Your business is as good as the content you present. When it is about engaging customers online, content is the way of communication! And the way in which you put forward your ideas makes all the difference!
Although publishing of good content has prevailed since many years, the formats through which content is presented has changed. It is important for you to know and adapt to the new and trending formats to present your business or company information in an appealing way.
Content formats have evolved overtime and you have new avenues at your disposal in the year 2020 and in the close coming years.
It’s good if you have an active blog and a noteworthy social media presence, this needs to remains constant but the type of content you work on needs to change with time. The more types of content you work on, the better reach you have for your business. This includes providing new support options to your customers that transforms the way in which you offer customer service.
Here is a list of trending content formats that will open new avenues of customer support for you:
Online Courses
Today, many people are interested in learning new skills that will help them improvise. If you are a business owner, you are considered as one of the experts in the industry and you are expected to present information that is useful to people for winning their hearts.
When you curate this information into an online course, it is a great way to get the attention of your audience and to keep them engaged on your website for a longer time. If you create an online course, you also establish yourself as a leader in your industry. You can share your knowledge about something you are passionate about by creating an online course for it. To look at it from another point of view, creating and offering an online course can also be an alternate source of income for you.
Your first step towards offering an online course is planning the course modules carefully. If your online course is through videos, you need audio and video equipment and you need to have many takes on how you can present the information in the best possible way to your audience though your videos.
Podcasts
A podcast is a series of audio files that can be downloaded for listening. Although podcasts have been around for quite some time, they have recently gained popularity from content marketers. The number of people listening to podcasts worldwide have increase over time and it is expected to increase in the coming years. In recent times, podcasts are driven majorly by the smart phones.
You can create various service-related podcasts where experts can break down the use of products for better understanding for the customers. You can also create podcasts about leadership and motivation were the leaders from various industries can talk about the trending aspects.
You need to have the right audio setup and then you can start creating regular podcasts. This is a great way to present useful information. Just like you post content in a blog, you can present the same information through podcasts.
Topic Focused Content
Google’s algorithm has evolved overtime and now they analyze more than just the quality of a page for ranking that page. Google also considers the context of a page in relation with the entire website. The overall value of a web page or a website is determined from the perspective of an individual searcher.
For instance, if there are two guides in the search results that provide information on the topic – online marketing. Both of them might be similar in quality while one is posted on a website that provides online marketing services and the other guide is posted on some article directory that publishes many other types of content. When someone searches about online marketing guides, the former will definitely rank better because it comes from a source that provides online marketing and therefore it is expected to provide more value to people.
You can utilize this trend by creating long pillar pages for establishing a foundation for your content marketing efforts. While creating pillar content, you need to work on a wide range of topics that are different viewpoints and nuances of a single topic. The supplementary content you create after this is where you can get more specific. Here you can go deeper and create content about individual topics that are in synchronization with your pillar page. Interlinking your content is also equally important.
Self-Service Content
Potential customers might want to know more about your company and they will have questions in minds that they want to ask you but they might not get in touch with you to ask you these questions. But you need to answer them anyway! You can address the concerns of your potential customers through establishing a knowledge base or an FAQ where you talk about the most common questions people ask you and technical questions about the products or services you offer.
Even if people are interested in your offerings, they might not want to talk to a customer representative at times; they wouldn’t send you an email either! In this case, your content needs to be self-explanatory. An enriched knowledge base or FAQ has a lot of potential to resolve customer queries.
Webinars & Live Videos
Similar to online courses, webinars and online videos have also gained momentum. Video streaming constitutes a huge amount of online traffic and it is expected to increase in the coming years. The demand for live video content is not only limited to sports and entertainment! Many big brands have established their customer following by streaming live videos on Facebook and other social media channels and video websites. You also have the option to host webinars on your website.
This is the era when people are keen about live videos instead of previously recorded ones. Live videos have the potential to get more views, get more comments, shares, people engagement and a larger viewing time as compared to pre-recorded videos.
EBooks
Creating Ebooks is a great way to provide valuable information to the customers and for attracting new potential customers as well. EBooks can be written by businesses pertaining to all industries, their scope is not limited. An EBook is an all-inclusive document through which you can cover any topic you like. Informative documents and guides in the form of EBooks work great for B2B and B2C companies. By providing a downloadable EBook, you offer information for free and this can establish you as an expert author in that niche.
Crafting a meaningful EBook helps your customers to understand you and your content in a better way and this further helps in driving sales. Through a well crafted EBook, you can align your ideas and content with the buying journey of your customers so that they become confident about your business brand. You don’t have to necessarily think about new topics for creating an EBook, you can compile a series of related blog posts and articles to make a meaningful document. You can also publish your EBook on Kindle where more people will find it and read it.
Case Studies
Case studies have immense power when it comes to depicting a specific scenario. Through a case study, you present to your customers something that you have created or solved and this is an example of your approach towards that situation. A case study comprises of both, knowledge and actionable information. Through a case study, you can establish thoughtful leadership, a case study is always unique and it is sharable.
A case study has to be presented in a standard format where you write a summary of the case study, explain the problem or the situation that you are evaluating, explain what solutions you implemented and then move on to the results attained and why they matter. You can find some great examples of case studies online; you can refer them to create yours. However while drafting a case study, it is important to make sure that it is interesting, it must contain storytelling elements like “why” and “how”. If a case study is presented in a standard information format, it will become boring; you must draft a story around the situation that you are presenting in your case study.
Good content providers you endless opportunities to reach out to people. While drafting any type of content, you must think from people’s point of view and you will be in a better position to improvise on it. Adapt with the new content trends and make your mark! Today it is all about presenting your content in the most impressive way and in a way that is readable and keeps the audience engaged and this can be done with the content formats mentioned in this article.
