How to Make Content in 2022?
To create content loved by users and Google robots you need to know the content marketing trends for 2022. Keep reading our entry to discover a few tips thanks to which writing and optimizing texts won’t be all Greek to you anymore.
Table of contents:
- How to Choose Content in 2022? Trends and the Current Situation
- How to Make Content Marketing in 2022? 10 Simple Steps to Effective Activities
- Be There for the Users
- Don’t Put Keywords Before the Text
- Don’t Get Stuck in Old Patterns That Don’t Work Anymore
- Create Comprehensive and Valuable Content
- Provide a Good User Experience
- Support Your Content with SEO Optimization
- Combine Planning with RTM and Regular Evaluation of Actions
- Make Sure Your Content is Diverse – Find Your Path
- Don’t Try to be a Jack-of-all-trades
- Use Content Marketing to Build Your Brand
- How to Choose Content in 2022? The Takeaway
How to create content in 2022 that engages users? What has changed in content marketing in recent years? Which activities are outdated and which should you follow? The online world is changing very dynamically – to stay up to date, as a marketer, SEO specialist, copywriter, or even e-commerce owner, you really need to keep your finger on the pulse.
In today’s entry we’ll tell you how to create fresh, valuable, and Google-compliant content that is willingly read, seen, watched, or even listened to by users. Sounds abstract? Not necessarily. Don’t lag behind the competition – regularly update your knowledge base so that you keep up with the current content marketing trends in 2022.
How to Choose Content in 2022? Trends and the Current Situation
Can you plan content according to your habits, create schedules based on templates, make posts inspired by previous posts and graphics from free stocks? One look at the actions of many brands reveals that it obviously can be done. But is it effective?
Of course, we’re not saying that the tried-and-true paths are bad (after all, why should you reinvent the wheel?), and old content can’t be recycled (in fact, we wrote a whole article about it – because content repurposing is something that can bring you benefits!), but you should always stay on your toes to make sure that your market rivals don’t outdo your efforts. So, how to make content in 2022? Let’s find out!
Chronic Content Fatigue – Are We Fed up With Content?
It seems like content marketing doesn’t have a bright future in 2022. Well, nothing could be further from the truth. It’s a fact that users are fed up with low-quality content filled with links and ads, ubiquitous clickbaits, and pop-ups. But in no way does it mean that “content marketing is over.” The situation generates new challenges for specialists, forcing even the most popular brands to depart from traditional forms of content and go beyond the average.
More content doesn’t always equal better marketing. Note that according to research, only 7% of marketers are able to say that the effects of their activities are satisfying (Marketing Dive). Your goal is to create content that fascinates, and engages so that it stands out from the hundreds (or perhaps even thousands) of other pieces of information that reach users every day they’re active online.
Nowadays, not only users but also Google algorithms have a lower tolerance for mediocre content (the so-called thin content). That’s why uniqueness is so important and applies to virtually every level of marketing.
Growing Awareness and Budgets
The survey results presented by Lauren Smith from Studio ID are extremely consistent and state that 67% of 100,000 respondents say that their content marketing budget in 2022 will increase compared to the previous year, and only 5% don’t agree with that statement.
According to the Content Marketing Institute, these increases are already happening: in 2021, 43% of professionals noticed growth in their content budget. CMI also sees increasing collaboration between sales and marketing departments – and this trend is likely to continue. The rising threshold of entry, the immense competition, and the potential that lies in well-performed content marketing activities are vital for companies that aim to invest in this branch of advertising.
What Should You Invest in?
In 2021, video was in the first place, just behind it were events (including still popular online events, such as webinars), and in third place was everything that belonged to individual communication channels such as company blogs, or newsletters. It’s worth noting that the list of expenses includes such elements of content marketing as getting to know your target group, technologies, UX, or building communities in social media. So it’s clear that content marketing in 2022 isn’t just about copywriting!
