Multi-Channel Content Marketing Strategy & Implementation: A How-To Guide
You know content marketing can help your business marketing efforts, but you feel stuck and don’t know where to begin.
More eyeballs on your content means more opportunity for conversions and sales.
Thankfully, there are simple ways you can use content marketing to double or even triple your website traffic and sales.
The question is how?
The answer is by using multi-channel content marketing.
In this guide, we share a step-by-step process on creating a multi-channel
content marketing campaign that can connect your business with your audience across different platforms.
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Contents
- Why Use a Multi-Channel Marketing Approach For Content?
- Step 1: Understand Your Buyer’s Preferred Channels
- Step 2: Figure Out What Type Of Content Your Ideal Client Wants
- Step 3: Map Out Your Strategy And Implementation
- Step 4: Repurpose Content Whenever Possible
- Multi-Channel Campaign Examples For Content
Why Use a Multi-Channel Marketing Approach For Content?
Did you know that 72% of consumers prefer to connect with brands through multiple channels before making a purchase?
This means that the majority of customers research a brand across two or more channels before deciding to spend money. The process might look something like:
- Do a Google search
- Visit your business website
- Look for your business page on Facebook
- Search for additional content on other channels
- Decide to buy
Multi-channel content marketing helps create brand loyalty, provides valuable information to consumers, and creates a desire in consumers to purchase products from your company in the future.
This is where having a multi-channel marketing approach for content is essential.
If consumers do not see you on these other channels, they’re likely to see your competitors.
Using a multi-channel marketing approach allows you to create one piece of content and then repurpose that piece of content so you can share through multiple channels to show up where your customers are.
Why A Multi-Channel Marketing Strategy For Content Works:
Content — especially informational, relevant, and helpful content — helps you to engage your target audience.
It resonates with them because your content shows them how you can solve their problem.
Multi-channel and integrated digital marketing helps your business get in front of a larger audience and gives you a chance to generate more leads — and eventually more sales.
A Multi-Channel Strategy Allows You To Easily Repurpose Content Across Multiple Channels
Creating new and fresh content is important for the search engines and it’s important for the customers that you’re trying to reach. One way to freshen content without having to constantly create new content from scratch is to repurpose the content you already have.
Fortunately, there are several ways you can turn one piece of existing content into different forms on content without having to go back to the drawing board.
For example, you can take one long blog post and turn it into multiple forms of content:
- Break up one long post into several shorter posts
- Pull tips from the article to share one tip at a time on social media
- Create a video
- Read the blog post (without sounding like you’re reading it) to create an audio file, such as a Podcast
- String several short blog posts together to create a long blog post
- Combine multiple blog posts to create an eBook
- Use a program like Canva to create visuals of quotes or tips from the article that you can share on social media
- Create a pin for Pinterest
Each channel has a different delivery method. For example:
- A blog post typically provides details in writing
- Video provides an audio visual component the product/service where you can show and tell what the product or service can do for them
- Podcasts allow your customer to learn about your business on the go
A Multi-Channel Content Marketing Strategy Saves You Time
A multi-channel approach to content strategy saves you from constantly creating new content from scratch.
You can turn one piece of content into several several pieces of content. Write a blog post and turn it into several different infographics, podcasts, videos, etc.
Let’s talk about Howard. Howard is probably just like you…
Howard is the owner of a dog toy store for dogs that like to chew — chew a lot.
After he grabs his cup of coffee, he heads to his desk and ponders over what he should share with his “readers” for the day.
The thing is…
Howard has no direction. He doesn’t know:
- How his ideal client likes to digest content
- His ideal client’s burning desires and pain points
Basically, Howard is (pardon our French) making shit up as he goes.
So, after 3 hours of work and 2 big cups of coffee, Howard has something to show for it:
A shitty blog post that doesn’t connect with the reader and isn’t optimized for SEO.
Nobody is going to read it and nobody cares.
Why?
Well, Howard’s audience LOVES spending time watching video content of fluffy dogs and engaging on social media (aka – looking at puppy pictures).
Instead of connecting with them on these different platforms, Howard simply wrote a blog post.
This is his daily routine. It isn’t bringing potential customers to his business And it certainly isn’t bringing him sales.
Howard finally has a realization. He’s wasting a lot of time and money.
In order to maximize Howard’s content marketing strategy, he needs to create a multi-channel approach that connects with his audience where they like to spend their time.
Once Content Is Created, It Can Be Repurposed And Distributed In Multiple Ways
Creating new and fresh content is important. However, repurposing content across multi-channels saves you time and breathes new life into old content.
