Advertising has always been the key component in helping businesses grow. But in the past, it was always the company with the biggest budget that thrived.

Today, the tides have turned, leveling the playing field for small- and medium-sized companies. Thanks to the internet, you’re now able to compete with larger entities.

How? With content marketing, of course.

Now, it’s all about who has the best content and content marketing strategy. Medium and large brands that are switching over to content from paid search are spending 31% to 41% less.

Then businesses that compare the results of paid search with content marketing are seeing 3x the leads per dollar spent.

When you couple the savings with the high return companies are getting, you can see why 65% of marketers are leaning towards building their content in the coming years.

If all of this doesn’t convince you, then let’s take a closer look at why you should jump aboard the content gravy train.

Long-Term Results (Traffic, Leads, and Conversions)

One of the best ways to compare content marketing with paid marketing is to give a real estate analogy.

Paid search is like renting an apartment and content marketing is like buying a house. What happens when you stop paying rent? You lose your home.

And it’s the same thing that happens when you stop paying for your pay-per-click (PPC) ads – they disappear.

However, you don’t have this issue when you’re investing in real estate – aka content. All of the blog posts and articles you create are yours forever and are online for as long as you have a domain to place them.

This ensures you get lasting results. So if you’re creating high-quality, engaging, and relevant content, then you’ll continue to see traffic and conversions.

While your audience may be small in the beginning, this will grow as your content marketing continues. This creates a snowball effect where your audience, leads, and revenue grows over time.

Your Competitors Are Investing in Content

If this alone doesn’t scare you into diving into content marketing, then nothing will. As a business owner, your goal is to compete with other companies in your industry.

Otherwise, you’ll quickly put yourself out of business.

If you’re unable to keep up with the shifts in marketing, then you’ll fail to attract the attention of your audience. Meanwhile, your competitors will rake in all your traffic.

In the past, it was all about radio, television, and print advertising. But thankfully, these overpriced methods are outdated.

And for the past decade, we’ve seen the rise in content marketing and there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight.

Take a look for yourself:

More and more businesses are investing time and money into content of different forms. It’s not just blog posts they’re going after either.

There are different types of content and it appears that visual content is the future – i.e. video, infographics, animated videos, and so on.

It was already anticipated that 84% of communications will be visual and 79% of internet traffic would stem from video content by 2018.

Build Your Brand’s Visibility and Authority

Consumers today don’t welcome advertisements – in fact, they hate them. This is what makes content marketing such a success.

Businesses are able to publish branded content that’s informative and valuable. And in doing so, they’re soft-selling their brand, but at the same time, building relationships and trust with consumers.

Trust is everything to today’s consumers, which is why online reviews affect nearly 68% of purchasing decisions.

If your content is posted on social media and gets shares, likes, and comments, then this helps build social proof that your brand is trustworthy. Once you gain this level of authority, you will easily grow your following and traffic.

But this is impossible to do without content marketing. Use it to demonstrate your expertise and you’ll have consumers coming to your website and social media pages to engage.

Grow Your Loyal Customer Base

One of the biggest benefits of having a solid content marketing strategy is that you can grow a loyal customer base. By achieving this goal, you will have brand advocates who promote your business for you.

They’re recommending your products and services and mentioning your brand on social media every chance they get. This is free word-of-mouth promotion that’s highly effective in driving traffic.

Why?

Because as we pointed out, consumers trust their peers. So if they see real people vouching for a brand, then it’ll make them more inclined to purchase from them as well.

Stats show 74% of consumers say positive reviews make them trust local businesses more.

By developing content that’s high-quality and valuable to your customer base, you can grow this loyalty. Of course, the service or product you offer must also meet the expectations of your customers.

Otherwise, you’ll have to worry about negative brand mentions and reviews. Businesses have lost 22% of business when negative articles show up on the first page of search results.

The risk increases with the more negative content and reviews that show up on the first page. So take your branding and online reputation seriously by doing your part in content creation.

If you’re showing up on the first page, you’re in the green. Especially since the first page of Google gets 95% of all internet traffic.

Don’t Get Left in the Virtual Dust

Alright, so we went over just some of the benefits of using content marketing (there’s a plethora more). And we explained why it should be a part of your long-term marketing strategy.

Now, it’s time to put together your strategy. As we’ve already seen, your competitors are already making plans to create and promote their content online.

If you’re not doing the same, then prepare to eat their virtual dust as you get left behind.

Don’t let this happen to you – start researching your audience and begin crafting content they’ll find valuable and engaging.

If you need help, you can always hire a digital marketing agency to give your business the boost it needs.

Let us know in the comments how you plan to use content to propel your branding strategy forward! Or reach out to us to discuss how you can grow your content strategy today!