Andrea Edwards discusses how content marketing has transformed from a tactic to a philosophy focused on serving customers rather than selling. She emphasizes that content marketing requires identifying customer challenges and aligning a brand's content to provide value. Edwards also stresses that content marketing is about transforming a business through collaboration, strategy, and creating compelling content that engages customers and ultimately leads them to purchase.

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@AndreaTEdwards
Mastering your brand
story in the digital age
with content marketing
@AndreaTEdwards
AndreaTEdwards
AndreaTEdwards www.thedigitalconversationalist.co
m
The Digital Conversationalist
The Digital Conversationalist

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@AndreaTEdwards
What is content marketing?
• It’s a philosophy, not a tactic
• It’s not an add-on to existing
marketing
• Move from selling to serving
• Fundamental shift in mindset
• It’s a revolution
• It’s more than marketing

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Because we just
don’t care about
brands anymore –
we really don’t

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15% of people trust
recommendations from
brands
84% trust recommendations
from people they know

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67% of the buyers journey
is now digital
Source: Sirius
Digital owns 90% of the
buyers journey
Source: Forrester

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Who do we trust?
According to an affilinet survey, the order of trust
1. Family
2. Friends
3. Bloggers
4. Social media connections
5. Colleagues
6. Journalists
7. Religious leaders
8. Celebrities
9. Brands
10. Politicians

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We are the change
• Global conversations
• Sharing knowledge
• Speed
• Conversations
• Human
• Communities
• Power
• Today’s playing field
• Business continues to speak marketing

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#DigimindTalks
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It’s content shock!
Average attention
span dropped
12 secs in 2000 to
8 secs in 2015 -
Statistic Brain

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@AndreaTEdwards Photo: Courtesy of Shutterstock

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Content Marketing is
fundamentally about business
transformation
It’s not something the
marketing team ‘does’
Everyone must be on board
and it starts at the top

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It’s huge!

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No focus?
Content shock!

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Our goal today
Creating conversations with customers, partners,
influencers, employees, potential employees
To achieve that, it’s about creating content so
good, it earns the right to exist in your customers
world, where they are
We’re building so much loyalty with customers –
because we consistently deliver value to them –
they reward us and buy from us

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Start with content
strategy

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Book a brainstorm
• Marketing
• Digital
• Comms
• Sales / biz dev
• Partner leads
• Customer service
• Agencies
• Executive leadership

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Your job?
What does the customer care about?
• Define the customer – who buys, who
influences?
• What challenge is your customer facing?
• How do you define your story in relation to
customer need?
• Create the big idea

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Do the research

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You’ve done your
research, listened to
sales and…

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Come up with your big idea…
• The big picture of digital transformation and steps
to transform successfully
• Dog training tips & tricks for a more peaceful home
• Healthy eating and living information for a better
life
• Strategies and advice to become a successful
marketing professional in the digital world

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Now you need energy
• The quality and intent of the content
• It requires a hunger
• A desire to solve your customer’s problems
• A sense of urgency in how you think and plan
• A true obsession to help customers
• Half hearted? Not going to happen

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Success needs a
destination

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A content hub – mission critical
• A central destination
• Make it easy for customers
• Feature content audience wants
• Very very little sales or promotional content
• Branding up to you – but subtle is good
• Regular posts / many authors
• Full spectrum of topics around big theme
• Wrap CTAs around the content
• It will be the future digital entry point to business

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Amplification
strategy?

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What are your channels?
• Social media – Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Google+,
SlideShare, SnapChat, Twitter, etc…?
• Spend money!
• Direct marketing?
• Advertising?
• Native advertising - Outbrain?
• PR?
• Events?
• Influencers, customers, partners?
• But the most powerful?

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Your employees
500 connections
500 x 500 = 250K
5k x 500 = 2.5 mil
And remember, they
are trusted

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#DigimindTalks
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Unleashing the employees
1. Culture
2. Guidelines
3. Employee brand first
4. A Platform
5. Effective measurement
6. Champions
7. 1-2-1 Coaching
“If your employees
aren’t your biggest
fans, you’ve got
problems WAY
bigger than social
media”
Jay Baer

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But employees must
be advocates for
themselves first, your
brand second

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To become a content
marketing driven
business

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Reach customers in their bubble
• Think holistically
• Tap into their need
• Educate them and enhance their life
• Make them laugh
• Answer their questions
• Engage with them how they want to be engaged
with
• Make them want to read/watch/absorb you
• And then they buy

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Once you’ve done that,
measure, measure,
measure, refine and
keep going!
Patience really is a
virtue

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Your customer has a
challenge
Identify it
Align your brand to it
Create world-class content
customers can’t resist

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It takes guts
• Starts at the top
• A powerful CCO
• Company-wide commitment
• Strategy
• Processes to simplify
• 180 degree shift in thinking
• An energetic team determined to succeed
• True collaboration

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#DigimindTalks
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True success is big picture
1. Siloes down
2. Partnership
3. Train & trust
4. Leaders
engaged
5. Culture change
Image: Courtesy of Shutterstock

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Content marketing is
the digital shop front
for your business

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Is your window
tantalising enough for
customers to walk in
or will we walk past?

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