1. Only publish your best material. Be consistent.

The content market is fierce today, with so many people producing content. It is essential that you only publish the best content you can. Otherwise, you will not succeed. It is better to print just one great post per week than five average posts each week.
You must set not only a high standard for quality but also maintain that standard. Even though this can be difficult for experienced content producers, it is essential to stand out in a sea of others and make your voice heard. It is necessary to realize that creating premium content requires time, effort, and money. There are no shortcuts.
For more advice on how to stand out in an increasingly competitive crowd, check out this post on 11 of the biggest content marketing challenges and how to overcome them.

1. Evaluate the Success of Your Content with Data

One of the most common misconceptions about content marketing is that simply by publishing blog posts, your business will magically take off, and you’ll be besieged by armies of eager prospective customers clamoring for whatever you sell. This is not often true. Clever content marketers know how to measure results and produce great content.
Bloggers may be content to look at how many social shares their latest post has received and then make a decision about its success. Even the most popular blog posts may not be enough to achieve your business goals. How will you measure the success of your content?
It doesn’t matter what your content is supposed to do. However, you must use analytics and other data-driven methods to evaluate how your content performs. Otherwise, you might be wasting time on content that’s not delivering any value for your business. For some, success might be measured in overall traffic using Google Analytics. For others, social shares or “attention metrics” such as scroll depth might be more important, a metric that can be measured by tools such as Chartbeat.

1. Repurpose your Content

Producing the best content requires time, effort, and skill. You can get more return on your investment by giving away your best content, even if it’s free. Many businesses reuse content from one format to create multiple formats.
Consider the blog post that you last published and how it performed. It resonated with readers because it was a valuable and timeless resource. Was it something your audience couldn’t find elsewhere? It would be a good idea to make it downloadable. Some blog posts may be suitable for an email blast or live webinar. Whatever way you decide to repurpose content, make sure you get the most out of your content production investment.
For more on how (and when) to repurpose your content, check out this blog post.

1. Use your best headlines in PPC ads.

It would help if you considered repurposing the headlines that are most successful in your PPC campaigns. A headline that resonated strongly with readers will resonate strongly with potential buyers.
When you look at it, PPC ads copy and content share many of the same “hooks,” such as solid verbs and emotionally engaging angles, clear benefits, and straightforward explanations. Both are similar in length (or should be). AdWords Ads and Bing Ads have a mandatory character limit in their ads that advertisers must follow. However, shorter headlines of approximately six words perform well from a content perspective.
An A/B test can be used to determine if a blog post, whitepaper, or webinar exceeds your expectations. Check out this blog post on how to think like a content marketer for PPC for more tips on how you can make your content go further.

1. Recognize that not all content has to tell a story

My biggest complaint about the content marketing industry revolves around the emphasis on storytelling. While storytelling is an essential skill for content marketers, both aspiring and experienced, it is also a key component of brand storytelling. Brand storytelling is one way to reach potential new customers.
This doesn’t necessarily mean all content is storytelling or all content marketers are storytellers.
Not all content can tell a story. Sometimes a simple blog post can serve a purpose and provide value to your readers. People who don’t know or aren’t skilled in storytelling in content marketing often speak loudest. Listen to them, and don’t be afraid to say no if you aren’t a natural storyteller. It’s not necessary for content marketing success.
Don’t shy away from telling stories if that’s what makes the most sense for your content, but don’t buy into the hype that every single piece of content has to be an engaging, complex narrative – it simply isn’t true.

1. Do not be afraid to speak your mind, especially when others don’t.

Content marketers face a challenge in coping with the overwhelming volume of content produced. There are millions of blog posts published each day. It can seem almost impossible to make your voice heard among the sea of useless, poorly written content.
Much of the content produced, especially in digital marketing and other close-knit industries like digital marketing, is merely regurgitating the views and opinions. Readers are quickly becoming less interested in the content. If hundreds or even thousands of blogs say the same thing, why should they waste their time reading that content? This is why producing contrarian content is so powerful.
You can take a controversial stance and speak your mind when others don’t. This is a highly effective strategy for your content. You should be careful not to offend anyone or be contrarian, but be bold and say what you think. Your readers will appreciate your honesty, if nothing else. You’ll also sound and look more authentic if you don’t repeat what others have said.

1. Use Specific Keywords in Your Content

We wouldn’t need to worry about SEO in an ideal world. We would publish blog posts that were insightful and thought-provoking about the topics we chose. This would allow us to reach huge online audiences eager to learn and then buy what we sell.
We don’t live there, so we need to think about SEO.
Experts in content marketing advocate for a “keywords” approach to content creation. This means publishing content relevant to the reader’s interests and does not concern itself with keyword targeting. This is great in an ideal universe, but it can be challenging to do well in the real world. It is important to target keywords in your content before you create it.
Keyword targeting for SEO is a broad topic. I will not attempt to simplify it. It is essential to think about keywords you want to rank for when writing blog posts or other content. To learn more about how to target keywords with your content (and optimize your content for a better shot at ranking highly), check out this post on blogging tips.