Empathy Takes the Lead, but Data-Driven Marketing Is Right Behind It
In recent years, a personalized approach to users has become increasingly important – brands realize that the more empathetic they are, the more warmly approved their content is. Authentic relationships, a pro-human (not just pro-consumer) mindset, and abandoning direct sales messaging and hard selling in favor of building brand sensitivity are paying off (CMI). All in the spirit of giving more, taking less.
Alongside this trend, we’re witnessing an increase in the popularity (and effectiveness) of data-driven marketing – in light of this, performance marketing, while not a relic of the past, should not be your main driver in content planning. Having a balanced approach is best as SEO is only a small part of what you should base your marketing data on. Today’s content creators, in addition to being creative, should collect and analyze data in order to tailor their strategies to the changing situation or the effects of the published content.
How to Make Content Marketing in 2022? 10 Simple Steps to Effective Activities
1. Be There for the Users
When creating content in 2022 – including your sales content – focus on solving the problems your audience is struggling with. What motivates your recipients? Why did they type this particular query into Google? What do they need at the moment? Take every opportunity to meet their expectations. Why is it so important? Generating organic traffic (e.g. through SEO) is just the beginning: keeping the user on the site, reducing the bounce rate and increasing engagement is equally important. Google has been paying more and more attention to user intent for quite some time, and you should do it too.
Example: You run a travel agency and want to increase sales. Try to create content (articles, videos, news) that helps users understand current pandemic restrictions in specific countries and show them that you understand the importance of safety. Give them tips on how they can buy their dream international trip and make sure they don’t choose your competitor’s site.
2. Don’t Put Keywords Before the Text
As mentioned above, content you create in 2022 needs to be valuable and serve the user. Your potential customer should want to engage with your brand, and over-optimized texts may only deter potential buyers from your company. Keyword stuffing and sticking to a rigid, increasingly outdated framework won’t help you improve your brand reputation, what’s more – Google won’t appreciate them either.
Example: If a user wants to read about a stretch mark removal procedure, s/he will try to find a reliable article on the topic including specialized equipment and information on the course of the procedure, contraindications, etc. If instead, s/he finds a text full of randomly bolded phrases without any factual value, they’ll leave the site right away.
3. Don’t Get Stuck in Old Patterns That Don’t Work Anymore
Regularly review what works and what doesn’t. Test new solutions and experiment with innovations – it may turn out that a podcast doesn’t attract fans, but regular video content does. You can’t rehash a strategy from previous years and expect it to continue producing the same results while your competitors are reaching for cutting-edge AI solutions. We’ll go even further with this statement – you can’t even create one strategy in January 2022 and stick to it throughout the year regardless of the results. What else not to do? Learn the 8 most common content marketing mistakes.
Example: You’ve been running a Facebook profile forever, but every year you notice that your fans’ engagement decreases. Let’s assume that in this case, the reason is not bad copy or insufficient investment in ads, but a decline in interest in a given platform among your target group that is beyond your control. In this case, there is simply no point in investing in a medium that doesn’t attract your potential customers.
4. Create Comprehensive and Valuable Content
In the cornerstone content article, we wrote about how every website should contain valuable, distinctive content. The trends shaping content marketing in 2022 indicate that it is indeed better to build a solid compendium of knowledge than dozens of short texts.
It may seem to you that it’s not in line with the belief that users need short, quick, and to-the-point texts. Actually, we are not suggesting writing just to get to a certain word count or creating a not very engaging video or audio content. The goal of creating rich content is to be able to exhaustively answer a user’s question, which in turn should encourage people to stay on your site because they simply don’t have to look elsewhere for a solution as you provide them with all the needed information.
Tip: If you are worried that users may get lost in long texts or complex videos, you can always create convenient tables of content that make navigation easier.
5. Provide a Good User Experience
This section isn’t just about UX, though user experience is vitally important when it comes to websites. Looking more broadly, what matters from a content marketing perspective is the entire experience that comes from clicking on a link to your site in the search results, an ad of your product, or a post on social media.
