Content Marketing: How Much is Too Much?

CONTENT MARKETING: HOW MUCH IS TOO MUCH?

Content marketing is one of the most effective ways of generating traffic and acquiring sales leads. In order to get the high amounts of traffic that businesses want, they need to produce a high amount of quality content. The problem is that companies tend to overdo it, which can actually hurt their traffic more than help it. Here are some tips to help you decide exactly how much content you should be posting and when.

Stick to a Schedule

When good content is posted too often, it can appear to the reader as spam. Because you are running posts too close together, you also run the risk of being overly repetitive. This can annoy your regular readers, causing you to see a drop in traffic.

One way to avoid this is to create a schedule for your content. Schedules allow your readers to know when to check back for fresh information. It also allows you time to create fresh content, rather than creating it every time you think of a good idea.

How Often Should I Post New Content?

The amount of content that you will post will depend on your industry. For those building an authority website on a generalized topic, three to five posts daily is normal. Those targeting niche markets will want to post less, as they don’t have as high of competition as those targeting general categories. Posting once per day at the same time each day will usually suffice. Professionals and those targeting even smaller groups of people will often see success when they post one to three times per week.

If you aren’t sure about the number of posts you need to make for your industry, take a look at your competition. Try searching in Google for long tail keywords that are similar to the ones for your website and note their schedule. If your competitors have a mailing list, you should subscribe and take note of how many topics they cover each week.

How Many Times Can I Use the Same Topic?

We all have that one keyword that we really want to squeeze into every blog post. The problem is that unless we are taking a fresh approach to the topic or offering our readers something useful, this will also get repetitive. While this isn’t usually an issue for websites targeting large categories, it can easily become one for those in niche markets. For example, if you are marketing a brand of bug repellent, you can only write general bug repellent articles so many times before people stop reading.

The best way to avoid repetitiveness in content marketing is to understand the five stages of the buying process. By writing topics that appeal to those in each stage, you can easily get 25 various blog posts on a single keyword, each one coming from a different angle.

Use this quick guide to come up with blog topics for each of your keywords. This will give you a wider variety of ideas.

• Awareness – this stage lets people know that they have a problem and there are answers. For a bug repellent, these would be topics like who is being affected by bugs, which areas of the home bugs are found in, what bugs are found in the home, why we get bugs or how getting bugs can affect our lives.
• Consideration – this stage is where the customer is evaluating different solutions on the market. Blog posts that target people in this stage usually compare products and features. Spotlighting different features of your product can fit in well here.
• Intent – this stage appeals to the customer’s logical side. Here you are appealing to their emotions and helping them lean towards your products. Write posts about who is benefiting from your product, what your product can do or how your product is working.
• Purchase – this stage is encouraging customers to buy from you. For bug repellent, you might want to discuss topics like who can get a discount on shipping, what promotions your company has coming up or which of your repellents are being purchased most often.
• Repurchase – this stage encourages people to come back to you. For content marketing purposes, think about why people would want to keep in contact with you and learn more about your niche. Usually, these posts are very technical and offer your clients information about a keyword that they can’t get anywhere else.

Even if you are marketing a website built around one keyword, you shouldn’t overuse the same topic. Repetitive websites do not look professional and often rank lower in search engines. If you feel your topic is very specific, such as a brand of bug repellent, then expand your topics to cover news stories or the latest developments as well as general usage articles.

How Many Times Should I Share My Content?

Content marketing and social media marketing often tie together very closely. Once you have your social media posting schedule in place, you may want to consider sharing your new content automatically. Sharing your content once when it is published is a great idea, as many followers use social media to track their favorite writers and websites.

Avoid the temptation to post links to your content all of the time, as it can make your social media account look like spam. Instead, try sharing your content once when it is published, again a few weeks later and then again if it becomes relevant. It is a good idea to share the content via all social media networks you have an account with as well as email when you first publish. Afterwards, rely on inbound links, reader shares and search engines to bring you a steady stream of traffic.