Content is King And Still Wears The Digital Marketing Crown

According to e-commerce giant Oberlo, 70 percent of marketers actively invest in content marketing. But is that a wise thing to do? After all, it’s been over two decades since billionaire businessman Bill Gates declared that “content is king.” Is this statement still accurate?

To be honest, commercial noise is abundant. Advertising is everywhere, from your door to your TV and online. Competition is tough and widespread. Around 6,0000 to 10,000 physical and digital commercials are seen daily. Dang! Given that, marketers will need more than “hey pal, buy my product!” to stand out. In a world saturated with commercials and clients jaded by repeated sales, how can you connect with them in subtle ways to gain attention?

Early adopters of online content struggled with advertising revenue realization, as initial expectations regarding revenues were not met and many advertisers were hesitant to invest in this new medium. However, this has evolved over time with more sophisticated monetization strategies.

The bottom line? Content marketing is undeniably effective. Oberlo’s statistics underscore its importance:

• 62 percent of marketers outsource at least some of their content marketing
• 84 percent of marketers pay for content distribution
• 25 percent or more of a brand’s marketing budget is spent on content marketing

These figures clearly demonstrate the enduring value of a well-executed content marketing strategy.

Why Content Marketing Still Works

These numbers may seem high, but marketers aren’t flippant in their methods—content marketing strategies are vital to a brand’s growth and sustainability. There are two reasons businesses spend a significant amount of time and money on content: Search engines love it, and it’s excellent for building trust with users who are hungry for it.

Search Engines Think Content Is King

Oberlo’s studies show that 72 percent of marketers say content marketing boosts engagement and leads. Eighty-eight percent say that content marketing has helped them achieve their goal of building brand awareness and credibility. Companies can accomplish this because search engines and social media platforms show users their content.

Search engine marketing plays a crucial role in boosting engagement and leads through high-quality content.

A recent study concluded that Google’s top rankings tend to be full of long-form content. When it comes to the web, the more content your business puts out, the more visible you are to the people who need your offerings.

Users Still Want Content

Consumers want and expect content from businesses. In fact, 90 percent of users expect brands to provide content, according to Oberlo.

The rise of user generated content has significantly impacted the digital landscape, transforming traditional media by democratizing content creation and distribution. This shift has led to an overwhelming supply of content created by users themselves, challenging the dominance of traditional media players.

As content creators, we want to serve thoughtful answers to your questions that will allow you to make informed decisions. Creating marketing content also provides our team with continuing education as we continually research ideas we’ve used in the past to make informed decisions in the future.

Other studies revealed that 80 percent of respondents genuinely enjoy learning about a company through content. Seventy percent prefer learning about your company through content instead of ads. With most people skipping TV advertisements and declining to engage with direct email marketing, content has become an indispensable digital marketing tool for business owners.

Quality Content Is the Name of the Game

So yes, content is still king. But there’s more to it than just churning out endless blog posts. When it comes to content, focusing on quality instead of quantity is essential. For example, writing one high-quality long-form content may be better than delivering five 200-word salesy, keyword-stuffed blog posts that do nothing to answer people’s questions. It’s disappointing when you land on a dry article with no substance – Google thinks so too. Especially in today’s landscape where content creators are relying on AI-generated writing to do all the heavy lifting when it should be the converse. A-I is great for research but very dry when it comes to storytelling.

In fact, comprehensive content with higher word counts tends to fill the search engine’s top 10 results spots. High-quality content also resonates better with visitors, making them more likely to buy from your brand. Most high-quality content comes from a person with a copywriting background or someone with a wealth of experience regarding the subject they are writing about.

Additionally, the Internet allows for the distribution of high-quality content at basically zero marginal cost, making it a valuable strategy for businesses. If you want to start creating quality content, there are four main elements you’ll need to incorporate into your digital marketing strategy.

Element 1: Consistency

Google’s algorithms tend to favor recently published or updated pages. In some cases, the search engine will even show the date the page was last edited in its search results. Publishing consistently also helps you expand your website and grow your authority, leading to higher rankings and more traffic.

Electronic online editions of magazines and journals need to be consistently updated to maintain reader engagement. The same can be said of businesses. However, you are not a magazine, so take the time to keep things fresh and make sure you are creating content that fits your workflow.

