rate

Nowadays, shoppers prefer to browse and buy online, as opposed to taking a walk down the local high street. This, of course, has huge implications for sales and profits. Various types of content marketing strategies have reflected a demonstrable increase in sales conversions when compared to traditional marketing techniques – so get online and get marketing.

Learn how to market your business by following the rest of ProfileTree’s Guide to Content Marketing in Northern Ireland, which includes tips on various marketing methods in business; information on new digital marketing tactics and advice around the most effective marketing channels.

How do Businesses Use Marketing in Northern Ireland?

We understand that marketing is a huge industry, with multiple channels, styles and influences. But how and why do businesses use marketing to boost their brands? Whether your content comes in the form of an online campaign or a good marketing video, all of your efforts should place great focus on those all-important end goals. These marketing goals can be defined as ‘the 4 purposes of marketing’: a mantra which has guided the industry since its birth. So, here they are:

1. Product

Whether your product is a good or a service, your product should always aim to fulfill the needs or wants of consumers (this also applies to businesses that sell information, for example). It is crucial that you have an expert understanding of your product in order to market it properly. Effective marketing helps in highlighting your product – so make sure you know your product better than anyone else.

2. Price

Once you have that expert understanding of your product, decisions can be made around its pricing. This is extremely important, as pricing can often determine your product’s supply and demand, as well as profit margins and marketing methods. Product placement can often depend upon its price point: so do your market research and form your pricing on an information based strategy.

3. Promotion

Now you have your product and price, it’s time to start promotion. This should kick off with research into the most effective marketing channels, before exploring various types of marketing tactics, which may include advertising; social media marketing, email marketing, public relations or video marketing (to mention but a few). Depending on the nature of your brand or product, opting for fun marketing strategies can truly separate your brand from the competition.

4. Place

A guiding principle of marketing is to place a product in the right place, at the right price and at the right time. It is therefore crucial that you evaluate the ideal places to convert casual browsers into real, paying customers. Whether digital or traditional, all types of marketing strategy will consider.

What is Good Content Marketing?

Content has emerged as one of the most attractive marketing techniques available in Northern Ireland. But what can marketing do for a business, and what does quality content actually look like? Companies that use online marketing tend to build their content around a set of key objectives, and your marketing strategy should identify its own objectives and follow suit.

In a nutshell, your content marketing strategy should aim to tell its target audience about your product or service whilst converting them into paying customers. However, unlike traditional forms of sales and marketing, content marketing gets the consumer to come to you rather than you reaching out to them. Indeed, for many modern businesses, content has become one of the most effective forms of inbound marketing available to the world today.

A strong content marketing effort entails creating, curating, sharing and distributing great content. This means avoiding a content subject that’s no longer relevant, instead opting for content that is relevant; accurate and appropriately optimised for leading search engines (think Google, Yahoo! and Bing). Marketing with content properly means creating content that:

• Attracts the attention and interest of a determined target audience;
• Informs and educates the audience about your business or brand;
• Engages and entertains the audience;
• Increases leads and sales conversions; and
• Encourages the growth of fans, advocates and loyal customers.

How to Get Started with Content Marketing

Many businesses in Northern Ireland can learn all about marketing, with a huge range of web resources, books and articles in circulation. However, many struggle with taking those first critical steps into a content marketing strategy. Your content should form part of a strategic marketing approach, identifying key actions from its very beginning. See below for some top advice on how to get started with your content marketing strategy:

Set Out Your Objectives:

Plan your content marketing strategy by making a short statement on who your target market is, how you will target them and what they are set to gain from your content. In many cases, the goals of a content marketing strategy are common: boost sales, boost leads and boost traffic.

Understand Your Audience:

Across every sector in existence, knowing your target audience is absolutely crucial. Here, relevancy is key – so target your content to engage a set group, as opposed to creating generic content which tends to be ignored by many. Identify the particulars of your target audience by obtaining essential data through web, email and social media analytics. This can give you that all-important feedback on your target market’s priorities, interests and buyer personas.

