Let’s talk about the center of all marketing strategies: content creation. Whether you love content creation or it makes you cringe, there is no denying the fact that in today’s marketing world: content is king. There are so many factors that go into content creation in order to leave an impactful impression on your target audience. Ahead, I’d love to walk you through the 2 main types of content your business needs in order to maintain a healthy marketing balance that delivers big results over time.
Technically, you could focus on creating content for one specific platform, but why do that when you can set up your content creation to reach more people in your specific niche audience? The most effective way to reach your audience is to create strategic pieces across multiple platforms. For example, instead of focusing only on social media, you could stretch your content out across both social media, your website, and directly to your customer’s email inboxes. Oftentimes if you focus all your efforts on one area, the chances of your content being seen are much lower. If your valuable content is spread out in a way that targets your audience in different places that they’re spending time, your efforts put into creation mode won’t be for nothing.
But how do you spread out your content without being spread too thin as the content creator? Entrepreneurs and small business owners are already spread thin enough when they’re first starting to build their business because they’re typically wearing all the hats. Is that you right now? Let me teach you the ways of a simpler strategy that won’t make you exhausted.
Macro Content = Your Website & Google Holding Hands
Did you shudder when you just read “macro” and think about that economics class you took in college? Have no fear! I am not giving you an econ lesson. Instead, the macro is going to change your website’s life and will become besties with our friend, Google. Ever heard of it?
Google loves to see websites update their content on a regular basis. Every update sends a little trigger to the search engine telling it that you are, in fact, an active website that is still relevant to searchers. That’s where Macro content comes in. It’s the larger pieces of content that are longer form, like a blog post for example.
Macro content is also is more accessible as far as searching goes. If someone is looking for a topic you wrote about, it would still be on your website, in the same place you left it. People searching can pull it up directly. No digging around or waiting for happenstance. It’s ready to be found! Whereas, smaller pieces of content like social media posts are typically found based on the chance of you scrolling through its platform’s algorithm.
Give the People What They Want: Micro Content
I’m not downplaying macro content here, it’s equally as important and people do want to see your awesome content through blog posts and other longer pieces. But the chances of your people being on social media more often is more likely– making it content they truly want.
Microcontent is the smaller, quick content that is typically scrollable. Social media posts– Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook (groups + business pages), Tik Tok, Twitter, Linkedin– are all examples of micro-content. While most can be referred to on your actual page, more than likely your audience will discover your content because they were scrolling through their phones and stumbled across it. Because this makes micro-content less likely to be seen, it’s important to remember a solid mix of types of content are created to diversify your content’s reach and opportunity to land in front of the right audience.
A Little Bit of This,
a Little Bit of That
Now how do you have a healthy balance of marketing content, you may be asking yourself? I recommend creating a game plan on how you’d like to spread out your content, keeping the purpose of both types of macro and micro-content in mind.
I recommend creating 2-4 pieces of macro content a month. Start with 2 pieces if 4 sounds overwhelming. If you sat down and created 4 blog posts a month and posted 1 article a week, your consistent posting and website updates would make a positive impact on your standings with Google. This development doesn’t happen overnight, but consistent posting will eventually create a return. Give it a few months and you’ll start to see your hard work pay off!
Microcontent needs to be created more often (10-15 pieces per month, or even a week– it depends on your business!) The difference is that the content is smaller in size, they’re mere snippets of your longer content. Think: as your audience is scrolling through their phones, they could stumble upon your micro-content. It’s quick, simple, and could lead your audience to act on your call to action. It also builds brand awareness.
When you’re developing a game plan, think about exactly how active your audience is and where they’re hanging out on a regular basis. Decide which of the various social media platforms would be the most effective for you to focus on. What platform makes the most sense? Are you a retail brand that has a visual crowd? If so, you’d want to focus on Instagram.
Is your crowd mostly looking for ways to simplify their business strategies and goals? Do they need how-to guides? You might want to focus on Facebook groups or YouTube. It all depends on where your target audience is– so do the research and find them! Don’t waste your time creating content for platforms that your people aren’t interested in. For help narrowing down where you should focus your social media efforts, download my free Social Media Cheat Sheet below:
You’ll want to experiment with micro-content to decipher the best days and times to post your content. Keep a spreadsheet and monitor your effort’s success rates– what posts work/don’t work. Days posted vs. timing. You’ll quickly become acquainted with your people and will get a better understanding of their social media wants and needs over time. When in doubt, ask them what kind of content they’re looking for! It’s your business after all, and you should take the initiative to start these conversations to get to know your audience better.
Game Plan Set? It’s Time to Schedule Your Content
Who has time to constantly update your social media on a daily basis? Not me. That’s what scheduling tools are for! I’d rather spend that time engaging with my audience rather than worrying about the actual post itself and hashtag strategy. As a marketing agency that has to market itself, I personally need to have a presence on most social media platforms so my clients can see my aesthetic across the board. That being said: it’s a lot of work to maintain it! After polling several entrepreneur groups, asking for their opinions on various scheduling tools, I’ve finally narrowed down and set mine up using 2 tools for my scheduling needs.
Publer
When I was introduced to Publer.io,* I thought it was too good to be true. Most scheduling tools have limited platforms that they can post on for you, or they limit the number of posts you can schedule. Publer.io is the most affordable option I found and enables me to post not only Instagram, Twitter, and my Facebook Business page, but it also allows me to schedule posts for LinkedIn and my Facebook Group— which for me, is a game-changer. I now batch most of my content, so once it’s created I spend one afternoon (over a short period of time) where I upload and schedule my content months in advance. I can’t even tell you how much of a relief that is for me! I highly, highly recommend you give Publer a shot.
TailwindApp
TailwindApp is the best tool for Pinterest scheduling. I use their Create Advanced Plan that simplifies the creative process of designing pins. WORTH upgrading– because you can also use the beautiful graphics as photos for your website and for other social media creation. For example, I used Tailwindapp for the title graphic of this blog post. After a few clicks, voila! The perfect graphic was created for me without having to take the time to manually create something on Photoshop or Illustrator. It saves me a lot of time and headache.
Tailwind also makes sharing your pins an easier process. You can schedule them and even have them automatically looped (repinned) without having to set it up later. Utilize this automation and let it become your friend. People often forget that Pinterest is a search engine that millions of people utilize every day. If you maintain a presence here, you have the ability to gain consistent website traffic by simply utilizing Tailwind to schedule pins and loop them according to their success rates. After putting in the time and research to find the best Pinterest scheduling tools, there was no competition. I highly recommend trying Tailwind if you’re looking to have a business presence on Pinterest.
It’s Your Turn
Now that we’ve gone through the ins and outs of how to strategically create micro and macro content, it’s your turn to take the reins and put your marketing plan into action. I guarantee that if you approach your content marketing with a mixture of both micro and macro content, you’ll start to see your web traffic and brand awareness start to grow… which will ultimately turn into sales conversions.
Have you ever heard of macro and micro-content creation before reading this article? I’d love to hear about how you’ll implement this strategy into your marketing plan.
Have results already? Let me know below!
*Disclaimer: I may earn a small commission for links in this post at no additional cost to you. I only recommend products that I absolutely love and also use myself – promise! 😊
hi there, I'm blaire!
I’m an expert at marketing & entrepreneurship, and completely obsessed with helping business owners transform their dreams into booming success stories. Sometimes it just takes an extra set of hands and another person’s perspective to make the business magic happen. Contact me today and let's talk shop!