Ideally, your business website is a guidebook for customers, leading them through the sales funnel and providing education and insight at each step of their journey. For this to happen, of course, you need more than just a website that looks good or ranks well on Google. You need a website that’s not only visible, but actually substantive—providing informative content to the consumer.

And it’s not just the website that matters: Content is also the fuel for your blog, your social media channels, even your video advertising. Content, when done right, establishes your brand as authoritative; it proves your thought leadership; and, most importantly, it educates your customers—empowering them to trust your brand and to do business with you confidently.

What’s the Point of Content?

To accomplish these diverse goals, it’s important to define good content—what it is, but also what it isn’t. Very rarely is good content overtly salesy or promotional. That’s more the province of spam—something that doesn’t offer any immediate value to the user.

Good, compelling online content should certainly reflect positively on your brand, and may well be a kind of advertising—but rather than bending over backwards to promote, good online content goes out of its way to educate. It addresses real consumer questions or problems. It explains what your product is used for or how it can be most impactful.

In a word, good content provides value to the people reading it. This means writing for human readers, not just search bots; and it means having a good indication of who your target customers are and what pain points they’re looking to address, both through your content and ultimately through your products.

A Few Points About Content Creation

As you seek to develop this kind of content on your business’ behalf, keep a few pointers in mind:

• Writing content is not the kind of business activity that leads to overnight results or immediate ROI. It enhances the perception of your brand and educates your customers over the long haul, but it’s important to be patient and have the right expectations.
• Great content can be a tool for outreach, serving as a kind of magnet that draws in new leads. For this to be meaningful, though, you have to nurture and assist your content with relevant follow-up, including emails, newsletters, and well-managed social media accounts.
• Your goal, above all, should be to provide potential customers with avenues to learn more about your business, without interacting with you directly—so, effectively completing the first few phases of the sales process.

But What About Search Engine Optimization?

Of course, the best content in the world won’t mean anything if people can’t find it—which makes it imperative to bring new readers to your website, your blog, and your social media accounts. In other words, search engine optimization is the necessary enhancement for all effective content marketing.

But here’s the good news: While SEO is a complex endeavor with a lot of moving parts, developing great content is 95 percent of the process. Search engines promote content that delivers a rich user experience—that is, content that provides readers with value. So if you write content that addresses the questions and needs of your customers, in a non-gimmicky way, you’re well on your way to solid SEO.

Of course there are other marketing concerns, social media management and pay-per-click ads being two examples—but killer content is at the heart of any successful outreach attempt.

Check out the other posts in our Bringing in More Business series:

POST 1 – Digital Outreach Starts with Website Building
POST 2 – Why Content is Still King 
POST 3 – Why Your Website Needs Marketing
POST 4 – Why Your Business Needs to Get Social
POST 5 – Why Website Marketing is Integrative