Audit, audit, audit:

Many businesses already have pieces of digital content long before they embark on a content marketing strategy. In this regard, reviewing all of your existing content to find out if it meets your business goals is an essential step. Do this by following a three-pronged process: log your existing content, assess its performance and identify gaps in content. When exploring how to do marketing, many businesses ignore this basic, yet important step: so get online, and audit that old content!

Organise Your Strategy

‘Content made simple’ doesn’t necessarily generate content that will engage and persuade your target audience. Indeed, a well resourced, well organised and well researched content strategy can make that critical difference between success and failure. Define who is in charge of creating, maintaining and updating content, as well as identifying your budget, resources and publishing schedule. All types of marketing strategy require thorough planning: so get informed and get organised.

SEO and Keyword Research:

Any content strategy model will take full account of keywords and the power of SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). In today’s digital marketplace, search engines (including Google, Yahoo! and Bing) reign supreme. Businesses at the top of search engine rankings tend to perform better; but how do they achieve this? The answer lies in keyword research and ensuring that your content contains the right keywords in the right positions on the page. However, SEO doesn’t start and end with keywords: numerous factors can impact your search engine rankings, including outside links and even page design. On this note, it is crucial that you embed your website marketing strategy with the most effective SEO tactics (for expert tips on understanding SEO and maximising your SEO potential, check out our guide here).

Boost Your Brand With a Blog:

Whether your business is a luxury resort or a family-run jewellers; your content marketing strategy should place a blog as its centrepiece. Whilst providing a hub for all of your other marketing efforts, blogs can boost your credentials and create a loyal following of customers and web users. Ensure that your content is well written, concise, engaging and optimised. Beyond articles, your blog can host traffic-driving content such as how-to guides, tutorials, newsletters, interviews and more.

Types of Content for Marketing

When we consider what types of content to include in our content marketing strategy, it pays to go back to basics and look towards a digital content definition: put simply, this refers to any content that exists in the form of digital data. This includes anything that can be broadcast, streamed or held in computer files (including popular media types such as images, GIFs, PDFs and videos). Do not become constrained to one particular format: the world of content is diverse, and has now come to include the universe of social media.

Website content creation doesn’t have to centre around blog writing and the skill of a professional writer (although it certainly helps). Website promotion methods include a variety of formats, and this may change depending on the nature of your product or business. For example, a boutique fashion store may choose to share high quality images of their clothing, whilst a luxury hotel may use video content to advertise its rooms and conference spaces. Similarly, a teenage lifestyle platform may opt for GIFs and memes, whilst a medical journal may opt for extensive guides and informational eBooks.

Whilst experimenting with different forms of content is an essential step in any content marketing strategy, it is crucial to remember that content about your brand or business must form the base line. This means posting content that is relevant to your brand, and not something totally unrelated. Understanding how to create consistent content is any important step – so refine your tone of voice and turn your content into recognisable branded messages.

Social Media Marketing Methods

Content marketing problems are not simply resigned to blogs, websites and visually appealing videos. Understanding how social media marketing works is essential for all businesses in Northern Ireland. See below for some top tips on creating content for social media marketing:

Identify Your Platform:

Choosing the right platform for your social media content strategy is crucial. Increasing numbers of consumers are opting to engage with their favourite brands on social media, and the most successful content campaign examples have tailored their content to specific platforms. For example, a wedding dress maker may wish to share images of their dresses on Instagram. Meanwhile, a recruitment firm may wish to make content for professional platforms such as LinkedIn their priority.

Understand Your Social Media Audience:

When it comes to social media content marketing, understanding your audience is crucial. This means understanding the devices they like to use, the platforms they prefer and the style of content which engages them most. For example, understanding how to use Twitter for marketing purposes involves understanding trending topics, and what type of post will drive traffic to your site. Know your product, know your audience and know your platform – it’s essential.

