Traditional marketing is becoming more and more obsolete with time. In this
With an evolving society and a problem in place, many have sought alternatives in hopes to gain the public’s attention and trust back. While the concept of content marketing itself is nothing new, as new technologies and ways of communication emerge, so has the field of content creation, making it a prominent part of growing a business and running an ecommerce store in today’s era.
Content marketing is a strategic marketing approach that focuses on providing relevant and valuable information to the customers. In short, it tells customers exactly what they need to hear to use your services. If you’re a beginner who is struggling to incorporate content marketing into your ecommerce business, here is a detailed guide made specifically for those new to the concept and seeking to test the waters.
In this guide you’ll learn:
- What exactly is content marketing
- The importance of content marketing for ecommerce owners
- The basics of getting started
- The many types of content marketing
- How to improve and make the best of your content marketing efforts
Ready? Let’s dive right in!
Organic Content Marketing
You may have a great product or idea to sell, but how exactly do you sell it to your customers? An effective way is to create a story around your idea that targets your specific niche. A key element to always keep in mind while planning content marketing is that the niche should be as specific as possible.
Only then, you’ll be able to connect with customers through your story. Ecommerce businesses use various social media platforms, website blogs, ads, and partnerships to promote their organic content. While this may seem a bit daunting to you, this guide will break down the entire process into several simple steps for you.
Importance of Content Marketing
Why do you need content marketing as a beginner eCommerce business?
- Educate — To educate your prospects about the products you offer. Allow them the liberty to get to know all of your products or services.
- Engage — To create a community around your brand
- Help — To show your audience why they need your products or services
- Bond — To build relationships with your customers
- Involve — To show them the background and hard work that goes into your products or services
- Showcase — To showcase the company’s expertise and knowledge on the concerned field
- Connect — To boost your website’s visibility on Google Seach and find new customers
How to Get Started With Content Marketing
As a beginner, content marketing can oftentimes feel overwhelming, but the good news, with the right foundation and understanding, it can be very easily manageable and incorporated. Considering you probably already have a product and brand in mind, and know what your business will be all about, as a general rule of thumb, these are some of the basics when getting started:
Identify your audience and competition. Take time to research and determine who your audience is, and especially who is likely to be interested or in need of your products or services. The last thing you want is to try to reach everyone out there. The key lies in identifying who your niche or target persona is and elaborating your content based on their demographics, psychographics, age, gender, cultural background, interests, hobbies, likes, and dislikes.
Determine your key messages and end goal. Without direction or a reference point, you’ll have no clue where you’re headed. Before you begin creating content, it’s crucial for you to determine what is the main objective, and what exactly is it that you wish to achieve with your content. This can be, educating users about your brand, announcing a specific contest or company update, getting users to sign up for your newsletter, generating sales, or simply growing your social media accounts.
Once you’ve figured this out, take time to elaborate and decide how you plan to communicate it to your audience. Identifying your key messages will help you ensure every type of content you create is centered around your goals and delivering relevant information.
Determine the best channels and strategies for you. Compelling content is always strategically planned and delivered. Once you have set clear goals and objectives, make sure to plan out the best strategies to reach your audience, which should also help you figure out the best channels for the type of content you’ll be creating. This is why taking adequate time to study your audience, along with its patterns and behaviors, should never be bypassed.
Beyond helping you establish your key messages, it’ll also become the foundation to help you decide the type of content you’ll be creating, assess your current position on the market, and overall help you plan out a specific content calendar while identifying the best channels to deliver your message.
Types of Content Marketing + Examples
There are various types of content marketing. In this section, we’ll go over the eight most popular types.
Social media content marketing
With social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, Twitter, etc. it is easier than ever to content market via some step strategies. There is a wide range of content ideas to be used which are popular on different social media platforms. Some options may be to use Instagram reels, Live stories,
Social media content marketing example
Take Kylieskin’s Instagram as an example. Kylieskin by Kylie Jenner has a classy look. Like its sibling brands, Kyliecosmetics, Kylieswim, and Kyliebaby, this brand has a unique and minimalist social media appearance that compliments its products. If you were to go through their Instagram feed, you will most likely notice the feed theme, it’s all baby pink.
The posts show creativity and different ideas but every post will have a shade of baby pink in it. This is very much in brand with Kylie’s personal social media account as well as her other businesses. The consistency or theme of monochromatic colors is strikingly noticeable.
Infographics content marketing
An infographic is basically a way to catch the attention by displaying important information or data with
Infographic example. Image source.