Element 2: Originality

Google and other search engines tend to punish duplicative or derivative content. Users want to learn new things, gain fresh insights, or analyze their problems from different angles. Showing the same information repeatedly doesn’t meet this need, so duplicate content serves no purpose to the search engine or the end user. Therefore, it usually doesn’t make it very far up the organic rankings.

Originality in content extends to various formats, not just marketing but also news, entertainment, and more.

Element 3: Variety

Diversifying your written content means going beyond a single keyword or topic. After all, a focused website is excellent, but Google rewards comprehensive content. Therefore, you’ll want to incorporate content around the related keyword and long-tail keywords to diversify and add depth to your strategy.

The ‘interactive news business’ model leverages diverse content formats to engage audiences effectively, combining traditional media strategies with digital technology to deliver rich, interactive content. News websites are excellent models for diverse, engaging content that converts. They were late to the game but have set the bar high moving forward.

Remember, great content goes beyond standard blog posts and landing pages—it’s about crafting dynamic, high-value pieces that resonate with your audience. Consider these strategies to elevate your content game:

• Long- and short-form videos
• Images (including infographics)
• Audio (such as podcasts and books)
• Social media posts (especially those with informative captions)

Don’t underestimate the impact of images and videos. Incorporating multimedia not only enhances the value of your content but also improves search engine rankings. Multimedia elements provide additional SEO benefits, such as opportunities to optimize image alt tags and attract backlinks when others share your content

Element 4: Usefulness

Quality content also means useful content. When users have questions, your content should directly answer them. This approach benefits not only your audience but also your SEO efforts. Google’s coveted snippets, which appear at the top of search results, are more likely to feature helpful, answer-focused content. These snippets highlight information relevant to user queries, positioning you as a thought leader and increasing your visibility

Companies must keep editorial control if they are to guarantee the quality and relevance of their materials. Maintaining the integrity and dependability of the given information depends on this oversight.

The good news is that becoming a featured snippet doesn’t require your website to rank at the top of search results: Here are some tips to enhance the value of your content and give it a fighting chance for a coveted snipet spot:

• Include more images and other multimedia content
• Add transcripts to your videos
• Use headers in your content
• Keep answers concise
• Break up lists and paragraphs
• Use keyword research to answer a variety of questions

Google will reward your content marketing efforts when your content helps users get what they want.

Even if Google isn’t the content creator, it focuses on providing its users with the most relevant results. To everyone who uses the internet, they aim to create the best possible user experience, so avoid making dry or irelevant content.

Creating Effective Content

Effective content is the cornerstone of digital success. It’s about delivering relevant, informative, and engaging material that addresses your audience’s needs and adds value. Start by understanding your audience through market research, analytics, and customer feedback to craft a strategy that resonates.

Examine the content your competitors are producing; there is no shortage of mediocre content. The key is to identify content that resonates with you, as this can serve as a springboard for new ideas. Explore different media types like motion graphics and podcasting. You can tie all of these things together in one way or another. For instance, a single blog article can be highly informative, with all these elements creating their own unique learning ecosystem.

High-quality content is also critical for SEO, Consistency and measurement are key—regular updates build trust and credibility, while metrics like engagement, traffic, and conversions help refine your strategy to align with your goals. Analyzing user behavior on your website is crucial to understand how people engage or disengage. Your bounce rate will reveal areas of underperformance.

Think Outside The box

Experiential marketing is all about people interacting with your content in a different way and ultimately exposing them to your brand. No company does this better than Red Bull. By empowering participants in the wacky Flutag competition to unleash their creativity, Flutag has captured the imagination of everyone—and it’s free to consume! They do this without spending money on TV, print media, and other advertising channels. They deliver content that people want and share through word-of-mouth or social sharing.

Obviously, most of us don’t have a Red Bull budget, but the main goal here is to deliver what an audience wants and has come to expect, and to connect with the brand in a unique way.

The Risks of Bad Content

Bad content doesn’t disappear – it hurts a business’s reputation and credibility. Irrelevant, thin or poorly written content will drive away potential customers and erode relationships with existing ones. And duplicate content will get you penalised by search engines overnight and your site will disappear from the search results.

In 2017, Pepsi got backlash for a commercial featuring Kendall Jenner, where they trivialised social justice movements by showing a protest scene that gets resolved with a Pepsi. The ad was pulled, but the damage to their reputation was done. In 2018 H&M got backlash for an ad showing a black child wearing a hoodie with the slogan “coolest monkey in the jungle,” which was widely deemed as racist. These incidents show how important it is to have thoughtful and culturally sensitive content, one misstep can cause severe reputation damage and erode public trust.

