Preparing for The Content Marketing Marathon

What Is The Content Marketing Marathon?

It is 2022, and almost every brand and business engages in at least some form of content marketing. And that can be a problem! With everyone doing it, companies need to work hard. They devote considerable resources to creating fresh, relevant content on an ongoing basis. We call it the content marketing marathon.

Like athletes who train and prepare for the big race, businesses need to be ready for the content marketing marathon for your campaign to provide the results you need.

Google requires creating a ‘satisfactory amount of content‘ for your page to rank. The satisfactory part will depend on your intended target audience and the message you want to convey.

You do have some control over the frequency, however. As long as you publish engaging, relevant content regularly, your content marketing campaign is bound to succeed.

7 Steps to Prepare for The Content Marketing Marathon

We look at running the content marketing marathon the same way an athlete prepares for a race. You need to take steps before, during, and after the race to make your content marketing strategy the best.

Step 1 – Set Your Goals

Most marathon runners have a coach and a strategy, a reason for running, a plan, and metrics for success. 43% of all companies now have a content executive and have established their strategy. It would help if you did the same.

Step 2 – Training

Runners spend months training for their event; you must do the same for the content marketing marathon. Pick your topic, listen to your customer’s needs, and establish an editorial calendar. Even better, cross-train with different content formats and lengths. If you are unsure what your audience expects, why not quiz them on SurveyMonkey?

Step 3 – Your Fans

Supporters are what keep marathon runners going. Your supporters are your internal and external content marketing teams. Hire managers and writers, crowdsource internally, and tap into the power of freelancers and other external resources.

Step 4 – The Right Tools

Runners use sneakers and stopwatches to help them cross the finish line. 56% of marketers use content marketing-specific technology, such as a CMS like WordPress, a curation tool like Storybase, and marketing automation tools like SharpSpring.

Step 5 – Pace Yourself

Mike, the most out of each mile you run in the content marketing marathon. In other words, get the most mileage out of a great piece of content before moving on to the following article. Check out this Content Marketing Pyramid for more info on content reuse and repurposing.

Step 6 – Stay Hydrated

Keep a consistent flow of content by using curation. Just like water fuels marathon runners, fresh content creation supports your content creation strategy. Our recommendation is a mix of 65% created, 25% curated, and 10% syndicated content.

Step 7 – Encourage Other Runners

Being a team player is a big part of the content marketing marathon. When you help out others around you, everyone wins. When curating content, stick to ethical best practices by annotating with your insights and giving proper attribution to third-party sources.

Running The Content Marketing Marathon Yourself

OK, now that you know these content marketing facts, it is time to prepare for them. Much of what we outlined above should be familiar to most content marketers.

The big thing you need to understand is that content marketing takes time. It is a marathon race instead of a quick sprint. For most small to mid-size businesses, that is the biggest obstacle. If you fall into that category, you most likely will need some outside resources:

• A content strategist can help you create and document your content marketing strategy and determine your target audience.
• A copywriter or editor can help you define your content strategy and develop an editorial calendar.
• A graphic designer or agency can help you create visual content like infographics.
• A professional photographer or studio can provide images of your location, staff, or products for your e-commerce site.

You may want to do some of this in-house if you are a more significant business with more resources. You likely already have a sales and marketing person or team, so start there. You will only need occasional outside help if you can develop your content marketing strategy and create at least some of the content in-house.

In that case, you may want to establish a relationship with a temp agency specializing in creative and marketing services, such as Creative Circle, Filter Digital, or VitaminT.

Are You Running the Content Marketing Marathon?

Do you have anything to add to our content marketing marathon? Feel free to add your comments below so our audience can benefit and grab our feed so you don’t miss our next post! And feel free to share our content marketing marathon tips with your audience!

Thank you! We appreciate your help in ending bad business websites, one pixel at a time!

By Gregor Saita
Co-Founder / CXO
@gregorsaita