It’s that time of year again. While everyone is making personal New Year resolutions to become better people, companies are beginning to roll out strategies to become better communicators.
In 2015, the importance placed on content marketing in communications strategies increased exponentially. Owned media became a large playing field for even the smallest companies, one where a blog post could get more views and a higher ROI than a well-pitched story in a regional publication.
MediaMiser wants to help communications professionals achieve their goal of becoming better communicators this year, so we’re suggesting five content marketing resolutions that communications professionals can make in 2016:
1. “I will try something new”
Whether it’s targeting a new audience, creating a new tone for your brand, or trying your hand at a new type of content (ie: infographics)—try something different, be impulsive, punch above your weight. Not only will this expand your mind creatively and strategically, but it will also give you a better understanding of what works and what doesn’t.
Make this the year of outside-the-box thinking and see how it benefits your business.
2. “I will keep track of all my ideas”
Every idea has the potential to be a good one or transformed into a great one if time and effort is put into it. Keep a spreadsheet of all your content ideas; Some may not be relevant at the moment, but as you progress through the year you might find a use for them. These ideas are also always beneficial for blog fodder if your content calendar is looking a little dry.
Need a little nudge to get the ball rolling? Keep track of questions about your industry that interest you, or articles you’ve read that are interesting. Build off of these, and you’ll have a great idea bank to reference whenever you need it.
3. “I will find a new purpose for older content”
Take a moment to review your website’s analytics in Google Analytics. Do you see a trend? Do you have older content that is still being visited and engaged with?
There’s great opportunity in repurposing this content and re-releasing it to your target demographic. Have an old blog post that still gets steady traffic? Create a Slideshare from it. Have a whitepaper that continues to be downloaded on a regular basis? Turn it into an audio whitepaper or podcast. Repurposing content alleviates the pressure to continuously create new content, and allows you to present your target audience with content you know is relevant to them and that they’ll be interested in.
4. “I will go back and optimize existing content”
A new year brings new ways to optimize your content. Have you added alt tags to all of your images and links? Does your content rank well on the Flesch Reading Ease test? Are you properly using header tags? Review all of your released content and see if there are ways that you can increase their SEO value.
Not only will this boost the organic traffic to your website, but it will also allow you to see if there is any older content gaining more traffic. This will help you identify more topics for blog fodder, or allow you to repurpose more content.
5. “I will learn to play nicely with others”
Sometimes it’s a little too easy to focus solely on your business and your content. In 2016, make sure to build relationships with other companies, share their content, help spread their messaging. By doing so, you’ll be creating valuable partnerships, ones that you can use to leverage your own content.
Have your strategic partners write a guest blog, and see how quickly you’ll be asked to write a blog in return. Soon, they’ll be sharing your content and becoming an influencer for your business.
