As the e-commerce brands have grown in popularity, they have embraced content marketing over the past couple of years.
However, while some e-commerce sites are using content exceedingly well, others seem to be doing nothing more than ticking boxes and not incorporating content entirely.
To those less familiar, there are three content types:
• Transitional content
• Transactional content
• Relationship-building content
Transitional content – as the name indicates, it is when the content shifts reader’s attention from product awareness to evincing of interest.
Transactional content – This type of content encourages people to complete a transaction – be it signing up an email or completing the purchase procedure.
Relationship-building content – This content is what people think of when content marketing is mentioned. The objective of this content is to build an audience and gain their trust. This content should help to move customers towards the point where other types of content are required.
There are indeed many issues when it comes to the use of content by e-commerce sites. Many e-commerce sites have just stuffed the content onto the site without properly incorporating it into the site or utilizing it where it can have an optimum impact.
For example, DIY retail offers plenty of opportunities for brands to produce valuable and informative content including how-to, instruction manuals, buyer’s guides, etc.
However, these have to be comprehensive, reader-friendly, well laid out and professionally produced. It would perhaps be useful on category pages, where clients could have easy access to the kind of content with FAQs as also dealing with possible concerns about the products.
The content must also be used where it can be read by most including the retailer and customer. They may also be shown on category pages where customers are considering purchases.
Your efforts at content marketing will not succeed unless you are dedicated and not half-hearted. There needs to be a commitment to produce regularly interesting and informative content.
There are several instances where sites start a blog, publish two or three posts a month, and then needlessly get frustrated and conclude that this whole content marketing is a purposeless exercise.
You will have to research to find out how often you need to post content. There are people that publish between eight to ten articles per day. This may be on the high side. You will have to determine that works well for your business. Apart from the correct frequency, consistency of quality is also needed.