By Robert Cordray
As most businesses know, corporate training programs help prevent unnecessary errors within an agency. Training can give employees the knowledge they need to best promote the company’s content, all while keeping the company in good light. In addition, training helps with an overview of what can be expected in the future and giving companies the tools they need to work through or around any possible missteps in the content marketing arena. Along with these benefits, below are three ways training can help prevent marketing errors.
1) Do not place limits on output
Training should help jumpstart, not be the end, to content location and promotion. Search for new areas to place your content that will draw in a new and large audience. Take advantage of modern media and marketing ideas. Embrace social media along with the other networks available to prospective clients. In addition, corporate training companies can offer new ideas in content promotion. All corporations should have teams to expand in to all the various multimedia possibilities to share the company’s content. Do not focus solely on social media; spread the company brand between locations and types of sites.
Some areas of a company will be better suited than others for types of content. Is straight numerical analysis needed? The accountants may be your best choice. Is an artistic view needed? Then the design department may be a better choice. Think of what assets available among the companies’ current employees. Who would bring the best content in any given form? You must still be careful about what content you put online. A company does not want to have to face the backlash from content that has not been properly fact checked and ends up being a dud.
2) Learn from others success as well as their failures
Watch to see what others in the company or industry are doing right and expand on it (and if you’re the business owner, don’t overlook the importance of employee recognition for those who are getting things right.) Know how to best promote your content and consider other options. Whether it’s creative headlines or graphics of statistics—learn what works and what doesn’t with your market. Furthermore, taking steps to improve relationships with customers will improve any business. The long term strategy of being genuine and reliable is the way to be prosperous in content marketing.
3) Focus on the customers
The end goal of any organization is to focus on the customer/client and training should heavily address this. The customer’s needs are going to dependent on a company’s industry, but the company should not only cater to their audience but target the right one. In addition to reports, you can easily see if you are targeting the right audience through feedback in the comments section.
Furthermore, is the content moblie? Today we live in a day and age where people are more likely to read content on a phone or tablet than on a computer. It’s a priority that digital content is very mobile friendly and easy accessible.
Some good rules of thumb for catering to your audience include: always measure your outcomes, keep an eye on your content, know which pages or promotions interest customers the most and track of the status of your associated sites and links from others.
When training is done right, your content marketing doesn’t have to suffer.
Robert Cordray is a former business consultant and entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience and a wide variety of knowledge in multiple areas of the industry. Follow him at @RobertCordray.
