Content marketing is changing at the speed of light, and myths are getting more damaging to your prospects than ever. In this article, we debunk the top 7 myths in content marketing in 2019.
1. Content Marketing is Less Important than Creation
This is a trap writers often fall in. Creation doesn’t necessarily mean success. So much content is being produced today that marketing is at least 70% of the game. You shouldn’t leave your content to chance. Success of content marketing now involves a lot of data analysis, research, and relentless efforts to optimize content.
2. Content Will Produce Its Own Traffic (Inbound Marketing)
Admittedly, this myth follows from the first one. The term “inbound marketing”, which gets thrown around a lot nowadays, is (erroneously) understood to mean that simply generating content will attract new opportunities and transform one’s business.
3. Ordinary Content Suffices as Long as There’s Plenty of It
Are you or your writers spewing bland 500-word articles that are missing insights, a voice, and visuals? Your content might not be as effective as you think if that’s the case. Investing time, money, and effort in good texts will pay off like nothing else when it comes to content marketing in 2019. The Internet is saturated with texts and the competition for attention is tougher than ever. Even as recently as 2018, the required content standard wasn’t as high as it is today.
We All Have to Start Somewhere
The journey of content marketing is long and hard, but also interesting and rewarding. There’s no doubt content marketing has grown up. Posts that were good now have to be great to compete, and at least 1000 words long according to research by Orbit Media on the content standard for bloggers and marketers. More research and polishing are needed to create content that reflects the purpose of your brand.
There is one key difference between good and great content: being passionate about your subject. Content that is written solely for SEO optimization purposes rarely makes a lasting impression on the reader (see Myth 5).
4. We Don’t Need Technology for Good Content Marketing in 2019
Content and social media are very, very closely related, but not synonymous with one another. The dawn of content marketing witnessed practically no technology or just really basic technology. The use of social content was perceived as a manual job. In reality, there are many living components to content marketing, including images, social networks, videos, blog posts, multiple media, search, metrics, email, optimization, etc.
Businesses must avail themselves of apps and digital marketing technology platforms to launch, publish, measure, and manage content. We could even claim that in 2019, it is difficult to create content without modern technology. Marketing automation providers like Marketo, Hubspot, and Infusionsoft are becoming increasingly useful for businesses of all sizes.
To make collecting, polishing, and publishing brand content easier on your team, we recommend using apps like Latinstock-corbis, Stackla, and Spredfast that make it possible to source content from your fans, readers, and other supporters.
5. Search Engines Are Top Priority
Google started out with good intentions – organizing all the information in the world and making it accessible and useful to everyone. Yet, you know what they say about the road to hell. Marketers who were overly focused on SEO have seen projects go horribly wrong. Google has started punishing people who write texts exclusively for SEO purposes. You need to appeal to people’s emotions. That way, the chances of your content going viral are much better.
Marketers continue to underestimate the value of quality content. Many companies labor under the misconception that content will write itself or that anyone can do it because “it’s just writing”. You’ll find creating an impactful text with an X Factor is pretty challenging, and if that weren’t enough, there is the virtually non-stop production of content to deal with. It could be feasible to let an agency handle this for you.
6. Your Content Marketing Will Succeed if You Give Content Away
Bloggers are the essence and emanation of content marketing in 2019. A lot of writers and marketers believe giving away free content is enough to attract followers. However, a good blogger knows to ask for something for their content. They are aware that conversion to leads and sales won’t just happen with freebies.
If you have a free e-book for download on your site, ask for an email or token amount in return to create engagement. Don’t offer free training and premium resources for free. People generally don’t have enough appreciation for freebies. They think that if something is free, it’s probably worthless or they get suspicious that you’re trying to lure them into buying something. These perceptions change when you ask for something from them in return.
7. Content Marketing Won’t Work for My Business
Content marketing is not an industry-specific marketing style, nor has it ever been. There’s no particular industry, for which content marketing is most appropriate. Ultimately, this type of marketing is a way to tell a story. All brands can tell interesting stories once they learn how.
Any business can generate high-quality content, even if they don’t have much content marketing experience. However, this begs the question of how your brand could do this in a way that would make it stand out if just any business could manage to do the same.
Those looking to create top-quality content have to offer tangible value. The type of content doesn’t matter. In can be educational, entertaining, or inspirational. What’s important is that your content give the audience something that will ultimately fortify your brand’s status.
Final Thoughts
Great content marketing in 2019 achieves 3 key outcomes – it is appealing, it draws readers, and it fosters commitment. In digital marketing, this means engagement, traffic, and conversion, with the last one being the most important to the financial success of your brand.