Is your content marketing customer-centric?

“The Do audience intent cluster is, think of how crazy this is, the one on which 97.296% of the current marketing activity is focused. All those ads – BUY NOW, BUY NOW PLEASE! – are simply trying to maximise the chance they'll bump into Do intent. In the processing, annoying everyone in the See and Think intent clusters!”

Avinash Kaushik, Digital Marketing Evangelist, Google.

To prioritise content marketing activities, we recommend initially focusing on customers with the highest levels of intent, starting with “Do” and working backwards to “Think”. Once you’ve got content for these two stages nailed, you can widen your gaze, building out content for both “See” (people with no purchase intent) and “Care” (current customers with some commercial value).

Here’s how:

Do - Using content to drive sales

Start with the “Do” stage, ensuring you’ve got suitable content lined up for people with high purchase intent - who know what they want and are actively looking to buy now - to nudge them over the finish line.

These people are looking for product pages, demo videos and FAQ content to help them understand the ins and outs of the service you’re offering. They want to see case studies and customer testimonials that showcase the results they can expect. They want reassurance that they’re making the right decision.

Once you’ve created your “Do” stage content, it’s time to align suitable engagement points to drive action at this stage, pointing people towards relevant product pages to get a quote, add to cart or speak to a member of staff for more information.

Think - Using content to drive on-site engagement

Once you’ve nailed your “Do” stage content, it’s time to widen your gaze. What about all the people in the “Think” stage, who are still researching and considering different options? They’re not quite there yet. Nurture them, support them, give them helpful advice and guidance - and make sure that when they are ready to buy, you’re front of their mind as a trusted expert in the field.

At this stage, you should be producing content that discreetly reinforces the need for your product or service. Think like a publisher instead of a brand. If you sell car insurance, for example, this could be tips for safe driving in snow, a blog about the damage potholes could do to your car, an accident response guide, or quick videos explaining how to fix a puncture or check your tyre pressure.

Your aim here is to keep people coming back for more. They’re not ready to buy car insurance just yet, so hold off with the “BUY NOW” buttons. For now you just want them to click through and engage with other relevant content, subscribe to your newsletter, and return to your website for more great content.

See - Using content to drive brand awareness

Now that you’ve got the “Do” and “Think” stages down, it’s time to focus right at the top of the funnel. At the “See” stage, people have no commercial intent. Sticking with the example above, this could be anyone who already owns a car and has recently renewed their insurance, or anyone who is thinking about buying a car; your largest addressable qualified audience.

Insurance isn’t on their radar at all yet - so what content will these people find relevant, interesting and entertaining? Suitable content could include a ‘car finder’ tool to help them find the perfect new vehicle, a series of blogs reviewing the top 10 cars for families/students/older drives, or an infographic showing how car design has evolved over the years.

At this early stage, your focus should be on driving likes, impressions and shares - it’s about getting as many people as possible and interact with your content, follow your social accounts and click through to your website to find out more. 

Care - Using marketing to drive customer retention

Your connection with the customer shouldn’t just stop once they’ve entered their card details. Existing customers are just as important as new ones, and we need to work to maintain this relationship and keep them engaged. As an insurance provider, limiting your contact points to the moment someone buys a policy or makes a claim leaves a bad taste in the customer's mouth.

We should be providing content to support them across the entire customer journey. “Care” stage content could be a welcome pack full of information about how to maintain and look after your car or a monthly newsletter full of safety tips and the latest automotive news and trends.

In terms of engagement points, this is your opportunity to upsell and cross sell. Not only do we want customers to renew their policy or make a repeat purchase, we want them to recommend us to friends and family, we want them to rate us and leave positive reviews, we want them to become loyal brand ambassadors.

Aligning your marketing and measurement strategies

Great content is crucial, but it doesn’t stop there. Once you’ve build out entertaining, educational and valuable content that meets the audience intent at each consideration stage, you need to follow it up with great marketing and measurement. That’s the really clever thing about this framework, it provides a way to think about everything through one lens

Ask yourself, are you really meeting your audience’s intent at each of these stages, or is your content, marketing and measurement strategy looking a little lop-sided? Don’t worry, we’re here to help. Find out how a See-Think-Do-Care framework can drive growth for your business.