- Blog post on your blog
- Newsletter blast to your email list
- Break content into multiple social media posts and post on YouTube
- Video to post on YouTube and embed in blog posts
- Infographics to share on social media posts
- Email your list
- Ads on Facebook, Google, etc.
- Record yourself reading your blog post on a podcast
- Combine several blog posts together to create an Ebook
You Are Showing Up Where Your Audience Is
Once you know where your customer is, implementing a multi-channel marketing strategy helps you stay fresh in their minds by getting in front of them where they are hanging out anyway.
- The format of your content matches the platform where your ideal customer is
- The format is different on each platform
Credibility
When you consistently deliver high-quality and informative content, you become a go-to source of information for your ideal customers.
It makes customers want more information, stories, videos, memes, etc., from you.
It builds a relationship with you and your business so they want to buy from you.
The Buyer’s Journey Is Just That… A Journey
Just because someone doesn’t buy today, doesn’t mean they never will.
Remember, studies show that customers want to connect with your company through multiple channels before spending their money on your product or service.
Let’s take a look at a customer’s buying journey.
Stephanie has a tiny Maltese named Carlos. Carlos LOVES his squeaky toys.
Stephanie buys three new squeaky toys a week because Carlos loves them, and she loves making him happy.
As Stephanie waits in a long line at the grocery store, she does a quick Google search for dog toys for dogs that like to chew — chew a lot.
She is at the beginning of her buyer’s journey:
- Awareness
- Consideration
- Decision
Before she can do in-depth research, it’s her turn to check out.
When she walks into her house, Carlos greets her with the squeaker from his latest toy in his mouth and the cotton from the inside of the toy is spread all over the floor.
After putting away her groceries and cleaning up the cotton, Stephanie is ready to resume her dog toy search, but she has forgotten the website she found while standing in line at the grocery store.
If Howard had a pixel on his site for social media, like Instagram and Facebook, where it tracks who found his site or viewed his content on social media, he could retarget Stephanie using social media ads about his business — about his dog toys for dogs that like to chew — chew a lot.
It Maximizes Brand Awareness
The more times you get in front of your potential buyer, the better.
By sharing content across multiple channels to target them, you can do it.
Brand awareness is about more than customers recognizing your logo. It’s about them recognizing your brand and what it represents.
It’s important to share information about your brand to set you apart from your competition.
The more times your potential buyer sees your brand, the more aware they become. This increases the chance they want to learn more about you and what you have to offer.
Step 1: Understand Your Buyer’s Preferred Channels
Most businesses do it backwards. They think, “What channels should we use for our marketing?”
Instead of asking, “What channels are our ideal customers using?”
Before you can understand the channels your ideal customers prefer, you have to know who your ideal customer is.
Who is your product or service for?
You need to know everything about your ideal customer including:
- Age
- Gender
- Income
- Education
- Occupation
- Interests
Once you know who your buyer is, you can build a buyer persona. Building a buyer persona allows you to attach a name, a face, and a lifestyle to “create” an actual person so you can understand exactly who you are trying to sell your product or service.
Once you build your buyer persona and know who your potential customers are, you can look at real data to see where these buyers are hanging out so that you can get your content on these channels.
Business Insider did some research that shows who is using social media and which channels they are using, so you can find out which social networks your people are using so you can use it too.
Narrow It Down to the Top 3 Channels
You may think you need to show up on all channels. That’s not the case and may result in a lot of lost time, money, and effort.
Focus on data to give you information on where your buyers are, and then decide the best channels for you.
- Website
- Amazon
- Snapchat
- Youtube
- Podcast
- And many more
According to Investopedia, as of 2019, internet users spent approximately 43 minutes per day on Facebook, 28 minutes on Snapchat, and 27 minutes on Instagram.
Step 2: Figure Out What Type Of Content Your Ideal Client Wants
Are your people looking for cute dogs on social media?
Video content that shows them how to use your product?
Are they looking for answers to their questions on Google?
If you find yourself scratching your head trying to figure out the type of content to share, try one or two of these:
- Ask your customers what they want or need, using your website or a social media poll (such as Facebook)
- Spy on your competition to see what they are doing
- Search Quora or Answer The Public to see what others who have an interest in your niche want to know
- Check your analytics – what are people viewing and engaging with right now?
You can view your website and social media analytics. These analytics can give you an idea of the type of content that your ideal customer likes to see.
The goal is to connect with your ideal customer by addressing their needs and keep them coming back for more.
Step 3: Map Out Your Strategy And Implementation
Once you know who your ideal customer is, you’re ready to create and implement a multi-channel content strategy.
Content strategy differs from business to business. There are many ways to map out your strategy. You might prefer pen to paper, PowerPoint, or an online source. Either way, mapping out your strategy is important.
