How content marketing increased our website traffic by more than 900%
As we started down our content marketing journey, our website was pretty basic. We had been focused on providing examples of our work, and simple explanations of services and capabilities.
It became clear that we needed a strategy to get our website found. We wanted to be in the right place at the right time, when prospects were looking for solutions.
I have to admit, I was a bit skeptical when we first started exploring the idea of content marketing as a vehicle to drive website traffic. With roots strongly planted in response-oriented marketing, I wondered how something as soft as content could possibly drive action.
We quickly found that inbound marketing could provide us with a significantly improved ability to measure traffic, leads and conversions. All metrics that felt familiar. Here is the approach that infused response and action to transform our website into a lead generation machine.
1. Goal setting.
Setting a focus up front is a key to success in most marketing communication programs. An essential step is to determine what the primary goal for content marketing is, and therefore where efforts should be focused. Content marketing can be an effective lead generation technique and has the ability to ensure a company can get found when prospects are in the right mind-set. We set a number of goals for the program initially:
• Generate web traffic (objective was to increase 3-fold)
• Convert web visitors to leads (objective was to increase 3- to 4-fold per month)
• Build a pipeline of leads for nurturing (objective was to increase 3- to 4-fold per month)
• Move unqualified leads to a sales-ready state (objective was 5% conversion of leads)
• Gather valuable information for lead nurturing as well as marketing and sales follow-up
• Provide a vehicle to package thought leadership content that can be leveraged for presentations, client education and other purposes
2. Leveraging keyword analytics to shape the content strategy.
Analytics grounded the strategy and definitely built depth into the content marketing strategy. We didn’t just brainstorm a bunch of topics we wanted to write about, or only leverage existing content. The process began by thinking through what problems or solutions a prospect might search for via the web.
The next step was analyzing current search behavior to determine users’ interests, and then building a keyword tree. The keyword tree identified direct and indirect keywords that would help generate traffic. In addition, long-tail keywords were utilized. Long-tail keywords tend to be phrases that are more descriptive. Although long-tail keywords have a lower search volume, they tend to be easier to rank against and bring in the most relevant traffic. An example of a long-tail keyword we adopted is “successful email marketing campaigns” versus “email marketing.”
Potential keywords were then inputted into a keyword analytics tool. Factors in finalizing the keyword and content strategy included: difficulty to rank against keywords, search volume and accessibility of content development for those keywords. Grounding the content strategy in analytics ensures a strategically sound approach.
3. Developing content.
Content is critical to capturing people’s attention, holding their attention and successfully prompting them to take a desired action. The focus should be on presenting meaningful content that will generate engagement with users.
Most content marketing strategies have blogs as the hub. Our strategy followed this path, with the blog serving as the primary content delivery vehicle. Our runway from “a go-decision to launch” was less than 45 days. We quickly realized, however, that we needed to enhance the core content on our website, in addition to launching our blog. Our site map grew significantly during the launch period, to ensure all web pages were optimized.
As the blog launched, it became clear which topics were getting the most traction. Initial analysis helped shape ongoing content development. Analyzing what content was getting traction from a traffic standpoint helped guide additional content development. Content that served as a natural extension was typically delivered in the form of an ebook or white paper. We also expanded into new delivery methods such as infographics.
4. Infusing calls-to-action within content.
Rather than leaving each article with a strong conclusion and “thanks for reading,” a call-to-action was incorporated that led the reader to other relevant information. The key was to ensure the call-to-action was reader-centric. The call-to-action provided a benefit to the reader, and a mechanism to learn more about the topic, with a drive to an ebook or other related blog articles. This helps transform a one-way content marketing strategy into a two-way dialogue.
5. Utilizing lead forms to capture information.
Leveraging strong calls-to-action and lead forms within landing pages is the key to transforming web traffic into a lead generation technique. Ebooks, white papers and other content serve as enticement to convert traffic to leads. It’s important to give reasons for prospects to provide information.
It’s also critical to optimize each landing page to increase the likelihood of converting. The first rule of thumb is provide solid information and compelling landing page copy to ensure that leads complete forms. Each landing page followed best practices and was optimized to increase conversions.
6. It’s not exactly “build it and they will come.”
The program was supported with a social media and search engine marketing budget. We increased our social media presence to directly support the thought leadership efforts. We were fortunate that we had a modest LinkedIn following. An editorial calendar was put in place that integrated daily social media postings as new content launched. Employee sharing was central to the social media efforts in gaining traction.
Additionally, an SEM program was put in place to feature the ebooks and drive traffic to the lead pages. The combination of social media and search engine marketing were essential to helping improve natural search rankings.
7. Applying behavior to deliver relevant and personalized lead nurturing communications.
Once users engaged, behavior was leveraged to develop targeted, relevant communications. Email is one of the most effective channels to marry inbound with outbound marketing. We developed an entire trigger email series that applied behavioral information to personalize outbound and follow-up communications to take the entire customer experience to a more actionable level.
8. Utilizing a centralized database for constant integration.
Creating a unified database is essential to supporting inbound and outbound marketing efforts. This includes aggregating high-level contact information as well as marrying engagement with behavior. In an optimal world, we would capture all promotional history, including social post content and other interactions with each contact. This information can help ensure necessary tracking to identify solid recommendations for driving action across the customer experience. We are now able to track engagements across multiple channels so we can continue to deliver relevant and personalized communications.
9. Measurement and continuous improvement.
One of the golden rules for ensuring program success in most marketing efforts is to determine metrics up front. We did set these objectives up front, which provided ample opportunity for celebration as we hit milestones along the way.
Analyzing the high-level macro results of the inbound marketing programs provided a platform of real-time learnings and feedback that will shape other communications tactics.
On a micro level, the focus was on leveraging behavior to determine the value of engagement against specific groups. This helped determine how to best enhance content going forward to generate leads that have positive business impacts, and analyze content that drives engagement, social sharing, comments and reviews, and information downloads.
So did it produce results?
It turns out that content marketing can work to generate web traffic. Our initial inbound marketing program has yielded remarkable results:
• Doubled the number of pages on the website within 90 days
• Increased inbound visits to the website by more than 900%, versus a baseline from the month prior to initiating the program to 90 days later
• Generated 50 times more inbound leads than the prior period
• Increased the number of inbound links 8-fold in 90 days and 25-fold in 120 days