Beginning a content marketing journey can be overwhelming – there’s so much to think about and so many questions that need answering. We all know the importance of having a content strategy before we get started, but what does that really mean? If you can confidently answer each of the questions in this week’s SlideShare, you’ll be well on your way to having it all figured out.

1. REALITY
CHECK
DON'T START CONTENT MARKETING UNTIL YOU CAN
ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS

2. Every project needs a champion. Who will own the content?
Identify a single point of contact who will be responsible for oversight
of all of the moving parts.

3. STAMP
APPROVALOF
Who needs to be involved in approvals?
Common stakeholders include marketing managers, compliance teams and legal
teams. Make sure you build enough time for these layers of approval in the
content timeline.

4. What are your content objectives?
site traffic
audience engagement
conversions
lead nuturing
lead generation
There’s no point embarking on a content plan without knowing what you
want out of it. A plan centred around engagement is going to look very
different from one whose sole purpose is lead generation.

5. What does your audience look like?
What do they care about?
By creating fantastic content and spending zero
time on audience development, you are certain
that you will not succeed...
You have to focus on audience development
as much as you focus on creating content.
Robert Kyncl
Google/YouTube

6. How many buyer personas do you need?
A buyer persona is a fictional representation of your ideal audience
member. If you’re serving multiple types of people with your content,
you’ll need one for each target audience.

7. Who are your influencers?
What's your plan for reaching out to them?
Partnering with bloggers and advocates of the market you’re trying to reach will
give you a leg up to get cut-through with your content.

8. To insource or outsource?
If you’re wanting to tell stories related to your own brand and expertise, it makes
sense to keep it in-house. If you’re strapped for time, you could engage an external
resource to ghostwrite for you.

9. Which formats would best suit the stories
you're trying to tell with your content?
Would the story be best told in a short-form blog post, video or e-book?
How about a webinar or in-person event?

10. What can you afford?
Don’t forget to allocate around half of your content budget to amplification. If
nobody sees your amazing content, nobody can engage with it.

11. How can you repurpose the content you already have?
What engaging snippets could you take from sales brochures, product guides,
annual reports and press releases for articles and social posts?

12. How can you make sure all pieces of content are cohesive?
Sticking to an overarching set of guidelines will help ensure your content tells the
same story wherever it shows up. Nothing throws the audience off more
than inauthenticity.

13. To date or not to date?
If your content is timely, it would make sense to include date or
timestamps on it. If it’s more evergreen, it can probably go without.

14. To gate or not to gate?
What’s more important to you: swarms of unqualified traffic or a
few audience members who were engaged enough with your site to give
you their contact details?

15. How will the back end work?
Is your plan best served with a simple blogging plug-in, or do you need a fully
fledged content management system?

16. What's the best outlet for each piece of content?
Once you’ve brought your content to life, where should you plug it in to get more
engagement? Your own blog? Someone else’s? Social media?

17. Who's in charge of optimising the content for each platform?
Whether it’s a blog, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, each platform has different
requirements. Who will do SEO? Who will make sure tweets have the
right hashtags and character counts?

18. How will you amplify the content?
SEO
The best content in the world means nothing if you don’t get it out into the world.

19. When and how should you pay to amplify?
How much do you have to spend on Sponsored Updates, Promoted Posts
and media buys?

20. What does success look like?
Linking up with your objectives, how will you tell when you’ve gotten
where you need to be?

21. What are you waiting for?

22. Presented by King Content, Australia's most
awarded digital content marketing agency.
Check out our blog for more content marketing
insights and advice.
@King_Content
www.kingcontent.com.au