‘Content is king’- the title of an essay by Bill Gates published in 1996 has become an overused phrase that highlights the importance of content marketing.

The truth is, after all this time, content still remains the king. And, in case if you are a startup, it’s high time you start bowing down to this all-powerful king.

A startup is something born out of numerous sleepless nights, caffeine-fuelled brainstorming sessions and a burning idea or desire to find the solution to a problem.

Once you have all that sorted out, then comes the hard work- marketing.

How to bring in the customers? How to make your brand seen and heard? How to sustain and grow your startup when there is a constraint on the marketing budget?

Content marketing could be your answer to these questions.

This form of marketing which dates back to the late 1980s has come a long way from magazine articles and soap operas to blogs, videos and webinars in the digital era.

And once you set foot into the world of entrepreneurship, you would soon realize that today’s consumers have evolved past responding actively to advertisements and sales talk and rely more on the trust and image that a brand projects for making purchase decisions.

In such a situation, creating engaging content that resonates with the audience can contribute positively to the growth of your customer base.

Here are 5 reasons why, as a startup, you should prioritize content marketing above all other forms of marketing:

Building Brand Voice

The experts in any industry are always respected and trusted by the crowd. When it comes to picking a startup instead of an established brand, trust is one of the deciding factors. One simple way to garner this trust is by presenting yourself as an expert in your industry. This can be done by creating content relevant to your industry that can entertain, educate or solve a problem.  The consumer gets the feeling that ‘this guy knows what he is doing’ and consequently your brand will gain his trust.

Tell Your Brand Story

Everyone loves stories and content marketing is a great way to capitalize on them.

When you are building a brand from scratch, you would certainly have a spectacular story to tell. Why not let your customers know how you came up with the idea for your startup, who you are, the mission and vision your brand stands for, etc.

The Master Key to Many Doors

Great content can complement other digital marketing strategies. It is the best way to get people to subscribe to your newsletter or email list.

Relevant content can boost your SEO rankings and drive organic traffic to your site. In addition, posting content on popular social media platforms can help establish your brand presence at a place where billions of people spend most of their leisure time.

A Pull Marketing Approach

Pushy sales talk and advertisements alone can never achieve the tremendous feat that gets accomplished by marketing good content. People have now become smarter and they can smell sales talk from a long way off. Therefore, marketers are in a race to find new ways of presenting their products and services in the best light to their prospects.

Content marketing is a form of pull marketing that draws customers in. In contrast to outbound marketing such as Google and Facebook Ads, it is more economical. Paid advertising could get really expensive depending on your industry and the leads generated via these channels need not necessarily turn into sales. But with content marketing, you can build a website that draws in organic traffic even if you have to make cuts on your ad budget at times.

Long Term Growth & Results

Content marketing is not a one night stand, it is a long term commitment that adds value to your business by creating awareness, engagement and growth. Simply writing something and publishing it is not enough. This approach to marketing is a long term investment for your startup that requires consistent effort.

Content marketing can progressively add value to your business. It’s different from Ad campaigns where you invest some amount and get a high ROI and then repeat the same procedure over for the next campaign.

With content, each new article you write will supplement the previous articles in your blog, and every new subscriber can potentially turn into a customer in the future.

It can take some time for the results to become obvious, but content marketing can generate higher returns in the long run.

Startups can employ a wide array of content marketing strategies like how to videos, enticing blog topics and interesting infographics to attract attention to their brand.

Irrespective of the type of startup, there is no limit on the variety and amount of content you could create. For instance, if you have a startup raising chickens in the backyard, you could come up with a blog providing valuable chicken breeding tips or a video on how to set up a chicken coop in the backyard.

The only thing that matters is you get started with crafting content that wows your audience! And if you’re having starting trouble, we have a crazy talented group of content writers who’d love to help you out. Check us out here.