One of the basic principles you need to follow is to focus on providing the user with what they came for and offering quality that is superior to the quality offered by your market rivals. Thus, the way the content is served (visually and logically clear, distinctive, and easy to remember) is important. Moreover, make sure that your content meets users’ expectations and is free of clickbaits. We discuss this topic here: How to create content that sells?
Example: If you run a catering company, instead of listing its advantages, show them visually so the user notices and remembers them. Build a positive brand experience – offer something to users. And if you’re writing an article about getting hydrated, don’t pushily advertise your juices in it – we guarantee that such a form can only encourage the user to leave the page.
6. Support Your Content with SEO Optimization
SEO is the answer to many marketers’ dilemmas. Well-prepared graphics, professional analysis of key phrases, and a fast-loading website are aspects that simply come in handy in content marketing as well.
Example: You’ve written an elaborate article about your business, but for some reason, it doesn’t display as high as you’d like and doesn’t generate too much traffic. This could mean that it lacks SEO optimization – from keyword phrase analysis and proper SEO title, headers, and alternative texts, to internal linking or schema data.
7. Combine Planning with RTM and Regular Evaluation of Actions
In 2022, you can’t afford any delays – once you know how to choose content for 2022, plan it wisely and well in advance. Take possible changes into account, and avoid situations where you don’t know what to publish, that may result in irregular content posting. At the same time, don’t forget about real-time marketing and follow the trends to successfully support your sales. Analyze your competitors’ activities and keep an eye on the revenue generated by each action.
Example: You are in charge of marketing at a publishing house. At the beginning of the year, you planned to allocate a large portion of your budget to podcasts about books. It turns out that podcasts don’t translate so well into book sales., However, interviews with authors are more effective. It’s not too late to reallocate some of your budget to text-based promotion.
8. Make Sure Your Content is Diverse – Find Your Path
Try new challenges and depart from the most traditional formats by experimenting with podcasts, vlogs, graphic series on Instagram, engaging TikToks, or long articles. When planning content for 2022, think about how to convey the message: with a video or text? Maybe it’s best to publish both an ebook and an audiobook to reach more potential recipients? How will you make the content more interactive? Keep an eye on trends – the growth of video and audio content seems unstoppable in 2022.
Tip: If you’re wondering how to choose content for 2022, consider multidimensional planning that will allow you to expand your reach and increase engagement by using more dynamic formats (live videos, podcasts, video). And if you’re not sure what format will appeal most to your target audience – rely on data or… just ask. The voice of the interested parties is worth its weight in gold.
9. Don’t Try to be a Jack-of-all-trades
Find your niche. You have to be aware that online marketing covers such a wide spectrum of activities that unless you have a whole team of creatives, project managers, and analysts around you, you’ll find it hard to perform all the activities at the same time. Also, keep in mind that not all trends and mediums are in line with the expectations of your target group. That’s why it’s so important to differentiate between things that seem valuable in theory and things that can actually benefit your company.
Example: You’re a content marketing specialist for a company that sells wooden, classic furniture. You know that your target audience is primarily people over 45 years old. At the same time, everyone around you says that there is no social media marketing without TikTok. Instead of following the crowd, analyze the preferences of your recipients. What will be better? A simple video explaining how to take care of the bench that’s in your customers’ living room (placed on a traditionally designed subpage optimized for SEO so it can be found in the search engine), or a video published on TikTok – a platform that they’ve never heard of?
10. Use Content Marketing to Build Your Brand
If you specialize in content marketing, you surely know that its purpose is to create valuable content for users. It’s up to you to plan your content for the coming year so that it converts. Don’t forget that content marketing combined with effective storytelling and branding elements is a perfect tool to build brand recognition (see the graphic below). Make sure your message is memorable – intrigue users so that they want to come back to you.
How to Choose Content in 2022? The Takeaway
How to choose content in 2022? Carefully, boldly and flexibly! Don’t be afraid of experiments, but always put the user in the spotlight – let people take advantage of your content so that they share it and remember your brand for longer.