Infographics content marketing example
Ecwid’s post about taking breaks with simple exercises while working from home during the
Blog content marketing
Thanks to SEO and Google analytics, blogs generate not only traffic but revenue for ecommerce brands. Blogs allow businesses to promote everything, from launching new products, sharing customer or client reviews, and providing guides to promoting collaborations, and sharing new campaigns.
It is important to understand how SEO works and the roles of keywords in bringing your website to the first page of Google search. You must remain mindful to post not only regular but
Regular blogging builds loyalty and trust allowing you to build a community, and ultimately, keep customers coming back.
Blog content marketing example
Ecwid Blog is a great example of good blog content marketing. With regularly generated content, Ecwid makes use of SEO to drive traffic. It has categories that ecommerce businesses would appreciate including product ideas, launch preparations, marketing and promoting, success stories, partnerships, selling online/on social media, business, and Ecwid updates. The blog allows the user to learn everything there is about eCommerce while keeping up with modern trends.
Video content marketing
There is a reason why TikTok is famous and so are Instagram reels. People love video content. It requires the least amount of mental energy to process and they are fun to watch.
On social media, video content marketing boosts social media engagement and helps connect with new audiences thanks to the share feature. Sharing videos on the landing pages of your website results in your audience spending more time on your website, therefore, boosting your SEO. Some examples of video content are new product launch videos,
Without a doubt, video is one of the strongest content marketing approaches.
Video content marketing example
This Ecwid Instagram video hit 17.5k views. Why? Because it was short and relatable. It allowed people to learn about product titles in 60 seconds. Everyone loves short videos that give away important information. Using simple video editing techniques and writing a short script, the brand made more than 17.5k clicks on this video.
Video content is easy to shoot. You can record
Paid ad content marketing
Your brand cannot prosper while existing in a vacuum. Therefore, to thrive, your business needs a constant inflow of new prospects. Paid Ad Content Marketing generates a lot of traffic. Some types of Paid Ad Content Marketing are as follows:
- Native Advertising (promoting your content on relevant
third-party sites so puts your content out there for new customers that may be interesting in your business) and Paid Seach (purchasing ads to appear on search engine results pages). - Influencer Marketing (involving influencers who create relevant content to promote your business).
- Social Media Paid Promotion (the most impactful paid promotion option, pay to generate traffic to your social media accounts to website).
Paid ad content marketing example
Elementor uses Paid Instagram Ads. Instagram ads appear everywhere on the app, including the relevant user’s feed, story, and explore page. Their similarity to a normal post with just the label “sponsored” allows users to click on them more. When ads are similar to posts people constantly interact with, users are more likely to visit the post/website or buy the product.
Podcast content marketing
Podcasting is a way to add a new dimension to your content marketing. A simple series of audio content that is released regularly in episodes varying in length can allow your brand to connect with your audience via interviews and narrative experiences.
There are various benefits to this. Podcasts are in, there is no denying that. You don’t need a lot of equipment or expertise to start them. Simply with your phone microphone and your adoration for your brand, you can create a series of podcasts. By transitioning between interviews, background stories,
The Ecwid
Podcast content marketing example
The Ecwid Ecommerce Show podcast helps new businesses grow. It includes
Collaborative content marketing
All great brands collaborate with relevant brands or influencers. There is no denying that collaborations bring diversity to your content. If you believe that you and your team have produced all the content they could for the brand, it is time to bring in new voices. Influencers and collaboration with other brands prove to the audience that your brand is not stagnant but rather an adaptive one.
Collaborations drive traffic to your site. Influencers and brands have their followers and by sharing the collaboration, they introduce you to an entirely new audience. To be more inclusive, your content marketing strategy could include involving your audience by promoting a pitching system where they could
Collaborative content marketing example
Uber x Spotify created a huge hype in the tech world and gave them publicity and media buzz. The concept was simple, if you are bored of your Uber driver’s music, you will be able to connect your Spotify to the car’s radio and listen to the music of your choice.
This was a smart content marketing idea. Both brands understood the human behavior of associating music with car rides. This simple observation allowed both companies to make millions of profit. Plus, they were both able to access each other’s customer base and use that to further their content marketing.
User-generated content marketing
If people, not associated with the brand, create content promoting it, that is
This benefits the brand by making a strong statement that people love us. Repost the posts on your social media or invite the creator to write a guest post about you. However, always request permission before reposting. It is essential to credit the creator as well, not only for ethical reasons but also because it tells people that you are inclusive and proud to welcome new voices.
