A is for Audience. How can you identify your audience for your content marketing strategy?

1. A – Z of
CONTENT
MARKETING
A is for
Audience
mcm2, Nantwich, Cheshire - www.mcm2.co.uk
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2. This is the first in a 26 long series of
presentations – hopefully it will give you a
good breakdown of content marketing.
How it works, how to do it, and what the
benefit is for your business.
Done well, content marketing can generate
high quality leads, traffic and business, over an
extended period.
Done badly, it can be an all consuming waste
of time.
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3. A is for Audience.
As diverse a bunch of people as you
can imagine.
To start with just think about all the
people who live in the same street as
you.
They share the same postcode, but
they like different things, watch
different things on TV, read different
books.
Your audience for content marketing
is wider and far more diverse.
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4. Your Content Strategy sits here.
What they
What you need to
need to tell know
people
Business Audience
What you What they
want to tell want to
people hear
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5. Your Content Strategy sits here.
What they
What you need to
need to tell
Your strategy sits where the know
people
needs and wants of your
business overlap the needs
Business Audience
and wants of your What they
What you
audience.
want to tell want to
people hear
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6. Your Content Strategy sits here.
What they
If what you are doing is not
What you need to
firmly based on what your
need to tell know
business needs and wants
people to tell people, then it
Business Audience
cannot serve any long term
What you
purpose. Marketing that is
What they
not based on what the
want to tell want to
business needs is marketing
people hear toss!
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7. Your Content Strategy sits here.
If what you are doing is not
based on what the
What they
audience wants to hear,
then What you the point?
what is need to
need to to
If they don’t need tell hear it, know
or want to hear it then
people
chances are they won’t.
Business Audience
So the trick is to find that
point What you
of overlap. Once you What they
want to then start
have that you cantell want to
to grow your message and
people hear
pull your audience over so
that they area of overlap
increases in your favour.
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8. So, since A is for Audience, lets start with
them, how can we work out what they
need and want to hear?
We go through a simple process;
• Who are they?
• What are they currently engaging with?
• What do they need to hear?
• What do they want to know?
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9. What do they
Who are they?
need to hear?
What are they
What do they
currently engaged
want to know?
with?
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10. Age band
Gender
Who are they? Location
Education Level
Industry Segment
We know that everyone is different, Etc. Etc. Etc.
and some markets are wider than
others. But a few minutes
determining the centre of gravity for
your product is worthwhile. You
might find that you actually have a
number of centres of gravity – with a
number of core audiences, so
perhaps you need a number of
tactics within your strategy.
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11. What are your competitors doing? What news stories are there?
What podcasts in your market are there? What blogsites are there?
What videos are out there? What is being said on social media?
What presentations are out there? What specialist forums are there?
Produce a mind map of the
information that is currently out
there. By subject and medium.
Unless the market is completely
empty, and no one is engaging
What are they with anything there will be
currently engaged people currently engaging with
content. What is it they are
with? reading, watching, listening
too? What do you think of it?
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12. What do they ask your sales team?
What questions are they asking?
What do they talk about over lunch?
What questions come up with customer services?
You need to produce a list of things
that people are interested in, that
are related to your industry. It does
not have to be directly related, it can
be tangential, but a good place to
start is by looking at what they are
asking your team. What do they chat
What do they
about in reception? Over lunch, in want to know?
the small talk on the phone?
You need somewhere to start, once
you get going we can get more
sophisticated by asking them directly
as part of the strategy.
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13. Safety information?
Specifications?
Good news stories? What do they
Industry information and stats? need to hear?
Customer service information?
Location details?
Staff and Stories?
You can turn what they need to hear into content that they
can engage with. That way you can link it to information you
want them to know, and things that they want to hear.
Once they know that they need to know something you can
capitalise upon this need.
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14. Once you have a view of your audience you
can start to formulate your strategy. You can
start to look at what you are going to do to
engage with them.
If you don’t start with your audience then it is
highly likely that your strategy will not address
their real needs and so will not work!
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15. If you want to find out more about how
we believe content marketing can help,
and how it should be done, visit our
blog on www.mcm2.co.uk/blog.
We would really like to know what you
think, so email us on
martin@mcm2.co.uk
We also have a quick test to see how
good your content strategy is at -
http://www.mcm2.co.uk/test
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16. Remember;
If you always do what you've always
done you will always get what you've
always got.
Unless things change.
The world of marketing has changed
and we need to change with it.
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