By Daman Jeet Singh, the co-founder of FunnelKit, a suite of sales tools that helps over 18,000+ businesses streamline their checkout process.
When someone is loyal to your brand, they are more likely to buy products from your site and interact with your company across multiple marketing channels. If you manage to build loyalty, you can expect to see more sales, referrals and engagement.
The thing is, it takes time and effort to build brand loyalty.
You can do many different things to instill trust and confidence, including selling high-quality products and offering stellar customer support.
But today, I’d like to focus on another aspect of brand loyalty: content marketing. I firmly believe content marketing is one of the best ways to build loyalty among new and existing customers. If you can get someone to feel committed to your company before they place an order, you can bet that many of these people will become long-time customers.
Let’s look at a few actionable ways you can use content to enhance brand loyalty and grow your business.
Get To Know Your Audience
First and foremost, if you don’t understand your target audience, you will have a tough time building loyalty through blog posts and social media content.
Imagine you’re tasked with selling a product with a niche audience, like email marketing software. Instead of pitching the product to small business owners, you have to walk into a room with a bunch of random people pulled off the street, and many of them are not business owners or interested in email marketing.
This sounds hard, right?
You’re setting yourself up for this situation if you don’t spend time getting to know your audience. I recommend reviewing your on-site analytics, sending feedback forms and practicing social listening so you can better understand the goals and roadblocks of the people who need your product or service.
The more you know about these folks, the easier it will be to build loyalty because you can create content that resonates with their needs and interests.
Offer Value Without Asking For Anything In Return
The key to using content to increase loyalty is to offer value to your readers without asking for anything in return. People expect to get something valuable when they have to pay for it. On the other hand, they’re not expecting most businesses to do something helpful for them with no strings attached.
At this point, you know about your audience’s goals and pain points. Use what you’ve learned to create content that addresses common concerns and brings them one step closer to their goal.
For example, if you know your audience consists of small business owners who want to grow their email list, you could do any number of the following:
• Create an “ultimate guide” lead magnet.
• Publish a series of relevant posts (e.g., 10 free ways to grow your email list).
• Announce an online course for beginners who want to learn to manage their leads and increase their subscriber count.
All these different types of content will make it easy for you to deliver value to existing readers while attracting people to your site, and continuous value translates to brand loyalty.
My general rule is this: While brainstorming for content ideas, I ask, “Who is this for, and how will it help them?” If I can’t answer these questions, I rework the concept until I can.
Diversify Your Content
I alluded to this tip previously, but it’s worth diving in and discussing here: Diversify your content. People with similar interests may prefer to consume content in dramatically different ways.
For example, some people want to take their time and read a blog post; others are interested in audio and video content because they can listen on their way to work. You’ll also have people who want something they can download, such as a PDF or video series.
If you’re worried that you won’t be able to come up with enough ideas to fill these needs, I have some good news for you. Content repurposing is an excellent way to maximize the value of each of your posts, which means lower costs and improved engagement across multiple platforms.
For instance, you can repurpose your best blog posts on email marketing into an in-depth content upgrade, a video series on YouTube or even a few social media posts highlighting key points from each article.
Diversifying your content helps ensure there’s something for everyone, which means people are more likely to visit your site when they want to see similar content in the future.
Get Active On Social Media
Now, let’s talk about how getting active on social media can help you build loyalty. There’s a good chance your target audience is out there and interested in hearing from brands just like yours.
If you don’t take the time to engage with prospects on social media and show them why your business is worth their time, they will likely get picked up by a competitor, which is not a preferred outcome.
I suggest spending time on social sites each week and tracking relevant conversations with your favorite social listening tool. In the example I’ve used throughout this post, a marketer may follow the hashtag “email marketing” and look for posts where their input might be valuable.
You can build loyalty and enhance awareness by consistently posting on social media and engaging with people interested in your brand. You can send people with questions links to your articles or answer them directly. If your advice is solid, they will remember you in the future.
Final Thoughts
As you can see, there are plenty of great ways to build brand loyalty using content marketing. The tips outlined here have helped us generate new leads and increase rapport with new users and existing customers. I’m confident that with time and patience, you can see similar results.
Read the full article here