This will be marketing expert, entrepreneur, and author Ayat Shukairy’s first time at Content Marketing Conference—and we can all agree she’s in for a treat. But everyone who attends her session is in for a treat, too, because she’s going to share what it takes to create websites—and content, of course—that visitors (who aren’t necessarily customers!) fall in love with…and get them to convert!
Ayat hints at what she’ll be talking about at CMC18 in her Speaker Q&A:
Q: What excites you most about presenting at CMC18?
A: Whenever I speak at a new conference, I’m excited about meeting new people, experiencing the format, setting, and location of the event, and learning from a wide range of interesting speakers. I love Boston, so it’ll be great to visit the city again (last visit was like 10 years ago!).
Q: Why is NOW the time to master content marketing?
A: A couple of years ago the craze was about producing mass amounts of content and the focus was on length and so forth. However, content marketing plays an integral role in engaging your audience (if you know the audience) and you are producing pieces that they will love and share. The ultimate goal remains creating a loyal base. However, the problem is that many organizations haven’t honed in on the process of what they are creating and for whom and why, so you are getting massive amounts of untargeted and uninteresting pieces that end up creating more noise than anything significant.
For instance, I may search about the “10 don’ts of content marketing” and I’ll get 10 articles that are the same exact nonsense adding no value to what I am seeking. Nobody is offering a unique perspective and everyone is spewing the same content, just worded differently. The organizations that are succeeding are those that have a strategy built upon what clients need and want. Those are the organizations that have a loyal tribe that is sharing their content and gaining more members and customers.
Q: What does it take to connect with customers today—and how can great content do that?
A: Connecting with customers is no easy feat. In a world where customers are exposed to thousands of marketing messages a day, it’s hard to break through the noise. Additionally, nowadays, every product and service has become commoditized, because every company is offering the same thing. This makes standing out amongst competitors challenging; but with great content, organizations have a means to stick out. They’re providing a unique perspective that can help them gain loyalty and a tribe.
Q: If there was just one thing you could convince all content marketers to do, what would that be?
A: Oye, that’s a tough one. When we started our blog, we were always catering to our target market personas with our content. So those type of personas who are likely to be interested in our service. What we found, however, after conducting research, is that people are coming to us to learn, and we need to address those learners and cater to their needs. So although our priority is gaining customers, clearly those visiting our blog aren’t looking for conversion rate optimization (CRO) services—they aren’t our target customers (at least, not always). Well, if you had that type of information would you throw in the towel on content, or would you do something about it?
We decided to gain those marketers who are coming to our blog to learn as loyal tribe members because they’ll share our content, which gives our pieces more visibility, helping us rank more and become authorities in the eyes of Google on the topics surrounding CRO. This strategy is long-term, but it has paid off and got us more recognition and a better chance to win brand-aware customers. So that one thing is, understand who is reading your content and know how to address them (even if they aren’t your target customer).
Learn more about Ayat and catch her 10 Tips to Get into the Brains of Your Site Visitor
session on May 4 from 1:15pm – 1:55pm.