1. What is content marketing? How do brands use it in their communication strategies? What are the goals/objectives?
“owning, as opposed to renting media. It’s a marketing process to attract and retain customers by consistently creating and curating content in order to change or enhance a consumer behavior.”
2. Select a brand of your choice and identify a specific communication objective for this brand. Describe the role of content marketing in your efforts. How might content marketing be integrated in both traditional and non-traditional strategies of this brand? Please be very specific; identifying individual traditional mediums (particular TV programs, print, etc.) and non-traditional mediums (particular networks for instance) in your response.
In a way, THF is already starting to produce informative content that starts to establish their authority on the subject of early childhood development in regards to disaster preparedness. Through distributing their book Big Wanda to schools across New Orleans, THF has started the process of establishing themselves as leaders. However, there are still areas in which THF has failed to utilize some of the potential benefits content marketing presents. With the majority of the traditional marketing strategies, including television interviews on local new networks and holding fundraising events, THF has spent the majority of its marketing efforts on finding money to support book distributions and events. However, despite the amount of independent research conducted by THF in order to effectively understand social disparities and areas most in need of their educational books, THF is missing out on a huge potential to publish their research on their blog. In doing so, in combination with current news appearances and the successfulness of their book to prepare children for disasters, THF has the potential to take the lead in promoting and educating the greater New Orleans community on the importance of early childhood development.
3. What specific metrics will you use to determine/modify the direction of your campaign?
The metrics that are needed in order to understand the impact a content marketing campaign has, rest predominately on consumption, sharing, lead generating, and sales metrics (Field Guide to Metrics). The first, consumption, can be evaluated by focusing on popularity of articles or videos published on the blog. By integrating articles that do not directly deal with the THF fundraising but are published by THF, enables a wider audience to access the information. Research articles have the potential to be used be others that may not take the same direction THF has taken, resulting in a wider audience accessing the information while establishing themselves as a legitimate source regarding early childhood development. Similarly, by examining sharing metrics, the THF is effectively able to determine which articles catch the most attention and where they are being shared. This provides invaluable insight into the institutions, organizations, and individuals accessing and utilizing this information. This results in potential partnerships that can be established between other leading educational institutions further strengthening the legitimacy THF holds.
Consumption and sharing metrics are an essential to help determine how effective a content marketing strategy is. In comparing the consumption and sharing metrics, a strong estimation of the additional audience accessing and utilizing the information can be accounted for. For example, how often an article is being shared and utilized can give a good estimate as to which resources and publications create the most leads or informed decisions. Adding further value, by comparing consumption and sharing metrics to sales metrics allows the ability to determine which sources of content generate the most leads. It is after this point that the THF would be able to evaluate lead generating metrics in order to determine the most beneficial content. For example, if content involving fundraising events generates less leads than a research article, THF should focus on more research-oriented material in order to continue strengthening their support base. However, its is just as important to take into consideration that fundraising events may be a more valuable source of content helping to maintaining members more so than attracting them.
In the case of the Team Happy Foundation, a content marketing strategy could dramatically improve the lead generating material essential to the organizations long-term success. With the majority of their marketing focus directed at maintaining current supporters, THF is failing to acknowledge the importance of lead generating content marketing. Though they are establishing themselves as leaders in regards to early childhood development through televised interviews, book publications and donations, they can take more steps to insure they are continuing to generate more supporters. By producing more research and publishing of their findings, connecting and establishing relations with other educational institutions, and continuing the current marketing efforts to retaining supporters, THF has the potential to make a lasting impact in the field of early childhood development.
References Cited
Linn, Michele. “Field Guide to the 4 Types of Content Marketing Metrics.” Content Marketing Institute. How to Guides, November 5th 2012. Web. Nov. 20th
Team Happy Foundation. Team Happy (dot) Org. Web. Nov. 20th
