Creating content could be the biggest waste of your time. If you spend hours researching and writing quality content but very few people read or share it then you are literally wasting time and effort. It is simply not true that if you create quality content people will find it, yet alone share it.
The Importance of Content Research
Your content should start with research and planning. What content resonates with your audience? What did they read this month, what did they share and where did they share it? An understanding of the content that is working i.e. the types of content and the content formats that move your readers to share and convert means you are better placed to create winning content.
What 100 Million Articles Tell Us
At BuzzSumo we have analyzed over 100m articles to see what content resonates with audiences and which content they like to share. We found ten key factors that increased social shares, these included images in content, lists and emotional content. It was the emotional content of Budweiser’s recent Super Bowl video that caused it to get over 1m shares and over 25m views.
Content formats are also important. People love sharing quizzes. Did you know four of the five most shared posts on BuzzFeed last year were quizzes?
The Importance of Promotion and Repromotion
Creating content that resonates with your audience is just half the battle. You have to invest as much time in promoting and distributing your content as in researching and creating it. Just tweeting out your content when you publish it is not promotion or distribution. After just 3 days the volume of shares for content falls by over 97% on average. You need to repromote and distribute your content regularly. Also don’t neglect the importance of influencers. We have found that just one share by an influencer can increase your social shares by as much as 30%.
Content amplification is a critical aspect of any content strategy for the web and you can learn a lot by looking at what is working for your competitors. What is your competitor’s most shared content, who is sharing it and on which networks? You can learn from your competitors and build a better content strategy.
Free Webinar: 5 Key Content Hacks to Increase Your Views and Shares
We are offering an exclusive opportunity to learn how to leverage your time to get more traffic, views, and shares with less content, because it's better content.
At our free webinar you can learn how BuzzSumo used this approach to grow its traffic x 10 this year and how WordStream has employed these strategies to consistently grow web traffic 100% year-over-year.
The webinar is on Thursday 2/12, where we'll share with you our 5 favorite hacks to skyrocket your content marketing performance.
Steve Rayson is the Director of BuzzSumo and Anders Pink Content Marketing. A serial entrepreneur passionate about marketing, technology, and learning, he co-founded and was and CEO of Kineo eLearning. Steve specializes mining social data for practical insights that can improve marketing.