In my opinion, online advertising has to be engaging rather than just being persuasive. Consumers are, after all, a very sophisticated bunch, and massive amounts of information are readily available online. You may have drawn them into your site by being organically relevant in search engines or through online advertising, but a potential customer going to your website will leave in a heartbeat if they perceive no value in what your site offers. Hence, SEO alone cannot stand the test of time without involving your customer in a meaningful ‘conversation’. By ‘conversation’, I really do mean a two-way communication between you, the service/product provider, and your customer.

Instead of passively delivering a message that you expect your customers to swallow hook, line and sinker; your messages, instead, should become an engaging series of conversations, where feedback is welcomed with open arms, ideas are shared and developed, and relationships between both parties grow.

What does it mean for you as a business? As a business, it means you get your customers engaged, and this engagement happens before you even sell your wares to them. Essentially you are creating ‘hooks’ in their head; when they think of a topic related to what you’re selling, they will think of you. You have created something of value to customers. Therefore engagement is an invaluable means to keep your clientèle involved in your brand.

How do we engage our customers then? Through honest creation of content, unique to your purposes of your company. Information seen as useful for your customers will sit well with them. Providing a platform for constructive feedback, or at least a channel for your customers to send you their thoughts on the subject matter. Social media has also proven itself invaluable in such a channel. All in all, unique content centered around your customers can only be a good thing, for one search engines love relevant content and secondly, your customers will see that you possess the domain knowledge relevant to their needs.

In conclusion, building on good content will prove itself to invaluable to your business in the long run.

Filed under: Content Marketing, Marketing