Everyone knows the phrase “content is king.” In fact, it’s a saying that has been around for some time within the digital marketing sector. But is it still true?
The content marketing field is constantly evolving and changing. Therefore, it couldn’t be more important to stay up to date with the latest trends. Organizations that want to remain competitive must keep on top of the changes. So, is content still king in 2021?
How Content Marketing Has Changed in Recent Years
Not so long ago, ranking on Google was much easier than it is today. Like all marketing channels, content marketing went through a peak and eventually slumped. Essentially, consumers became disillusioned. After the success of some of the early adopters of content marketing, more people began to cash in. Soon, so much content was on the market that the novelty wore off.
Consumers have, over time, become more resistant to the power of content marketing. Nevertheless, marketers have no intention of quitting. Content marketing isn’t going anywhere any time soon. After all, virtually all modern marketing comes under the umbrella of content marketing. The key to success today, though, is to focus on what makes it powerful. It’s essential to understand all the recent changes, the resulting obstacles, and how you can overcome them.
The biggest obstacle facing content marketers in recent years is the glut of content out there. Unfortunately, consumer demand for content has remained static. Brands are still generating endless amounts of content, year after year. Users can only consume, share, and process so much content.
While there is still an appreciation for high-quality content, the increased saturation has led to problems. Fewer pieces are getting significant results. Experts have estimated that just 5 percent of all branded content is gaining 90 percent of consumer engagement. This means 95 percent of content receives little or no attention from users at all. It’s important to know how to tap into this 5 percent of popular content. To do that, you need to adapt your strategy.
A Saturated Market
According to WordPress, users produce around 70 million new posts every month. This would suggest that content is just as important as ever. But it also highlights a problem. With such a vast amount of content produced regularly, how do you make yours stand out?
The above statistics show that 61 percent of marketers have created more blogs and articles in 2021 than in previous years. Clearly, there is a saturation in the online marketplace. Getting your site to the top of the search engine rankings has never been more critical or more challenging. One common way that marketers try to do this is by creating more and more content.
There’s a common misconception that the more content you create, the more search traffic you generate. Unfortunately, this isn’t true. Yes, it may be true that the average count of a first-page Google search result is 1,447 words. But that doesn’t mean if you write content that’s the same length, you’ll automatically generate increased search traffic. There’s more to it than that.
If you’re regularly writing content and still aren’t getting the results you need, it’s time to think again. Your strategy needs to change and adapt. So, here, we look at the future of content marketing and how you can adjust.
Keyword Research Is Becoming Secondary to Topical Authority
Keyword research will always be important when it comes to content marketing. However, Google is increasingly emphasizing the expertise level of a website compared with other factors, such as link building.
Take a look at the above pie chart. It represents the Google algorithms in use in 2020 to determine search engine rankings.
Now take a look at this one representing the Google algorithms in use in 2021.
What’s the difference? You’ll see that the 2021 chart has an additional section – niche expertise. This didn’t appear anywhere on the 2020 chart. It’s a clear indicator that Google is now valuing knowledge as an indicator of authority.
Essentially, the more in-depth coverage you give to a topic, the higher your organization will rank. Google is no longer simply rewarding the creation of content for a single keyword. Instead, it is now focusing on the way that content fits into the site’s context.
How can you adapt your strategy to this change?
The key is to showcase your knowledge of your subject by publishing more long-form content. Build it around specific pillar pages that provide a foundation for your expertise on your topics. You can then augment these posts with other pieces of content building on those pillars.
The above infographic shows just how many benefits long-form content can offer.
Another way to prove your expertise is to work in collaboration with subject matter experts (SMEs). They can help create valuable content and repurpose it into different formats to create a community.
Focus on Value-Driven Content
There are 7.5 million pieces of blog content produced every single day. It’s no wonder, then, that consumers are becoming increasingly picky about which ones to view. Modern consumers are extremely unlikely to hand over their contact details in exchange for poor-quality content. Therefore, brands must showcase the value they can offer immediately.
As part of an adapting content strategy, brands must now think of new ways to bring value to their consumers. They need to gain an in-depth understanding of their prospective customer’s needs. They need to determine why those customers are interacting with their brand. Then they need to offer them practical suggestions through published content. Rather than just showcasing a product or service, it should show how it helps to solve customers’ issues.
Brand reputation will always be important. But thinking about the end-users when creating content is becoming increasingly vital. Organizations that produce helpful content that targets and solves consumers’ problems will be more successful in the future.