1. Back-Up Your Arguments with Data

Trust can be difficult to find in today’s digital media environment. With fact-checking and journalistic due diligence at all-time lows, it’s easy to see why so many readers have become reluctant to accept “facts” as the cold, hard truth. It is essential to back up any assertions with data.
Data should be used in content as naturally and routinely as spell-checking. Statistics and facts should be included if you are attempting to prove a point. If you use data to support your topic, make sure you properly cite it and, if applicable, provide a link back to the source. You wouldn’t want someone else to use your data without mentioning your research.
Read more about using data in your content in this blog post about marketing data and how to use statistics to make your content more convincing.

1. Make sure your content reflects the brand’s voice.

The best way to refine and develop your brand’s voice is through content marketing. Even large businesses can have trouble identifying and defining their brand voice, mainly with larger teams.
It can be challenging to maintain brand consistency across large teams. This requires constant review of editorial standards to ensure consistency in quality and tone and a more detailed overview of your blog and contents. Although it can be challenging to develop a brand voice through the range, it is worth looking into.
For every post, ask questions about how the content advances and develops your brand’s voice. Is the writing reflecting your company’s values and beliefs? What is the tone of your writing? Are you authentic or artificial in your brand voice? These questions can help you control your brand voice and improve the content you create. If necessary, answering these questions and correcting your course will help you provide a better brand experience for your audience, something all blogs should strive to achieve.

1. Do not copy other corporate blogs – look to the Indie Superstars instead.

I have worked with many clients who wanted me to make their corporate blogs more attractive and “sexy.” Corporate content managers often refer to blogs by influential solo bloggers as examples of the direction they want their blog to go.
This is a much more difficult task than you might think.
Even corporate blogs with a long history can learn from the blogging stars who rule web publishing. One, they are authentic bloggers who write as themselves and uniquely represent their brand. This can be a challenge for corporate blogs. A corporate blog can learn valuable lessons from them by being authentic.
If you have been given the task of revamping an old corporate blog or starting one new, don’t look at other corporate blogs as inspiration. Study how the individuals behind the most famous influential blogs have established their audiences and emulate those strategies instead. It will be an excellent gift for your readers, and they will return for more.

1. Continuously improve your writing skills.

I get asked the most frequently, “How can you become a better writer?” For many content producers, their lack of experience and confidence are the most significant obstacles to their goals. I tell them to keep going in the hope that their writing skills will improve.
Since I started blogging professionally, it has been quite some time. I am confident in my abilities, but I still need to improve. I seek out help and advice from experts. Like many other skills, writing is something you can improve on. You can read more material than you might typically (not just blogs, but actual books). Even if you only write a few hundred words a day, it is essential to write every day. Strive for excellence and never settle for mediocrity.
You don’t have to know everything about content. Keep learning, and you will never be satisfied. Strive to push your writing skills to their limit – then go even farther. You will attract more readers if you put in more effort and time to improve your writing skills.

1. 2. Answer Complex Questions With Your Content

We discussed earlier the importance of using specific keywords in your content. You’re probably already targeting simple keywords terms that are relevant for your business and ranking for them. This strategy is worthwhile, but pursuing complex search queries may be more lucrative. You could rank in the Google Featured Snippet or position zero, as Dr. Pete Meyers puts it.
The Google Featured Snippet ranks as the most sought-after real estate on search engine results pages. Your content that answers complex questions by being featured in the Featured Snippet could not only drive tons of traffic to your site but also increase your brand’s subject matter expertise. The Featured Snippet has high user trust. This means that your brand can win big if Google selects your content to answer complex questions.
Do you want to be featured in the Featured Snippet? Read this post on position zero and the value of answering complex questions with your content.

1. 1.Start Content Remarketing

It takes so much effort and time to produce content that a blog post or whitepaper will not be worth your efforts. It’s not just the cost of creating costly content but also the (often inevitable) low return on investment that discourages newcomers from seeing content’s potential value for their businesses. This fallacy can be believed by even more experienced marketers and larger companies. Content remarketing is a proven way to ensure that your content is seen, interacted with, and responded to by more people.
Remarketing can be used to increase the visibility of your content, just as you are using PPC to maximize its impact. You first define your audience for which you wish to remarket content. Next, you tag visitors to your site to allow you to later remarket to them via banner ads on Google Display Network. Hopefully, this will increase brand awareness and engagement with the content you have spent so much effort creating.
Although content remarketing can be extremely powerful, it is still not the norm. Many companies don’t even think about leveraging remarketing to promote their content, so if you want to get ahead of the curve and broaden your content’s reach, check out this exhaustive guide to content remarketing courtesy of Larry Kim.