Content Marketing Course And Certification

What Is Content Marketing?

Content Marketing is the strategic marketing approach that is centered on the development and distribution of relevant, valuable and regular content to draw, attract and retain a clearly-defined audience and eventually to gain very high and profitable customer engagement.

Content Marketing is mostly about creating and disseminating content that interests and draws a targeted audience while encouraging them to take necessary action which is very profitable to a business. 

Content Marketing is known by many titles such as corporate journalism, inbound marketing, branded media, customer publishing, and native advertising, to mention but a few. However, the fundamental idea behind this strategy is the same.

The increase of users on the world wide web, social networking, digital and mobile technologies has changed the relationship between the consumers and businesses. Regular consumers of date don’t purchase a product just by idly viewing its advertisement on a billboard, they research on Google to compare similar products like yours, read the product’s review online by experts, ratings from past customers, and even ask their friends on various social networks, before spending their money on your product.

As a result of the aforementioned, business owners need to rethink their conventional and traditional marketing strategies and channels if they want to gain the trust of their customers and influence their final buying decisions. This is where Content Marketing comes in. It assists businesses to draw potential consumer's attention towards their own products by highlighting and promoting their key features to convince the customer on why he or she should go for their product.

Before you create a Content Marketing Strategy for your business, you will need to first define your goals. What is your aim with your content? Is it to have more subscribers on your blog? Or is it the acquisition of traffic? Or maybe, you simply want to convert certain sales pages of your website, Whatever your goals are, you need to clearly list them out first before you even begin designing the strategy.

Features And Characteristics Of Content Marketing

Some of the Features and Characteristics of Content Marketing Includes:

1. Targeted Audience: As opposed to the traditional means of advertising that may be more centered on promoting content only to new customers, Content Marketing mostly targets your present customers. With Content Marketing, you build a relationship with your customers by sharing information that they are interested in. Potential and new customers can also be brought in with Content Marketing because they are interested in what you are saying.

2. Tell a Story: The content you distribute should be delivered in a nice story-telling manner as opposed to giving a sales pitch. Decide what your content will be judging from your customers’ present interests, you are writing for your audience and the potential audience not for your company.

3. Provide Value: Every piece of content you write must serve to educate, inform and/or entertain your target audience. Remember, content is not ‘Content Marketing’ unless your audience finds it to be interesting and valuable. If your content is relevant and enjoyed by your customers they will repay you by becoming a loyal customer. 

4. Create a Dialogue: Instead of directing your customers and just ‘selling’ your brand,  create a dialogue, Invite your audience to engage in your Content Marketing and duly reply to their comments or questions. 

5. Increase Profits: Content marketing brings more traffic to your sites while establishing a relationship with your audience. With honest content, your readers and customers will feel well informed and will be more likely to trust your brand when making a purchasing decision. 

Advantages Of Content Marketing

1. Reach a targeted audience who may avoid ads – Content marketing helps you reach a target audience who may avoid traditional ads, knowing your audience helps you produce targeted content.

2. Build brand awareness, trust and loyalty – People build an impression based on the content you feed. This means publishing well-meaning and authentic content would portray you as an authority. Build your brand and people would follow. 

3. Increased traffic and conversions – A well thought out content draws your audience to your website, thereby boosting web traffic. Once their attention has been gotten, you can easily persuade them to register or make a purchase. 

4. Support other marketing tactics – Good content is important for the success of many other marketing tactics, such as search engine optimization, social media, and public relations.

5. Reduced Costs – There is no hidden cost, this means you can keep spending at a minimum level.

Benefits Of Content Marketing

1. Content Marketing increases the visibility of your brand.

2. With Content Marketing, you develop a lasting relationship with your audience.

3. It Improves brand awareness and recognition.

4. It builds loyalty and trust, with both your present customers and potential ones.

5. It helps you to build great authority and credibility.

6. It positions your business as an expert in your industry and market field.

7. It generates traffic to your site to improve lead generation.

8. It acts as a means of communication through social shares and comments.

9. It helps your customers move through the purchase decision faster.

10. Content Marketing provides value with no strings attached.

Why Study Content Marketing

1. Develop marketing and life skills needed for fast conversion and general use in any field or organization.

2. Understand customer behavior through the production of quality content targeted to their needs.

3. Low cost of entry, you don’t need a huge capital to begin producing content.

4. Be the boss of your own content - no need to pay for it like ads, and it can be reused by you.

5. Using content marketing strategies like SEO, PPC gives you an edge and sets one apart from marketplace competitors.

6. Enhance your storytelling skills and abilities.

7. Build your Social media presence which can lead to faster conversion rate.

8. Stay abreast of the latest technological innovations in content creation strategies.

9. Higher earning rate for content creators.

10. Job opportunities and career advancement. 

Content Marketing Course Outline

Content Marketing Introduction

Content Marketing - Introduction/Overview

Content Marketing - Target Customer

Content Marketing - Content Creation

Content Marketing - Media Channels

Content Marketing - Editorial Calendar

Content Marketing - Style Guide

Content Marketing - Basic Tools

Content Marketing - Challenges

Content Marketing - Tracking Success

Content Marketing Types & Channels

Content Marketing - Blogs

Content Marketing - Lifecycle Emails

Content Marketing - eNewsletters

Content Marketing - WhitePapers

Content Marketing - Case Studies

Content Marketing - eBooks

Content Marketing - Digital Magazine

Content Marketing - Mobile Apps

Content Marketing - Web Apps

Content Marketing - Podcasts

Content Marketing - Webinars

Content Marketing - Infographics

Content Marketing - Articles

Content Marketing - Press Releases

Content Marketing - Social Media

Content Marketing - Examples

Content Marketing - Web Resources

Content Marketing Video Lectures

Content Marketing Exams and Certification