Content Marketing: Quick Fixes to Boost Your Brand

Web marketing concepts usually centre around established techniques, including email campaigns, video marketing and social media. However, simple and easy fixes can be implemented, boosting your brand’s engagement and SEO credentials. See below for some expert advice on some quick content fixes to boost your brand:

About Us content for website:

Across a range of sectors in Northern Ireland, nearly all businesses will host an ‘About Us’ page on their website’s landing page. Understanding what to write in about us section of the website can be hugely beneficial. Use this space to highlight the story of your business, as well as its skills, staff, resources and industry credentials. This also provides an ideal opportunity to include high-performance keywords. After all, when it comes to SEO, every little helps.

Make it visually-appealing:

What makes a perfect website? Popular answers here would centre around security, mobile-friendliness and user experience. However, the textual content on your site is an all-important indicator of your business, as well as an important element of Search Engine Optimisation. Whether you are content marketing for small business brands or larger, more established organisations; make the content on your website engaging, visually appealing and easily digestible. Marketing success examples nearly always contain a robust, attractive website – your brand should follow suit.

Talk to the Experts

Here at ProfileTree, we specialise in growing brands online. To see over 100 content marketing examples as well as our industry-leading content marketing services list, visit our site or follow our influential Business Leader series on Youtube.

Let us grow your brand while you run your business.

For Content Marketing in Northern Ireland, Choose ProfileTree.

Why Choose ProfileTree?

For content marketing in Northern Ireland, we’re proud to do things our way.

That’s because we built our own company using our proven content marketing techniques and knowledge FIRST to create the right, broad view strategies to help local businesses to grow.

And because we specialise in looking at your online presence and your business goals as a whole, then delivering the right solution for your individual needs.

Find out more below PLUS our free tips for using content marketing to drive real results…

There’s one great reason why we believe in content marketing: we built our own Northern Ireland-based business on content and SEO.

And there’s one great reason why content works: in a single word…quality.

Content marketing creates the substance, the ‘depth’ your audience can use to engage with as they move across your online world. Content can be the draw used to help your audience move from, say, your search result to your landing page to a call-to-action.

Let’s take a closer look at your…

Search Engine Results

These need to show your audience that there’s something useful, something of value to them to be found if they click through to your page. How can this be done? The right, inviting content can be geared towards the audience you expect to be discovered by based on the keywords targeted. They’ll want to see evidence of a high-quality, well-targeted page of genuine interest to their particular niche.

Landing Page

Again, simply having a landing page isn’t enough. Having a landing page with content worth delving into for your traffic will deliver completely different results. With the use of quality content, a landing page can become a high-performing part of your customer’s journey into purchasing and/ or into your brand’s community.

Customer Journey

That customer journey will also use quality content throughout to meet the needs of your audience at each stage. Whether they are at the awareness, interest or consideration ‘step’ of their journey with you – or, even better, they are ready for consideration, purchase, retention or advocacy – the quality of your content can be the key to how well they engage, for how long, how they respond and if they’ll share with others.

A powerful approach for amazing outcomes.

Content Connects

Think of content as the ‘highway’ between your digital marketing efforts for potential customers.

How do you get the right people from your search result to the right page? How to help the potential buyer respond the right way for your business? In short: content is the essential component.

While SEO places your page in the right place, content gives audiences a reason to click and a reason to stay longer, building trust in your brand.

Content Engages

Your – for example – social channels can look great, but amazing content can impress, engage and draw in your customers/ potential customers even more.

It’s about creating a valuable community of future customers and existing customers around your business.

Imagine a group of people who watch for your new products, buy when the time is right and even recommend your business to others.

Content Explains

People increasingly want to understand what your business is all about; your values, your likes and dislikes and even company culture.

Content helps your audience see what your business stands for and how this fits into their lifestyle and choices.

Of course, getting this message and tone just right is a specialist task. That’s why ProfileTree helps companies like yours to grow with superb, highly-tailored content.

Content Grows

Great content gives your target groups something worth sharing.

Instead of – say – ‘look at our special offer’, an extremely shareable piece of content with the same offer included will reach much further with better results for your investment.

We’ll help you deliver your message in a way designed to drive conversations…and conversions. How? We’ll start by showing you proven, local examples of amazing content success.