Three ways to use great content in 2016

While we know that ‘content is king’ has prevailed for the past few years, this is the year when content will really dominate in traditional and also newer and more exciting ways. According to a recent survey, 72% of B2B marketers say content marketing is their top priority in 2016, with the most effective marketers allocating 46% of their overall marketing strategy to content creation and promotion.

Consumers want great content and they want lots of it! The good news is that when you create one piece of content, it can be used in a range of innovative ways, across a number of different platforms.

Here are 3 great ways you can – and should – use the same piece of content in 2016.

1. Blog standard: If you haven’t started blogging for your business you need to start. According to Hubspot, businesses that blog just once or twice a month generate 70% more leads than those that don’t blog at all. Every time you publish a blog, it creates a new indexed page on your website which will boost your ranking on search engine pages. You’ve also just created something that people can share on their social media sites. Make use of the tried and tested formulas such as FAQs, How-To Guides and Expert Tips. Ensure every blog includes a call to action and, also reference any influencers or thought-leaders in your field in your blog. You can ensure they know about this with a nifty new tool, Notifier by ContentMarketer.io. It scans your blog for any names/brands, finds their Twitter handles and sends an automated tweet to let them know they’ve been mentioned. This is a handy way of gaining their attention – they may even tweet your blog or give your business a follow. 
2. The video star: Video is nothing new and was a huge feature of 2015’s most impactful marketing trends. In fact, more than 200 million people in the US accessed videos on their mobile devices last year. With the prediction that Google is to embrace video advertising in the year ahead (it has already started to display thumbnail size videos instead of the traditional text results for some searches) you can be sure that video is what search engine users want in the future. Platforms such as Twitter videos, Vine, Periscope and of course Youtube will all continue to be huge in 2016. The content you created for your blog post can easily be tweaked into a quick, one minute script and used as an interview, tutorial or demo on the video platform that your target audience prefers. 
3. Interactive Infographs: The past two years has seen a marked surge in the use of visual content marketing and infographs have been a central feature of this trend. Infographs are 30% more likely to be read than plain text. As of April 2015, there were 62 million searches for the term. They are also a fantastic way to use the content you’ve already created for your blog or video and transform it into a visual tool. In 2016 though, consider making your infograph interactive. Interactive content is predicted to become increasingly popular and makes a greater impact on the user by involving them. Inviting the reader to scroll down through an infograph which could reveal additional images, clicking to unveil a hidden stat, or incorporating audio or a video snippet will engage your audience on a deeper level.