5 Content Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

In today’s fast-moving digital age, getting content marketing right is more important than ever. Engaging and delighting your potential customers is crucial to content marketing. After all, digital marketing strategies cost around 62% less than traditional marketing, though it generates nearly three times more leads than traditional techniques. 

Your business should prioritize creating flawless content that addresses the wants and needs of your leads. This way, you will be able to convert leads to customers and, eventually, promoters.

To help you in your quest to curate delightful content for your leads, here are five content marketing mistakes that you should avoid.

1. Pushing Content Without Setting Goals or Standards for Measurement

Measurement and goal setting are key to gauging the success of your marketing.

A recent study conducted by the Content Marketing Institute found that 49% of content marketers believed measuring content effectiveness to be a challenge. 

Understanding that measurement is a top priority doesn’t seem to be a problem, according to a Bright Funnel infographic. A whopping 91% of marketers agree that it is a priority, but 40% say that their measurement strategies need improvement. What’s more: only 13% of marketers rank their measurement as excellent.

Proper measurement starts with setting goals for your marketing plan. Then, you can not only track measurement to assess success, but you can also use whether or not you achieved your goals to gauge your success. 

2. Posting Content and Never Engaging With It Again

The content you post on your blog or website can always be used again, especially when you’re distributing content about a similar topic. 

That’s why internal linking is important—it helps to optimize your website and can lower your bounce rate by keeping people clicking around on your website for a little bit longer.

The average bounce rate for blogs is around 77%. Internal links have the potential to lower that to a percentage as low as 52%.

While specific topics may become irrelevant, general themes can always be revisited. It’s always wise to look through past blog posts to find content that can be reworked or content that can be linked to a current piece you’re creating. 

3. Distributing Content Without Thinking About Your Audience 

It’s important to connect your content to your audience. You want to use your content as a means to move your customers through the buyer’s journey. Content should be targeted towards a distinctly defined primary audience at a specific stage of their journey. 

If your content isn’t directed at anyone, it’s less likely to get picked up. People won’t engage with something that doesn’t speak to them.

In fact, 61% of consumers are more likely to purchase a product or service from a company if that company is producing custom content.

Making content specific isn’t something you should skimp on. The most effective B2B marketers spend around 39% of their budget on content marketing.

4. Only Proofreading Once

From sending an email to a colleague to distributing an email blast to hundreds of potential customers, proofreading is essential. Word processors won’t catch every single error you make, and they also won’t always catch grammar errors, like using “their” instead of “they’re.”

Look at it, hand it to someone else, have that person hand it to another person and then revisit it a final time.

Having two or three pairs of eyes on every single piece of content you create is crucial. Otherwise, one typo can turn a potential customer into someone who won’t ever consider your business again.

An estimated 50% of potential sales can be lost by a typo in content. While they may seem harmless, typos can make you look unprofessional and can damage your reputation as an organization.

5. Ignoring Distribution

Engagement doesn’t just come with clicking the “post” button on a blog or the “send” button on an email. Encourage people to engage with your content by promoting it on social media and by optimizing your website.  

For example, 94% of B2B companies use LinkedIn for content distribution. B2B companies are going where their audience is and their audience is clearly on LinkedIn.

Think about the channels you use to distribute your content marketing. You should be posting somewhere you know your target audience will see it and in a place where it can be easily shared.

The Takeaway

Content marketing is exponentially better for your company than traditional marketing. You can generate more leads and customers with significantly less money. However, it’s important to avoid common content marketing mistakes while you curate your content. 

You should never:

• Push content without a means to measure its success
• Create content and never engage with it again
• Create content without thinking about your audience
• Only proofread content once
• Ignore distribution

Keep these mistakes in mind, and avoid them at all costs. Content marketing plays a crucial role in the success of your company. These mistakes can make or break the way a potential or current customer sees you, so take all of them seriously.