interview with content marketer Christian Slagter

A webshop is set up like this. But how do you make it successful? With content marketing, says Christian Slagter van Slagter Media. As a co-author of the handy book Success with E-commerce he wrote the section on the use of content marketing. “Content marketing is not a quick sales pitch, but putting the customer first. You create leads and customers by creating valuable content and bringing it to the attention of your potential customers. ”Read the interview and take part in the competition to win the book.

What is content marketing?

“Content marketing is the creation of information that your audience finds so valuable that they want to know more about your company. With content marketing you attract visitors to your website, you help them by answering questions, you generate leads, customers and sales and you interact. Content marketing is therefore not a quick sales pitch with which you only try to bring your own services and / or products to the attention, but you respond to questions and needs that live with your (potential) customers. ”

What does a content marketer do exactly?

"A lot", Christian laughs. "A content marketer looks at your business objectives, determines who your target group and therefore your audience is, analyzes the current state of your online presence (SEO, SEA, social media etc.). Subsequently, a content marketer helps with the definition of the online marketing strategy, drawing up a content calendar, creating valuable content, bringing this content to the attention and measuring and optimizing the performance of the content. ”

Why should you engage in content marketing as a company? What does that yield?

“What do you do if you have a problem or a question? You go to Google. And you are not the only one. Your audience is therefore active online and you can reach them with content marketing. If you as a company can answer the questions of your potential customers, this ensures brand recognition, trust and authority. By creating valuable content and bringing it to the attention of your potential customers, this will eventually lead to leads and customers. Google will also start appreciating your content, because visitors will stay on your page longer, people will share your content and other websites will link to your content. And those are all indicators for Google that your content is relevant and valuable, so that it will come up sooner in the search results. ”

Shouldn't you focus on the customer instead of content?

“The customer is certainly central, because you create the content for that! Therefore first find out who your ideal customer is, also called a buyer persona. Here you prepare a detailed customer profile for which you ask yourself questions such as: who are my customers? What questions and problems do they have that I can solve? Which content do they prefer to consume? Through which channels can they be reached? "

How does content marketing differ for B2C and B2B?

“There are of course parallels for both content marketing strategies, but the main difference is that you appeal to a different audience. A good one B2B content marketing strategy often comes down to being a valuable source of information within your sector. This is also called thought leadership called. The buying process often takes much longer, while usually several people are involved. This makes it important to map the various buying stages. The tone of your content is also more business-like. ”

“At B2C you don't get that far with thought leadership and the focus for content marketing is more on topics where consumers are one emotional bond have with them. B2C customers are more impulsive and flexible in their purchasing decisions. They can immediately decide to make a purchase based on a number of positive assessments. This makes it important to keep the thresholds in your content as low as possible. "

Does content marketing stand on its own as a marketing channel? What is the comparison with other marketing channels?

“You integrate content marketing with other marketing channels and can be applied both online and offline. For example, consider a physical magazine in which you share interesting information. This ensures brand recognition and ultimately people will search the internet for more information about your products and services. But content marketing also fits perfectly with social media, because you share the content through these channels and show that you are constantly working on your field. In my opinion, content marketing is more informative than various other marketing channels, which are often aimed at realizing a sale immediately. ”

When does content marketing not work? What are the conditions?

“Content marketing takes a long time and a lot of patience. You only see the first effects - at least that is my experience - after about 6 months from the start of your campaign. For example, you will not immediately appear at the first position of the search results. If it were that simple, then everyone did it, right? There are a number of conditions that ensure that your content marketing succeeds: it takes a long time, consistency is the key to success, measuring is knowing and your content must be valuable. ”

“You have to ensure that you persist and produce and share new content on a regular basis. For example, a blog on your website once every two weeks. In this way, your audience will also take this into account, while at the same time you keep their attention. Search engines also appreciate this, because your website keeps moving. And your content must of course be valuable to your audience. It is important that you understand how your content performs and how this relates to your objectives. Consider the number of visitors to your article, the position you take on keywords in Google's results, but also the number of subscriptions to your newsletter or realized conversions. See where you can improve the process so that people can better appreciate your content. ”

Can you give a good example of content marketing in practice?

“Our webshop is a good example that is close to me Makeup Your Stash, which was set up by my partner Saskia. The webshop is aimed at women who are looking for a handy solution to store their makeup. One of the strategies is for beauty bloggers to review our products. They often have a large number of followers that fit perfectly into our ideal buyer profile. You get the perfect attention for this. ”

“Of course we want the beauty bloggers to give an honest opinion about the product, you don't want to make a sales pitch out of it. The beauty bloggers won't do this either, because they don't want to grab their name. The beuaty bloggers make articles, videos and photos of our products, including links to our webshop. In this way we become easier to find in the organic search results. In this way, the beauty bloggers are true ambassadors for our webshop, so that their readers will be more inclined to purchase our products. You thus create brand awareness, trust, authority and the desired conversion. ”