You finally built your website…now what? You made all this great content but nobody is coming to your site. To cure your headaches watch this training video with some useful content marketing tips for your nonprofit organization.
What Is Content Marketing?
It’s pretty simple actually. Think about two different buckets for your website. One of them is what you already have (the “about us” page, or your “mission statement”). The other bucket is what people want. They want what they’re searching for. So what is content marketing? It’s creating valuable, relevant, and consistent content in order to attract a specific audience.
How To “Do” Content Marketing?
1. Have a content platform
Now that you know what it is, how do you actually do content marketing? It starts by having a platform. You need a content management system – think WordPress, Drupal.
2. Create regular content
You have your platform, and now it’s time to start playing the game. Think about your audience. What do they need? What do they fear? Find the value that they’re looking for that helps them, informs them, or in some way improves what they’re already doing.
3. Create “evergreen” content
Think of an evergreen tree. It’s green all year, it doesn’t shed, but at certain times of the year – like during Christmas – thousands of people are looking for evergreen trees to put in their homes. Think about content that could be relevant year-round, but also have episodic spikes of interest throughout the year. This type of content that will produce the most value.
- Bonus! Create “dandelion” content. Think of dandelions. They spread far and wide, but have a shorter life cycle. Create topical content that addresses current events, news, and trends, to cross-pollinate your brand with developing trends and reach wider audiences. By keeping track of your content as well as what’s trending online, you can also adapt evergreen content into dandelion content for social media.
4. Have “hooks” to build an audience you can talk to
As a nonprofit, you’re probably giving away free content, and free things all the time. Well, you will lose money if you continue to do that. This is why you need a “hook”. In other words – “why would somebody give you their information?” For this example, let’s think about an e-mail. If you get the person’s e-mail, and therefore permission to talk to them, the next time you put out free content you can reach out to them. You can also contact them the next time you do a fundraiser, or when looking for volunteers, etc. That’s how you build your audience. This is the most valuable asset that your organization will have.
5. Content distribution
You created all this amazing content, now how do you get it out there? There are two simple ways. One is SEO – Search Engine Optimization. You have to build your site using the right keywords, and put it where people can find it. The other way to distribute your content is through SMO – Social Media Optimization. You can talk to anybody you want on social media. Create relationships. Have you written an article that highlights a different organization or product? Let them know! At some point they might feature your organization on their site. That’s the cycle you want to create.
You Must Measure It
This is the most important. How will you know if what you’re doing is right? Look at your Google Analytics, and check what the data say. Then, adjust based on the results. Look for how people are searching for your types of content, and mimic what’s out there. Do more of what works and expand on it.