Downloadable Content Strategy Template And How To Use It

Content is the backbone of marketing.

Whether it’s a keyword-packed blog post designed to help you climb the search engine rankings, or a radio ad aimed at attracting new customers, content is the connecting point between your audience and your business.

To build your brand, build trust, and ultimately drive conversions, you need high-quality collateral that achieves a specific goal.

But this is easier said than done, especially when you consider your overall brand and the need to maintain consistency throughout all of your marketing materials.

Maximizing your impact requires creating a content outline that works towards your short- and long-term goals.

In other words, you need a content strategy.

What is the content strategy?

A content strategy is a concrete plan that outlines how content will be used to achieve your business goals. It should include tactics for targeting your audience at every stage of the marketing funnel, from awareness to loyalty.

By making sure that you’re not just creating content without a purpose, it allows you to create a more effective business that drives action.

For more information on how to analyze your existing content and build a solid content strategy, be sure to check out Copypress’s Content Strategy Webinar.

Now that you know the elements of a successful content strategy, it’s time to start creating your own.

You can create one from scratch, but you don’t have to.

To save time, we’ve created a Downloadable template that you can use. Available on both a Table And Word documentIt contains everything you need to create your own unique content plan.

Download it now in the format of your choice and let’s get to work filling it out.

How to customize this content strategy

1. Determine your basic strategy

Your marketing should tell a story about your brand.

Your content strategy is the roadmap to the plot. Before we dive into creating new marketing pieces, it’s important to define a few key features to ensure everyone, internally and externally, has the same understanding of your brand.

Start by listing your brand reputation and Unique value propositions.

You should also research your competitors and examine the type of content they use. If they are successful with white papers, there is a good chance that should be part of your strategy as well.

Once you have all of this done, you should describe the central topics your content will address. These can include:

• Inspiration.
• Tips, tricks and how-tos.
• Thought leadership.
• Technique.

You will use this information to build the skeleton around which your strategy will take shape.

2. Determine the target audience

Your content should not only promote your products and services – it should meet the need of your audience. You should take their problems into account and explain why you are offering the right solution.

But before you can do that, you need to know who you’re targeting. Customize your content strategy by adding information about your primary and secondary audiences.

You must include:

• demographics – Age group, job title, preferred platforms, etc.
• psychology Interests, hobbies, values, etc.
• challenges – Their pain points, fears, and anything else you can help them with.

You may find it helpful to develop customer personas that describe archetypes to different segments of your target audience.

3. Outline specific goals

The next step in customizing this content strategy template is to define explicit goals and how your content will help you achieve them.

This can include both SMART goals and stretch goals – both of which should be as detailed as possible.

SMART goals are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.

This can include having specific content featured in other publications, generating a certain number of leads within a specified period of time, or producing a set number of new pieces of main content.

Stretch goals, on the other hand, are more ambitious. They are often quarterly or annual goals meant to push your team to higher goals.

In general, your SMART goals will contribute to your stretch goals.

For example, if your stretch goal is to increase web visitors by 150% in the next year, you might want to create a series of SMART goals to break down into manageable tasks. You can create specific goals to identify new keyword opportunities, update existing pages, create a certain amount of new content, and test social and A/B copy, all with the SMART format.

Make sure you have the marketing funnel in mind and set goals for each stage.

4. Determine the topics to be covered

Every piece of content you create and share should have value for your target audience. In this step, you must list everything you intend to cover.

Each piece should align with one of the themes you identified in the first step.

This list of topics can be as high level or as detailed as you want, just be aware that doing the work up front can often save you on the back end.

5. Outline your content mix

And just like no two businesses are alike, no two organizations will use the same mix of content. Depending on your unique needs, you can use formats like:

• blog posts.
• Case studies.
• videos.
• Podcasts.
• Graphs.
• Social media.
• User Generated Content (UGC).
• traditional media.
• Direct mail senders.