A Move Toward Engaging, Interactive Content
With so many pieces of content published each day, catching the user’s attention is paramount. This is where interactive content can prove to be indispensable.
The above infographic shows a worrying statistic. If the average human’s attention span in 2021 is just eight seconds, marketers need to find better solutions. They can no longer rely on consumers simply reading content.
This chart shows various forms of interactive content marketers are now using to great effect. From quizzes to calculators, interactive content is keeping consumers engaged. When you have engaged consumers, they stay on the website for longer. In turn, this allows the brand message to seep through. These fun activities are excellent ways of getting the brand message across but without boring the audience.
More people than ever access the Internet via smartphones and mobile devices, which affects attention span. When browsing the Internet on the move, users spend very little time on one thing. If it doesn’t immediately grab their interest, they move on. “Snackable” content is, therefore, imperative in 2021.
Content that people can digest at a glance looks set to be the way of the future. GIFs, infographics, visuals, and short videos are all effective in this regard. Of course, this appears to clash with the earlier advice about long-form content. The key is to provide a mix of both content types to complement each other. This allows consumers to select the content that best suits their needs at different times.
The Importance of Historical Optimization
As time goes on, organizations create more and more content. It’s important to be aware that this content doesn’t become worthless over time. Rather, it can be just as useful in the future as it was on the day an organization published it. How?
Historical optimization and evergreen content are the keys.
Evergreen content – or content that is always relevant – has proven it can consistently drive the most significant volume of organic traffic. It also requires minimal effort. Temporal content (i.e., content that’s only relevant for a short period) will always have its place. But evergreen content is a gift that keeps giving. Yet, for it to achieve maximum success, you must refresh it regularly. This is where historical optimization comes in.
The above pie chart reveals that old posts still have value when it comes to attracting leads. Historical optimization has a vital part to play in this. It involves refreshing old content so an organization can generate even more leads and boost traffic to the website exponentially.
Historical optimization helps to get more value from:
- Content that has high conversions but attracts low traffic volumes.
- Content that has high traffic volumes but lower conversion rates.
- Content that underperforms relative to the resources and the time it took to create it.
Utilizing historical optimization to its full advantage allows marketers to capitalize on a post’s existing traffic and authority. So, what do you need to tweak and change? Content needs updating to improve:
- Comprehensiveness
- Freshness
- Accuracy
Areas to alter include:
- Titles
- Copy quality
- External and internal links
- Meta descriptions
- Calls to action
- Images
- Keyword
With these updates in place, you can then republish the old content as fresh, new content. This will help to boost your Google ranking, too, since Google favors new content.
The Featured Snippet
The above chart shows that featured snippets have a vital part to play in boosting search engine rankings. Google features these high-ranking search results below the ads. They answer the questions a user may pose immediately. As the chart shows, if your site’s content is the featured snippet, it will get a lot more exposure. This is something that can make a huge difference in today’s competitive online marketplace.
How can you get your content to be the featured snippet?
Imagery, formatting, structure, on-page SEO, and keyword research are all important in this regard. But, perhaps the most important factor is to answer as many questions in a similar vein as possible. The “People Also Ask” widget can give a valuable insight into the topics Google links together. This allows you to identify untapped opportunities for content that will enable you to plan your future strategy effectively.
Looking Forward to Emerging Technologies
All the above are strategies that you can harness now to improve your content marketing. However, it’s crucial never to rest on your laurels when it comes to achieving marketing success. Just because a strategy works today doesn’t mean it will continue working in the long term. Marketers must, therefore, constantly be aware of developments in the sector and be ready to adapt and adjust.
If there’s one thing we can be sure about, it’s that the world of content marketing won’t sit still. It will continue fluctuating and changing to meet new demands and expectations. Organizations need to stay ahead of the game to have the edge over their competitors. Looking ahead to emerging technologies is the best solution to achieve this.
The increasing availability of emerging technologies, such as voice and visual search and VR/AR, will soon feature heavily in content marketing.
Around three-quarters of voice search results rank in the top three search engine positions for that specific question. This means that brands that have created content that supports this functionality will see their revenue increase. Meanwhile, VR content revenue is increasing by about 30 percent year on year. While VR and AR technologies are still relatively unexplored territories, they’re important to keep in mind. Soon, the content marketing sector may demand more content in this vein. Brands need to be ready to meet their expectations.
The recipe for successful content marketing is much the same as it’s always been. It essentially means staying up to date with industry developments and being ready to make changes to stay ahead of the game. The most successful marketers have learned lessons from the past and have used them to adapt.