Not having a content strategy is like starting a business without a business plan.
You’ve already figured out who your content is for.
Now let’s:
- Focus on your message
- Brainstorm content ideas
- Set Goals
- Decide on a content management system
- Establish a system for analyzing stats/data
Let’s take a look at a strategy for Howard to get his next piece of content published and repurposed across multiple channels.
Howard’s strategy was to:
- Publish a blog post to his site every Monday
- Republish the blog post across his social media channels
- Publish infographics to social media on Tuesday and Friday
- Schedule a Youtube video on to post on Wednesday
- Record a podcast episode to publish on Thursday
- Send a newsletter to subscribers and schedule a blog post to be reshared on social media every fourth Saturday of the month
- Share products along with content throughout the week on each of his social media marketing channels
Monday morning Howard finishes his workout, showers, grabs his cup of coffee, and heads into his home office.
He glances at his clock.
8:00 a.m.
He sets his timer to go off at noon for lunch.
He pulls out his content calendar he worked on over the weekend.
His focus this month is about best chew toys for small dogs.
This time, instead of writing a shitty blog post that nobody cares about…
Howard films a couple of REALLY cute videos of small dogs chewing on your average toy.
He shows them destroying these toys in a matter of minutes.
Then, Howard turns these videos into 2 different SEO-optimized pieces of content, 2 different YouTube videos, and 6 different social media videos that he can use over the next two weeks.
In half a day, he creates enough content for the next two weeks.
Create a piece of content for SEO and organic traffic → Create an infographic based on this piece of content and post to all social channels → Create a video based on the content and then post on YouTube.
Step 4: Repurpose Content Whenever Possible
Content can be and should be repurposed when possible.
You can use the same content numerous times but give it a spin so that it looks like fresh, new content because it’s in a different format.
This is why multi-channel content is so powerful.
You can film a 5-10 minute video about ‘why small dogs are better than big dogs’. And with that, you can…
- Create a couple of infographics
- Break up the video into five shorter videos for social media
- Create three SEO-optimized blog posts
- Use the video content for paid ads on Facebook
- And more
Instead of stopping here, you can repurpose this content.
Now let’s look at the multiple ways to use your awesome piece of content to continue working for you.
Ways To Repurpose Content
Here are a few ways to repurpose content:
- Create infographics highlighting key points. Creating a short, informative graphic about your article is a great way to build and continue brand awareness while repurposing content.
You can do this by signing up for a free Canva account. Use one of their templates to design eye-catching infographics.
- Create a video to share on Youtube. You can demonstrate a product, show your personality, do a how-to video, etc. A plus about creating Youtube videos is you can share it on your social media channels and embed it in a blog post.
- Create a podcast. Record yourself or hire someone to read your blog posts and record them as a podcast.
- Newsletters. Share your content in a weekly newsletter.
- Ebooks. Use a collection of blog posts and turn them into an eBook.
- Submit content to social bookmarking sites. Publish your content to your website first. By including a timeline strategy, you can submit your content to sites such as Medium, Scoop It, and more.
Repurposing content allows you to spread your content across multiple channels and widens your reach. Think through ways that you can maximize exposure and brand awareness.
Multi-Channel Campaign Examples For Content:
There are many great examples of multi-channel campaigns.
Do you remember the Starbucks Frappuccino Happy Hour campaign?
Starbucks updated their website and released a multi-channel campaign creating interest in the Unicorn Frappuccino. Starbucks also used an in-app message to encourage customers to engage and share their photos enjoying the drink.
https://youtu.be/VaIzv8cCrGM Not sure how to format the link here in docs to show video. Video is of the barista talking about the number of frappuccinos made and being over the unicorn craze.
Their goal was to reach their ideal customer across multiple platforms and have those customers become brand ambassadors to spread the buzz about the new Unicorn Frappuccino.
And it worked.
People shared photos of the pink drink across social media and created Youtube videos talking about the new drink.
Multi-Channel Content Marketing Example #1:
Bed Bath & Beyond uses social media marketing to remain in front of their audience after folks visit their website. They also use email marketing by repurposing content from their webpage to create email campaigns and promotions.
Multi-Channel Content Marketing Example #2:
Many companies use email as a form of multi-channel marketing. This channel is great to notify customers about sales, new items, new services, grand openings, and more.
The Exchange is a good example of a company using email marketing. Their email marketing campaigns give a brief glimpse of upcoming sales and new items. It’s the right amount of information to get a customer’s attention to redirect them to the website or for the customer to head to their local Exchange to shop.
They then repurpose content from the email campaigns into individual social media posts, highlighting them as individual deals and sales. They use both videos and photos to market to buyers across their marketing channels.
