Brand Storytelling begins with the customer

The customer is at the center of your Brand Story and not the Brand. It is about how your customers want to see and experience the brand. You may have a great proposition but if it does not meet with customer’s expectations or content quest, the customer will look for other content sources.

Marriott that has announced the launch of its Content Marketing initiative, with a magazine marriott Traveler” based on the success of a short film “Two Bellmen“. Two Bellmen has amassed over 4 million views.

Content Marketing brings Your Brand to Life in Your Customers’ lives

Customer wants to interpret and consume information that they find and stories that are likely to breathe life into your customers expression or way of interpretation, the story is not likely to make for a great Content Marketing effort. Content that you share with your audience should seek to add value to your customers lives by enriching the customer experience.

To achieve a good mix of credibility and creative freedom, it is important for Brands to engage influencers.

According to a Forbes research on Influencer marketing and role of influencers

• Experts are critical at the onset of a purchase cycle. Since readers trust this group their content often introduces new products and services to readers who may otherwise not be aware.
• Brand content becomes more powerful the further you get into the sales cycle. While expert content is always preferred, likely for its neutrality, as customers become closer to buying they tend to gravitate toward greater trust in a brand delivered message.
• Influencers (experts) are far and away the most trusted at the point of sale. Many tend to think reviews can deter purchased but it appears that once a buyer is close to making a purchase they are more willing to overlook negative reviews.

Content Marketing Creates an Ongoing Connect

Content marketing is not only about creating an emotional bond with your customer with a campaign that resonates with your audience, but also creating an ongoing connect where customers seek your content to answer the questions or looking at ways to entertain themselves.

Content Begets Content

Engagement with Content is not a One-time Effort but an ongoing exchange with the customers, where the customers interacts with brands seeking ways to enrich their lives. The Content exchange creates points of influence, where customers are most likely to seek content from and share content. According to a Study From Google, the path to purchase and points of Influence For Auto, Beauty and Smartphones category are:

Content Marketing Requires Brands To Tell a Unique Story

If your brand story is same as that of the competitors in the market, the users may not find it engaging or entertaining to create a surround cloud that your brand requires to create a buzz or get found. Use different ways to tell your Brad’s story. optimizing your content with a large number of pieces being published can help increase the chance of getting found, however, to create the viral buzz it is important to have a unique content proposition. Unique Content Proposition requires knowing the buyer persona of your audience and knowing what gets them glued to your brand. The content can be highlighted with a visual treatment that brings your audience back to you as they like the visual or the audio treatment.

Looking at newer ways to present the content can also up the engagement for your brand. This could mean generating content that people find immersive due to the sequencing of posts with visuals and static posts, or using a campaign idea with an execution that makes your brand relatable in your customers’ lives.

A Chart that can help you understand the importance of attributes for customers that are seeking value from content in addition to advertising information.