To avoid these pitfalls businesses must prioritise quality over quantity. Regular content audits and updates to outdated or underperforming content will safeguard your brand’s commitment to delivering great content. By investing in great and relevant content businesses will not only increase engagement but also build trust, credibility, and loyalty. This will lead to long-term success.

The User Experience Is King

Creating searchable content isn’t enough—Google’s recent algorithm updates focus on enhancing user experience, aligning with its mission to “organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” As digital content shapes the future of information consumption, Google prioritizes accessibility and usefulness in its rankings to serve real people, not robots.

Quality content that meets user needs satisfies both audiences and search engines, ensuring mutual success. Keep these principles in mind as you optimize your content for users.

Google has unveiled a new concept they call E-E-A-T, which stands for

Experience. Expertise. Authoritativeness. Trustworthiness.

The inclusion of “experience” suggests that the author’s level of expertise in the subject matter is another criterion against which content quality can be judged.

Google’s new definition of E-E-A-T emphasizes the importance of “trust” as the “most important member of the E-E-A-T family.” 

Google also offers many other illustrative instances of crucial ideas, including:

• Assessing the trustworthiness of online resources and their authors.
• How significant E-E-A-T is, and what weight it should be given in assessments.
• To what extent may information do harm? 

Web Page Experience Matters

When it comes to defining page experience, Google uses the following criteria:

• Does the website provide a secure experience for visitors?
• Is the site optimized for viewing on mobile devices?
• Do ads interfere with the main content on the page?
• Are there intrusive elements that obstruct users’ view of the content?
• How easily can users find the main content on the page?
• Can people easily distinguish the main content from other content?

Companies involved in supplying information need to focus on page experience to effectively engage their audience.

Google also focuses on what they refer to as Core Web Vitals (CLV). This category includes three critical issues:

• How long it takes your site to react to user input
• How long it takes web pages to load
• How predictable your site is (for example, no random pop-ups or page shifting)

These may seem like common sense aspects that every designer should consider, but sometimes you may do things in the name of promotion that go against the principles of good design. To rank well, you need to optimize your content for your user, making it high quality and featuring it front, center, and fast!

The Well-Designed Website’s Place in SEO

You’ve seen that search engines are not just about delivering great content. They care about providing a great experience, of which content is just one part. With that said, if you want high rankings, it’s important to have an expertly crafted website like the ones created at Mighty Fine. After all, who will care that your content is well-written if your site is ugly, hard to navigate, loads slowly, or has elements obstructing the very content your user is there to see?

Not only does a high-quality, user-friendly website help Google look good and accomplish its goal, but it also helps your business look good and brings you closer to your goals of increasing brand awareness and boosting your bottom line.

Measuring Success and ROI

Measuring success isn’t just about crunching numbers – it’s about finding the story behind the numbers to inform your strategy. Key performance indicators (KPIs) like engagement rates, website traffic, conversions, and ROI are your compass to what works and what doesn’t.

Tools like Google Analytics are your magnifying glass to see patterns in traffic, engagement, and user behaviour. On social media, likes, shares and comments tell you how your content is landing with your audience. Content audits and customer feedback give you even more insight to see where to grow and refine.

When you measure your content, you can tweak your strategy, optimise resource allocation, and get results. ROI analysis highlights the financial return on your investment, so every piece of content is working hard. By measuring and evaluating, you can align your strategy to business goals and set yourself up for long-term growth and success.

Your Content Marketing Partner Means Everything

You can see why we think content is king. Scoring top search engine rankings requires more than just throwing a few words together and publishing them to your website or blog. Instead, content is successful when it creates memorable experiences.

That’s why having the right partner is key to success in content marketing. There’s a reason why most brands spend more than a quarter of their marketing budget partnering with a digital marketing agency. Building authority in your industry requires assistance from marketers who excel in their respective fields.

From building the foundations of your business through branding and web design to helping your ideal customers find you through marketing and advertising, Mighty Fine can help you achieve your goals. 

Contact us today to discover how we can work together to create a strategic digital advertising campaign that gives you peace of mind about your marketing so you can focus on doing more of what you love and growing your business.