So your content is posted, and all your channels are going strong to promote it. Social media, check. Native advertising, check. Content discovery platform, check.
Perhaps it’s time to hit the pause button, because you may have hit the content jackpot without even knowing it. Set aside the editorial calendar; it’s time to look for the golden nuggets of earned media that might be out there.
There’s no need to be modest and just allow the buzz from a blog, vlog, or even a news article to take its natural course. Did you know promoting it might deliver significant ROI? Using a content discovery platform, such as Taboola, you have the potential for your earned media to reach even more people.
People trust earned media.
Before customers choose to buy, they’re asking questions.
What’s the best lawn mower for my price range?
Is that restaurant any good?
Where should I invest my money?
We all know that a great content marketing strategy is an indispensable tool to supply those answers. Customers want an expert opinion to answer their questions so they can make the best-informed decision with their money. When that expert opinion comes from you, freely shared, that builds trust.
When the information comes from an independent, trusted source, the needle jumps even higher. This shows up again and again in marketing surveys and studies. For example, Nielsen’s Global Trust in Advertising survey found that earned media took three of the five most trusted ad formats:
- 83 percent trust recommendations from friends, family, and acquaintances.
- 70 percent trust branded websites.
- 66 percent trust online reviews.
- 66 percent trust editorial content (newspaper articles).
- 61 percent trust brand sponsorship.
When you’re lucky enough to have some earned media that presents your solutions to your customers’ problems, what you have is another tool to build trust.
You’re in control.
When the blog, vlog, or article including your company or thought leaders went live, everyone was pretty excited. At the same time, even when it’s well done and checks off all your boxes, you might be disappointed in the results.
Perhaps the article appeared in a regional publication, so the publication’s efforts to promote its own content does not match your scope, not by a long shot.
Or maybe it’s the headline living on the website. It was written with someone else’s audience in mind, but truthfully, it’s just not optimized for your customers.
Or after that initial social media blast, the fizz has evaporated.
If you use a content discovery platform, that’s an opportunity to give that messaging a second life cycle and reach a fresh audience with the potential of achieving a much greater reach.
When the headline and image appear on the content discovery platform, here’s the biggest advantage of all: You’re in charge of the words and pictures. You can run A/B tests on your creative’s words and images to discover what’s best for grabbing clicks and making more people are aware of your brand. While you can’t change the content itself, you can change how it’s first seen by the world.
Customers deserve a break from a hard sell.
Well, they more than deserve a break. They don’t trust the hard sell, especially online. Let’s take another look at the Nielsen survey, which shows paid online/mobile marketing is the least trusted advertising format:
- 36 percent trust text ads on mobile phones.
- 42 percent trust online banner ads.
- 43 percent trust ads on mobile devices.
What’s up with this lack of trust? You can come up with many answers to this. A very good one is a hard sell is best when it aligns with a customer’s needs at the right moment: When they’re in the mood to buy.
On the other hand, when a hard sell reaches someone up high in the sales funnel, well, they’re not going to care. They may even be annoyed. That’s why you need content that reaches people who are in an optimal position in your sales funnel. The earned media content might have just what you need to catch their attention.
Earned media makes life much, much easier.
It happens. You wish you could change just one little thing about the blog, otherwise, you wouldn’t hesitate to promote it.
Don’t let your deep in-house expertise make things complicated. Remember, what you have is finished content in your hands. Even if it has something small that doesn’t align with corporate messaging, it can still do a great deal of good for your brand. Let this free content work for you and put it out there on a content discovery platform such as Taboola.
Why wouldn’t you want to reach readers and watchers who are interacting with great content on publication websites they already trust? Give that content an extra push and reach even greater numbers.
Bottom line? It pays to promote your earned media.
Taboola is the world’s leading content discovery platform, serving 360B recommendations to over 1B unique visitors each month on the web’s most innovative publisher sites. To learn more about how Taboola can help you A/B test your site content, contact us or start your campaign today.