You know what would be a really impressive gift for anyone in the online business space? A marketing strategy that just “writes itself.” Now that sounds awesome, doesn’t it? No more having to guess at potential posts and emails that might work, just a top-tier strategy that did exactly what you wanted.
Well you can call us Santa (sort of) because we can help you with this one.
Even if you aren’t already working with us, we’ve got some pointers to help you dominate 2022 with your new online approach. And we’re going to show you how to do it using data.
Your content, data, and you
Yes, we said data. As in numbers. Don’t panic because we aren’t about to send you back to math class. What we are going to do is show you what numbers you want to look for to figure out important things about your content strategy, such as which ideas paid off in the past.
The data we are discussing can be referred to as KPIs or Key Performance Indicators. These indicators are the numbers that will help you judge what content ideas and campaigns you want to try using again for your content plan next year and what you want to ditch.
Certain data that you get, such as click-through rates, engagements, and other KPIs are going to give you an idea of how your audience reacted to your content. For example, if you posted about your new album with a killer photoshoot and got a ton of click-throughs to your website, we’d say that’s a positive sign. On the other hand if you posted about said album with a graphic you made in Photoshop and got a couple click-throughs but very little else, it may be time to change your imagery.
As we head into the New Year, let’s discuss how to make those digits work for you.
What KPIs to look for
What KPIs should you pay attention to? There are of course different ones for different aspects of your marketing strategy. To be blunt, there are a lot of these indicators that you could track if you really want to get in depth, but not everyone has the time or the resources to do that. So we will give you the top five to keep your eye on, if you aren’t doing so already.
- Return on Investment. You invested time and money in the photos you used on social media to promote your band, now it is time to look at what kind of return you got. Did you gain more real followers or did more people buy merch? Did some of those followers share your posts to gain you even more followers? Or, if you are a small business, did your time invested in that email campaign to promote your Spooky Season Sale really pay off with increased sales? If you spent time, money–or both–on creating and distributing content, see how well it paid off.
- Conversion Rate. Let’s say each month you put out a new series of posts on Instagram or TikTok to promote your brand with the goal of getting more people to both follow you AND visit your website. How did those campaigns pay off? What percentage of people did what you wanted each month? Which months had the most traction? Figuring out how many people “converted” to followers, leads, or even customers is a great way to figure out what efforts you made were really worth it.
- Website Traffic. This is a highly important one that you 100% should be tracking. But what can it tell you? Looking at when your website traffic increased after certain posts or campaigns can tell you which ones were a good idea. On a more technical level though it can indicate how well your SEO efforts are paying off–which keywords in which blogs may be working better than others, which keywords are giving you a higher ranking on Google, etc.
- Social Media Engagement. Let’s be real, large numbers of followers are great to see buuuuut it doesn’t mean much in the long run. Follower numbers can serve our vanity more than much else, hence why they are considered a “vanity metric.” What you really want to look at is things like clicks, shares, saves, mentions and comments. Are people truly engaging with the content you put out? If so, it means it is grabbing and holding their attention which increases the chances that they will pay you more attention more often and encourage the people around them to do the same. And that really is a good feeling.
- Click-throughs. You want to track this for your blogs, your emails, your social media posts and links on your social pages. Who is clicking through to your website after they see your content? What is encouraging more click throughs and what page gets the most click throughs?
Using data for creating a content strategy
So you know what data you need to hunt down. Once you get it all together you may find yourself saying, “Okay, I have the numbers, but how does this help with my yearly planning?” Here is a quick guide to help you as you start creating a content strategy using data.
Step1. Look at which posts or campaigns did poorly. Make notes of what NOT to do again.
Step 2. Look at what did well. Which posts got the highest rate of engagement and encouraged people to visit your site. What email campaigns got more people to convert to first-time or repeat customers?
Step 3. Determine your overall brand goals for 2022 and use your new information to build a strategy that works well. Meld your goals for next year with tactics that worked from last year. Don’t repeat things exactly, but harness the essential stuff that got attention, interaction, and sold your creation. Remember, you do not have to create every content format every month. Continue testing new formats and stick to a few that give you the best results.
Building a content marketing strategy that blends your goals with what the numbers are telling you can be, well, tough. Why not start out the new year with a new partner that is a pro at melding the numbers and the creative ideas into one killer plan? If you need an extra hand to make your marketing strategy exactly what you need it to be, you can send a message to info@rachaelmattice.com or visit our Contact page.
Written by Brianna Fries, a California-based writer, editor, bookworm, and mother of two. You can discover more of her work at briwritesthings.com.
