Kex+ Webinar on Content Marketing
On September 14 at 10 AM EST, SEOReseller launched another episode of the KEX+ (Knowledge Exchange) webinar series. KEX+ is a deep dive into various industry-related topics and information that help agencies like yours grow.
In that episode, business excellence manager CJ Masungsong and managing consultant Bernard San Juan III talked about content marketing and the 3H framework: Hero, Hub, and Hygiene.
Content marketing is a strategic approach focused on creating and distributing valuable, relevant, and consistent content to attract and retain a clearly defined audience— and, ultimately, to drive profitable customer action.
Webinar speaker Bernard San Juan III summarized it succinctly, “What makes you a thought leader in your industry or recognized as an expert is the content you put out there.”
When done correctly, content marketing can help agencies build brand awareness, drive traffic, and generate leads. A well-planned and executed content marketing strategy should be done in three stages.
The first stage is Planning, wherein you gather your team and bounce ideas off each other. You have to come up with topics that are valuable to your audience—things they find useful, helpful, and interesting. Start with broad topics that you want to have conversations on, and work your way from there.
During ideation, you can refine these topics and provide more details. Ideation is about choosing the right target audience, topics, and call-to-action.
Remember that there is only one way to get the planning stage wrong: it’s to have only one idea and obsess over it. Pitch as many topics as possible, then narrow your options by asking yourselves whether they’re plausible, too limiting, or too general.
After carefully listing your topics, decide their formats or methods of delivery. Will you do a podcast, a webinar, or an article? Whichever you choose, plot them out on a content calendar. Depending on your schedule and available resources, you can spread your topics and deliverables throughout an entire month.
Once you’ve finalized your topic/s and timeline, move on to Content Creation. In this stage, the best practice is to follow the “hero, hub, and hygiene” framework.
- Hero content is the most emotionally resonant, well-produced, creative, and original content. Its purpose is to build brand awareness and credibility. Hero content is meant to get people’s attention and is a catch-all for the other types of content you’ll be producing. Examples include webinars, long-form articles, and podcasts.
- On the other hand, Hub content leads users into your Hero content and leads them out to relevant content. Hub content must always be contextually related to Hero. These can be teasers, blogs, e-books, videos, or promotional materials.
- Now that your Hero and Hub content resonate with your audience, keeping them engaged is just as important. Hygiene (or Help) keeps the conversation going and ensures that your audience stays updated on relevant, helpful, and shareable topics. Examples include blogs, social media posts, and how-tos.
And finally, Promotion. While it is crucial to ensure that the topic is unique and value-adding, it is pointless if people don’t know it exists or can’t find it. You can do this by publishing newsletters, press releases, blogs, articles, and ads. In this last stage, you can get the most mileage out of your content by mobilizing various channels.
Ultimately, all types of content are essential to creating a well-rounded content marketing strategy. By following the three stages of content marketing, capitalizing on each content type, and following a solid and actionable content calendar, you’ll surely generate more leads in the long term.
More importantly, as emphasized by webinar speaker CJ Masungsong, “You’re telling your audience that you’re an expert and that you can put out this kind of content; to educate and to add value.” As such, earning your audience that level of trust and confidence is simply priceless and invaluable.
