We’re diving deep into the foundation of a strong content plan, an area often mistargeted, especially by freelancers working with new businesses. It all begins with understanding the business for which you’re creating content. Clearly define the business, its purpose, services, and features (and how they measure impact in qualitative and quantitative ways). Then make sure you have your ICP created with clearly defined roles, responsibilities, and how they are measured. If you have a measurable on the customer side that matches with the measurable on the business side…you have a benefit! Your content should be built around benefits.
Step 1: Identify the Company and Create a Value Statement
The first step in building a content topic matrix is to identify the company and craft a succinct value statement. Think of this as a logline for a movie or a book, which clearly states, “We do X for Y.” The more straightforward, the better. Sure, you might have additional details, like, “We do X for Y by doing ABC,” but the primary focus should be on the core message.
Step 2: List the Services
Once you have your value statement, list down all the pragmatic services that the business provides. These might be specific tasks, product lines, or any form of value that the business offers to its clients.
Step 3: Understand the Features and their Impact
Dive deeper into the services provided by your business, list down the features and for each feature, identify which Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) they affect. The idea is to understand how the features of your service can positively impact your clients. For instance, if your business is in manufacturing and you offer a feature that reduces kickbacks on the line, this will likely decrease returns from the customer.
Step 4: Identify Your Ideal Client Profile (ICP)
Next, create a profile of your ideal client, including their role, responsibilities, and pain points. Let’s take Mary, the Head of Business Development, as an example. Identify her responsibilities within her company and then enumerate the pragmatic measurables that relate to her role.
The most crucial aspect here is identifying her pain points. For instance, if she’s the head of quality for a manufacturer, a return from a customer can be a massive pain point as it signifies reduced quality, tarnished reputation, and necessitates uncomfortable conversations with customers.
Step 5: Create a Benefit Matrix
The magic happens when you can match a pragmatic measurable to a pain point and trace it back to a responsibility. If you find a corresponding KPI on your feature side, voila! You’ve identified a benefit. The trick here is not to start with your feature and then find a benefit, but to start from the pain point, identify a pragmatic solution to it, and then link it back to your feature.
Step 6: Craft Content Based on the Matrix
Using this benefit matrix, you can now create a content topic matrix that addresses each point of your customer’s journey – awareness, consideration, and decision stages:
- Awareness Stage: The buyer realizes they have a problem and starts searching for more information. They are likely unaware of your company at this point. Content in this stage is typically educational and aims to reach as many potential customers as possible.
- Blog posts
- Social media posts
- Infographics
- Ebooks
- White papers
- Educational webinars
- How-to videos
- Podcasts
- Checklists
- Consideration Stage: The buyer defines their problem and researches options to solve it. At this stage, they are aware of various solutions and are trying to narrow down their choices.
- Case studies
- Product webinars
- FAQ pages
- Comparison guides (your product vs competitor)
- Demo videos
- Expert guides
- Decision Stage: The buyer chooses a solution. They’ve narrowed down their choices to a few options, and are trying to decide which is the best fit. Content at this stage is typically more specific and detailed about the offerings and benefits of your company’s solution.
- Customer testimonials
- Detailed product descriptions or spec sheets
- Live demos or consultations
- Free trials
- Product literature
- Pricing pages
Remember that the buyer’s journey isn’t always linear and customers may move back and forth between the stages, so it’s crucial to have a mix of content available.
The key takeaway is that we need to flip our perspective: instead of starting with our business and services (even though they need to be clearly defined), we need to start with the customer – their roles, responsibilities, and pain points. Only then can we effectively link our business solutions to their needs, which ultimately forms the basis of a successful content plan.
Remember, too many people start from the wrong end. It’s time we change that and focus on how our business can help alleviate the pain points of our customers. Happy content planning!