Oftentimes, the biggest successes in business come about in ways a leader could never have imagined — through serendipitous opportunities that create unexpected connections.
The only problem is that if we wait for these serendipitous moments to arise on their own, they may never appear.
Content marketing has a way of putting businesses and business leaders “out there,” allowing you to cast a wide net of likelihood that your writing will impress the right client or your insights will resonate with the right influencer.
Related Content: Why the Success of Your Inbound Marketing Strategy is Determined by Your Content
To give you a better idea of what we mean by “serendipitous opportunities,” below are five unexpected benefits of content marketing that we’ve witnessed firsthand.
- Generate new leads. Reading your insights and getting a feel for your expertise may alleviate any hesitations a potential client has about buying your product or service.
- Warm up old leads. If an article written by you provides a new angle on an industry trend, a prospect who stumbles upon it not only remembers you’re out there, but he also sees you have fresh, unique ideas. This can be especially useful if an old lead went with one of your competitors and was disappointed by the service he received.
- Connect with your idols and influencers. At times, your reach can extend far beyond potential clients, allowing you to impress someone you admire. Brent Beshore, for example, published a bucket list naming some of his idols on Forbes. Soon after, a number of those people contacted him — one even went on to become his mentor and advisor.
- Create additional publishing connections. Oftentimes, when you write about a narrowly tailored, niche topic for a general site, editors devoted to that niche end up reading your piece. If the editor likes what he sees, he may reach out and ask if you can write an article for his publication.
- Harness speaking and sponsorship opportunities. Publishing can lead to speaking and sponsorship engagements. Former Influence & Co. client Belo Cipriani, for example, landed a series of speaking gigs with a blind tech company after publishing multiple thought leadership pieces.
The bottom line: Content marketing provides you the opportunity to connect with a wide audience of people you may not have reached otherwise.
Whether an article lands you a new client, a LinkedIn message, or an increase in your company’s blog traffic, positioning yourself as a thought leader increases your chances of encountering those serendipitous opportunities that are crucial to building a business.
Serendipity, Defined - n: A "happy accident" or "pleasant surprise." The fortunate mistake of finding something good while not searching for it.
Still, serendipity doesn’t just come about because you’ve written articles. To truly garner the benefits, there are a few elements you need to incorporate in your content strategy.
- Write about what legitimately interests you.
It puts soul behind your words, showing your readers that there’s a real, passionate person behind that expertise.
- Communicate with readers.
Respond to comments, thank your Twitter followers, and comment on other people’s articles. Doing these things opens up the line of communication between you and your potential followers, and it establishes a true connection.
- Share content on a semi-repeat basis.
Even if you shared an article 10 months ago, it never hurts to continue to promote it. You never know who might have missed it.
- Write regularly, but not all the time.
People need to know that you’re excited about sharing your ideas, but they also need to know you’re actually doing what you’re writing about — not just living behind a computer screen monitoring social media.
Content marketing ultimately takes advantage of what some say is the Internet’s biggest flaw — once you put something out there, it never goes away, and anyone has the potential to see it.
By putting this aspect of the Internet to use, content marketing allows you to create your own luck — paving the way for opportunities you never knew were possible.
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