Ideation: Getting Strategic About Your Content Marketing

2 minute read

Upland Admin

According to recent research, up to 70% of B2B content goes unused.

Why? Because businesses fail to plan for, create, and govern their content effectively. Because they focus on sell, sell, sell! instead of what they can do to best serve their audiences.

And so their content gets all the way through the creation process…and then sits there, collecting dust–unused and un-useful.

Yikes.

But that staggering statistic doesn’t have to be a death sentence for our content. Instead, let’s make it a wake up call. Let’s stop producing overly promotional content (which is a top turnoff cited by customers) and start producing content that informs, entertains, and intrigues our target audiences.

How?

Well, we think the first step is a little something SiriusDecisions writes about in their latest research report:

They call it Ideation.

Ideation is the first phase of any content marketing project—and it’s all about getting strategic before you jump into your next campaign.

According to SiriusDecisions, in the ideation phase, B2B marketers should:

  • Identify not just your overall business audience, but the specific audience you’re creating each content piece for
  • Know as much about that audience as you can (industry, geographic region, etc.)
  • Assess what that audience needs from your business
  • Draw up buyer personas to make your audience information come to life for your writers
  • Map out your sales funnel—and target content to each stage
  • Identify sources of existing content, expertise, and information
  • Figure out what you need to create—and assign content creators and publishers to their tasks

Want to dive deeper? For the sake of your content (and the buyers consuming it), download the full SiriusDecisions Toolkit. In it, you’ll find videos, a report, and a full presentation explaining why establishing an ideation process will make your content more effective across departments and how you can ensure your content remains in-line with the interests and needs of your target buyers. Go ahead. Your buyers (and your boss) will thank you.

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