An effective content marketing strategy is imperative for an online business to be successful. It allows businesses to generate an audience that is invested in what they have to offer, leading to increased conversions.
But there are a few big challenges that come with content marketing, and it’s important to know how to solve them.
Here are 10 common content marketing challenges and some simple ways to overcome them:
- Creating Quality Content
- Lack of Budget and Resources
- Generating Content Consistently
- Not Targeting The Right Audience
- Measuring Content ROI Accurately
- Lack of Stakeholder Buy-In
- Lack of Creative or Innovative Ideas
- Strict Publishing Schedules
- Evolving Digital Marketing Trends
- Long-Term Sustainability
Creating Quality Content
Part of having a successful content marketing strategy means creating high-quality content that appeals to your target audience.
Quality content is essential for the effective promotion of brands or businesses and needs to match the standards expected by B2B buyers.
This can be difficult given the ever-changing nature of the digital landscape, as well as staying up-to-date on trends and topics that your audience is interested in.
Ensure that readers have access to a unique and valuable experience by avoiding producing similar content to others.
Researching Your Competitors Content
Researching your competitor’s content and its SERP rankings may give you an idea of how to start when creating your own content. Google measures user engagement with webpages by observing bounce rate and time on the page.
To gain a competitive edge in the market, it is important to focus on creating content that stands out and captures the interest of your target audience. Optimization of metrics will not be enough if your ranking for relevant searches is low.
To ensure quality content, create evergreen pieces that address timeless topics within your niche, conduct keyword research to make sure you’re meeting user search intent, and ensure all pieces pass quality assurance checks before being published. Aim to produce content that is far superior compared to the competition visible on the corresponding search engine results page.
Lack of Budget and Resources
One of the most common content marketing challenges for businesses is a lack of budget and resources. This can be especially frustrating when you are trying to create high-quality content that drives results. Fortunately, there are solutions to help you make the most of your limited resources.
Creating relevant content requires time and money, both of which have budgets associated with them – if resources aren’t allocated correctly then production won’t meet demand predicted from campaigns performance metrics.
Producing high-quality content on a regular basis can be challenging when budgets for content creation and production are limited.
It is important for small business owners to have the necessary resources to regularly create quality content. If time constraints make writing blog posts difficult, explore what other companies have done on similar topics in order to leverage existing content.
Content marketing can be supported by using existing topics as inspiration. Content-based on these topics can then be developed and tied to products or services offered.
Save Money On Content Marketing
To save money on content marketing, consider repurposing and recycling old content. Reuse articles by updating old information and aligning them with current SEO strategies, while confirming brand voice consistency. Additionally, repurpose long-form content such as white papers or ebooks and reframe them into other types of content or address a popular subtopic.
Reusing a video library is an effective way to create content marketing opportunities. For example, if you have a webinar with no accompanying blog post, then take advantage of the opportunity.
Outsourcing content creation is an option to explore while undertaking a content marketing journey, as it can lead to higher-quality content and a better return on investment.
Generating Content Consistently
Content marketing is an important part of any digital marketing strategy, but generating content consistently can be one of the biggest challenges.
After all, it takes time and effort to create content that resonates with your target audience and gets them to take action.
Sixty percent of marketers find that consistently creating content is their largest content marketing challenge, which is essential for maintaining a reputation as a thought leader. Without a content strategy, businesses may experience inconsistent outcomes with their content production.
Developing a content strategy will help prioritize your content and improve its visibility to internal and external stakeholders, who may not be familiar with its value or role in current marketing.
Content Calendar
Creating a content calendar for the next six months can be a useful part of your strategic planning. This will allow you to monitor competitors’ output and provide a benchmark for the amount of content necessary to reach desired goals in your industry.
The sheer amount of information available online can be overwhelming for users, so you need a way to sort through all the noise so users get the information they want quickly and easily.
One way to do this is by segmenting your content into various categories or topics that people may be interested in. Then, use keywords related to those topics when crafting blog titles or website headings so users can find exactly what they need.
Not Targeting The Right Audience
A central factor when addressing various content marketing difficulties is identifying your target audience.
Creating high-quality content will help with engagement but even then, it can take time for people to start engaging with your posts or leaving comments on them if it’s something new for them – especially at first glance without much context about your brand before clicking through from organic results pages (ORPs).
That’s why it’s important to build relationships with allied groups or companies who can help drive traffic and add trusted voices of authority around any topic you cover in order to increase community trust from newcomers familiarizing themselves with these entities beforehand thereby increasing the likelihood of engagement thereafter.
Establish Target Audience
Establish a target audience to create an effective content marketing strategy; determining the right audience is vital for achieving desired results.
Defining the target audience can be difficult and it is possible to become overly general or specific.
Creating content for target audiences involves segmenting the consumers and creating relevant content for each. Keep the wider audience in mind to ensure the content can be enjoyed by those coming across it for the first time.
Maintaining a balance while focusing on a target audience is important.
When a company attempts to target a new generational demographic, they run the risk of selecting an audience that does not match its brand. Overeager content marketers might be tempted to focus on relevant trends instead of considering whether the chosen demographic is appropriate for the business.
