Every year over two billion blog posts are published online. If you’re a business owner or blogger, this statistic may seem alarming. How are you supposed to get your latest content out to your audience when there are billions of posts coming out every year and beat your competition at content promotion?
The reality is, it’s not easy to drown out the noise from your competitors and get consumers to read your content. However, there are steps you can take to ensure that your content reaches a large crowd of interested prospects after you create a blog or eCommerce storefront.
We are going to look at several ways you can make your content readily available for consumers for free. Everything from your website design to the way you interact with your followers on social media can make a significant impact on how people remember and interact with your brand.
There are countless benefits to having a solid content marketing campaign. You’ll likely see increased sales, improve lead generation efforts, and overall boost your visibility. Let’s examine some of the best ways to execute on content promotion without paying a dime.
Create an Email Drip Campaign
Most blog and business owners currently use email as a way to keep in touch with their customer base. As much as we would like to think that our subscribers are hanging on our every word and waiting for our next blog post, the reality differs drastically. You have to continually engage with your audience if you want them to continue coming to your website.
Email drip campaigns are a great way to engage with your new subscribers and expose them to your latest blog posts. An email drip campaign is a series of emails that eventually leads to a call-to-action such as downloading or purchasing something from your website. However, throughout your campaign, you must build rapport and show your subscribers why they should care about what you have to say.
After your introduction email goes out, you can either link to or transcribe your blog posts into a format that’s acceptable for email. Make sure that the content you promote is relevant to your niche, and relevant to your audience if you’re segmenting your lead list.
For example, if you own an online pet shop, you’re going to ask new subscribers what kind of pets they own. You can take this information and create an email campaign for people with cats, dogs, birds, or all of the above. If the content is relevant to your audience, they are more likely to find value in your content and share their thoughts with others. Similarly, this could help promote your new content to subscribers that have been following you for months but haven’t interacted with your company.
Digital Marketer’s drip campaign has an excellent segway between sending a introduction email and content promotion. Would you feel compelled to read a blog post if you received this message moments before?
Improve Content Accessibility On-site
Have you ever visited a website with the hopes of reading their blog, only to discover a tiny link that reads “Blog” on the website’s footer? We’ve all been there, and some consumers will give up if they can’t find your blog in the first few seconds.
It’s not just essential to have content promotion on social media and through email, but you need to focus on ways to promote your content while consumers are looking at your site. There are various ways you can make your content accessible to a broader audience on-site. First, make sure you have a clear button that says “Blog” on your navigation bar. Beyond a link for your blog, you should also include search functionality within your content.
Let’s say someone comes to your website about gardening because they are interested in growing flowers. This consumer is not going to want to scroll through countless pages of content to find a handful of pages they find interesting. However, if they can type in “Flowers” and get all of the results featuring that keyword, they will be more likely to read and share your content.
If you’re currently using chatbots to help with common customer inquiries, you could use this bot as a way to promote content to site visitors. A simple popup that says “Hi there, check out our latest blog post on preparing your soil for spring,” with a link, can go a long way towards promoting your content to leads.
Keep in mind that chatbots can be programmed with different personalities depending on its function. Here’s a graphic from Chatbots Magazine that explains which personality type you should craft for your bot.
You’ll notice that a bot with personality is popular with consumers who are shopping. If your goal is to convince customers to invest in your product or service, you’ll want to create a chatbot with a lighthearted, bubbly personality.
Engage with Leads on Social Media
Social media is one of the best tools you can use when you want to reach a broad audience. There are 2.41 billion active monthly users on Facebook alone, and many of these people may be interested in your content. You have to be willing to put your business out in the public square if you want to generate more traffic to your website.
There are various ways to use social media for promotional purposes. Many businesses prefer to post their latest blog updates for their followers. While this is a great tactic to obtain general traffic and shares, it lacks the personalization that many consumers have come to expect from businesses.
You can make your blog posts more personal for consumers by engaging with them in the comments section of your business page, or by commenting on relevant conversations happening in other groups. For example, if you notice someone in a gardening group on Facebook asking about how to grow flowers when they live in a desert climate, you could share an informative piece about flowers that grow well in a dry environment. Small actions have a huge impact on your audience and can help you drastically increase subscribers.
Start a Contest
Contests are a fun and engaging way to promote your brand, and in turn, your content, across social media, email, and on your website. There are various approaches you can take when you want to create an online contest for content marketing purposes.
You can then set up criteria for the contest entry that will help promote your content. For example, if a consumer wants to enter your contest on social media, they might have to share your post, follow your page, and tag four friends. If each of those four friends tags four of their friends, that’s 20 people exposed to your content. It doesn’t take long to figure out that this method of promotion can help your business grow exponentially.
The prize for winning your contest will vary based on your niche, but in most cases, customers who are subscribed are likely to enter the giveaway. As they expose your brand and content to their friends, you’ll see a trickle-down effect, and before you know it, you’ll have thousands of shares and eyes on your content. In the example below, we can see how creating a contest for your followers can improve engagement and boost your views. Notice the criteria under “How to Win.” You have to follow the brand on social media, take and post a photo, and tag their company. Every step in the entry requirements builds a connection between the audience and the company, all while promoting the contest to countless other people.
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Look for Guest Posting Opportunities
Finally, you can promote your content for free by looking for guest posting opportunities. Many popular blogs and businesses accept guest posts from credible and professional individuals who have experience in a specific topic or industry.
Once you’ve found a website that’s relevant to your website, you can look around on their website and see if they are currently accepting guest posts. If so, it’s time to do some research and learn about the blog you want to publish your content. Take your time and read through past posts and gather info about the editor. You’ll want to send an email from your business account with an introduction and your pitch.
When your approval email comes it, it’s time to get to work and write your guest post. Make sure you stay on track and keep the content relevant to the site publishing your content, and use links to your content sparingly. This tactic will expose your content to a brand new audience and help build your credibility as a professional blogger.
Conclusion on Content Promotion Strategy
Creating great content is only half the battle when you want to generate leads for your business. It’s equally important that you’re spreading the word about your posts through social media, email, and even on other websites.
The content marketing tactics for content promotion listed here are all free ways you can boost your visibility and get more traffic on your site. As you gain traction and your business grows, you’ll find that promoting your content becomes much easier. You have to be mindful of who your readers are, where they spend time online, and how they like to consume content. You’ll have to learn and adapt as your blog grows, but there are plenty of ways you can start promoting your content for free today.
Learn more key secrets in content promotion with this cool infographic from Klientboost and Uberflip.
