"Content marketing is the gap between what brands produce and what consumers actually want," - Michael Brenner.

No matter how long you've been in business, you must have heard about the content being king. Many companies focus on creating all types of content to promote their brand, products, and services. But does an eCommerce business need to produce that much content?

Content marketing is an essential part of any marketing campaign. Whether you are promoting dental services or advertising an eCommerce website, avoiding this powerful weapon is out of the question.

Content attracts your audience, engages it, and keeps it coming back for more. Meanwhile, it promotes your brand, helping you steal market share and become an industry leader.

Let's take a closer look at why content should be a part of your eCommerce strategy.

A Few Statistics to Consider

These statistics can help gain some insight into the importance of content marketing.

61% of online consumers have made a purchase using a recommendation from a blog. (Content Marketing Institute)
Content marketing costs 62% less than traditional marketing but generates three times more leads (Forbes)
For content marketing, conversion rates are 6 times higher than for other marketing techniques (Content Marketing Institute)
70% of marketers are actively investing in content marketing (HubSpot)
78% of CMOs believe that content marketing is the future of marketing. (Forbes)

About 60% of marketers create at least one piece of content every day. While your competition is creating content, you shouldn't stay behind.

How Creating Content Can Improve Your eCommerce Business

Creating content can have a significant effect on your company's profitability. A successful content marketing strategy can:

Improve Brand Awareness

In a highly competitive world of eCommerce, highlighting your brand could be the only way to steal market share. High-quality content helps you tell your brand story and makes it stand out from the crowd.

Regular content creation improves brand visibility. This in turn helps shoppers feel more connected to your brand and choose it over the competition. Even if the consumer doesn't start buying immediately, visibility efforts stay on top of their mind and provide results in the future.

Generate Leads

Content is a powerful lead magnet. Valuable content aimed specifically at your target audience can be exchanged for contact details on your website. Armed with this data, you can design a more powerful marketing strategy.

Increase Conversion Rates

Well-organised content distributed across available channels can help you convert customers. Content allows you to connect with your audience at different stages of the sales funnel and drive it smoothly toward making a purchase.

Valuable content can spread like wildfire, turning more and more leads into loyal customers.

Generate Consistent Traffic

High-quality content is the foundation of your SEO and PPC efforts. By creating valuable pieces of content for your audience, you can move your website to the top of the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages) while building authority and cementing your position as an industry leader.

Improve Your Relationship with Consumers

More than 80% of consumers feel more positive about a company after reading its custom content. By developing a solid content marketing strategy, you can improve the relationship with your buyers and turn them into loyal customers.

Content gives you an opportunity to answer questions, hear feedback, and interact with your audience on a new level.

Educate Your Audience

When it comes to eCommerce, many consumers spend days choosing the right product online. By creating educational content like buying guides, e-books, and blogs, you can help your consumers make a decision.

Helpful content both engages and educates your audience while helping your brand build authority. Such a tactic goes a long way toward keeping your customers loyal.

Increase Marketing ROI

Content marketing helps you decrease customer acquisition costs. Being an efficient yet low-cost marketing tactic, content marketing allows you to spend less money on PPC ads and traditional marketing efforts.

While content marketing can't replace PPC advertising, it can cut costs while presenting new advertising opportunities.

Types of Content for eCommerce Marketing

Here are a few types of content you can consider for your eCommerce content marketing strategy:

Video content — excellent for showing products and providing how-to information
Branded guides — product and buying guides educate customers and push them down the sales funnel.
Images — this can be anything from original photos of your products to UGC (User-Generated Content). Images help customers digest information and become more interested in your products.
Blogs — blogs can help you connect with the customer while implementing SEO strategies.
FAQ — this type of content can simplify consumer's interaction with your business while providing support 24/7.

Each content type comes with its own benefits. Implementing as many as you can into your strategy can help you achieve top marketing goals.

Content Marketing Strategy for eCommerce: Getting Started

If you don't have a content marketing strategy yet, here are a few tips to help you get started:

Identify your target audience segments. Design a transparent buyer persona to whom your content will be addressed.
Find out which form of content the chosen target audience segment prefers.
Figure out which stages of the buyer journey the content should be created for.
Pick the easiest (for you) form of content. Consider starting with buying guides. This educational content doubles up as a lead magnet.
Create your first piece of content (you can delegate this to your marketing team or hire a writer to speed up the process)
Start distributing content across one most convenient channels. For eCommerce companies, it's usually email.

This can be enough for a quick start. With time, you can start developing more content forms for other audience segments and distributing them across different channels.

Developing a Content Marketing Strategy with This Side Up

Does your eCommerce business need a content marketing strategy? If your goals include lead generation, increase in sales and conversions, boost in high-quality traffic, and a better relationship with your customers, the answer is "yes."

Content marketing is too powerful of a tool to keep in the shed. By wielding it regularly, you are directly affecting your company's profitability. Would you like to learn more about content marketing for eCommerce? We are always here to help.