You’ve likely seen or heard the phrase “content is king.” Coined in an essay by Bill Gates in 1996, the phrase refers to how content will rule the Internet. We posit, however, that content is actually queen.
Queens Are The Key To Any Strategy
In chess, queens are the key to any strategy. They are often described as the most powerful piece with the ability to move in any direction. Players must use their queens smartly and nimbly to achieve a winning strategy.
In digital marketing, content is queen. Content is a key component of any channel’s paid or organic strategy. The digital marketing team must react smartly and nimbly to create the best content for brands that will stand out among all the other media out there. Without content, as without a queen in chess, your game is sunk!
Creating a good chess strategy requires intelligent use of your queen. You shouldn’t just move the piece around without forethought and study of the board. In digital marketing, before implementing a plan, we have to fully understand the client’s brand and determine the best ways to use content.
Studying The Board With The VAST Methodology
In order to “study the board,” the NetElixir Content Team uses the VAST methodology to determine the best path forward. V stands for voice and brand knowledge. We analyze each client’s voice and tone used on their website and social media. If they don’t have any content yet, we work with the client to understand their brand and how they want to represent themselves. Are they casual and fun, like a close friend, or are they business-like and serious, providing no-nonsense facts and information?
A stands for audience understanding and development. We have to understand who we’re speaking to in each brand’s voice. We analyze all the potential groups this brand could reach, including those that the client themselves might have missed. Who could possibly benefit from this product and how? These are the people we want to connect with.
S stands for storytelling. This is where we put voice and audience together and share content that expresses what the client wants to say and how they want to say it. Here, we also consider trending topics and tangential keywords to find new avenues for sharing the brand’s story.
Finally, T stands for testing. Any strategy needs to be tested in order to determine its success. Testing leads to insights about what methods work best for each client’s brand and what resonates with their audience. With these insights, we make revisions and adjustments to optimize results — and then we test again.
Once we’ve analyzed all of these factors, the content team is ready to make a move and create differentiated copy.
One Team With One Key Element
Ultimately, a digital marketing strategy is built of many different parts with different functions. Like on a chessboard, these disparate parts make up one team, and they all must be used together to succeed. Regardless of whether your strategy includes paid search, paid social media, or SEO, you need strong, well-developed content to implement it successfully. In chess, whether your strategy begins with a knight defense or sacrificing a pawn, your queen is likely to be the crux of your game. If you don’t use your queen enough or you take too many risks, your strategy is likely to fail. Similarly, if you don’t create and utilize your content strategically, you won’t be able to pull off a successful marketing strategy.
Content is queen.
