SOUTH FLORIDA – We ran into JD Craigman, the Creative Director & Owner of Intravate Consultants who shared with South Florida Caribbean News that your content marketing strategy should never look the same from one year to the next.
According to Craigman, you should avoid wasting time and money on outdated strategies, and you need to know what strategies are working for generating leads and conversions with content.
He also shared that your performance metrics alone aren’t enough to inform your content marketing strategy and that will need to look at your toughest competitors and see how their strategy stacks up against yours and what they’re doing differently.
JD Craigman was kind enough to provide us with five types of content that are driving the most results for 2020.
5 Types of Content You Need in Your 2020 Content Marketing Strategy
- Short How-To or Q&A Videos
Year after year, marketing research studies continue to show that video outperforms any other type of content, which is why you can’t skip it in your 2020 strategy.
Video content is king with 2020.
Shorter videos get more clicks from fresh new leads looking for answers to questions or step-by-step instruction.
Create three- to five-minute video clips that provide a specific answer your target customers are asking.
Use keyword research and insights from your content marketing performance metrics to inform video topics. Create these videos in bulk, since quantity matters for video marketing. Your videos don’t have to be perfect, and they’ll naturally improve over time. However, your videos should make you look like a qualified expert on your subject.
You don’t have to put your face in front of a camera lens if it feels awkward to you. There are plenty of ways to implement a video marketing strategy. You could outsource an explainer video to a freelancer or record a conversation with a business associate who can prompt you with questions that cover your talking points.
Plus, if you already have evergreen blog posts in your arsenal, you can repurpose them for video content.
- Long-form Blog Posts
In today’s crowded digital environment, content quantity matters as much as quality. Not only should you care about the number of blog posts you publish and how frequently, but also the length of each post in terms of the word count.
Long-form blog posts rank higher on search engines, given the quality of the content is good. Aim for 2,000- and 3,000-word posts that serve as in-depth guides and evergreen resources that benefit your target client. Use SEO keyword research to inform your blog post topics.
Search engines also rank your domain higher if you consistently update your blog with new posts. Be sure to have a strategy in place for publishing long-form blog posts on a regular basis.
- Infographics
Infographics are great for generating leads because they can be posted on virtually any online platform, including social media platforms and your blog. They make your brand look like an industry leader on social media and they get tons of shares.
You can also incorporate infographics into your blog posts as a way of breaking up long text with eye-catching visuals.
Write your own text for your infographics or outsource them to a freelance infographics writer, who can do the research and write the copy. Then, you send the text to a graphic designer or use a tool that helps you generate infographics using templates.
Try to incorporate as many as two or three new infographics into your content strategy each month.
- Email Content
Landing yourself in someone’s email inbox on a regular basis makes you an authority and allows you to keep all your best leads close.
That said, you still need to optimize your email marketing content for conversions. Higher conversions start with crafting compelling subject headlines that get your leads to open your emails. Converting them to take any action from opening your email requires captivating content with a strong call-to-action (CTA).
Email content shouldn’t be limited to a written note or a sentence with a link at the end.
Embrace a casual, relatable tone and write original content in your email drip campaigns. Incorporate pictures, GIFs and videos into email content, the way you would embed graphics or videos in a blog post to break up text and keep your audience engaged.
Include no more than one CTA per email, whether it’s to watch your YouTube video, listen to the new podcast you started or learn more about an offer on a sales page.
- Free E-Course or E-Book
Pre-internet marketers knew the value of leveraging freebies to cultivate brand awareness and nurture new leads. It works in online marketing all the same, but the freebies you’re giving are digital rather than physical.
Put out free downloadable or streamable information on something your customer needs help with. It should be small and succinct, but high in quality. It could be an ebook or a short series of video clips providing information your target customer can put into action.
Create a search engine optimized landing page where you can direct people to a landing page where they can learn more about your free offer and enter their email address to access it. Inform people they’ll be signed up for your e-newsletter, you won’t spam them and they can unsubscribe at any time.
Promote your freebie in your blog posts and on your other content channels. Reach out to influencers in your industry, including bloggers, podcasters, YouTubers and social media influencers, who can share your free resource with their audience.
Leveraging Content to Generate Business Leads
In today’s competitive online environment, quantity matters as much as quality. The best part about these five different types of content is that you can start with one type of content, such as blog posts or whichever comes most naturally for you.
Then, repurpose your blog posts into the four other types of content and distribute them on their respective channels.
The most important part above all, however, is doing your research on the specific customers you’re targeting so that the content you make attracts and speaks to them.
JD Craigman – Creative Director & Owner of Intravate Consultants
Intravate Consultants is an award-winning marketing firm, based in Miami, FL.
JD is a former Division I student-athlete having played both football and basketball. His collegiate career began at Mendocino College, but after two years, he moved on to the University of Kentucky (UK).
While at UK, JD became a member of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. where he served as Rho Lambda Chapter President. He proudly earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Sociology in 2008.
After graduating, JD found himself in marketing, and with the birth of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, digital marketing was the “new thing,” and he was determined to master it.
JD launched his first small business in 2010 and he was able to utilize everything learned in the digital marketing space to become successful.
As JD started networking with local business owners and operators, he discovered that a significant pain point for them was marketing. Shortly after that, he launched Intravate Consultants, LLC.
Their niche is to develop comprehensive and smart digital marketing campaigns that allow small business owners to focus on running the business.
JD Craigman hosts a seminar series, Get Legit, for those small business looking to fine-tune their brands through logo design, digital marketing, social media, and more.
In 2019, Intravate Consultants won a Reed Award, the most exacting award in political campaigns, grassroots, and advocacy, for website design in a mayoral race.
Intravate Consultants was nominated again in 2020 for Best Website for State Legislative Campaign.
When JD is not at the office, he is volunteering his time with multiple nonprofits. He is currently a member of the 100 Black Men of South Florida, where he serves as Chairman of the Leadership Academy, the 100 Black Men mentoring program. JD serves on the board of Miami-Dade Black Affairs Advisory Board, as the Marketing Co-chair.
