5 Reasons Why Small Businesses Struggle With Content Marketing
Small businesses frequently struggle with content marketing, but it’s mostly because they don’t have a strategy in place. It’s often attributed to luck, but most of the time, it’s just because you didn’t create a plan. A part of the strategy is, of course, knowing what NOT to do.
These are the 5 main struggles of small businesses when it comes to marketing.
#1: Going it Alone
#2: Lack of a Content Strategy
#3: Hiring a Bad Writer
#4: Not Leveraging Existing Assets
#5: Perfectionism
#1: Going it Alone
Small businesses often have one person being the marketing department AND the sales department. In order to create good content, you need a writer AND a marketer. They have to have a good understanding of how SEO works and what types of posts go viral on social media. When they feel overwhelmed or “don’t know where to start” it is going to be hard for them to produce content that will actually work for their business – especially if they are trying to do everything by themselves. To get around this, your company should consider hiring an expert in the field of blogging or hiring someone part-time just for marketing purposes.
#2: Lack of a Content Strategy
It is easy to think that you can just “come up with a few things to write about and go from there,” but this won’t work. You need a strategy. The best way to do this is by creating an editorial calendar – where you plan out your content weeks ahead of time so you don’t accidentally create posts that compete against one another or cancel each other out. Your editorial calendar should include: *What types of posts will be created (eg: how-to articles, listicles, infographics)
*When the posts will publish (eg: Monday at 9 am)
*Who will be writing them (eg: only available for certain hours each day during the week) It is also a good idea to create a ‘master content strategy’ or separate strategies for different platforms, such as your website and social media accounts.
#3: Hiring a Bad Writer
A lot of people think that if they have SEO knowledge, they can write well too – but this is not the case. It takes more than just knowing how Google ranks websites to be able to write good copy that will attract readers. Content marketers need both writing ability AND SEO knowledge in order to succeed. Some small businesses are under the false impression that “knowing how to write is enough” which means many companies hire bad writers or never even bother hiring someone at all! If you want to avoid any further trouble with content marketing, try to work with an expert. Or, know someone who can do it!
#4: Not Leveraging Existing Assets
One of the best things you can do when creating content is to create new content that takes advantage of what you already have – whether it be previously published articles or even just ideas that were never fully executed on. For example, let’s say your business used to offer a service and then discontinued it due to lack of demand. Maybe there is still some interest out there for this particular service – so instead of letting it go waste, why not write some case studies about how people use this product? You could even interview people who are currently using the product (or did use the product in some capacity) and ask them what they think about it.
#5: Perfectionism
Many small businesses believe that “good enough” isn’t good enough when it comes to their content marketing efforts. They want every post to be amazing and go viral, but this is just not realistic. Don’t let your fear of failure stop you from trying something new! Content marketing strategies often take time before they become successful so if you are putting in the effort but still aren’t getting the traction you were hoping for, don’t give up!
It is easy for a small business to feel overwhelmed by the idea of content marketing, but it really comes down to having a strategy. The 5 struggles highlighted here are often what holds businesses back from succeeding with their content marketing efforts and should be addressed as soon as possible.
By avoiding these pitfalls, you can create an effective plan that will deliver results! If this has been something that’s been holding you back from success in your own business, let me and my team help you get started today.