The Unseen Bond Between Content Marketing and Copywriting

At Modern Marketing Partners, we love to keep you updated on the recent changes that affect the marketing world. One of the most important considerations in your content marketing is the effect of copywriting, the ability to write compelling media that will drive people to make a decision. But what are the differences? What are the similarities? How do they impact each other?

After broader research of the topic, we found an article that we would like to share about the competition and correlation between the two. Titled “Content Marketing vs. Copywriting: Top Strategies for 2014,” this post in Social Media Today by Julia McCoy gives in-depth analysis of the effects of both on your overall marketing strategy. We’ve narrowed it down and given you everything you need to know about.

Content Marketing

According to the Content Marketing Institute, content marketing is defined as “a marketing technique of creating and distributing relevant and valuable content to attract, acquire and engage a clearly defined and understood target audience.” The end goal or objective is to drive the profitable customer to positive action.

Content marketing is especially important today because traditional marketing methods have been tuned out by millions. Television advertisements are generally ignored; hence, why people love their DVRs and prefer watching their favorite shows via commercial free instant services like Netflix and Hulu.

The purpose of content marketing is not only to attract customers, but also to retain them through the consistent creation and acquisition of valuable and relevant content. Clearly, this is an ongoing process that you will likely integrate into your marketing plans or strategies.

Copywriting

Wikipedia says that copywriting is “writing copy [or text] for the purpose of advertising or marketing.” Copy is written with the intent of persuading a potential customer to purchase a product, a service or adopt a specific belief or idea. In essence, copywriting is one of the steps involved in the creation and implementation of a content marketing strategy.

How Can You Introduce High Quality Copy Into Content Marketing?

Content is said to be the present and future of marketing. In our technological world, audiences are bombarded with tons of information on a daily basis. As a result, they’ve become experts at skimming, weeding out the “fluff” and zeroing in on the information that strikes them as relevant and valuable.

With this in mind, it is vital to adopt strategies designed to deliver effective content marketing; the kind that’s packed full of the best ingredient: quality, tempting copy. What’s the secret? Knowledge. Content marketing is not complicated, but it does involve knowing a little about the brains of your audience.

Knowing Your Content Marketing’s Target Audience

You’ve no doubt read a lot about knowing your audience. In order to produce quality copy that is relevant and valuable to your marketing strategy, you need to understand the following

Merely identifying this information isn’t enough. To truly know your audience, you need to get inside their heads and understand HOW and WHY they react. Once you manage this, you’ll be ready and able to apply some of the top strategies for 2014:

Build an Emotional Connection

Everyone has their favorite type of content styles and means of communication. Content can elicit an emotional response, and content that triggers an emotional reaction is proven to:

Hook
Engage
Impact
Motivate
Retain

The quickest way to tap into your audience’s emotions is to use the power of headlines. Headlines are the most prominent element on any page, and what they say can make the audience think; think about reading the content beneath the headline.

Studies indicate that emotionally charged headlines promote sharing, which is the golden egg of a successful marketing strategy. When a headline produces a strong positive or negative emotion, people are more likely to retweet and share. What kinds of emotion should you target? The most commonly shared headlines inspire awe, stir up anxiety or incite anger.

Use Logical Techniques to Motivate Your Audience

This strategy can be summed up in one word: persuasion. You can write a beautiful piece of content with incredibly persuasive potential, but will your audience take the time to read it? If you include eye-catching and emotion-provoking headlines, you’re on the right track. The next step is to tap into logic.

Logic through format. One of the most popular formatting options for content is bullet and numbered lists. These short blurbs of information stand out just as much as headlines, but did you ever consider whether or not they were ordered correct? Proper order is important because our brain is expecting it.

Motivation through emotion. Humans share a deeply engrained biological fear of loss. We’re far more fearful of losing something than gaining the same something. As a result, you can appeal to you audience and motivate them by focusing on how not to lose.

Another way to motivate your audience is through positive peer pressure. In other words, openly show the audience why your current customers chose you.

KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid)

The words we chose directly affect the ability of our audience to comprehend and process their meaning. Your choice of content language should be strategic yet simplistic.

The trick to this strategy is to avoid dumbing down the content, but keeping a lower-literacy user in mind as it is created. Not everyone can read and understand college level material. There’s no shame in this. However, the majority of people can readily read and comprehend an 8^th-grade level.

Build Relationships with Your Audience

Social media is HUGE, and it’s only expected to grow larger. It promotes one-on-one relationships and intelligent conversations. One of the strongest success strategies for effective content marketing is building a relationship with your audience, making them feel involved and important.

Copywriters build on relationships by interacting with their audience. They take suggestions and criticisms and add them to their expanding pool of experience.

Through social media platforms, companies can build relationships with their audience. The audience—a diverse mixture of past, present and potential customers—can offer their two-cents, which in turn helps them feel a closer connection to the company, brand or individual.

Seek Professional Copywriters and Content Marketers

Search engines are cracking down. Poor-quality content is unacceptable. Successful content marketing is hinging almost entirely on high quality copy—the kind professional copywriters are experienced in providing. No matter how awesome you are at marketing research, strategies and content writing, it’s no substitute for a true professional; the elitist who is in the trenches every single day and on top of every last update—no matter how minor, major or in between.

How Can You Incorporate Copy into Your Content Strategy?

The answer is simple.

Know your audience
Interact with them
Build their emotion
Create a cycle of relationships.

Now is the time to act, bringing your content strategy into the eyes of the consumer and onto the top page of Google. Proper planning, writing, and follow-up are the first steps to building a great content campaign.

Content Marketing is the Story of Your Brand- Don’t be the person who tells boring stories. You know who we’re talking about, the person who will drone on and on about things that are in no way engaging. Do you really want your brand to epitomize that person?

Having a well-developed content strategy is imperative. We offer a free review of your current strategy and advice on improving it in our Modern Marketing Report Card. Contact Chief Marketing Officer Neil Brown for more information on how you can bring successful content through engaging copy.