Every piece of content has work to do, whether it's selling your hot new coaching program or encouraging people to join your mailing list. It pays to have a plan, not just wait for inspiration to strike. Start by creating a content list This is a good project to delegate to a virtual assistant. Divide each piece of content based on format (video, audio, blog post, email, etc.) and categorize each piece by topic or subject. Then note the location of each snippet (blog URL, Vimeo or other private storage service, guest blog URL, etc.). It may sound like a daunting task, but when you put your promotion plan together, you'll be happy to have information in one place. Determine how much new content you can actually produce Now look at your calendar and consider how much content you can actually produce. Once a week or 5 times a week? Can you afford to outsource this kind of content creation? Which format will you make? What call to action would you use? Do you have a product or affiliate product that you want to promote in your call to action? Remember, your market research will tell you which formats are most popular with your audience, so don't get overwhelmed thinking you need to leverage everything.
Focus on which format resonates with your target customers. Are you planning a specific theme or theme for each week or month? Planning is often easier when all of your posts for the month revolve around one theme. Using themes also makes it easier to choose offers for your call to action. How do you choose a theme? Revisit your market research. What topics does your audience want to learn more about? Focus that month's content on that specific topic and move on to your editorial calendar. Basically, you want to set up a comprehensive editorial calendar to keep track of the type of content you'll be producing and the deadlines for publishing it. Once you get into this industry mailing list habit, you can work ahead, within reasonable deadlines and with less stress because you know exactly what's going to happen and when. Types of content you can make: Blog Posts – The most common type of website content. Some experts recommend 1,000 to 2,000 words of valuable content per post, but your market may prefer fewer words. It's more important to thoroughly cover your topic and not waste time on irrelevant words. Also, look for guest blogging opportunities. Writing for an established, authoritative blog with a large following can increase your visibility if you add value to your articles. Video – YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world, with users uploading 300 hours of video every minute. Not only can you expand your audience by creating a YouTube channel, but you can also use video to build trust with your audience faster. Of course, video is an effective way to engage your audience on social media. Social video generates 1,200% more shares than text and images combined.
Ebooks and short reports - the most popular lead generation tools. Provides more information than a single blog post and is a natural next step to promoting your listing after readers have completed your blog post. In exchange for their email address (and the chance to follow up with them), readers receive your ebook and want to follow you on social media. Sell Kindle books on Amazon to increase your credibility and attract more new customers. Know almost Podcast - Encourage your followers to listen to you in the gym and in the car! Have you watched the iTunes Podcasts section lately? It's pretty big, but you'll gain new authority and credibility when people see you on some big-name lists. Don't want to make your own podcast? no problem! Do your research and submit visitor applications to podcasters and hosts you know will reach your target market. Infographics – For those who like to see charts or don’t have time to read the whole blog post. Extract the most important points from your blog posts or latest videos and place them in a graphic format. consistently Now that you've narrowed down what you can actually produce each month, decide on a consistent approach to creating and publishing all of this content. Can you spend an entire morning or day writing blog posts or shooting videos? Scheduling time in your calendar and working on multiple works at the same time allows you to finish ahead of time and gives you an incredible sense of accomplishment. If this style suits you, choose your day of the week and focus on the content.
If one of the formats you use isn't your strong suit - say you're a slow writer or you stutter on video - is there a way you can outsource some of the work? Hiring a ghostwriter or virtual assistant who specializes in content creation is a viable option. Just send her your list of blog titles at the beginning of each month and she'll write you blog posts for you to publish the following month. Hiring a virtual assistant who can do quick video editing will also make your video production easier, even if you're prone to tripping over words. Another word on consistency: Do your readers or followers expect your content to be published on a specific date or time? If so, stick to that consistency. If you've never been consistent, choose the days of the week to post new content now. The worst thing you can do is to CREATE your time in batches and let it build up dust on your hard drive. Once created, make sure it's published! This is another easy task for a virtual assistant to handle, especially if you have everything organized on an easy-to-read editorial calendar. Get creative with your content! Yes, you want it to provide value, but make it unique to you. You need to stand out from the crowd and not look like a cookie-cutter image of other entrepreneurs. **** Where do you currently publish and promote your content? Are you using more than just your blog? Are you producing content in various forms to reach mo