You’ve heard the old saying, “Content is king,” so many times that it’s become trite. Perhaps you’ve even used it on your C-suite when you don’t want to go into a long-winded explanation about why you need the budget to build a content-focused martech stack.
But content’s much more than just a “king” or a “queen,” for that matter. It’s everything.
Image Source: Media Shower
Unless you’ve been secluded on a remote tropical island for the last decade, content marketing’s impact has exploded over the marketing/advertising universe. Contrast it to old-school advertising, and you’ll see what I mean.
- Old-fashioned ads make people aware of your products/services and pitch offers.
- Content marketing, on the other hand, shows who your brand is, how aware it is of the problems your customers face, and offers information that may lead to a solution.
Even the major ad agencies have tipped their hat towards content marketing. For example, look at how shampoo manufacturers have changed their messaging over the years.
These ads from the 1950s make the product, not the customer, the hero. Bursting with adjectives that describe their shampoo, the braggadocio is palpable.
Compare that to today’s shampoo companies. Awakened to their customers’ everyday struggle to get their hair in shape to face the world, they demonstrate that their brand is ready to lend a hand, making their product the weapon of choice customers use to seize the day.
If you have the technology to support a robust content strategy, your company can position your brand as the go-to solution to help your customers meet their day head-on.
What Is a Martech Stack?
A “martech stack” is the collection of digital tools that a company uses to meet its marketing team’s technology needs. So, if content marketing is such a critical ingredient in reaching a brand’s target customers, why are some companies still filling their stack with generic, one-size-fits-all tools? Having a content-focused martech stack can give your corporation the edge over all its competitors. If you build it well, it doesn’t have to break your budget.
As Martech Advisor’s Dan Purvis puts it, an exceptional martech stack will “make your marketing efforts more effective, efficient, and tailored to your business.” A martech stack with a content focus, then, must go beyond simple project management and content management systems. You should be incorporating purpose-built content process tools that are built to handle the complexities and nuances of content planning, collaboration and promotion. And with a big reliance on data, those tools should include content analytics components that help your teams create more effective content.
Let’s dig into the key components of a content-focused martech stack.
Build Your Content Martech Stack with These Key Components
Since today’s customers demand content in a variety of channels – delivered at a convenient time and place — a content marketing tech stack should incorporate everything it needs to meet those demands. Here are some must-haves for building your stack.
Include target customer analytics
Know your customers, and you’ll have a heads-up on the strategy you need to meet their needs. Use both social media and your own content analytics to identify the demographics, interests, and pain points of those who engage with your social media and blog posts. Technology that provides your team access to all this data in a single place is a key component of content marketing success.
Put collaboration at the forefront
Gone are the days when the marketing, sales, and product development teams stayed in their own “silos.” To find topics that inform your customers and prospects about solutions to their most pressing challenges, you need input from diverse perspectives.
If you want to discover all the objections and feedback prospective customers have about your products and services, a content collaboration component in your martech solution allows you to work hand in hand with your sales team. When you have that information, your teams can create content that answers your prospects’ questions, meets their objections, and satisfies their curiosity.
Suppose your prospects need specific information about how your new gadget works. In that case, it pays to collaborate with the engineering and product development teams to produce content with detailed information that can help the prospect feel confident about a purchase.
Make scheduling posts easy
A content calendar is essential to timing your posts to happen at the exact time your audience needs to receive them. A content calendar that keeps everyone on the same page, paired with a content automation system that works even when you’re fast asleep, is a critical factor in getting your content into the right hands at the right time.
Enable content promotion
When you have a piece of content that’s so timely, so pertinent to your customers’ needs that it has to reach them quickly, it pays to have the capability to amplify that post’s content on social media and search. Access to promotional tools like social media and search engine advertising platforms is essential in your martech stack to enable you to capitalize on these opportunities.
Measure your results
Analyzing the effect your content has on your target audience requires a robust content measurement tool. With it, you can tweak underperforming content and identify your best-performers to promote in your email newsletter, distribute on other channels, or repurpose into other forms for new audiences.
Leverage email marketing
Since email messaging produces $38 for every dollar you invest (on average), as HubSpot’s Caroline Forsey points out, it pays to have a content marketing stack that integrates easily with your email marketing tools. For distributing your content at scale, it’s a must-have.
Simplify overall content management
You could have a hodgepodge of task-specific tools in your content toolbox. However, wouldn’t it be more efficient if you had as few tools as possible?
For an enterprise with a heavy content production load, an centralized content hub is hugely beneficial. It’s an essential ingredient for producing content at full capacity. An integrated content marketing platform allows your teams to plan, collaborate on, create, publish, automate, amplify, and measure the results of your content.
Even more importantly, as Casey Strohl points out, a comprehensive solution gives your content leadership team a “top-down view on your entire content marketing strategy.” Tracking your teams’ progress toward your goals in real-time allows you to make needed changes immediately, rather than waiting for days until the numbers roll in.
The best content marketing platforms integrate with the digital tools you already have in your martech stack, allowing you to streamline your teams’ workflow and create a unified spirit throughout the enterprise with cross-departmental collaboration.
There’s another benefit you gain through such a connected martech stack: Your creative teams can see the numbers that show the results their work creates for the entire company, motivating them to create even more great content.
If you’re ready to save time and drive the kind of results that will impress even the most skeptical in your C-suite, you need to see what a comprehensive content marketing platform like DivvyHQ can do for you. For a personalized tour, request a demo today.