In this article, we will explore the benefits of creating viral content and provide tips on how to create content that has the potential to go viral.

Content marketing is when you distribute content, like blog articles, YouTube videos, or social media posts to attract and retain customers in an implicit way. Now, not to be dramatic, content marketing literally runs the world. Because think about it, are you more likely to buy a product because a Facebook ad is telling you to, or are you more likely to buy a product because a TikToker who you know and love and trust is giving you their personal recommendation? 

The concept is simple. Give value before you try to extract it, You wanna teach people something new, you wanna inspire them, make them laugh, all of that. You want your content to give something, and this is gonna allow you to gain trust with your audience, and introduce them to your product naturally, which will do so much more for you and your brand in the long term than trying to go for a hard sell ever could, but content marketing is competitive. 

There are millions of businesses that are out there trying to push their own content and trying to capture people’s attention, but here’s a secret. Most brands are doing it completely wrong. 

So, I’m gonna show you how you can get the best results from your content marketing and get more traffic and more customers for your business. 

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The Rules Of Content Marketing

The number one rule of content marketing is that it should not feel like marketing at all. Rather, it should actually introduce people to your brand in a very seamless way. 

Here where so many brands go wrong, they publish content that interrupts the user experience as they’re scrolling. 

So it’s very clear that when brands do this, they just don’t understand the buyer’s journey because building trust with customers takes time, from the moment that they first hear about your brand to the moment that they buy from you, this is gonna be divided into three stages. 

We have awareness, consideration, and decision. 

The awareness stage is when someone realizes that they have a problem and they’re looking for a solution but they’re not really sure if there even is a solution. So they might be typing “how to gain muscle” on YouTube. In that case, you’d wanna make a how-to video or an explainer video to address what it is that they’re actually going through. 

The consideration stage is when someone is now aware of a few potential solutions to their problem but they’re trying to choose that right solution. So they might be typing something in like “best supplements to build muscle”. In that case, you’d wanna make a YouTube video that is informative and is lightly touching on your product without being too in your face. 

The decision stage is when someone is ready to buy. So they might be comparison shopping between two of the best options. If they’re on Google, they might be typing something in like “whey protein powder versus plant-based protein powder.” 

In that case, you could create a blog post that’s persuasive and addresses any fears or objections that the customer might be having before they can actually seal that deal. 

Choosing A Content Marketing Channel

The next step is choosing which channel to do your content marketing on.

Many brands are spreading themselves too thin by trying to tackle all the channels at once. I would say just aim to master one before moving on to the next. and remember, you do not need to be everywhere. You just need to be where your audience is hanging out. 

Hopefully you’ve put a little bit of thought into the type of person that your business is serving, like what’s their age, what’s their income level, where do they live, what are their values, attitudes, and lifestyles, because answering these questions are gonna help you understand where they’re spending their time online. 

So when it comes to choosing a channel for content marketing, you could create : 

  • E-books, you could do –
  • Articles, 
  • YouTube videos, 
  • Podcast episodes, TikToks, Instagram posts, Instagram reels. 

Now, is there really a format that works best? Not at all. You just wanna make sure that you’re choosing one for your brand that works and one that aligns with your interests and your talents as well. So if you’re good at writing, maybe start a blog, maybe an email newsletter. If you’re a video nerd, you can try YouTube or TikTok or Instagram reels. 

How To Get Started With Content Marketing

Once you’ve chosen a channel,  here’s how to get started with content marketing. 

First, you’re gonna wanna set your goals. 

-What do you wanna accomplish? 

-Do you wanna grow an audience, do you wanna get more sales, or are you trying to retain your existing customers? 

Next, you’re gonna wanna figure out your style and you’re gonna wanna find some proven topics as well. So check out a competitor to find inspiration, you’re gonna wanna take notes on the kind of content style and the kind of topics that are doing well, Like look at the social posts. What has a lot of comments and engagement? And you can also get topic ideas from online communities like Reddit as well, also, you can create content by finding a keyword. 

Now, whether you’re publishing on Google or YouTube or TikTok, a lot of content marketing platforms use keywords. So what you can do is you can use Google autosuggest to find things people are already searching for around your topic, i suggest you to use searches related to at the bottom of Google search results, and that’s gonna help you find variation on your keywords. 

Create and publish content, if you wanna stand out from the millions of posts that people are making every single day, then your content needs to be pretty amazing. So try not to focus just on quantity, you also wanna focus on quality. 

You wanna consistently give your audience an amazing experience, so cut the fluff, make sure that your content is very engaging, and no one is gonna watch your content, if they’re not clicking on it in the first place. 

Make sure that you’re paying special attention to making your headlines, descriptions, and your thumbnails . 

You’re gonna wanna make sure that you are promoting your content, don’t just publish your content on one platform. You wanna make sure that you’re distributing it on websites, content roundups, email newsletters, and you can also boost your content with a little bit of paid spend, like a boosted Facebook post, or a YouTube discovery ad, or an Instagram promoted post. 

Make sure that you are tracking your performance, that’s help you to analyze your performance.

Now, no matter what platform you’re choosing, you wanna make sure that you’re focusing on three metrics:

  • traffic, which measures the number of people who have viewed or engaged with your content. This will give you an idea of how many people have been exposed to your brand and message.
  • engagement measures how many people have interacted with your content, such as likes, shares, comments, or views. This will give you an idea of how well your content is resonating with your audience and how likely it is to be shared.
  • conversions measures how many people have taken a desired action, such as making a purchase or signing up for a newsletter, as a result of engaging with your viral content. This will give you an idea of how effectively your viral content is driving business results.

By focusing on these three metrics, you can gain a better understanding of how well your viral content is performing and make data-driven decisions about how to improve it.

Read also: 5 Influencer Marketing Tactics On Instagram To Increase Sales

Content Marketing Tips

Here are some tips for creating effective content marketing:

  1. Understand your target audience: Before creating any content, it’s important to understand who your target audience is and what their needs and interests are. This will help you create content that is relevant and resonates with them.
  2. Create a content calendar: A content calendar will help you plan and organize your content in advance, ensuring that you’re consistently creating and publishing new content.
  3. Use visuals: Visuals, such as images and videos, can help make your content more engaging and shareable. They can also help to break up text and make your content more easily digestible.
  4. Optimize for SEO: Make sure your content is optimized for search engines by including relevant keywords and meta tags. This will help increase the visibility of your content and drive more traffic to your website.
  5. Be authentic: Creating authentic content that is true to your brand voice will help build trust and credibility with your audience.
  6. Promote your content: Share your content on social media, through email marketing and influencer marketing, and other channels to increase its reach and visibility.
  7. Track and measure your performance: Use analytics to track the performance of your content and make data-driven decisions about how to improve it.
  8. Be Consistent: Be consistent in your content creation and publishing schedule. This will help you build an audience that anticipates your content and is more likely to engage with it.
  9. Make it shareable: Make it easy for your audience to share your content on social media and other platforms by including share buttons and making the text and visuals easily shareable.
  10. Create evergreen content: Create content that will be valuable and relevant in the long-term, not just for a short period of time.

By following these tips, you can create effective content marketing that will help you connect with your target audience, build your brand, and drive business results.