To maintain a wide range of customers, it is important to ensure that current audiences and customer bases are not excluded. Finding the proper balance is essential.
Measuring Content ROI Accurately
Investment in data-centered marketing is growing and as a result, measurement and analysis are becoming increasingly important.
If you do not monitor and assess metrics such as backlinks, web traffic, domain authority, email inquiries, or social media shares then you won’t be able to accurately evaluate how effective your content is performing.
Assign a monetary value to each website visitor, gauge the number of visits per content, and employ lead magnets such as white papers; furthermore, assign a numerical value to the lead downloads.
To accurately assess content marketing ROI, it is necessary to have the appropriate analytics in place and to ensure they are set up correctly. Common analytical tools for B2B operations are Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and dashboard visualization tools like Databox.
Lack of Stakeholder Buy-In
Stakeholder buy-in can be a determining factor in meeting deadlines, producing quality output, and avoiding unnecessary costs.
Early engagement of all stakeholders is advised. Try to include individuals not connected to the project to benefit from diverse opinions. Moreover, don’t overlook people outside of the team such as clients and partners who may be affected by decisions taken during the course of the project.
Stakeholder engagement in the project can be increased by providing clear objectives in content briefs, along with brand and style guides.
The objectives of the content should be monitored to assess how well they are generating traffic and leads. Analytical evidence can be presented to stakeholders, helping them stay informed and involved in the project.
Lack of Creative or Innovative Ideas
Content marketers may struggle with stepping out of their comfort zone. Some may be hesitant to attempt something new and untested, even if their current strategy is successful.
To address this, consider adding different types of content to your plan. For example, switch up your blogging with visual elements or experiment with photo essays instead of text posts.
You never know where these experiments might lead!
Consistently challenging yourself and pushing your content creation boundaries are both important components of succeeding in the competitive digital marketing field. Without consistently striving to advance, you may find that potential clients are not being attracted.
Leverage risks with your content marketing strategy to evaluate effectiveness.
Strict Publishing Schedules
Schedules for publishing should be flexible.
Flexibility is important for content production according to the needs of your audience. For instance, you may modify the frequency of a blog’s publication or switch up the schedule periodically in order to provide novelty. Ultimately, it is up to the company to decide which content works best with its target market.
Varying the schedule of weekly blogs can enable variation in content, making it appealing to the target market. What works best for the company should be tailored to what resonates with its audience.
Differing Reading Habits
It is important to consider differing reading habits among the audience when determining publishing schedules. If strict adherence to a schedule leads to an unacceptable decrease in content quality, these efforts will be of limited value.
Avoid unrealistic schedules to decrease the likelihood of failure; adjust schedules as needed.
Research your competitors’ publishing schedules to determine the ideal rate of content production. Compare this with your own and consider if the timing is impacting performance. Analyze if some of your content could be performing better when posted at a different time.
This information can aid you in developing an appropriate and effective content publication schedule, helping to prevent mistakes caused by unreachable deadlines.
Evolving Digital Marketing Trends
Content marketing can be difficult to stay up to date with due to the frequent changes in trends. To ensure you remain relevant, educate yourself on the latest industry developments. Reading books, attending conferences, and watching webinars are all good resources.
Additionally, listening to podcasts is helpful as well. Keeping up to date this way will allow you to utilize current practices and avoid becoming outdated.
Social Media Advertising
Social media advertising is moving towards paying for promotion, making organic content less visible. Joining this trend may be the only choice if it is financially viable. Before taking any action, have a clear understanding of your purpose and goals before investing.
Content marketers need to be aware of changing search engine algorithms, as Google has undergone many updates since its inception.
This sometimes means some keywords do not rank highly anymore. These challenges can actually be seen as opportunities as well – when a strategy isn’t working, look at it as a learning experience, instead of viewing it as a failure.
It is recommended to invest in tools that can monitor the effectiveness of strategies, and staying up to date with trends and algorithms is advised.
Long-Term Sustainability
For a content strategy to be successful, the advantages must exceed the costs. If you are investing significant amounts of effort and resources into a strategy that does not help meet your objectives, then it will not be sustainable in the long run.
In order to avoid these content marketing obstacles, it is necessary to design a content marketing strategy tailored to the objectives of the business.
This will not just determine the kind of content you produce, but it can also assist in determining when strategies become unsustainable. That way, it is possible to plan for scaling back before any losses are encountered.
Having a clear vision of the desired outcome and an actionable plan is essential when managing content marketing efforts. Then you’ll need to map out a path for how to achieve your goals.
After evaluating the sustainability of your current approach, you may choose to continue using your content marketing plan.
If you deem your current strategy unsustainable, it might be time to seek professional advice regarding the design and improve your content marketing strategy.
Conclusion
Evidence suggests that the challenges of content marketing arise from three main elements: setting goals, understanding the audience, and providing consistent, high-quality content.
By addressing these aspects first, it becomes easier to focus on additional issues such as overcoming fatigue, assessing return on investment, and dealing with market saturation. Outsourcing content production to a content marketing agency can have a large effect in addressing or preventing these issues.