This is not an exhaustive list of the different types of content that you can use to help you reach your marketing goals.

You can choose to use many different formats, or just a few. It is up to you to decide what works best for you and your needs.

6. Determine distribution channels

After you’ve decided on the types of content you’ll use, it’s time to figure out where you’re going.

Since the best content in the world will do you little good if no one else sees it, your content strategy will help you avoid this problem by defining which marketing channels to use – and what kind of content goes where.

This helps target the right audience, and by finding the most important places where your audience interacts with your brand, you will be able to find new opportunities.

The content you post on each channel must align with one of the goals you listed in the previous section.

7. Determine the transmission frequency

To keep your brand top of mind and maximize your position in search engine results, you’ll need to release new content regularly.

Again, there is no right answer to this.

Depending on your industry and the competition in it, you may find that publishing one blog post per week is sufficient. On the other hand, you may find that you get the best results by posting on social media three times a day.

Depending on your audience’s needs and wants, you might have one channel that you post to regularly, and another that’s less frequent.

It’s important to walk the line between reminding customers of your existence and annoying them with over-posting.

If you post too little, your audience will forget you. If you post content too frequently, you risk becoming a nuisance, which will unfollow you on social media and unsubscribe from email lists.

8. Collect notes and amend them as needed

Everyone has blind spots and biases, which makes it extremely important to get other people’s opinions on your strategy.

Once you are done filling out this form, send it to key stakeholders for feedback. If you work with a sales force, be sure to get their input.

Ask them if there are any key areas you missed or initiatives from other departments that you could look to.

Even if you are a one-person company, your content does not exist in a vacuum. Ask for the opinion of a trusted friend who knows your industry.

Obviously, you don’t want to share this widely – that would allow your competitors to undercut you – but it never hurts to have a second opinion.

9. Distribution and measurement of your content

Well, this step is not actually part of customizing your content strategy, but it is the most important part of content marketing.

Once you’ve released your content across different channels, you can start looking at key performance indicators (KPIs) and various metrics to see how it’s performing.

There are four main types of content marketing metrics: consumption, engagement, leads, and sales.

The metrics you use will depend on which channel a particular piece of content is using and what your call-to-action (CTA) is.

For example, the success of an outdoor offer with a prominent phone number can be tracked using call tracking, while display advertising can be analyzed through CTR.

Some of the most popular KPIs used in content marketing include:

• organic traffic.
• Return on advertising spend (ROAS).
• Qualified Leads (QLs).
• Cost per lead (CPL).
• Cost per acquisition (CPA).
• Social media return on investment (ROI).

Use the information you gather from these metrics to help you determine where your content strategy has succeeded and failed.

wrapping

By now, you should have a good, coherent content strategy developed.

But there are a few things to remember before you get on your way, and they are:

Don’t forget about search engine optimization

Digital technology will likely be an essential part of most of your marketing initiatives, which means it’s important to keep search engine optimization at the heart of your content plan.

Obviously, this won’t apply to completely offline content, but if any piece of content is going to appear online, it should work with your SEO strategy.

Find content and keyword gaps and plan content based on them. Follow best practices regarding linking, tags, and site structure.

Reuse the winners

If you have a piece of content that has performed particularly well, you should get as much of it as possible.

Look for opportunities to change the format of the piece and republish it on another channel.

For example, you can add some graphics and release the most popular podcast on YouTube, or share your most viewed blog post across your social media platforms. This will help you amplify its reach.

Remember that your content strategy is a work in progress

Content marketers are never done, but that’s okay.

What you learn today will benefit you tomorrow.

Don’t be afraid to go off script if the situation requires it.

With that said, you should stick to your content strategy as closely as possible.

Using what you’ve created here will benefit you in the long run.

More resources:

• How to analyze your content and craft a winning strategy in 2023
• 7 ways to easily set up an SEO content strategy
• Content Marketing: The Ultimate Guide for Beginners

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