Some brands, like Passion Planner, even create separate social media accounts to promote
Along with its main Instagram account, Passion Planner has two feature pages, Passion Planner Daily and Passion Planner Digital. The company uses all three of them to promote
How to Up Your Content Marketing Game
So at this point in the guide, we can confidently say that at the core of content marketing, lies the strategic approach to reach, attract, educate, and retain a specific group of people. This is always with the ultimate goal to generate profit and build a solid customer base.
And although we’ve provided you with key knowledge about some of the top and most successful tools to achieve this, here is how you can make the best of your content marketing game and get the most from each of the strategies provided above.
Up your SEO game
With proper SEO, you’ll make it easy for potential customers to find your business. You can have the most beautiful looking website and
- Improving your site’s navigation
- Including keywords on your main headings
- Staying on topic
- Making use of meta tag keywords
- Ensuring quality of links
- Abiding by Google’s standards and regulations
At first, SEO can feel very intimidating and discourageging. Keep in mind this changes as you become familiar and start getting your hands on it and testing the waters. If anything, you can always hire an SEO expert to help you optimize your sitea and rank higher.
Build brand loyalty
If anything, a decent part of content marketing revolves around building your brand and creating loyalty. With any type of content, you put out, make sure you use it as an opportunity to connect with your audience, build a sort of brand identity, and deliver your key messages.
You also want to ensure to establish or decide on the personality you’d like to give your brand and ensure you incorporate the same tone of voice, enthusiasm, theme, and colors to the type of content you put out. This will help others easily recognize your posts and make them feel related.
You likely don’t want to build your brand around empowering women and use atone of voice that doesn’t resonate with them, or warts, come out as offensive. The key is to find your identity and start gaining your customers’ trust with your content. Awesome and inexpensive types of content that can help you achieve this usually include newsletters, free guides, social media posts, or even weekly blog posts.
Keep your content relevant
Content relevance is all about your audience’s preferences and unique perceptions of the topics you cover and even your product or services. It’s a common mistake to get lazy with your content after the momentum has been lost. Nevertheless, this is when you are to be dropping as much
Beyond helping you stay up to date and on track, keeping your content relevant is a great way to communicate with your audience and add authenticity to your brand.
Some tips to consider in relation to content relevancy are:
- Pay close attention to trends in your niche.
- Always update your topics, and avoid staying stuck on a topic for too long.
- Keep your audience surprised.
- Understand your audience
- Keep grammar in check
- Offer solutions
- Include visuals
- Keep it fun
Also as a key takeaway, don’t forget good and original content often speaks to the reader and generally answers a question or keeps him or her informed.
Measure your success
As you’ve gotten from this guide, content marketing is there to make you reach new customers and generate sales. Aside from constantly putting out relevant and engaging content, you always want to measure how each one of your efforts is performing and overall determine what’s working and what’s not. As a rule of thumb, you want to measure more than just sales.
Without a doubt, sales are the end goal and most significant component, but beyond sales, you want to measure actual profit, engagement, bounce rate, customer base, retention rate, and so much more. This should help you get more and more familiar with your audience, and eventually up your sales more and more while avoiding a future backlash or resentment toward your brand.
Content Marketing Key Takeaways and Recap
Now that you’ve become familiar with the fun and rewarding world of content marketing and have a solid foundation to apply it to your business, here is our recap of today’s post and what we consider key takeaways. Overall, we want to reiterate that creating content is not an easy job or one to take lightly, Keeping a schedule ad posting regularly without losing your audience’s attention takes time and practice. Moreover, with the right foundation and mindset, you can quickly start noticing the rewards that come with it. And when these seem to take a lot longer than expected, this is when measuring and changing strategies come in handy. Nevertheless, keep focused on the main goal and always consider the following when getting started:
- Content marketing takes time and practice.
- Know and understand your audience
- Analyze the competition
- Avoid fluff or sales pitch as part of your content
- Offer variety and new topics
- Always focus on the needs of your audience
- Choose the type of content and your channels wisely
- Have a plan and remain consistent
When it comes to content marketing, consistency is your best
If you feel like this guide has helped you understand a little more about the complex yet rewarding nature of content marketing, we’d like to encourage you to comment below. Help us know how we can continue to make a difference and help fellow Ecwid sellers make the most of their business.
Besides our efforts to get rid of fees that get in the way to get started, we also work hard to offer our sellers a community where they can come for common questions and find reliable answers. Join Ecwid for free today and become part of a network of innovative thinkers and skilled ecommerce owners.
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